British Airways Boeing 727-200 1980's Livery

[donnlass]

Hi everyone

My partner is building a model BA 727-200 Airfix Kit and the colour scheme shows Midnight Blue for the the underneath of the fuselage which is right but says the top of the fuselage should be Brunswick Green and Grey combination of half and half.

Have never seen a BA which has been green and grey on top but have there been BA 727 - 200's with this livery?

Many thanks in advance.

[treadigraph]

BA leased an American Trans Air 727-100 for a short while around 1985 - I remember seeing pics of it with BA titles but otherwise the ATA scheme. I don't recall ever seeing it fully painted up.

A mix of Brunwick Green and grey may approximate to the grey used by BA on the upper half of the fuselage and fin around that time.

[Big Eric]

Photo here :- Photos: Boeing 727-22 Aircraft Pictures | Airliners.net

[Big Eric]

Is the model one of the Comair aircraft perhaps ?

Photos: Boeing 727-294/Adv Aircraft Pictures | Airliners.net

EDIT :- Ignore that,I've just noticed that the original title says 1980's !

[avionic type]

Anyone know why these aircraft were hired and where they operated to and from? I was with B.A. as an engineer at Heathrow in 1985 and don't remember it at all but I'd retired by 2000. Many thanks .

[Juliet Sierra Papa]

Does this help? British Airways - Logopedia, the logo and branding site

[Ironside0]

BA themselves never operated the 727 (they would have loved to but the powers that be made them but more Tridents!)

Comair (a BA Partner) operated them in BA colours in South Africa,think the colours were as mainline BA so the top would be a very pale grey,Maybe check Hannants website as they do the colour ready mixed in their xtracolor paint range.
This kit is a re release of the old Airfix kit previously with various different markings over the years

[avionic type]

Thanks for the info Ironsides0 but we in engineering heard that BEAs precurment department insisted that the original Trident which was nearly the same size as the B727 was too big and insisted it was downsized to what became the Trident 1 with an engine that was not suited to it as it was "off shelf"ie the Spey instead of a new engine Rolls was going build for it, it was not called the "Ground Gripper" for nothing by the time we got to the Trident 3 it was nearer to the b727 but was lumbered with a 4th engine and all that entailed and of course the 727 was a cheaper proposition by then . the only redeaming feature was the Trident was more technicly advanced in the Auto pilot dept and was the for runner of the Cat 3 landings and Automatic landings which non of the early Boeings had ,Im ready to be shot down in flames by saying the first commercial Boeing to have Autoland was the B747/400 and that was because Lockheed brought out the L1011 Tristar with it built in.

[donnlass]

Thanks loads everyone for your detailed and very helpful replies, the pictures have helped greatly with his model

[Avionker]

,Im ready to be shot down in flames by saying the first commercial Boeing to have Autoland was the B747/400 and that was because Lockheed brought out the L1011 Tristar with it built in.

The QANTAS 747-300's I used to work on CatIIIb certified if I remember correctly. Suspect the 200's may have been as well.

[firstchoice7e7]

avionic type,

i recall seeing the 727 in GLA , so i assume lhr-gla was one of the routes

[suninmyeyes]

Im ready to be shot down in flames by saying the first commercial Boeing to have Autoland was the B747/400 and that was because Lockheed brought out the L1011 Tristar with it built in.

The 747-100s had autoland Cat3a but it was fail passive, only two autopilots, the 747-200 had three autopilots and was fail active, Cat 3b. It wasn't a great system. Lots of red and amber lights and hard work for the flight engineer.

[777fly]

All of the foundation work on low visibility ops was done by the BLEU ( blind landing experimental unit) at Bedford UK in the early 60's and the knowledge gained was used on the Trident to perfect Cat 3 operations. As 411A would have been happy to remind you, most of this expertise went to develop the L1011 quad channel autoland system, know as PFM ( pure f*****g magic), available as a mature system from first aircraft delivery. All modern jet transports benefit from what was learned and developed on those two aircraft.
The early B747 systems were very basic, hard to operate and were unreliable. It was not until the B747-400 that Boeing evolved a properly working system and on the B777 they have acheived something close to perfection, which is closely akin to the original Trident triplex system.
I was in BA for many years from the late 60's and a B727 never operated a mainline service in BA colours.

[arem]

I think you are forgetting the 757 which also had a full cat 3b system which was time wise way ahead of the -400

[Airclues]

The Comair 727s were first painted in the BA 'Landor' scheme. They then had to suffer the 'world' tails, before eventually getting the 'Chatham' scheme.

Dave

[777fly]

Arem:
You are right, of course. Thanks for the reminder.....

[WHBM]

Originally Posted by avionic type

Anyone know why these aircraft were hired and where they operated to and from? I was with B.A. as an engineer at Heathrow in 1985 and don't remember it at all.

As I understand it :

B727-22 N284AT was leased for 3 months May to July 1988 from ATA, pictured in post 3 above. It had the BA name applied, but little else changed.

B727-51 N287AT was leased for 1 month Aug-Sep 1990, operated with ATA name. Here it is at Heathrow.

Photos: Boeing 727-51 Aircraft Pictures | Airliners.net

Both were hired in due to a shortage of 757s for various reasons. They seemed most common on Heathrow-Glasgow shuttle flights.

The only 727-200s in BA colours were the Comair franchise ones in South Africa.