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chornedsnorkack
12th May 2008, 20:27
Carvair was built out of DC-4. It kept the wing and engines, but the nose was replaced with a bigger one, including nose door and cockpit up in the hump above nose door - the prototype for 747.

There are said to be a number of propeller car ferries.

Can widebody jetliner holds be used as car ferries? Like B747, B767, A380?

I gather that the holds are low. Maximum height of 163 cm, for all widebodies between 767 to 747.

This means that sedans can be put in holds, and so can limousines - but SUV-s and most crossovers are too high. Rolls-Royce is barely low enough.

Do passenger airlines normally offer car tickets?

SpringHeeledJack
12th May 2008, 20:55
I believe that Lufthansa cargo had a daily 747F from Frankfurt to ? USA during the 70s and 80s on behalf of Volkswagen, so in effect that was a car ferry. I'm sure that they used both decks or at least a palletised double-decker.

Also, some of the Arab princes have been rumoured to have transported cars and horses around in DC-8s/747s in the past

Regards


SHJ

chiglet
12th May 2008, 22:19
Various a/c have staged through Manch/EGCC/MAN. Including C130s for collecting Various Rolls Royce Limos for the Saudi Royal Family.


There are said to be a number of propeller car ferries.


The Bristol Freighter...BR31 [Short Nose] and the BR32 [Long Nose] were crossing the English Channel [James Bond "Goldfinger"] and the Irish Sea.
Silver City Airways.....
watp iktch

Bigt
13th May 2008, 11:15
Didnt BAF run a CL-44 on cross channel car ferry flights for a short while?

bplgaz
13th May 2008, 11:36
Once saw a Morgan being loaded into the front cargo hold on G-VXLG on LHR-JFK run

22/04
13th May 2008, 13:30
BAF CL-44s were certainly flying Stansted - Ostend in the early 1970s. Swing tail loading I think. G-AZIN was one from memory.

Porrohman
13th May 2008, 22:38
According to http://www.cl44.com/cl44/Operators.htm ;


BRITISH AIR FERRIES

c/n 19 (http://www.cl44.com/cl44/prodlist/serial19.htm) G-AZIN 1972 - 1973
c/n 25 (http://www.cl44.com/cl44/prodlist/serial25.htm) G-ATZI 1972 - 1974

aviatordom
14th May 2008, 06:20
I've seen an episode of BBC's "Airport" where they are loading a Mercedes onto an A340-but from what i can remember it wasn't easy!

WHBM
14th May 2008, 08:30
In addition to the Lufthansa operation for VW described above there was another operation in the 1980s by Alitalia and Lufthansa 747 freighters for Cadillac; cars were built under contract in Italy and shipped near-complete from Turin to Detroit. They were stacked at 45 degrees nose-down, there were 56 cars on each flight.

http://auto.howstuffworks.com/1987-1993-cadillac-allante4.htm

The SSK
14th May 2008, 08:36
I believe that Lufthansa cargo had a daily 747F from Frankfurt to ? USA during the 70s and 80s on behalf of Volkswagen, so in effect that was a car ferry. I'm sure that they used both decks or at least a palletised double-decker.

Alitalia did the same thing from Turin, I'm sure I've seen a diagram with the cars loaded in special stackers.

surely not
14th May 2008, 09:12
Quite a few cars get carried ex Abu Dhabi in the holds of the EY A330/340 and B777.

One of the a/c had to return to stand the other day because the car alarm went off in the hold and the noise was too great in the cabin!!

The SSK
14th May 2008, 09:48
Surprised this one (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/1951848/Paul-McCartney-'horrified'-as-his-eco-car-is-flown-7,000-miles-from-Japan.html)hasn't been picked up in Jet Blast yet:

DILLIGAFF
14th May 2008, 19:47
Once had to offload from the hold of one of our 747s a nice Mustang convertable. The aircraft was on delivery from Seattle and the car belonged to one of our guys who was retiring back to the UK.
D

Geezers of Nazareth
14th May 2008, 19:47
Over the past 3 years I have loaded/unloaded the following ...

E-type Jaguar
Chinese Formula A1 car
Ferrari F3000
Rolls Royce two-door
Subaru Imprezza
David Coulthard's F1 car
a Bugatti 'shell' on wheels (almost complete car, no engine, no steering wheel)
A Dodge Viper (I think) for the Gumball 3000 Rally
Ferrari F430
A Maserati 'thing'
Lotus Esprit

These were mostly on A.330s and B.747s, althought the Bugatti was on a A.340-600.

These were all 'one-offs', just a single car on a passenger flight, in the below-deck hold.

To be honest, they're both 'interesting' and 'a pain' to handle. All the above had to be placed nose-in, then turned through 90 degrees. This means undoing all the strapping, moving the car and then re-doing the strapping. I think that it took 20 people to turn the Rolls Royce :eek: .

