Any L1011's still flying??
 

If so, where are they? Are any of them freighters?

RAF still flies some as tankers, I think (though their days are fading).

Orbital Sciences (OSC) flies one for one of the coolest ex-airliner missions: dropping their air-launched Pegasus satellite launcher.

The RAF operates nine (9): Four tanker/freighters, two (2) tankers and three (3) with full passenger interiors.

Along with the Orbital Science and Sands aircraft mentioned earlier, there are about a half a dozen still operational in the mid-east, most operating out of Jordan.

Was the TriStar really as well loved by pilots as some websites have lead me to believe? It seems to have quite an excellent reputation for safety and reliability.

Lockheed L-1011

I've heard some reputation that all those ahead-of-their-time-techno-bits (including the never-repeated DLC) made for some maintenance headaches. I wonder if that is why the comparatively simple DC-10's have endured longer.

--Nick

I've always heard good things about the L1011 but I'll tell you, I got the biggest shock of my life once from one! I was on an early TWA from STL to LAX in the mid 90s and my plane had cold engines - so I got to witness a really cold start - I've never SEEN such a cloud of oil smoke - if you've ever lost a complete piston ring and can't see the road behind you for the smoke, well, it was THAT bad from ALL three engines as they came online. Soon enough the excess oil was burned off and it got up to operating temperature, and the engines had that nice whine. I had always wondered why 1011s were do dingy near the #2 engine, and then I knew!

-drl

Luzair still have a -500 flying into LGW or at least did about a month ago.

I think you should refer to posts by 411A who, as far as I am able to ascertain, is still flying them.
From a personal point of view and as a pax the L1011 Tristar is and will always be my alltime favourite airliner.

The dirty (dingy ?) area around the #2 engine was not caused by oil from the #2 engine but by hydraulic fluid from the stabilizer and rudder servo and actuators. Hydrulic fluid leakage and normal dirt accumulation did the trick.

How would pilot's characterise the L1011?? Did it have it's quirks or was it a pilot's dream to fly?

Lets look at the facts about the 'ole Lockheed tri-motor....

First widebody with dual/dual fail operational autoland capability, certified to CATIIIB, straight from the factory.

First widebody with a fully certified dual FMS installation which provided complete LNAV/VNAV/engine thrust management in one neat package (SVA aircraft also had electronic moving map fitment, as well).

Only civil jet transport with an all-flying tailplane...with which you never ever run out of pitch authority (quite unlike some others, MD-11, for example)

Only civil jet transport with direct lift control, for approach/landing.

And finally, the only first generation wide body civil jet transport aeroplane to have never ever crashed due to an aircraft system/engine malfunction.

Designed in Burbank, and manufactured at Palmdale California by the Lockheed California Company...and simply designed and built to a higher standard.

PS: flys very nicely, too...thank you very much.:)
A true pilots aeroplane.

411A
 

Wouldn't expect anything different from you;)

I live in Witney, nr Brize and still love to see the 'old 1011 birds' come over my house (along with the VC10 crackling away, on a sunday morning about 0700hrs. Beats waking to the sound of feathered birds:))

B Rgds

CL747

Just spent a very pleasant evening in Fort Lauderdale FL with a friend who had many thousands of hours on Easterns L.1011's. He loved it, but said you really had to have your ducks all lined up when taking off in a 500. It apparently went like hell, and, in those days full power was always used for take-off's. He said he sometimes saw 3,000 feet climb a minute passing 30,000ft!! Lovely aircraft in his opinion. 411a. Great to always read your posts.

Oh, 411A, old chap.

Ilyushin 86 ties equal for this. In fact no Soviet/Russian widebody of any generation has ever had such an incident.

There are a couple of RAF Tristars at GAMCO in Abu Dhabi apparently being fitted with EFIS. I flew them for 7 years, and up to now is my favorite aircraft to fly ( presently flying the bus ). Had my first widebody command on one, FRA-AMS-YVR way back when !:)

Re. EFIS upgrade, tracked this down:

Innovative Solutions & Support | Platforms and Systems

Wow, there's life in them yet! Great to hear.

