Vanguard Memories....
First Flight as pax Early to Mid 1960's on BEA Vanguard, Renfrew, the then Glasgow airport, to London Heathrow.
Remember seeing BEA Argosy freighters on arrival. Very exciting for a 8/9 year old.
Skipping forward to late 1970's or early 1980's, when as working in Ops for UK Holiday airline, I used to take Jump Seat rides from Luton (LTN/EGGW) to Glasgow, Abbotsinch by then, (GLA/EGPF) to get to Scotland on Air Bridge (Carriers) night newspaper flights.
As I was keen/interested, one flight I took along a NAV LOG for the same route but for a Boeing 737-200.
The Vanguard/Merchantman took about 9/10mins longer for the same route, burnt A LOT LESS fuel,
and in it's pax config carried 139 pax, from memory, as opposed to 130 on the Boeing....
As many viewers of this forum will remember, the Airlines had moved on from Propeller aircraft to shiny jets in those days for pax...
But we can all see that economics have forced them back to the likes of first ATP's and nowadays DHC-8 types for these sort of sectors..
A different era....
I pose one question for those in the know.....
Whilst sitting at the holding point, pre Take-Off, one of the Captains working for AB(C), possibly Kay, would 'deselect' the Generators,
from three of the engines. The reduction of fuel burn on these engines was marked. Am I correct in my memory...?