This should be near and dear to Bob's heart. Why he and a lot of other engineers had a job building airliners. Boeing 707 is 60
I remember those days as if they were yesterday. We had already produced drawings with the upper fuselage frames at the smaller diameter but having our supervisor's wife working as a secretary on mahogany row we were getting the real story about why the frames weren't increased in diameter. The ad hoc company salesman was Wellwood Beale and he was resisting the increase because it would increase drag and because we already had a lot of parts already made. He got into a wrestling match with pres. Bill Allen and lost. We junked all the frames and started with new ones and did new drawings. The new crown line was higher and moved the tangent point something like three feet aft of the old KC-135 point. If one looks at the 707 profile you will see that it isn't symmetrical like the KC-135, directly above the keel line tangent point. The expanded upper lobe also had to be dropped back down to the original crown line at the 48 section pressure bulkhead so there is a break in contour that you won't see on the KC-135. Those days were exciting, busy, and a never ending parade of new design modifications and new airplanes. Beale soon left the company and went to Douglas. The company was not only wide awake and had vision but it aggressively followed up on its visions. It had great engineering talent, the best mechanics and production specialists, and a marvelous president who praised the employees at every opportunity. Not like that now and it's sad. Anyway, I have mentioned this in my book which is reaching the point of throwing it over the fence for someone else to finish. It is almost done.
Got to thinking about the mid 50's and the never ending scramble that started with the 707-120. We no sooner got that on its way when we started to stretch it and do new wings and engines for the -320. Then there was a mod for the -227 and the -138. No sooner got that going and the 720 came along, a wonderful story how a last minute call from Bill Allen to UAL president Patterson, who was about to sign an order with Convair for some 880's, that he could guarantee light weight engines for the 720. Patterson turned around and went to Seattle, thus eventually killing Convair. Then it was the 720B with the first fan engines, and the -320B with fans. No breathing room because we stated work on the 727-100 and when that was in production, the 727-200 was slipped in. While a bunch of guys went to work on the 737 we went to work on the SST and the C5 and after all of that was lost it was the 747 and 757. You just couldn't slow down until the big layoff forced some of us to. After that, the 767 and 777 got things rolling again. It was a great ride!, 48 years worth with a lot of great stories.
Convair's pitch with their 880/990 was that they were faster than the 707 and DC-8. How much concern within Boeing was there that this would cost 707 sales? Jeff
If I remember, Boeing was concerned about the 880 but aware of its shortcomings in the economics and small size. Convairs were never known for reliability, also. When the 720B came out , nothing could touch it.
I can't wait! I'll want to come out to Seattle and have you autograph it personally. Incidentally, one of my SJU-JFK flights in the sixties was on a Pan Am 707 which turned out to be a 720B instead of the usual 707-120B. What a hot rod!
Yeah, it was really a scooter. One of my favorite stories about it was when we were investigating the reasons why Western Airlines was blowing so many high pressure bleed ducts on their 720B's and no one else was. The answer, " We're doing anything to beat United to LA and we're running just under the bell." That would be the Mach warning bell. He also mentioned that the power settings of airplane had to be carefully monitored as the fuel burned off. I was on a test flight of a NWA 720B in 1962 and we left Boeing Field to the north and 10 min. later we were at 33,000 over the Olympic Peninsula heading south. I was in the jump seat and saw nothing but blue sky after rotation. This book thing isn't all about aviation, a lot of it is , but I simply sat down and covered what my life was like from 1926 to about 2004. I wonder now how I survived some of it. We would be glad to meet you again and have lunch at Paine Field. Bob
Sixty years ago, I attended View Ridge Elementary School in Seattle. One day all the students assembled out on the playground (not raining). The Principal told us to look up in the sky. A few minutes later the first 707 flew by. I remember it being orange and brown, and made lots of noise. I remember it like it was yesterday. What a GREAT plane to fly in 
I believe that you saw the 367-80, the 707 prototype. It always drew people's interest when it flew over. Great days!
It was the 707 that made me the aerospace engineer that I am today! When I was 6, we were living in Plainview on Long Island, NY. One day in spring of 1959, I was playing in my yard, probably after school, and I heard a loud roaring noise overhead. I looked up and saw the underside of one of the first 707s heading outbound from Idlewild to Europe. At that moment, my career choice was made up. At the age of 6!