--Nick

Sec 3,
You have to come out of the Twilight Zone:p
GAMCO is now ADAT in Abu Dhabi:ok:

WHBM.

You missed out the word "allegedly"

Any L1011's still flying??
 

Quote "If so, where are they? Are any of them freighters?"

RAK have 2 freighters and there are another couple flying for other operators.

411A,
I know it is a great airplane. I would love to fly one. But, I
would like to ask you why it didn't sell better being such
a great airplane.

DLC??
 

Can some one explain to me how does DLC (I presume "Direct Lift Control?") work?? Thanks

why it didn't sell better: heavier, so dearer trip cost than DC-10; dual-skin hull, so bilge, attracting corrosion; Expat.Brit (ex-TSR.2 &tc) Agency-designers, so brick-dunny (see VC.10 v.707). Some vendors as second-choice and unique (e.g: Ham Standard APU/environmental control, Garrett taking DC-10), so low volume, so slow/dear/losing interest: e.g the up-and-over pax door actuator was by one-off Talley: spares pain. GE (and on DC-10/40, Pratt) exploited the RR(1971) Ltd. confusion: RB211 "doomed".

US' carriers had split 1968, TW/EA launching L.10; AA/UA: DC-10, deferring breakeven for both. Douglas' new paymaster, McDonnell sank good $ after bad, MD-11...and expired into Boeing; Lockheed's new paymaster after C-5 bailout, US taxpayer, after -500 dumped twin/upgrades...merged with Martin and became mighty. Civil design soaks cash; easier to build bits to others' designs; "best", in engineering and feel, may not win at market. See GD: CV.990 - fastest, lostest, v.chunks of DC-10/747 - low-risk, high margin.

WHBM, Is the horizontal stabiliser part of an aircraft's systems? see:

Accident Database: Accident Synopsis 07282002

Why'd Everyone's Favorite Airplane fail?

I've always seen the L1011 as a case where the "best" product in terms of engineering and design excellence (including features and performance) fails at the hands of a "mediocre" design. Mediocre in all other ways except for cost, that is (at least in the short term).

Plus the widebody twin revolution came along and put a short end to both the L1011 and the DC-10 before too long.

Add in the political issues and that's about all it takes.

--Nick

411A,
Facinating info!!

Was the L1011 a little underpowered for it's size? I know DL flew a mix of -200's and -500's. Were the -500's fitted with a higher trust version of the RB211?

Despite the poor dispatch reliability, I loved these birds. :ok:

L1011
 

Saw a converted old LTU @ Cambridge. Never seen so much corrosion on an aircraft, under the lavs, no metal at all

Any L1011's still flying??
 

Saw one at Nairobi late on Wednesday 25th. No titles, never before seen - by me at least - dark blue and white colour scheme (ie, not left over from any recognised previous operator). Too dark to see the full registration, but nosewheel doors carried 'SGI' and was named 'ZAMZAM'. Anyone any ideas on whose and what?

Martinair use NBO, but the colour scheme doesn't correspond.

Edit. Unless JY-SGI has come out of storage, ex Delta originally, white top and blue cheat line?

Saw an L1011 2000ft above me today, northbound over France, with a BA B737, A319ish type between us going the other way.

Got a great photo! Reminded me of my MCC Course in the 1011, loved every hour on the sim.

Lucky we weren't flying a reporter, that would be classed as a near miss, and all those schools, hospitals et all below us!

T'was a great end to a day's flying...:ok:

Any L1011's still flying
 

ah i miss the old tri-stars (air atlanta, air transat, RAF . .) happy if noisy days! *overcome with waves of early 21st C nostalgia* . . cockpit like a greenhouse, HUGE windows!!!

