Boeing 7's & Airbus 3's
 

Does anyone know why all Boeings are prefixed with a 7 and all Airbus with a 3? Are these random numbers or do they actually mean something?

3's and 7's
 

Hello JL,

Boeing named it's civil aircraft sequentially. The 400/500/600 series were military aircraft or missiles. They were in the 300s when the 707 came aong.

I recall the A300 being so named for the maximum amount of passengers it could carry.

Both designations sort of stuck (marketing) and this is where we are today.

Welcome to the forums ! :)

Are Boeing 800 and 900 ranges also assigned to military or are they free?

What is the next Boeing after 797?

Thanks vapilot. Being trying to find that out for ages but no one seemed to know! I can rest easy at night now until the next obscure question comes into my head! :D

Just ask how many engines a B727 has.
Than ask about B737.......

Then ask about 707... :}

Contrary to popular belief, the 707 is actually a glider - No engines fitted.

707 has only one :cool:

Go on then. How many engines does 727 have? Don't need to ask about 737 as work on it and the 777 (talk about one extreme to the other!)

Is it true that 717 was sold and became MD80? If so did it ever fly under Boeing flag?

When Boeing merged with MD in 1996/97 it took on the MD-95 and developed it into the Boeing 717. The 717 originally started life in 1983 when a shortened version of the MD-81 was conceived and dubbed the DC-9-90. This emerged in 1991 dubbed the MD-87-105 before naming as MD-95. As an aside the original Boeing 717 was a 1960's derivative of the 707 that became the KC-135 which is what you may be alluding to.

A little pedantic I know, but I don't think it's correct that the original 717 was a derivative of the 707 - the two were different airframes but were developed concurrently, the former as a military tanker transport and the latter with a slightly wider body for civil passenger transport. Remember also the original designation of 367-80 (often known as the Dash 80) was a feint.

As for Airbus, the second Airbus model, the A310, was originally designated the A300-B10, so I suppose the series continued from that point to the A320 and so on.

Just to add to Golf Charlie Charlie's learned post:

In addition to the KC135 'Stratotanker', the original B717 designation also applied to the C135 'Stratolifter', the military transport version of the 707. I think 45 of the C135 As and Bs were produced for the USAF MATS (Military Air Transport Service).

GCC, you are quite correct. I was using the derivative in the sense of "copied or adapted from others; lacking originality". The dash 80 after all was the prototype for both product lines. The lineage of the 720 would seem to infer that even within Boeing at some level there was a "derivative" mentality of the two product lines. The Boeing web site says "The 720 was a short-range, high-performance version of the 707 and was first marketed to the airlines as the model 707-020. United Airlines was very interested in the 707-020 but had previously decided to go with Douglas and the DC-8. To help United avoid any negative public relations for going back to the 707, Boeing changed the name of the 707-020 to the 720." The 720 was in fact structually and aerodynamically different than the 707 and after initially gaining the 707-020 designation became the 717-020 because the fuselage was returned to the length of the tanker (717/KC-135). It then came to be known as the 720 for the reason stated re United.
The confusion that exists and how we relate to these aircraft is shown in MrBernoulli's post.
As he says the Stratolifter was the military transport version of the 717/KC-135, not the 707. The military transport version of the 707 was the -137.

Brian, your memory is better than mine - in fact the 720 had a separate FAA type certificate - 4A28 - as opposed to the 707-100/200's 4A21.

Not on the ones I played with. There was no APU, just high pressure bottles for use when the pufftruck wasn't available.

jetset lady
Can you please repeat the question?
Was it something to do with the "7" prefix on the Boeing and the "3" prefix on the Airbus?
:confused:

GE 90 - was an underhanded reference to the Avro 707 :p

I wanted to know why all boeings were prefixed with a 7 and all airbus with a 3.

Thanks to all who have replied. I never knew it was so complicated but good to know stuff like that. Also good to know where to come when have questions though as I drive our poor engineers mad wanting to know what things do and how they work etc.
Thanks again

at least you got the first thing right - if yout to know know HOW something works - ask an engineer! if you want to know IF it works, ask a pilot.

So true!!!!!!!!!! The number of times we make it work and then a pilot comes along and stops it working.


"Brian Abraham "GE 90 - was an underhanded reference to the Avro 707"

I'm not that old. Come to think of it, I remember topping up the high pressure bottle at the back of our VC10's as they hadn't got APU's either. But that's another topic.