SeenItAll
14th May 2008, 22:05
In July of 1960 I took my second flight. It was on an air ferry from Cherbourg to Southampton. If I remember correctly, the plane held 3 cars and 15 passengers. I think it was a converted DC-3 or -4.
Does anyone out there know the carrier or the equipment that was in use at that time? Thanks.

chornedsnorkack
14th May 2008, 22:27
Checking the descriptions, all widebodies bigger than B767 - A330, B747, B777 - have just 318 cm wide floor. Which means that a Tata Nano or a real Austin Mini could be placed across the plane (replacing one pair of LD3 containers) but a bigger car has to be placed along the plane. And turned at the door.

The door widths are 264 cm in 747, and 269 to 272 cm on B777, A330, A340... Finding the space to turn the car would be tricky.

WHBM
15th May 2008, 06:30
In July of 1960 I took my second flight. It was on an air ferry from Cherbourg to Southampton. If I remember correctly, the plane held 3 cars and 15 passengers. I think it was a converted DC-3 or -4.
Does anyone out there know the carrier or the equipment that was in use at that time? Thanks.
The airline was Silver City who had a small operation out of Southampton and the aircraft was a Bristol 170 Freighter

http://www.airteamimages.com/63212.html

CRayner
15th May 2008, 11:49
I did this in 1958 or 1959. My dad took cine film of it, which he still probably has. Great fun.

I must say I thought we went from Southend, but I was only 10 or 11 so I might be misremembering.

Steviec9
15th May 2008, 11:57
Our family (Anglo-Belgian) regularly used the BAF service Southend to Ostend and I can clearly remember (early 1970s) watching 3 or 4 cars being loaded on and then us sitting in the cabin behind - presume on a Carvair. I can even remember horses neighing once durinig the (often very bumpy) flight across the Channel. Fond memories! We stopped using the route around 1975 because it was something like £12 return by then and we couldn't afford it!

fendant
15th May 2008, 17:00
There is a regular service with Antonov's from Leipzig (LEJ) to Russia for Porsche Cayenne SUV's.

This is how the shipper ensures that they really arrive at their final destination in Russia and don't get lost en route.;)

Hartington
15th May 2008, 19:03
I too remember Silver City and the Bristol 170. Drive down to Lydd, hop on the plane to Le Touquet, drive up the coast to Boulogne or Calais and hop on Motorail to either Lyon or, in later years, Avignon.

I mostly remember riding in the cockpit. You went from the passenger cabin at the back into the front section where the cars were and then climbed up a ladder into the cockpit which sat over the cars. Now, at this point my memory gets a bit hazy (I was only about 10) but I recall the aircraft were fitted with a paper moving map (Decca Navigator?) which slowly rolled its' way across the Channel. The map was fitted to rollers and a pointer. As the aircraft flew so the map rolled from one spool to the other with the pointer showing the current position.

SeenItAll
15th May 2008, 20:46
Thanks much for the information about Silver City. As I was only 6 years old at the time, my memories are vague. I dig through my parents' photo albums and see if I can find a picture that confirms things.

Yorkie37
16th May 2008, 10:48
Coventry(Baginton) airport was very busy in the 60's early 70's with Carvairs and Bristol freighters. Later used (if I remember correctly) for transporting flowers from Holland in the summer months.

How do you post images, i have a picture of a British United Carvair at Cov in the late 60's?

Euravia First
18th May 2008, 10:54
My third flight as a passenger {at the age of 20} was a day return from Lydd to Le Touquet in 1965. It was purchased as a "foot passenger special offer" from Silver City Airways for 5 guineas. The aircraft was a Bristol 170 and I'm almost sure the return leg was operated by an aircraft bearing the livery of Compagnie Air Transport.

PaulDGriggs
22nd May 2008, 12:19
The Carvair was also fitted I believe with the tail unit from a DC-7 as the rudder needed enlarging, always interesting in a crosswind with the large hump!!

RFFS
22nd May 2008, 14:35
I lived a short distance from Southend airport as a youngster, in fact our neighbour was a Captain with BAF in the late 60's - early 70's ( Jack Chervall, wonder where he is now) and flew Carvairs, which he took me aboard once or twice, I remember too well the time an engineer carried out an engine run with me on board reducing me to tears with the emense noise of those huge avgas engines.
Many years later (Late 80's) i worked at the same airport, you could see the stains in some areas of the apron even then, where the oil used to seep out on stand, and the old oil bowser which they used to top them up with, was on the grass rotting away.
The delapedated former BAF building/offices i remember, were strewn with plans and diagrams of the Carvair some in very good condition, maybe i should have gathered them up, after all you can sell anything on ebay.

gooneydog
22nd May 2008, 14:46
I flew a Chryser Crossfire when it was still a "concept car" from Willow Run (KYIP) to LAX in a DC-9 a few years back. Supposedly it crashed being driven back from there and a driver was killed