Boeing 777-400 carry 400 passengers

[Lankana]

I think Boeing should develop a new aircraft with new seat configuration for aviation market. That is B777-400, it should carry 400 pax with three class operation (F/C/Y). Definately sales orders will come from the airlines like Singapore Airlines, AirIndia, ANA, Thai ....

How it will look B777-400 with 4 engines?

[Lucifer]

Since when has this site become spotters central?? Last time I looked, this was not airliners.net.

Yet another reason to restrict the website to genuine pilots only.

:ugh:

[Torquelink]

Bit unfair Lucifer - I suspect that Boeing have in mind just such a response to the A350-1000: another stretch of the fuselage and push the GE90s to 125k/lb (I think that's the max for engine out controllability?). Should give another 30 - 40 seats and move closer to where the 744 was plus complement the 748i while capping the A350-1000. I think that Lankana might be a smidgen off the mark with four engines though - why re-invent the A340-600? Come to think of it, why invent the A346 in the first place?!

:)

[chornedsnorkack]

I think that Lankana might be a smidgen off the mark with four engines though - why re-invent the A340-600? Come to think of it, why invent the A346 in the first place?!

And what was 777-200 in the first place, other than A330-300 reinvented?

Bit unfair Lucifer - I suspect that Boeing have in mind just such a response to the A350-1000: another stretch of the fuselage and push the GE90s to 125k/lb (I think that's the max for engine out controllability?).

But stretching the fuselage also stretches the leverage for fin.

Actually, 4 engines does include an outboard engine - which has long leverage for asymmetric thrust. Wasn´t Boeing 777 originally intended to be a trijet? Trijet does not have any outboard engines, while the wing engines have less thrust each than the engines of a twin would have... so better for engine-out controllability.

[Torquelink]

There are all sorts of arguments, regularly aired on Pprune, as to the the merits of two vs four engines but, for commercial aircraft, it's purely a question of economics. If you can do the job with two engines rather than three or four then two will be better from an economics perspective. I don't know what the maximum thrust available for a twin installation is from a practical point of view but assume that there will be issues of fan size, ground clearance, gear length etc and I imagine that a 125k/lb thrust GE90 on a "777-400" is probably about it.

[Taildragger67]

Chornedsnorkack,

And what was 777-200 in the first place, other than A330-300 reinvented?

No, the A330 was a re-invented A300 (same fuse barrel, etc.)

The first go at an A350 was (quite openly) a re-invented A330.

The A350 is a re-invention of that.

Winning formula.

777 was a muuuuch bigger 767.

As for the last part of your post... ??? :confused:

[Thirty Eight South]

'Yet another reason to restrict the website to genuine pilots only'


The main problem is responding to idiot threads - there in is the problem : don't answer idiot questions - if the answers reactionary, it cascades into a free for all.

[thepotato232]

Wasn't Boeing 777 originally intended to be a trijet?

Not in anything but the earliest design phases. Boing dropped any ideas for a tri 777 when it became clear that the tri design had lost out in the court of public opinion, and when the company's 75 and 76 had clearly paved the way for Boeing ETOPS. Whether deserving or not, DC-10s became synonymous with major aircraft accidents in America. That footage of UA232 turning into a fireball on landing in Sioux City was the death knell for the future of trijets in the American passenger market. MD lost big on the -11, and the L-1011 was another disappointment. Boeing didn't want their next flagship going that way, and thought they could do better selling a more efficient, modern-seeming twin. Seems to have gone okay...

[Taildragger67]

... and the development of more efficient & powerful engine technology meant that you could power a DC-10/TriStar-sized a/c happily on two donks with enough safety margin for, say, losing one beyond V1. Plus the ETOPS experience as mentioned.

[Thirty Eight South]

engine performance is the key. The early heavies were restricted by engine performance -with the tri jets available power from the RB 211 and US types restricted the design performance under the old certification rules - the politics is a known story with RR

factor in the operating economics and it became a problem - the 2% over predicted economic fuel ratios sunk the MD11 (during the oil crisis).

the evolution of the freighter market, curtsey of Fred Smith changed that- Lufthansa argued strongly against the closer of the MD11 F line as the only competition was the B747F (and derivatives); No competition = fixed prices. that’s changed - take a look at the offerings from both sides of the Atlantic.

ETOPS with the old rules didn’t allow too much variation in operating structure. this has changed, but have you seen the B777 engine failure rates? Take a look at the recent FAA AD that grounded most of Singapore airlines fleet recently.

On a design note - do you have any idea how much of a P.I.T.A. having an engine sitting above the rear fuselage is?

[chornedsnorkack]

On a design note - do you have any idea how much of a P.I.T.A. having an engine sitting above the rear fuselage is?

Then why did Lockheed and Douglas design trijets, rather than quads like Il-86 or Airbus 340?

[Doors to Automatic]

Lucifer - do you think that you are in some way superior to the rest of us?

