BOAC B707-436 Early LAX operations

[rog747]

707-420 on topic, and bits and bobs

a previous poster made a query re -420 engines, (EL AL?)
Photos: Boeing 707-430 Aircraft Pictures | Airliners.net

Photos: Boeing 707-441 Aircraft Pictures | Airliners.net

they were all (-420) built with RR conway's (1st turbofans, actually)
hence the designation 707-420 to indicate thus,
small LE device, larger wing,
tail heightened, rudder boost and large ventral fin added.
(CAA requirement)

-420 orders
boac, cunard eagle, varig, el al, air india, lufthansa.
(please, i'm no anorak lol)
the best livery imho
Photos: Boeing 707-436 Aircraft Pictures | Airliners.net


-120 had jt3c turbojets (not transatlantic intended, but did op initially)
-120B had jt3d turbofans,
this was a very different machine. (later some with full span LE slats)

-138 jt3c (i think)
VH-JET#1 & Her Sisters
shows early image, stumpy tail, no ventral fin, and turbojets.

then they were converted, or newly built to -138B, with jt3d fans.
(all a Qantas order, shorter body than -120)
-138B had full span LE as per this foto, plus small ventral fin.
G-AVZZ - Laker Airways Boeing 707 Aircraft Photos - Glasgow - Prestwick @ Airplane-Pictures.net

-220 had jt4a turbojets, with -120 body, for braniff only.

-320 had jt4a's, larger wing, transatlantic range, but had west coast range penalty.
-420 similar to -320 with RR conways for BOAC and others.

-320B had jt3d turbofans, some had full span LE (advanced) also many
differences in tail and fins etc.

707-320C ditto engines, the best range option.
all full span LE, major wing changes as 320B adv. extra e/exits.
opened up west coast non-stops, with range penalty on few occasions,
MTOW 151000kgs

when i was with BMA we fitted 212 Y seats to our 3 707-320C's for non-stop charter LGW-LAX/YVR (amongst other places)
erm, that was interesting !
never saw any shiny sliver on the oleo's on taxi-out from LGW


as poster 411a mentioned you also had different cowl inlets on jt3d's,
thin ones on older and larger cowl flaps on newer engines.
he is adamant that -420's operated to west coast non-stop on a regular basis but i dont think i can re-call this personally.
<his quote>
-436, yes normally operated non-stop LHR-LAX....just (as I have described previously).
In addition, AirFrance operated their 707-328's non-stop to SFO as well, from ORY....just.
Likewise, ORY-LAX...just, using JT4A-17 engines.
I remember these flights well, as they would request a direct routing LAX, as they were a tad short on fuel.
<unquote>

hope he can enlighten me re -436's as its too far!, thanks.

also someone queried 155000 as being max fuel?
(then the following posters confused this with mtow?)
the o/poster was talking about FUEL weight
(he also quoted that in pounds/lbs,!!)

the 707-320C mtow is 151000 kilos/kgs lol!!!

**note the pounds/lbs v kilos/kgs confusion here, and mtow/fuel max weights,**
(i hope you agree that some of you chaps dont be so quick to reply lol, thats how confusion happens in real-time, dangerous example of how easy it goes wrong?)

i personally really do not think BOAC 707-436's ever op'd non-stop to USA west coast unless they were very lightly loaded.
they were never scheduled to op non-stop.
EL AL did schedule TLV-NYC with theirs? (note the question mark)

i hope i did not bore you.
rog

[rog747]

and this is priceless ! 1st boac 707 service's

British Pathe - AIRPORT NEWS
British Pathe - B.O.A.C. NEW AIR SERVICE
British Pathe - LONDON TO SYDNEY BOEING 707 ON NEW ROUTE
enjoy!

[WHBM]

Originally Posted by rog747

EL AL did schedule TLV-NYC with theirs

I wonder at what time.

A 1964 El Al timetable I have here does not show any 707 non-stops, everything both ways 6-days-a-week operated through London/Paris. The next year, 1965, El Al got their first 707-320C (leased from World Airways) which would seem to give them better capability to do non-stops.

[Seat62K]

"WHBM" - Thank you!

"Wayoutwest" - I imagine that the services to Frankfurt and Zurich were the first legs of routes to India, the Far East and Africa. BOAC also flew to Rome. Until 747-236s were introduced (which could fly to places like Bombay nonstop) this continued; indeed I flew London-Frankfurt-Delhi-Kuala Lumpur-Hong Kong as late as August, 1978 and Singapore-Bombay-Frankfurt-London in April of that year (both on 747-136s).