I get a kick out of comparing the 1960 Eastern Air Lines schedule that I have (which coincided with my first airline flight - on that other 4-engine jet) with today's schedules. The one DC-8 flight listed for N.Y. to San Juan is listed as 3 hours, 15 minutes, exactly 1/2 of what the DC-6s used on all the other NYC-SJU flights were taking. Today, the average listed flight time is 4 hours or a little more! Two obvious reasons for that: in 1960, the jets were new and the airlines were trying to impress the flying public just how much faster they were. And, of course, fuel was relatively cheap. They were presumably flying at the aircraft's listed maximum cruise speed; today, with higher fuel prices, they are flying at a more economical speed. The airplanes may not be physically slower today, but they way they are being used sure is.
Thanks, Bob. And since we chose the same profession, that means that we were both very smart, or not so smart! At least I got my piece of the Boeing commercial pie with my time on the 767 and 777 programs. But the flights on my next trip are on one that I didn't have any part of, the 757.
I didn't either, Jim. I missed assignments on the odd numbered birds, the 737 and 757 except for the 777. It's really sad that the 757 was so admired by everyone except the flying public due to the narrow body. It is really a darn good airplane. One of my most interesting assignments was to mate a shortened 767 fuselage to a 757 wing. I got it all worked out structurally but the 767 fuselage weight and aero was too much make the economics work and everybody knew that except the guy who wanted to do it. I got a big raise out of my working it out but it wasn't going anywhere.
the first or 1 of the orignals is hanging from the ceiling of the ''museam of science and industry'' in chicago,il,
That reference is to the 727; they cycle the flaps and landing gear on regular occasion. Another of United's early 727s was at the Museum of Flight annex in Everett, WA the last time I was there.
My first flight in a 707 was from Oslo, Norway to Idlewild in Spring 1961. I remember first seeing a 707 when they started flying into Oslo in 1959 or 1960. The Norwegian AF flew F-86s at that time and I always ran out and looked up when I heard one. One day it sounded like a whole formation of F-86s going over, but when I looked up, it was a 707 with those loud turbojets. The first flight on Pan-Am was fun and everybody was dressed like they were going to church. Young, pretty stewardesses that made a fuss over you and served excellent food. Too young to drink then, but Dad, a major in the USAF, seemed very happy. Except that our trip home on an ocean liner had been cancelled because all USAF personnel had to fly home while the Army and Navy could still take the ship home. An adventure for me, a disappointment for the folks. After my only other flight in a C-47 with Dad as the pilot, the acceleration and climb angle on the 707 was a whole different world. And indeed, the 707 did open up a whole new world.
Taz, your comment re the climb angle of the 707 reminded me of the resistance of some airline chief pilots to operate the airplane the way it was designed. American hung on to the prop type of slow gradual climb out until they were convinced that the 707 did not require that. It took several highly damaging incidents before the airlines untrained their pilots in prop driven airplane habits. The 707 days were exciting and incredibly fast moving and Boeing pulled all stops to produce a winner and I think that they did. Some mistakes, too, but overall a very successful effort. The pace was not for old folks.
Bob- Affirmative, I had quite a few hours in the back of C-118s (DC-6s) flying aroung the Mid-East and Europe in the 60s when Dad was stationed in Turkey. Really glacial climb rate and very shallow pitch angle. The airlines eventually figured out you wanted to get to thin, cold air as quickly as possible for better fuel consumption and higher mach number. Took a while for the pilots to get used to the pitch angles that required, though. It just felt dangerous to them after years of prop flying, like you said.
landings were also a problem then. We had 4, that I can recall, in the first two years where the go-around procedures after an over-shoot again reverted to props and not jets . AOG had two of them going at once. Then there were under-shoots that wiped out the bottoms of two 320's within a two week period. One certainly cannot fault the pilots when they had been so throughly trained in propellor procedures for thousands of hours and then were faced with a new beast that required reverse technique in some instances.
Bob- It took those early turbo-jets quite a while to spool up. Not the same as a recip's near instant response and prop reversibility. The later engines and fans were much better and had thrust reversers. Do not remember when those were first introduced. Dad flew F-84A and B straight wings, which were not only seriously underpowered, but very slow to respond. Made formation flying and go-arounds a challenge. Luckily, they had a lot of lift from those fat wings.
Right on, Terry. Those incidents of which I mentioned were directly attributed to spool up either for a go-around or to correct the undershoot. On the go-around, the pilot applied power and immediately hauled back and applied power as he retracted the gear. The airplane settled onto the runway with full power as the gear was retracting. The AOG crew got it back in the air in 33 days after replacing the lower fuselage, both main gear, all engines and struts, and unbelievably, the lower wing skins on the right hand wing. We couldn't believe the list of replacement parts that included the lower skins. No easy task but they did it. The most amazing crew of mechanics in the world.
