Nothing mentioned about what a pig it is to load? Well here goes..
Tail-tipping. Because of the engine at the back, the MD-11 is naturally tail-heavy. In my previous company, the empty CG was at 97.xx and the tail-tip limit was at 100. You had to be real careful when loading and offloading.
Load-planning. When all pallets were loaded up, the CG was way up in front. If you were loading general cargo you could plan your load so that you loaded your heavy stuff on the pallets which went in the aft hold (lower-deck) and rear contour zones (main deck). I did the load-sheet for one flight from Asia to Europe with a stop in SHJ. For the SHJ-Europe leg there it was not possible to add pax (crew family) as the aircraft would've been out of trim. A bit of bitching but in actual fact nothing was wrong!
But if this was a charter with all cargo having the same load density then you may have problems which had to be solved by leaving a few pallet positions empty.
While it is possible for the 747 freighter to tail-tip, the guys at Boeing saw fit to develop a tail-stand. On the MD11 you depended on the loading sequence. Some airlines mandated the use of a weight-cart as a fail-safe.
A loadmaster on an MD11 is constantly going going out on the main-deck loader to look at the nosewheel extension as this is a good gauge of how high the nose is. Oh, and a 6 inch step from the top of the passenger steps to the aircraft entryway can develop into 2 feet.
Anilv