I don't think there was anything wrong with the original question - it makes a perfectly valid point & I speak as an aviation consultant with over a decade's experience in market forecasting and airline economics. If it is ok for me what makes you so special? (But then if all you do is fly Tridents in FS2004 I'm not surprised)

To the original poster, the 777-400 would be a great replacement for the 747-400 if engine-power and structural issues do not get in the way. For example, could the landing gear take the additional weight; would an even longer stretch cause problems with tails scrapes etc - these are questions I could not answer but from an economics point of view you would get a considerable seat-mile cost advantage over the 747.

Going to 4 engines would not be a go-er as the whole airframe would have to be redesigned which would be very expensive and it would not be any different to the 747.

I suspect a further stretched 777 will not happen as Boeing do not want, at this stage, to create a competitor to the 747.

Hope this helps.

[enicalyth]

I think both Lockheed and Douglas would have preferred twins if technology and opinion had been fully on their side.
A fin mounted engine adds weight and asks for strength where it is rather unwelcome. This was the view of my father who left de Havilland for Douglas and Douglas for Airbus.
He was a severe critic of Airbus wing design, the A330 losing out on advantages in wing/engine/fuselage integration for the A340 to have four pods. Then it emerged that the physics had been imperfectly understood requiring redesign effort anyway.
Airbus have hardly covered themselves with glory in their A340-500/600 range with its larger wing, different sweep. Once in service there has had to be some unexpected tinkering with c of g and flight dynamics but to be fair you can't always get it right first time. However talk of "optimisation" is spin doctor speak. My father railed at his and others inability to get the speed, cleanliness and economy that was desired. So someone somewhere coined the phrase "optimisation" and Leahy had his slogan.
Whereas most of Boeing's trials and tribulations have been of the "sex scandal and shopping" variety Airbus have an irritating knack of snatching defeat from the jaws of victory lately. Whether right or wrong the large twin seems to have inevitableness written all over it and in this context the trijet was a stopgap response, a page in history that has been turned.
But Sir Isaac Newton tells us why an apple falls down from the sky and by this law it seems quite fair, a plane without engines won't stay up in the air. If two part company, three's not a crowd but surely these days four is a bore.

I'll declare an interest. I work for a certain company but it might not be the one that you think!

[chornedsnorkack]

I think both Lockheed and Douglas would have preferred twins if technology and opinion had been fully on their side.
A fin mounted engine adds weight and asks for strength where it is rather unwelcome.

Sure. But outboard wing engine?

Once twins were given up, what would have been the second best for Lockheed and Douglas - trijet or quadjet?

[Capt. Inop]

How it will look B777-400 with 4 engines?
http://img294.imageshack.us/img294/9127/4eng777jv8.jpg:ok:

[alexban]

Wow ,Cpt inop ,a beautifull picture. Can you do it with six engines?:ok:

[Capt. Inop]

Can you do it with six engines?

Sorry, i got the pic from airdisaster.com forum, didn't shop it myself.

[Jgossett]

Could a plane as big as the 777 have a engine configuration like 727 or would the cost of making the airframe strong enough be outrageous :confused:

[galaxy flyer]

Sure a trijet 777X, a la 727 could be done, would it be useful, which is to say economic NO! Structures would be heavy everywhere, including wings.

The FARs and public opinion when the 727 and the heavy tri-jets were also an important factor in addition to engine power. In the sixties, there was a strong bias against twins, take-off weather requirements in 121 were a big element in Eastern and United wanting a tri-jet 727. Twins, I don't believe, could use low mins and a take-off alternate, they had to have a mile viz or landing minimums The "public", meaning media and opinion thought flying across the US, let alone oceans, demanded four engines, going to three was a leap of faith. Privately, the engineers at the airlines were reluctent to buy less than three for long-range in fear of the public rejecting them. Remember airlines were moving from Connies and DC-7s, so everyone associated flight with FOUR engines unless you were puddle-jumping in a Convair or Martin. We forget now that in mid-Eighties, going outside of 60 minutes with a twin was a "there they be dragons" kind of operation.

Hell, getting down to TWO crewmembers was a real effort! The original 767s had an F/E.

GF

[chornedsnorkack]

The biggest all-tail jets are the quads VC10 and Il-62.

Problems with tail engines include having the centre of gravity of airframe behind the centre of gravity of payload, and needing structural support to carry the weight from tail through the rear fuselage and into the wings.

Nevertheless, tail engines are the favourite arrangement for small regional and private jets.

There was the famous VC-10 trijet, with ordinary pair of low-bypass jets on one side, and a big high-bypass turbofan opposite. Would it make sense to reengine a VC10 to be a twinjet (another big turbofan instead of the other pair of low-bypass jets)?

[Lucifer]

Lucifer - do you think that you are in some way superior to the rest of us?

I don't think there was anything wrong with the original question - it makes a perfectly valid point & I speak as an aviation consultant with over a decade's experience in market forecasting and airline economics. If it is ok for me what makes you so special? (But then if all you do is fly Tridents in FS2004 I'm not surprised)
No; nevertheless it is frustrating to read spotterish questions from people that clearly have no understanding of the basic technical side of aviation, nor are actually asking a question - it is simply a "I want to see this plane" question that resides on another website, or in the Spectators Balcony.

