© David O’Sullivan and Lawrence Dooley

International Case Study

Concorde
Background
The Concorde (1976-2003) is probably one of the most iconic airlines of our time. A symbol
of pride for two independent nations, it operated in commercial service for 27 years until
its retirement in late 2003. To date, it remains the only form of commercial supersonic
transport to make its way to the aviation marketplace. It represented so much -being the
ultimate way to fly and technologically superior to any other commercial aircraft. The
Concorde was unmistakable. Developed by Sud Aviation (FR) and British Aeroplane
Company (UK) under an international treaty, it took 14 years of development and testing
to reach the marketplace. The aircraft was revolutionary for the time with anti-lock
braking and a unique structural design capable of altitudes of 60,000 ft and speeds of up
to Mach 2.2 (1,330 mph). Operated by British Airways and Air France, the death knell for
the aircraft came following a crash in Paris in the year 2000 and as a result of the industry
downturn following September 11.

The Beginnings
The post Second World War era was dominated by the cold war and the technology race
pursued by the then super-powers (the UK, France, the US and the Soviet Union). While
the US and the Soviet Union battled for technological supremacy in space, France and the
UK focused their attention on supersonic transport (SST). Throughout the post war years,
aircraft technology developed significantly, with many military advances being applied to
commercial crafts. Consequently, in 1956 the UK government formed the Supersonic
Transport Aircraft Committee and began to progress the supersonic jet concept together
with the British Aeroplane Company (BAC). Similarly, the French government was working
with Sud Aviation on another SST project. By the late 1950s, the British design (known as
Type 233) envisioned a trans-Atlantic aircraft capable of seating up to one hundred
people, the French had also progressed their plans and envisioned a medium-range aircraft
(known as Super-Caravelle).
Despite both designs being ready for construction by the early 1960s, the
significant budgets required to develop SST aircrafts threatened to project future. With
increased cost estimates, the British government made their support for the SST project
conditional on an international partner being found. After initial discussions with a
number of countries, only the French showed any interest in the SST partnership. Thus in
June 1961, initial discussions took place between BAC and Sud Aviation which eventually
led to the signing of an international treaty of collaboration (Nov. 1962) between the
French and UK governments to build a supersonic commercial aircraft. The treaty defined
an equal partnership between the two nations that entrusted the building of the airframe
to BAC and Sud Aviation and the jet engines to Bristol Siddeley (UK) and SNECME (FR). A
decision was made that no special company would be formed to build the aircraft and that
instead a management board consisting of representatives from the two governments and
the four companies involved in designing the airframe and engines would oversee the
project.

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The Development
The international treaty was a novel approach to progress the development of the SST
project, not only because it shared the development costs between the two partners, but
because it also decreased development time by bringing together the knowledge and
experience of two leading companies. This was done in order to achieve a common
objective as well as the two different SST design concepts. The development of the joint
project pushed the boundaries of science and technology so that they could achieve their
performance targets for the eventual output: the Concorde. The Type 233 became the
base design for the collaborative effort with the French partner taking the lead on the
airframe (60% share) and the UK taking the lead in relation to the jet engines (60% share).
It was decided that both BAC and Sud Aviation would develop a prototype at their
respective bases in Bristol and Toulouse. It is estimated that the eventual cost of
development was in the region of $3.5 billion. Despite the significant development cost,
the eventual aircraft incorporated a number of significant technological advancements
which resulted in supersonic flight. In fact, many of the standard features in today’s
aircraft owe their origins to the Concorde prototype that took to flight in 1969. Also,
many highlights that the 1962 international treaty was the fore-runner for the four
nations agreement that created the commercially successful Airbus Company. The
following outlines some of the more novel technical developments of the Concorde that
contributed to the achievement of supersonic speeds: the double delta shaped wings; the
turbojet engines; the anti-locking brake system and the aerodynamic fuselage.

Double- Delta Wings

The wing of the Concorde is thin, swept back and triangular, whereas a 747’s wing is swept
back but rectangular. The Concorde’s wing is called a delta-wing design: this reduces drag
and yet provides sufficient lift for takeoff and adequate stability which eliminates the
need for horizontal stabilizers on the tail. Reduction of drag improves aerodynamics and
permits the aircraft to travel faster through the air.

Turbojet Engines
To be economically viable, Concorde needed to be able to fly long-haul routes and this
required the engines not only to be powerful but also efficient. For optimum supersonic
flight; the engines were designed with a small frontal cross-sectional area to minimize
drag, and a low bypass ratio to give a high, supersonic exhaust speed. This turbojet design
was the best choice for the engine, which when eventually developed, was the twin spool
Rolls-Royce/SNECMA Olympus 593. Afterburners are used in the engines to gain additional
thrust to reach supersonic speeds by mixing additional fuel with the exhaust gases from
the primary combustion chamber to get more thrust.