TMD

Re post #9 the white cloud from the engine was unburnt fuel. The early RB211-22 engines were very slow to ignite the fuel and get the fire going during a cold start and pumped copious amounts of fuel vapour out the back.
Re post #27 the -200, -250, -500 all had RB211-524 engines which were the same as used in RR powered 747's (modified to suit the L1011).
Why did the L1011 not sell as well as the DC10?
Basically Lockheed screwed themselves. In the begining Lockheed proposed building two versions, a L1011-1 domestic version (which was built) and a L1011-2 version which was a dedicated long range aircraft with completely new wing etc. Lockheed disparaged MDC's plan to build a longrange derivative of the DC10-10 domestic version saying it would not be as efficient as their plan. In the end Lockheed could not afford to go ahead with the L1011-2 and MDC captured the market with the DC10-30/-40 long range variant which had been planned from the start. The L1011-500 was a shortened fuselage version of the L1011-1 that had a limited niche in the market.
The DC10-30 was a very capable longrange aircraft with great appeal to airlines not needing something as big as a 747-200.
Lockheed never produced a freighter version of the L1011 but did offer a conversion and there are(were) one or two around.
MDC had built DC10 freighters and combi's in production so the engineering was largely done for conversions.
Converted DC10's made better freighters than L1011's because the DC10-30 airframe was much more capable from the outset and did not need much conversion work. I think even a DC10-10 domestic version offered better freighter performance than a Tristar freighter due to differences in max landing weight and max zero fuel weight. Lockheed did offer a freighter conversion but the amount of work to go from a -1 version to a viable freighter was huge as was the cost.

Saw an L1011 on the cargo ramp in Dubai this morning. It wasn't there yesterday, so I presume it flew in!

Owned/operated by SAM Intercontinental Group, presently flying for the United Nations...and will be joined by another shortly. Third to follow in June.
A -250 model, ex-DAL.
Can be seen in HLLT quite regularly.
A very nice aeroplane.;)

Yes but the TWA pilots did not help by putting fuel/ign on ridiculously early. We always waited to max motoring, they put it in at 15pc. So many times I stood on the headset watching the cul-de-sac fill with white smoke, and then the fire engines turn up!

We had a Tristar with -22Bs that only flew at the weekends from ARN in the winter. So Friday mornings we went out, swept the snow out of the intakes ( and the S duct), and started it up. As it started to rotate, the oil press went off-scale high, and the oil quantity went down to zero. Then fuel/ign on, and after about 30 secs the grumble starts, and stops, and starts again as the engine staggers into life. Enrich ON, and watch the TGT. It took 3-4 mins of starter engagement to get to self sustaining. The oil could take ages to warm up, then the pressure slowly came down, and finally the oil qty recovered.

There were many changes of the start design, different bleed valves powered etc but the problem on the -22B was the surge line was so close to the steady running line, there was not much accel fuel available, until you got to flight idle.

Quote:
Owned/operated by SAM Intercontinental Group, presently flying for the United Nations

Thanks 411A; the SLF were all in uniforms and blue hats so that's the one.
As for the TriStar being, Quote:
"best" product in terms of engineering and design excellence (including features and performance)
At one point a member of the cabin crew popped up out of the emergency hatch above the flight deck and proceeded to pour the contents of a 2 litre bottle of water down on to the windshields while the flight crew operated the wipers!
Even me mum's Ford Ka is fitted with windscreen washers :)

So does the L1011, however...if the maintenance folks fail to fill the reservior (a usual occurance), the water bottle routine is used...:ugh:

A total of 16 L-1011's were converted to freighters.

There was one (1) L-1011-1, eleven (11) -200's and four (4) -500's for the RAF.

The L-1011-1 was the first freighter the conversion was none without any Lockheed input. The conversion was started in Miami and completed Alabama. The remainder were accomplished by Marshall with full coperation of Lockheed.

