Post by AeroWomen on Dec 14, 2004 0:31:22 GMT -5
A BLADE OF ARTISTIC MERIT
Fanfare for a jet engine blade
Part from GE Ohio plant joins Modern Museum's display
By Timothy R. Gaffney
Dayton Daily News
EVENDALE | Jet-engine designer Max Farson always thought the blade he was making for General Electric Co.'s biggest jet engine was pretty, but the West Chester engineer never imagined it would be revered as a work of art.
Yet the elegantly twisted, four-foot-long compressor fan blade is one of the exhibits awaiting visitors to the New York Museum of Modern Art in Manhattan, set to re-open today in a new building.
Instead of spinning unseen inside a giant GE90 engine, the blade stands alone on a pedestal in the museum's architecture and design gallery.
"It captures the whole essence of flight and technology," Curator Terence Riley said.
But the purpose of the design was to catch air, not attention.
"We always appreciated the fact that it looked pretty neat, but (its appearance) didn't influence the design," said Farson, a 19-year employee of GE Aircraft Engines in Evendale.
Farson said about 20 people were involved in the design of the blade, which GE calls the world's largest.
The blade is part of the compressor fan that goes on the front of the GE90-115B engine, which powers Boeing 777 airliners.
To meet huge power needs and low noise requirements, the fan rotates relatively slowly while its 22 blades scoop huge amounts of air into the engine, GE Aircraft Engines spokesman Rick Kennedy said.
The blade also had to be lightweight, yet strong enough to withstand aerodynamic forces and debris strikes. The result is the world's only composite fan blade in commercial aviation, made of carbon fiber and plastic with a titanium leading edge.
To create it, GE designers used not a sculptor's chisel but three-dimensional computer modeling tools.
"This fan blade can only have been built in its own time," Riley said.
The museum had long wanted an object of aerospace design, the curator said Thursday by phone from New York. Riley was particularly attracted to the huge Boeing 747 airliner — far too big — and then considered a single engine.
But "they're actually quite large," he said.
A single blade ultimately filled the bill.
GE hasn't overlooked the display's publicity value.
Kennedy said it reminds people the Fairfield, Conn.-based company makes "more than light bulbs."
GE is promoting the display with full-page ads in The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal, he said.
Farson has a bit more trouble seeing his work as art.
Fanfare for a jet engine blade
Part from GE Ohio plant joins Modern Museum's display
By Timothy R. Gaffney
Dayton Daily News
EVENDALE | Jet-engine designer Max Farson always thought the blade he was making for General Electric Co.'s biggest jet engine was pretty, but the West Chester engineer never imagined it would be revered as a work of art.
Yet the elegantly twisted, four-foot-long compressor fan blade is one of the exhibits awaiting visitors to the New York Museum of Modern Art in Manhattan, set to re-open today in a new building.
Instead of spinning unseen inside a giant GE90 engine, the blade stands alone on a pedestal in the museum's architecture and design gallery.
"It captures the whole essence of flight and technology," Curator Terence Riley said.
But the purpose of the design was to catch air, not attention.
"We always appreciated the fact that it looked pretty neat, but (its appearance) didn't influence the design," said Farson, a 19-year employee of GE Aircraft Engines in Evendale.
Farson said about 20 people were involved in the design of the blade, which GE calls the world's largest.
The blade is part of the compressor fan that goes on the front of the GE90-115B engine, which powers Boeing 777 airliners.
To meet huge power needs and low noise requirements, the fan rotates relatively slowly while its 22 blades scoop huge amounts of air into the engine, GE Aircraft Engines spokesman Rick Kennedy said.
The blade also had to be lightweight, yet strong enough to withstand aerodynamic forces and debris strikes. The result is the world's only composite fan blade in commercial aviation, made of carbon fiber and plastic with a titanium leading edge.
To create it, GE designers used not a sculptor's chisel but three-dimensional computer modeling tools.
"This fan blade can only have been built in its own time," Riley said.
The museum had long wanted an object of aerospace design, the curator said Thursday by phone from New York. Riley was particularly attracted to the huge Boeing 747 airliner — far too big — and then considered a single engine.
But "they're actually quite large," he said.
A single blade ultimately filled the bill.
GE hasn't overlooked the display's publicity value.
Kennedy said it reminds people the Fairfield, Conn.-based company makes "more than light bulbs."
GE is promoting the display with full-page ads in The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal, he said.
Farson has a bit more trouble seeing his work as art.