Commercial Airplanes and Air New Zealand celebrated delivery today of the largest commercially operated airplane to be painted all black. The 777-300ER (Extended Range) jet was painted in the special livery to commemorate New Zealand’s national rugby team, the All Blacks, winning the 2011 Rugby World Cup.
Two members of the World Champion All Blacks, Andrew Ellis and Kiernan Read, traveled to Seattle in mid-December to participate in a ceremony revealing the airplane's special livery to the world.
The all-black livery features an intricately detailed silver fern and the Koru, symbols of New Zealand and the airline, respectively.
Painting the aircraft took just over a week, including five days for completing the intricate detail of the silver fern and Koru symbol.
That was false advertising. The plane was NOT all black. Hugh Hefner's bunny plane from the 70s was all black except for the bunny head and registration numbers.
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Hence the reason why all Long EZs were white. I guess some of the newer stuff can tolerate higher temps, but still, black is just asking for trouble. Stuff that was once goopy tends to turn goopy again when you get it hot enough.
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On the 777, only the horizontal and vertical stabilizers are composite. The majority of the remaining structure is aluminum. The new 787's structure is almost entirely composite. In fact, the paint is required to protect the resins from UV damage.
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Rod wrote:That was false advertising. The plane was NOT all black. Hugh Hefner's bunny plane from the 70s was all black except for the bunny head and registration numbers.
Wasn't Hefner's Boeing a 727? I'm not sure that composites would figure into the paint calculations.
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Yeah, I was refering to the primary structure. The flaps and ailerons are composite, along with the wing-body fairings and a bunch of cover panels. The only other composite primary structures I know of are the floor beams in the passenger models.
BTW, the Air New Zealand plane was line number 984. Our shop starts working on line number 1000 tomorrow. It is scheduled to be delivered sometime in March.
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Umm, just to play devil's advocate--what about the F117 and B2 stealth aircraft? They're black, and composite... That's not paint covering them though, is it?
Darrell wrote:Umm, just to play devil's advocate--what about the F117 and B2 stealth aircraft? They're black, and composite... That's not paint covering them though, is it?
I think it's paint and a putty like crap. The putty goes between any panel gaps, etc to smooth out the surface (bumps and edges, like rivets, are anti-stealth). Both the paint and the putty absorb radio waves of the frequency used by radars.
As for composites, I have my doubts that those two plans are composite. I am sure there are composites on them, but the fact of the matter is that the F-117 is 1970s technology and the B-2 is 1980s technology. Engineers tend to be fairly conservative in their work and I don't think the state of 1970s/1980s composite technology and experience with that technology was at the level where engineers would be putting it into aircraft for structural parts. Especially aircraft that already had so many potential technological issues as the F-117 and B-2.
