YAAT: Take a look at this Airbus A340 pic

[Stunt]

Originally posted by: iamwiz82
I would think that keeping parts the same across the board would be better. I am thinking training, spares, etc.

Every new plane comes with a new engine...so you already have multiengine fleets.
Also...all 3 are mainstream products...finding a maintenance team is easy.
And normally you buy in batches so you will always have way mroe than just one oddball etc.

 

[thraxes]

Originally posted by: crab

Originally posted by: thraxes

Originally posted by: iamwiz82

Originally posted by: Stunt

Originally posted by: Baked
Wasn't this in Popular Mechanics a few months back? Or was I thinking of the Rolls Royce turbine...

Rolls, GE, and Pratt all make tubojet engines for Boeing and Airbus.

The buyer gets to choose.
ie. 747 with any of the three above.

Imagine a car you could pick the engine

Aren't they interchangable after the fact, as well?

No they are not. The pylon structure and Control Systems are different for every engine as each has a different centre of gravity, wheight, thrust rating and engine management system.

My dad was a mechanic for Lufthansa... totaly fascinating job IMO plus I got to know quite a bit about airliners.

Why couldn't they? Look at the DC8s with CFM56 engines installed...The 727 Super 27 with -217 engines, UPS's 727-100s with Rolls Royce Tays installed. If someone wants to pay, and since it's known from manufacture EXACTLY what the differences are, what's stopping them?

Usually cost. The planes you mentioned that had this refit done were low hour airframes (LH Cargo used to fly the modded DC8s - I even have a fan blade from one on my desk... a stupid bird put a dent in it though). That means they were old in age but not in use. If you can find such an old plane with low "mileage" it can be bought very cheap and new engines actually become financially feasable.

Sometimes the engines aren't changed but the flight deck gets completely modified from analog to digital. FedEx is doing this to a bunch of late 80s build DC10s

But: this is the exception and not the rule.

Most airliners nowadays are flown as much as possible before they are let go. One of the reasons you will not see any L1011 mods is that the biggest operator Delta flew those birds till almost the end of their airframes planned lifetime. They are cheap though, you can get an ex Delta Tristar for less than 100k$. Making it airworthy again costs 3 - 6 million though and getting spare parts would be a pain

 

[olds]

408

 

[crab]

Originally posted by: thraxes

Originally posted by: crab

Originally posted by: thraxes

Originally posted by: iamwiz82

Originally posted by: Stunt

Originally posted by: Baked
Wasn't this in Popular Mechanics a few months back? Or was I thinking of the Rolls Royce turbine...

Rolls, GE, and Pratt all make tubojet engines for Boeing and Airbus.

The buyer gets to choose.
ie. 747 with any of the three above.

Imagine a car you could pick the engine

Aren't they interchangable after the fact, as well?

No they are not. The pylon structure and Control Systems are different for every engine as each has a different centre of gravity, wheight, thrust rating and engine management system.

My dad was a mechanic for Lufthansa... totaly fascinating job IMO plus I got to know quite a bit about airliners.

Why couldn't they? Look at the DC8s with CFM56 engines installed...The 727 Super 27 with -217 engines, UPS's 727-100s with Rolls Royce Tays installed. If someone wants to pay, and since it's known from manufacture EXACTLY what the differences are, what's stopping them?

Usually cost. The planes you mentioned that had this refit done were low hour airframes (LH Cargo used to fly the modded DC8s - I even have a fan blade from one on my desk... a stupid bird put a dent in it though). That means they were old in age but not in use. If you can find such an old plane with low "mileage" it can be bought very cheap and new engines actually become financially feasable.

Sometimes the engines aren't changed but the flight deck gets completely modified from analog to digital. FedEx is doing this to a bunch of late 80s build DC10s

But: this is the exception and not the rule.

Most airliners nowadays are flown as much as possible before they are let go. One of the reasons you will not see any L1011 mods is that the biggest operator Delta flew those birds till almost the end of their airframes planned lifetime. They are cheap though, you can get an ex Delta Tristar for less than 100k$. Making it airworthy again costs 3 - 6 million though and getting spare parts would be a pain

I understand the financial aspect, just as I said in a previous post. It simply isn't cost effective for an airline to do so, even in the case of low time airframes. Take American's 20-30 Pratt powered 75s from TWA..these were all mid to late 90s airframes. Even if the intrest rates werent as crazy as they were, I couldn't see them doing the conversion.

It IS possible though. A while back RR offered Delta a deal where RR would convert Delta's Pratt 757 fleet to Rolls when they were having problems.

And Delta flew the balls off those L1011s...which was itself ahead of it's time. Lockheed had some bad luck with it in its early days, too bad IMO.