[rog747]

rome stops

quote
Wayoutwest" - I imagine that the services to Frankfurt and Zurich were the first legs of routes to India, the Far East and Africa. BOAC also flew to Rome. Until 747-236s were introduced (which could fly to places like Bombay nonstop) this continued; indeed I flew London-Frankfurt-Delhi-Kuala Lumpur-Hong Kong as late as August, 1978 and Singapore-Bombay-Frankfurt-London in April of that year (both on 747-136s).
unquote

i flew many times to Rome on BA 747-136's or a Super VC-10 to change the nav bags there for our (BMA) 707's we had on lease to DETA mozambique (late 70's upto the early 80's)

there were still a couple of BA 707-436's at that same time doing some shorthaul routes too.
Lisbon and Paris sometimes i recall.
the other -436's were sent over to BEA airtours (then British Airtours) for
jolly holidays to spain and sunny places.

[Spooky 2]

Hard to believe that BA would spend the time and money required to reconfigure the cockpit on the -379 to match their -336 configuration especially when the later model aircraft were somewhat superior in design.

Western Airlines went to Boeing in around 1968 and asked for a expedited order for what became the 707-347C. Boeing answer was "we can do it" but you'll have to take what we think is the best engineered configuration at the time. Fire handles on the overhead, hydraulics back at the FE station and a niceley equipped nav station. WAL took delievery of the first five and then cancled the contract for the last five which went to the RCAF as tankers.

[straightfeed]

July 23, 1973 BOAC G-ARRB B707-436 LAX to LHR 10 hrs 50 mins.

We paxed from LHR to LAX to take a 707-436 to DTW. Arrived at Ops to be asked to take the aircraft direct to LHR. Did it with no pax and a few positioning CCrew.
As the aircraft was pre INS the copilot had to scramble out of his seat after some 5 hours use his nav licence and then master the doppler and loran. All this plus the usual hold at LHR!
SFD

[Seat62K]

I'm puzzled as to the reason why a 707 would have been at LAX in 1973! (As far as I am aware, in that year LAX was served via JFK by Super VC10s.)
Was this the charter operation for Intercontinental Navigation?

[Captain Airclues]

Seat62K

As well as the VC10 via JFK there was also a 'non-stop' 707 service to LAX. However, it didn't always make it. I flew as passenger to LAX on 8/10/73 and we went via Winnipeg.

Dave

[straightfeed]

B707-436 in Lax in the early 70's.

We did a lot of affinity charters in the early 70's so that may be it.

Apart from the usual schedules some of the trips from my logbook for the 436 during '73 show-

LHR- LGW-Gander- Oakland
JFK-Zurich-LHR
LHR-Nice-LHR
LHR-Orly -JFK-Le Bourget- LHR
LHR-Dubrovnik-LHR
Gander-Montreal-Oakland.
LHR-Basel-LHR

All sort of died out by '74 then we went back to the usual BOAC schedules.

SFD

[WHBM]

BOAC got into Transatlantic charters (and to a lesser extent to the Far East) when the 747s came along and they were left with surplus 707 capacity, which ws reconfigured to Economy only. Pan Am and TWA were the same (I recall TWA 707s coming through Manchester, never a normal scheduled point for them). There was a specific subsidiary, BOAC Charter Ltd, set up to do the marketing of these, but the ops side was handled by the regular organisation.

Favourite points for BOAC were New York, Toronto, Los Angeles and Oakland (for some reason charters to the San Francisco area always went to Oakland). This traffic disappeared again as more 747s came along and they filled up the back with cheaper Economy fares. Some of the BOAC Economy-only 707s also got used at this time on some schedules, Toronto being a favourite for this.

It was difficult to keep to regular back-to-back flights in this market so there was a fair amount of unproductive positioning required to handle these flights, as described above.

Regarding the short-haul operations, in the early 1970s BEA, and then the Euro Division of BA, had a couple of shortfalls of capacity, and, besides using up whatever BEA Airtours had spare in the wintertime, which kept the Comet 4Bs on schedules from Heathrow well after you would think they had ended, they used both 707s and VC10s from BOAC (and later BA Overseas Division) on Euro routes. There were VC10s from Heathrow to places like Amsterdam and Rome as substitutes for sufficiently long that they appeared as such in some timetables.

[Tim Zukas]

"EL AL did schedule TLV-NYC with their [707-420s]? (note the question mark)"

My mistake-- I was thinking of Flight for 2 Jan 1964 that mentions El Al's summer-only nonstop being the longest scheduled flight in the world, by distance. But it does say it was eastward only, and no indication they ever did schedule it westward with -420s.

[davehowl]

Hi. I flew LHR to LAX on 9th January 1974 on G-AWHU (a 379C model with BOAC - the one with the upside down switches!) and it had a refuelling stop at Winnpeg during the sfternoon.

