Boeing Announces New 737 MAX Engine, Design and Order Details

[NYCA News]

NYCAviation:

Boeing Announces New 737 MAX Engine, Design and Order Details (http://nycaviation.com/2011/11/boeing-announces-new-737-max-engine-and-order-details/)

Boeing's 737 MAX program has inspired many questions since the airframer announced it in August. How big will the engines be? Will they be superior to the competing Airbus A320neo? Where will they be built? Who has ordered them? Boeing officials answered many of these questions—and more—on Thursday.
[Click to Read Full Article (http://nycaviation.com/2011/11/boeing-announces-new-737-max-engine-and-order-details/)]

[stratoduck]

what's really hurting the 737 design is the short gear. when it was designed, the smaller airports it served rarely had jetways, and operators relied on ship's own airstairs. the engine at the time was the jt-8, which was at the time a highly efficient engine.

when the -300 was re-engined, it needed longer gear, but redesigning the gear would have required major work to the fuselage and wing. the result was an engine the greatly improved efficiency and power, but the placement of the engine cut back some of those gains - it is too close to the wing. a design element of the 1960's is now an achilles heal.

beechcraft has suffered similarly with the bonanza. when it was designed in the 1940's, they tweaked every aerodynamic bit they could out of an aircraft with 165 horsepower. part of that design was a narrow cabin. now the bonanza has 300 horsepower, and the twin engine version of it has 600 horsepower, and they both are stuck with the narrow cabin.

[megatop412]

I'm surprised they decided to go ahead with messing with the landing gear. But, I guess it being just the nose it won't be too much of a redesign

[Matt Molnar]

what's really hurting the 737 design is the short gear. when it was designed, the smaller airports it served rarely had jetways, and operators relied on ship's own airstairs. the engine at the time was the jt-8, which was at the time a highly efficient engine.

It's hard to say anything is "really hurting" the 737. Boeing will soon be churning out more than 40 a month yet they'll still have a backlog a couple years long.