Clearly, the 777 cannot carry four engine without new wings and heavy structural modifcations, and clearly the 747-8 is the more efficient aircraft to carry that level of pax/payload.

I don't think people here expect everyone to know the ins and outs of every aspect of aviation, or people would not even be on here asking questions, but I object to weepy-eyed off-topic questions that are clearly not of a technical nature, but rather are derived from looking at aircraft for too long!


btw - what does Lucifer carry? Look it up on Wikipedia if you don't know what the trident is...

[john_tullamarine]

We should tend to be fairly generous in how we might interpret "technical" matters.

At the end of the day ..

(a) if a thread is too silly, we probably will remove/lock it .. doesn't happen all that often in this Forum

(b) if it gets a bit silly (etc.), we will moderate it in an endeavour to guide it back onto the paths of PPRuNe righteousness

(c) if it's too boring, few will bother replying to it and it gurgles down to the bottom of the quagmire

(d) if it seems a little simplistic or trivial, then hopefully the subject matter will be discussed politely and rationally and one or more folk will go away with a bit better appreciation of the subject ... often such threads only attract a few responses ... on occasion, they can generate a great deal of interest.

One needs to keep in mind that we all started out in this game knowing something between nothing and not very much .. so we must preserve, quite rigorously, an opportunity for the newbies to test the waters and develop their knowledge .. as did those with greyer beards all those years ago ..

(e) if the subject has lots of meat to it, then so much the better for the majority of readers.

However, there is no "one size fits all" in this Forum .. so we probably should exercise a bit more tolerance to reflect the spectrum of reader backgrounds.

About the only thing we insist on is that excessive rudeness etc. not be tolerated ... the Forum is a place of rational and, in the main, gentle discussion.

The Forum definitely is NOT some sort of elitist conclave where only those annointed with Tinkerbelle's pixie dust may come ...

[enicalyth]

I still think that the airliner most in touch with the market will more closely resemble the bigger B777 than the B744 or A380.

In the days of tombstone engineering men thumped their chests and said "G*dammit we make planes to fly and not to crash!" Until and unless the big twins show otherwise it seems to me that the smart money isn't on quads.
Unless tombstone engineering returns.

As regards having pods outboard or inboard Lawrence Pomeroy's dictum suggested that it was better to design for an outside blade thrown in than hope that an inside blade would be thrown out.

Chance is a terrible thing and there probably aren't that many VC10s or L1011s left to figure in disasters but I think Chorny is right to highlight differences between large and small types so long as we do not try to extrapolate data too far. But because somebody did something once don't necessarily imagine it all happened inside a clean room full of pure logic, sweetness and reason.

Predicting the future is not like laying a straight-edge on sales figure graphs or oil prices for the market can turn on the proverbial sixpence. Types such as the bigger 777s seem to me to have a better chance of survival when to quote Supermac "events, dear boy, events happen".

If God forbid one of the events was a rash of twins lost in wild and inhospitable places I'd guess quad sales might would improve but I cannot see a rehearsal of VC10/DC10/L1011 designs. I'm really sorry if you don't agree that the porrige in that pot has gone cold and short of bashing out the old arguments again I'm of no use.

You are all of course helpful to me because you're making me stop and challenge my way of thinking. If I can't convince others of the rightness of my arguments and the wrongness of theirs then either my understanding or my powers of persuasion are at fault. Subjectively and objectively I think that the medium and big twin are most likely to be the best choices for operators and manufacturers. But then I would say that, wouldn't I? I can be very stubborn.

Soon be home JT - nearly well enough to travel!

Thanks to you all for your ideas!

The "E"

[john_tullamarine]

..then, Godspeed, good sir ... the convivial ale still awaits the conjunction of our paths ...

[chornedsnorkack]

What do you think are the next generation of engines like? And how are they expected to scale up?

Are there any plausible engine improvements which can be applied to A340, but cannot be applied to A350 and B787 with the same effect?

[Doors to Automatic]

I think we have reached the highest thrust we will see but suspect efficiency will improve. I think that 250-400 pax will be the norm for long-haul aircraft so the 787/777 range will fulfill most requirements, particularly if they can achieve a slight further stretch of the 777.

[easyduzzit]

Who needs a 777-300 stretch?
There are already airlines carrying 434 pax in a 2 class B773, & 380 in 3 class layout!
The B773 ER is already proving to out perform the A340 500 in all respects, with the latter being significantly smaller, w.r.t. payload capability.
Cant see Boeing ever fitting 4 engines to a "New airframe" again.:ok:

[chornedsnorkack]

Who needs a 777-300 stretch?
There are already airlines carrying 434 pax in a 2 class B773, & 380 in 3 class layout!

Um, there is a legacy airline carrying 472 seats in a 3 class B773!

BUT can you get 589 seats in a 2 class B773? You can have 589 seats in a 2 class B744!

Also, Boeing has talked about Boeing 777-100 as well. 767-400 was preferred to 777-100. But there has also been talk of 777-250 model - and not for Trek Airways. Would it make sense?