[ExSp33db1rd]

I know an ex BOAC 707 Captain, now aged 90 and put the question to him. He has just checked one of his many logbooks. Incidentally he achieved a speed record in the early 1960s flying LAX-LHR in 9hrs 15 minutes, (airborne not chock to chock). He says it might have been SF0-LHR though.

Back to the question. He operated BA 591 LHR-LAX on Jun 3rd 1962 in B707 G-APFG. It went via JFK which is where he got off. Strangely his next sector was from JFK-Kingston. He reckons he must have been supernumary on the BA591 as he has the Captain's name down as Buxton and not himself.

From my logbooks (Times GMT Not UTC !! )....

30th July 1962 G-APFM BA 581/643 London 15.15 - New York 23.30 = 8:15.
31st July 1962 G-APFM BA 581/643 New York 13.22 - San Francisco 19.27 = 6.05

10th August 1963 G-APFG BA JBH/7141 London 10.38 - Montreal 17.48 = 7.10
11th August 1963 G-APFL BA 591/307 Montreal 20.00 - Los Angeles 01.30 = 5.30

I have absolutely no recollection of these flights, but my logbooks suggest that the SFO service had a nightstop in New York, ( same aircraft, same service number ) and the LAX service continued same day through Montreal. The August flight from London appears to have been a charter for some reason, i.e. not a normal service number. No idea. Make of it what you will. By the way, I recall Captain Buxton, a quick flick through my logbook shows that I flew with him on 23rd August, 1966 London / Bermuda / Miami and return.

I do recall that on one of my early flights across the USA, New York to West Coast, all of us were "new" to the route, and in New York the Captain had bought a road map of the USA, and ticked off various items, cities, of interest as we flew along. A passenger visiting the forward toilet looked through the then open Flight Deck door, and said " Geez, don't you guys know the way ? "

[rog747]

Originally Posted by Tim Zukas

"EL AL did schedule TLV-NYC with their [707-420s]? (note the question mark)"

My mistake-- I was thinking of Flight for 2 Jan 1964 that mentions El Al's summer-only nonstop being the longest scheduled flight in the world, by distance. But it does say it was eastward only, and no indication they ever did schedule it westward with -420s.

EL AL originally planned to introduce the RR Conway 707 in summer 1961. However, competition from other airlines already flying the new jets, thus EL AL was forced to advance its plans. Weekly Tel Aviv–New York service began on 8 January 1961, with a 707 leased from Varig of Brazil; from 19 February 1961, frequency increased to twice-weekly.
Their 707s required longer and stronger runways for takeoffs and landings than those commonly existing at the world’s commercial airports. To accommodate the new 707s, Lod Airport extended its main runway in November 1960 to 8,720ft.
On 7 May 1961 EL AL took delivery of its first of 3 new owned 707-458 (registered 4X-ATA) in a ceremony at Boeing Field, complete with blessing by rabbis and 250 attendees.

EL AL set three world records with 707 4X-ATA on 15 June 1961, during the return portion of its maiden passenger service—from New York to Tel Aviv: (1) the fastest flight from New York to Tel Aviv, 9hr 33min; (2) the first nonstop service between New York and Tel Aviv; and (3) the world’s longest nonstop scheduled commercial flight of 5,760nm. Piloted by Captains' Tom Jones and Danny Rosin, the aircraft carried 97 passengers at a cruising altitude of 41,000ft.

On 10 June the second 707 (4X-ATB) was delivered. During the 1961 summer season, six roundtrip Tel Aviv–New York services were operated a week with the two 707s. All flights called at either London or Paris, except for a weekly nonstop from New York to Tel Aviv with a scheduled flying time of 9hr 55min.
A Tel Aviv to New York nonstop was considered, which would have had to confront the unfavourable westerly winds; however, this was rejected because even under optimum conditions only about 30-40 passengers could have been carried. Initially, the 707s carried only a limited payload—up to 115 passengers and no freight, but it was soon discovered that most restrictions could be relaxed. The passenger limit was raised to 158 (except for 120 on the New York to Tel Aviv nonstop), although still without any cargo being carried.

On 15 February 1962 EL AL took delivery of its third 707-420 (4X-ATC). For that year’s summer schedule EL AL offered a new high of nine roundtrips per week to New York with 3 nonstop New York–Tel Aviv; the other flights were routed through European cities, including London, Paris, Amsterdam, Geneva, Rome and Athens.

By the mid-1960s EL AL carefully developed the practice of maximizing the utilization of each of its aircraft. In doing so, EL AL had to work with a very small Jet fleet—only seven aircraft—to service a far-ranging network (from New York in the west to Teheran in the east, and south to Johannesburg) The fleet was 3 RR 707-458, 2 720-058B, and 2 new 707-358B's.
The five B aircraft all now had PW JT3D-3B engines.