Saw one a few years ago in Entebbe, rumour was that they were having trouble with its AWC and were trying to get it re-registered. The only things I can remember about it were that it took up one of the few refuelling bays at Entebbe whilst work was being carried out on it. The Airport Authority tried on several occasions to have it moved to the old Entebbe ramp which is now used mainly by the UN, whoever represented this a/c always promised that it would be gone in a "couple" of days. I remember it was a pax a/c that had been stripped out to carry freight, obviously it had no freight door, and I believe it made one attempt to carry boxes of fish but the loading time was horrendous and that was possibly the only attempt that was made. The only other distinguishing thing I can remember was that it had a girl's name painted on the nose, "Natalie", I think. This same a/c also did some "static" time on the cargo ramp at DXB, before being moved on. The last time I saw it, it was in RKT with a damaged belly hold door. Does anyone else remember this "bird" or its history?

Always had an interest in TriStars and was surprised to see this TriStar at Sydney in November 2004. It had no titles – white overall with red blue cheat lines along the windows which I later learnt was its old basic Tradewinds colours.

Various bits if research on the web has revealed its colourful history.

It’s a -200 series originally delivered to Gulf Air on 18 December 1980 as N92TA; and in service with Gulf Air between 1980 and 1990 when finally reregistered as A40-TA on 19 June 1990.

Then followed a varied career shuttling between storage in Cambridge UK and being bought by Tradewinds in the States with subleases to Guyana, Air Holland, Airtours and Tunis Air. In summer 2004 it was bought by Universal Air Trading, ferried to Dakar and re-registered as 3D-AAB. Then bought by West Air then in November 2004 bought by AeroLift. It then flew Johannesburg – Calcutta - Philippines in ex-Tradewinds colours with no titles and was re-registered as 9Q-CVN on 18 November 2004 had an in-flight engine shutdown prompting a landing at Cairns when with no titles it was named "Natali".

It was ferried to Sydney for further work on 20 November 2004 and left I believe by Christmas that year. It was later seen in Karachi, Pakistan on 31 December 2004, in Sofia, Bulgaria on 14 January 2005 and was bought on 18 April 2005 by Vadim Lahktin, leased to Almiron Aviation in Uganda and re-registered as 5X-AAL. Almiron was a new cargo operator in the region and planned to operate specialized charter flights between Africa, Europe, and the Middle East. Their first revenue cargo service was operated at the beginning of April 2005 between Dubai and Lagos. It was seen in service in Johannesburg on 11 May 2005 still with no titles and in basic Tradewinds colours. The Internet is full of stories about a dubious awarding of its airworthiness certification in Uganda.

On 13 July 2005 at 1545hrs it skidded off runway on landing in a heavy downpour in Lagos, Nigeria which closed the airport for 2 days although there were no injuries. Various reports state it was flying illegally, that it had been seized by the Lagos authorities but the owner reporting it was only a rumour, it was a minor incident, the aircraft was released and in service again by 13 August 2005. Other reports saying that early in 2005, Almiron Aviation [South Africa] had entered into a cooperation agreement of L-1011-200 5X-AAL (msn 1201) with its owners (one Vadim Lahktin).

However, since the aircraft's subsequent registration in Uganda, it was beset with technical problems and its stated that the owner did not posses the Supplementary Type Certificate he required to perform the conversion from a passenger aircraft to a so-called "bulk-load" freighter. Not being able to comply with the Aviation Authorities of Uganda anymore, the aircraft's owner planned to re-register the aircraft in Kyrgizstan. On 2 October 2005 it was reported as seen parked at Ras al Khaimah in United Arab Emirates.

I believe this is also the final resting place of ex British Airways -1 series TriStars G-BBAF & G-BBAH - aircraft that we also used as freighters in their final years although always using the passenger doors which must have limited the freight carriage somewhat.

Last report I can find states it as being returned ex lease to Vadim Lahktin and stored at Ras al Khaimah.

All the above apart from my own sighting is sourced from the web - which as we all know is not renowned for its accuracy.

Ex Caledonian Tristars
 

Anyone know what happend to tt-dae and tt-dwe ex Caledonian tristars
flew on one of these in 1999 to Rhodes Ithink one is in Manas kyrgistan
laid up according to german lockheed web page?