When Did the 737 Become Transcontinental Aircraft?

I can tell you that Russians are very envious of P8. They still keep Tu-142 on maritime patrol duties. They have a recon bird based on Tu-214, but its efficiency is nowhere close to P8's, so it does not have the endurance needed to maritime patrol. It's quite a problem, therefore.
 
MAKG1 said:
Huh? I count several different fuselages just for the 737. The -100 looks downright "cute" it's so short.
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Well, the basic diameter is the same. Just various plugs to make them longer.
 
Shawn said:
Southwest initially planned to integrate all of the non 737's from Airtran into their fleet, but ultimately decided against it. They are in the process of refurbishing all of their older fleet to the new "evolve" interiors as well as slowly redoing Airtran 737's into Southwest planes. They are dumping the rest of the fleet as the merger transitions sticking to at 737 only fleet model. They have added some 737-800's in anticipation of adding "international" travel to Hawaii and when they take over all of Airtran operations in 2015.
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Isn't Delta taking the 717s to replace the old NW DC-9s?

SCCutler said:
QANTAS non-stop from DFW. Friends don't let friends connect at LAX.
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LAX isn't too bad if you're staying on the same airline & have lounge access. I can think of worse connection points, like EWR or JFK.
 
Greg Bockelman said:
Well, the basic diameter is the same. Just various plugs to make them longer.
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There are also apparently some modifications for rigidity and structural limits. That's a lot more than "various plugs."

I've heard people say the same thing about a 747-SP being a "short" -100. If you look closely, there are a lot of small but significant differences. The whole empennage is oversized and tilted about one degree forward. The cargo door intersects the wing root, which is itself oversized. The upper deck is several feet shorter. The main gear goes at a different station (the nosegear is the same). The center fuel tank is in a different place. It's not just a -100 with some 28 feet lopped off, even if the tube diameter is the same.

It's interesting to see the models side by side -- I occasionally have the opportunity to do so. And when Boeing had the 747-8 over for flight testing, that was really interesting to look at. Made the SP look like a toy by comparison.
 
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clear_prop said:
The 707/727/737/757 all share the same fuselage, and the 737-900 is really just a 757 replacement.
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Definitely not true... roughly the same diameter, but different design/construction details.
 
United flys Embraer 145s (50 seat jet) from Newark to Oklahoma City (1325 nm)!
 
clear_prop said:
737-900 is about as long as they can make it without changing the landing gear. It has a tail skid to limit the damage from over rotating.

The 707/727/737/757 all share the same fuselage, and the 737-900 is really just a 757 replacement.
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Unfortunately that length combined with the short gear is what will prevent it from being a true 757 replacement. The approach speeds are increased so much in order to prevent tail strikes that they use up ALOT more runway. The 75 also has twice the brakes. When UAL started using the 737 on the Maui to LAX routes, there were a bunch of flights weight restricted. Never had a problem with the 75. I'm also not a fan of the 737 having to keep the APU running for ETOPS. It just seems inefficient and kind of like a "Make Do" solution to no new 757s.
 
zaitcev said:
I can tell you that Russians are very envious of P8. They still keep Tu-142 on maritime patrol duties. They have a recon bird based on Tu-214, but its efficiency is nowhere close to P8's, so it does not have the endurance needed to maritime patrol. It's quite a problem, therefore.
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Well that's good. It was always very impressive wingtip to wingtip with the TU95. The 142 has got to be impressive. That's one HUGE ship, 40-50 KNOTS faster, huge span, and we'd see them all over the planet.

I have no idea if they still use them. They sure had a LOTTA propellors to take care of....

But since the average Naval Air Station is about 6,000 feet long, we just gave up the entire south atlantic.
 
The Boeing 737-900 is longer than the Boeing 707-320B [a trans con airplane], has more thrust in 2 engines than the 4 fan jets and more range to boot. The fuselage cross-section is identical.

The 737-900 is merely a 2 engine 707- and no one had any problems flying the 707 transcon from 1959-1983 . . . and intercontinental that same time period.

Virtually every Vietnam Vet got there and back to the real world in a 707 or DC-8.

The truly miserable flight is east coast to Europe in a 757 . . .. ugh.
 
Well, I'm now booked on a 739 westbound (6+06) and an A320 eastbound (5+06), so I'll be able to compare and contrast.
 
bbchien said:
Well that's good. It was always very impressive wingtip to wingtip with the TU95. The 142 has got to be impressive. That's one HUGE ship, 40-50 KNOTS faster, huge span, and we'd see them all over the planet.

I have no idea if they still use them. They sure had a LOTTA propellors to take care of....

But since the average Naval Air Station is about 6,000 feet long, we just gave up the entire south atlantic.
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Bruce, would you be so kind to point out current P-3 bases that aren't 8000 feet in length. In a brief search, everyone of the P-3 bases is right at 8000 feet.
 
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