EL AL achieved one of the highest aircraft utilization rates in the industry. To illustrate, on a typical schedule for a single 720B during summer 1964, the aircraft would operate between 7am on Monday and 4:30pm Wednesday, Tel Aviv time, four roundtrips: to Zürich, Rome, Teheran and (via a European gateway) New York. During this 57½-hour period the aircraft accumulated about 40 hours flying time. It was then rolled into the hangar for an overnight maintenance check to be ready for an early flight the following morning. This was followed by a TLV-THR- NBO-JNB and return.
With the purchase of Boeing 720Bs in 1962, EL AL had restored its South Africa service. However, unfriendly countries forced EL AL to fly an unusually circuitous route, via Teheran, Iran, and the Persian Gulf. After the 1967 war, EL AL was able to resume direct flights via Nairobi to Johannesburg.

A 3rd 707-358B arrived in 1969 and 2 707-358C's in 1969 and 1970.
By 1970 daily average utilization of the Boeing fleet was an exceptionally high 12 hours. Considering that EL AL was then operating only 306 days a year because of the constraints of flying on the Jewish Sabbath and holy days, this translated into an actual utilization of nearly 15 hours per day. All aircraft were active during the busy April-October high season. Between October and March, one of the 10 Boeings would undergo a major overhaul.

The number of employees grew to nearly 4,000 by the end of 1970, including 64 flight crews, and about 90% of the staff were Israeli nationals. Pilots were typically recruited directly out of the Israeli Air Force. The average age at which pilots would make captain fell to 30, among the youngest in the industry.
By early 1971 the 707s and 720Bs had served EL AL faithfully and safely for almost 10 years. They became the proud symbol of an airline that continued to gain acceptance as one of the most efficient in the world. Soon, however, these aircraft, like their prop predecessors, would have to relinquish their proud position.
Already industry leader Pan Am and other major airlines had entered a new era—that of the wide-body Boeing 747. EL AL would not be far behind.

Their first two new 747-258B entered service in 1971 on the TLV-LHR-JFK route. EL AL decided on a brand new colour scheme for their new 747's and likewise (like Condor for instance) it's first 747 4X-AXA was delivered with only three upper deck windows (usually associated with the original -100 series); however it was indeed a -258B series, and the additional upper deck windows were added soon after delivery.
The second EL AL 747 was delivered, like Condor's with 10 windows.
Sources EL AL museum

[DH106]

The -420 series also had the 'old' style single nosewheel door, a la 707-120 / 720, which always struck me as odd, considering it was supposed to be a re-engined development of the -320.

[rog747]

Originally Posted by DH106

The -420 series also had the 'old' style single nosewheel door, a la 707-120 / 720, which always struck me as odd, considering it was supposed to be a re-engined development of the -320.

Yes the quirky things we all noted lol

All 707-120/138/220/320/420 >> Basically all non-fan 707 and 720, and all fan jet 120B & 720B models had the old style single nose wheel door, but with a few late build exceptions - some of the last 120B and 138B's and 441 types had the newer double NG doors.

Some early build 707-320B fan jets just had the single NG door and some also had a large ventral fin (removed later) -- these 707's were the first for PA NW TW LH SAA LY and AF.
There were also very early build 707-320C models and but I do not think the very first ones had the single NG door.

[WHBM]

The pioneer 707-120s and 720s sold well, especially to the US trunk airlines, but the JT3C turbojet engines were almost immediately outclassed. Boeing introduced a significant modification to refit JT3D fan engines, which soon afterwards became available, and many were converted; American did a huge conversion of all their fleet, some of which were only a few months old.

The first intercontinental version, the -320, with JT4A turbojets, was likewise soon supplanted by the JT3D fan version -320B. Apparently the Boeing sales team had been furious with the engineers for making the original -120s so readily upgradeable, as they had anticipated selling whole new aircraft instead, especially as demand was dropping off after the initial bulge. It was determined that the -320B would have sufficient airframe mods over the -320 that engine upgrades were not possible.

[707AF]

Originally Posted by 411A

In addition, AirFrance operated their 707-328's non-stop to SFO as well, from ORY....just.
Likewise, ORY-LAX...just, using JT4A-17 engines.
I remember these flights well, as they would request a direct routing LAX, as they were a tad short on fuel.
.

sorry but AF did not fly SFO on those days . I am tracing back the non stop routes of the BOAC 707-436 . They were scheduled nonstop on LAX LHR on general timetable dating from the early 60s . In my opinion both 707-436 , 707-328 could have flown Europe from LAX non stop