Seats on a Pallet

[QA Pantie Sniffer]

Could somebody please provide photos or web link of a cargo pallet that has seats fitted to it. The pallet would most likely be installed in zone one of a freighter and used on horse charters. Would this be an approved modification or do the authorities just accept the concept? I would anticipate that most freighters with exception of combies are just straight freighters or does the QC have the ability to carry a combination of pax and cargo on the upper deck?

[Ex Cargo Clown]

74Fs don't carry freight on the Upperdeck, they have normal pax seats and rest areas (numbers dependent on series of 747 and fit out of airline). The are the upperdeck area uses of the maindeck accounts for the difference in height between Q6 and Q7 pallets.

Never seen a pallet with seats on, don't know why you would want to have one to be honest, plus I'm sure there would be all manner of safety implications, emergency exits etc

[3Greens]

Wouldn't happen as all seats have to be stress tested for take-off and landing!!

[rigpiggy]

737-200 Convertible (C), Quick Change (QC) & Combi
FF 18 Sept 1968
96 (C) Built

The Convertible passenger/freight version had a 3.4m x 2.18m (138in x 86in) side cargo door (SCD) on the forward port side for pallet loading. They also had strengthened floors and additional seat tracks. As a freighter it could accommodate seven LD7 (88in x 125in) palettes on the main deck plus any loose cargo in the two holds. Conversion time was approximately 3hrs but this was later reduced to about 1hr with the QC which had 12 passenger seats ready mounted on each pallet. This realistically allowed the aircraft to used for both roles allowing it to earn money around the clock by carrying pax by day and freight overnight. Some airlines even operated them as Combi's with pallets at the front and pax at the rear.

http://www.boeing.com/commercial/news/feature/737qc.html

[Saint76]

http://www.airliners.net/open.file?id=0382414

[Go You Good Thing]

DHL in Auckland operate a B727 which carries horses and trainers. They use a pallet with a number of seats in position one. Most B727F 9G bulk head is forward of position one. Sorry no photos but I am sure somebody is out there with photos that show seats and cargo together.

[WHBM]

The Boeing 727QC was the first, and for a long time the mainstream, type to have palletised seats. This was a fully certified original manufacturer's option, not a subsequent mod, and was a very popular buy in the USA with mainstream carriers in the late 1960s. In those pre-FedEx/UPS days it was common for major US carriers to have an extensive overnight scheduled freight network, the seats were stripped after the last passenger flight of the day and reinstalled into another aircraft arriving early the next morning.

Seats came in and out on forklifts through the front cargo door. Took about an hour to change the config. Many of the 727s that FedEx and UPS later operated with were originally these aircraft. The last users of such aircraft this way were UPS who had some weekend pax charters down to the Caribbean when freight business was reduced, so they put the seats in and out once a week rather than daily, and used contract flight attendants. UPS only gave up such passenger charters a couple of years ago, when their convertible 727s (still the original late 1960s ones) were finally retired. It's better suited to the package operators as the overhead PSUs and bins obviously have to stay in place during the cargo ops, so an interesting challenge if you are going to be carrying horses, which others will be better placed to describe.

[perkin]

Jet2 operate a couple of the 737 QC's and its noticeable how much closer to the ceiling you sit...!

[30AB-JK]

http://www.targeta.co.uk/pages/041_0189_RT8a.htm

[30AB-JK]

http://www.targeta.co.uk/pages/041_0189_RT8a.htm

[ballpoint]

Suppose you will need to locate the seats in front of the crashnet and not behind it.
Otherwise the groom will end up with a horse sitting in his lap after a rejected takeoff or worse!

Ballpoint.

[Jay.Walker.DUS]

Wouldn't happen as all seats have to be stress tested for take-off and landing!!

Think someone should tell the UK CAA that they messed up rather badly when approving this, as a rather well-known European freight carrier with suspiciously yellow aeroplanes regularly stick a pallet with 16ish seats down the back, and behind the horse boxes.

Sorry, no pictures.

[IRRenewal]

a pallet secured by 6 solid locks (4 forward, 4 aft of pallet)

4+4=8?
.

[moggiee]

Wouldn't happen as all seats have to be stress tested for take-off and landing!!
You'd better tell that to the RAF seeing as that's what they do on the Tristar!

[john_tullamarine]

As suggested in some earlier posts, not a significant problem .. caveats

(a) seat certification needs to comply with the appropriate aircraft standard

(b) seat to pallet to floor load path has to comply with the appropriate aircraft standard

(c) stuff behind has to be restrained to the appropriate standard. Generally, for aircraft with multiple decks, this means behind the load as the crash restraint usually is comparatively low. For smaller aircraft, where the crew is the meat in the sandwich, the load will be restrained appropriately so there is no problem putting seats in front .. caveat .. the clearance between seats and (typically) net has to be sufficient to allow for restraint deformation under crash loads so that the folk in front have some chance of survival.

In an earlier life I spent lots of time flying QC F27 and B727-100/-200 with palletised seating ... and, likewise, B727 with a load restraining bulkhead having seats ahead.

[QA Pantie Sniffer]

Thanks for the replies. Apart from the combi 737, can you get a 737QC that has the pallet setting in position one then a net between the seating and cargo containers?

Has somebody got pics of the inside of the 737 Combi?

I thought that the old yellow girl down in NZ was on the VH rego and CASA approved a modification of pallet pax and horses!!!

Maybe CASA just turns a blind eyehttp://www.pprune.org/forums/images/icons/umph.gif

[PH-SCP]

TNT Airways in Liege, Belgium operates at least two British Aerospace BAE.146-200QC aircraft (OO-TAY and OO-TAZ) that fly passengers during daytime and freight at night. I suppose their seats are palletized also.
Cheers

[flufdriver]

I have not actually heard of seats in front of the net, the one I'm familiar with were having challenges accommodating the animal handler on the forward Cabin crew seat because of the possible expansion of the 9G net.

there is an additional jumpseat on the flight deck (with all the requisite plumbing) to accommodate a loadmaster or similar additional body, it does get a bit tight though!

Again, the one I'm familiar with, is not being operated in the Combi-mode, but if it was, the pax seats would be behind the cargo, pax. boarding would take place through L-2

Transporting Horses is quite ok with the new type collapsible stalls on pallets.

fluf

[Blacksheep]

You can't get a seat pallet forward of the net on the B737QC because the net securing points are forward of the freight door (they have to be - think about it!) and there isn't enough room. The seats go in aft of the cargo or horses.

[Firebird]

Sorry no pics.
I have seen many freighters, that when hauling live, require a vet and handlers to ride in the cargo compartment. There is a pallet with 1 or 2 rows of seats, whatever is required, at the aft of the cargo area. There must be portable oxygen available and communications with the flight deck. The pallet (cookiesheet) has seat track bolted to it and even carpet. The seats are normal aircraft passenger seats.