Comment by potato3732842
18 hours ago
> in which case, why have the tail engine at all?
"you know what this motorized piece of anything needs, less power"
-nobody, ever
18 hours ago
> in which case, why have the tail engine at all?
"you know what this motorized piece of anything needs, less power"
-nobody, ever
You know you can just make the wing engines 50% more powerful, right?
No, you really can't. Even if it were the same size a dramatically more powerful engine would need a larger "tail" to maintain control in case of an engine out scenario. But a 50% more powerful engine is also likely to be much bigger meaning that major components like the landing gear (and everything around them). A 50% more powerful engine is also likely to be much heavier necessitating its support structures (a.k.a. the wing or tail) be redesigned.
The 737 MAX suffered a number of bad design decisions to accommodate its newer, more powerful engines. Its engines topped out at about 8% more powerful than the 737 NG engines.
> just make the wing engines 50% more powerful
You realize this is not quite how aerospace engineering works, right?
Essentially every new design is a twinjet, so it's clearly possible to make appropriate decisions in that design space. And both Boeing and Airbus have given up on quadjets.
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