Braking System
One of the major challenges faced by the design teams was how to stop the aircraft in a
reasonable distance. The fuselage design of Concorde required a relatively high take-off
speed (250 mph) compared to conventional aircraft. Over its commercial life, it was
envisioned that emergency stopping might be necessary. Thus, the Concorde was one of
the first major aircraft to use an anti-lock braking system to allow greater deceleration
and control during braking, particularly in the wet. These revolutionary brakes were
capable of bringing the 185-ton aircraft traveling at 190 mph to a complete stop within a
one-mile distance.

Fuselage
The Concorde fuselage was designed to be only 9.5 feet wide and 202 feet long. The
needle-like fuselage design was necessary to reduce its drag as it flew through the air.
This, together with the turbojet engines, facilitated the Concorde in achieving its
supersonic speed target. One side-effect of traveling in excess of Mach 2 is the heat
generated as a result. Beside the engines, the hottest part of the structure of any
supersonic aircraft is the nose and Concorde were no exception. The designers had
selected to use aluminum throughout the aircraft due to its familiarity, cost and ease of
construction. However, the maximum threshold temperature that this material can sustain
over the prolonged life of an aircraft is limited to 127°C. Consequently, this limited the
top speed of the new aircraft to Mach 2.02. While the aluminum skin could withstand such

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high temperatures, it also made the inside of the aircraft very hot. Since this was a
commercial aircraft, it would naturally carry passengers and therefore an efficient way to
cool the cabin was needed. The Concorde design incorporated an air-conditioning system
that used the fuel as a place to dump the heat removed from the cabin. The Concorde was
also painted with a high-reflectivity white paint that was approximately twice as
reflective as that used on other aircraft in order to reduce the heating affect. Yet in spite
of all these efforts, the windows in the cockpit still became too hot to touch during
supersonic flight.

Commercial reality
The first two prototypes of the Concorde rolled out of the hanger in 1967 and the aircraft
took its inaugural flight in 1969. It entered service in 1976 following a number of years of
development and safety testing. Despite significant interest shown by sixteen airlines at
the start of the project, in the end only two airlines placed orders for the new aircraft.
These were British Airways and Air France (the state airlines of the two countries backing
the project). In total, only twenty Concorde were built; two prototypes, two pre-
production aircrafts and sixteen production aircrafts. Over its lifetime, thirteen of these
aircraft were regular commercial airlines.
The Concorde focused on the business and luxury traveler market, these customers
valued speed and the elitist experience of flying faster and higher than any other
commercial flight. In fact, Concorde’s greatest advertising coup was due to the people
who flew Concorde on a regular basis: celebrities, successful business people, and even
royalty or presidential officials. The seventies and eighties were ‘good times’ in the
amount of people choosing to fly Concorde. Over its lifetime, Concorde became an icon of
the aviation industry, a symbol of affluence, and a major marketing tool for both British
Airways and Air France. Hundreds of thousands of passengers relished their supersonic
experience and paid a premium price to do so. However, despite marketing advantages and
premium pricing, the Concorde product was never going to recoup its development costs
with sales of just thirteen aircraft. Additionally, the inability of Boeing or the Soviets to
bring their versions of SST aircraft to the market meant that production and technology
efficiencies were never achieved, and the associated maintenance costs of SST remained
high. Even prior to the Paris crash of July 2000 that killed 100 passengers and crew, there
were questions asked about the continued viability of Concorde due to rising fuel costs,
environmental and pollution concerns and increasing competition from low cost carriers
with greater capacity.
Collectively, these factors had the effect of reducing the ability of Concorde to
operate above its break-even point in order to generate profits. Consequently, in April
2003, British Airways and Air France announced the decision that they would be retiring
the Concorde fleet. On October 24, 2003, Concorde completed its final supersonic flight
and the age of supersonic commercial flight came to an end.

Questions
1. Why was the decision taken to jointly develop the Concorde aircraft?
2. What are the advantages and challenges associated with the distributed
development of the Concorde aircraft?
4. What contribution did the Concorde deliver to the aviation world?
5. Discuss whether you would classify the Concorde as an innovation and why?

Sources
• www.concordesst.com
• www.news.bbc.co.uk
• www.britishairways.com/concorde
• www.elettra.co.uk/concorde
• http://www.darsys.com