ZZ999 - what then?
 

I see that RAF aircraft serial numbers have now reached the ZZ prefix. Presumably there's a cunning plan to move to something new when (if ever) we reach ZZ999? Start again at AA?

Since ZZ can quite comfortably get to 999, I don't think it's much of a problem. If a crisis occurs, they could 'capability gap' AA, making it A_A. Perhaps?

CG

That had been puzzling me too, in those idle hours of ... What were we talking about? Oh, yes, serials.

A mate told me there's a Committee at the Air Box looking into it. They are taking advice from BT, who have proven skills in making numbering sequences completely incomprehensible, and DVLA who live on another planet but are experts in irrelevant letters and numbers. Accordingly the results won't be known until 2019 ;)

I see two options ... Either AAAnnn or nnnAA. Or hexadecimal, starting at 0. :cool:

(Oops, that's 3 options, or 10 in Hex IIRC ... Or is that binary?)

A bloke darnnn the pub told me that ZZ999 will coincide with the end of 'a hundred year experiment'? No idea what that means. :E

How about starting at 001AA in a similar way to the way that car registrations swapped the year letter from the end to the front.

The sequence for aircraft serial numbers started with 5 numbers, and ended
at 10000, to be replaced by a letter and 4 numbers. This lasted until Z9999,
which was followed by 2 letters and 3 numbers, as at present. The logical
next step is 3 letters and 2 numbers - so it will not be that, will it!:confused:

The way the RAF is shrinking there are enough numbers left behind the ZZ prefix to see the Service into its second decade!

998, 999, change hands. :ok:

Perhaps they should add the year of registration, changing every 6 months of course in an attempt to boost sales...

I think it's a little bit older than that. Although the RN & Army who share the numbers are a LOT older.

The question of what comes after ZZ999 is likely to arrive sooner than some people think. Yes there are blocks of numbers that were never used previously but all the small UAS used by the army have a military serial and the way these get lost / smashed the unused blocks will disapear quickly. Its annoying the hell out of the spotters who can't tick them off in their little books.:D

VX275, Not sure if you were at the same meeting as me with ADRP back in 2000 where he suggested he give registration numbers to all our parachutes. That sure would have used all the numbers up! I managed to talk him out of it but he was pretty insistent over ORION.

Why have alphanumerics?

Just start counting at 001.

Won't be at 999 for some time.

If ever.

Except in an emergency.

All they have to do is transpose them, eg 001AA

Come on guys and gals, there's been 2 posts insinuating the Army/Navy takeover of the RAF and nobody's bitten. :D:D:D It's either getting old or you all have the BS filter active. :}

I can't see what everyone is worried about...all of the ZZxxx serials have been out of sequence (e.g. C-17s ZZ17x, just so '17' could appear in the serial), 51 Sqn RIVET JOINTs so they could get their 6+6+4+6+6+5+6+6+6=51 'signature' allocation, and so on.

The Typhoon fleet is somewhat nearer to reality (ZK3xx range), therefore fear not pretty much forever more with hardly any (if at all) serial blocks of ZL/ZM(except the F-35s)/ZN/ZP/ZR(a few helos)/ZS/ZT (one Lynx)/ZU/ZV/ZW/ZX/ZY being used so far.

Given it's taken about 30 years to get from ZA (Tonkas and Chinooks) to ZK (Typhoons and new Chinooks) I wouldn't worry too much.

British serial numbers are often given to aircraft destined for export, so that eats up a few (very few, unfortunately). As VX275 mentioned, Serials are given to the numerous military model aeroplanes that we now have and, as I read it, these can only multiply.

Tengah Type gave us the real clue but it seems to have been lost in the subsequent crayoning. At the dawn of military aviation, the Air Committee Joint Numbering System was created and set the convention. So, unless we gash the Convention in favour of popular fashion, it's probably 3 letters followed by 2 numbers.

UK Serials is interesting.

There are a lot of gaps - to confuse the enemy about production. The unused registrations could be used. But with the current size of the RAF, I don't think it's going to be a problem for a while yet!

I thought that I heard on the radio this morning that the EU wants the UK to change the number plates on cars, outlawing personal numbers etc, so no doubt they will issue an EU directive on the future of military aircraft numbering.....