Having zero knowledge of airplane technology, I do not know whether the following writeup/opinion piece on the 737 Max is a trustworthy source or not.
It was written by a software developer (that I could verify) named Gregory Travis who claims to have been a "pilot and aircraft owner for over thirty years"
being used to correct hardware design flaws.
Here's an extensive, selective quote from this document:
> "Over the years, market and technological forces pushed the 737 into larger versions with more electronic
> and mechanical complexity. This is not, by any means, unique to the 737. All
> airliners, enormous capital investments both for the industries that make them as well as
> the customers who buy them, go through a similar growth process.
> The majority of those market and technical forces allied on the side of economics, not safety.
> They were allied to relentlessly drive down what the industry calls 'seat-mile costs' – the cost of flying a seat from one point to another."
>
> To improve capacity and efficiency (I'm still paraphrasing the document), engines had to become physically larger:
> "problem: the original 737 had (by today’s standards) tiny little engines that easily cleared the ground beneath the wings. As the 737 grew and was fitted with bigger engines, the
> clearance between the engines and the ground started to get a little, umm, 'tight.' [...]
>
> With the 737 MAX the situation became critical. [...] The solution was to extend the engine up and well in front of the wing. However,
> doing so also meant that the centerline of the engine’s thrust changed. Now, when the pilots applied power to the
> engine, the aircraft would have a significant propensity to 'pitch up' – raise its nose. [...]
>
> Apparently the 737 MAX pitched up a bit too much for comfort on power application as well as
> at already-high-angles-of-attack. It violated that most ancient of aviation canons and probably
> violated the FAA’s certification criteria. But, instead of going back to the drawing board and
> getting the airframe hardware right (more on that below), Boeing’s solution was something
> called the 'Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System,' or MCAS.
> Boeing’s solution to their hardware problem was software."
Software that didn't work as expected.
- By itself, this story doesn't sound new, but (particularly to European readers) like a flashback from more than twenty years ago
when Mercedes botched the aerodynamic design of its "A series" car (its first entry into the compact car segment) and corrected it with