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Retro-jet maintenance
On another site (I know, I know), there is a group that shares photos of old, classic airliner liveries, and occasionally someone will drop in a photo of a modern-day retro-jet American Airlines bird. With just a few of those special edition aircraft flying around, how does American keep up with the techniques, equipment and materials to keep a shiny bare aluminium finish looking its best. Or are there plenty of experienced folks still around who have specialized skills? Or is it like washing a Chevy vs. a Honda. They're both cars and it really doesn't matter that much. Thanks.
Re: Retro-jet maintenance
Not sure about the American Airlines retro liveries, but when I was working for Aer Lingus a couple of years ago we also had quite a few special liveries, one of them a retro livery (EI-DVM). I don't think maintenance needed to apply special procedures/considerations due to the livery. From the pilots side, there are no changes in procedures whatever the livery.
Re: Retro-jet maintenance
There really isn't much to keeping the bare aluminum nice. Just a lot of manpower. It's just a pneumatic driven buffer with a very light polishing compound. It's similar to what is used when a car is detailed. It is a mind numbing task in my eyes. I worked a maintenance contract once where we had to buff the wings of a small 19 pax plane every six months. Myself and the other contract AMT had to do it since the company could not find a sub to do it. No a fun job.
The process is likely done by some of the lowest payed employees of the the airline, exterior cleaners. Or more likely now it is contracted to an even lower payed service.
The process is likely done by some of the lowest payed employees of the the airline, exterior cleaners. Or more likely now it is contracted to an even lower payed service.
Re: Retro-jet maintenance
A lot of the retrojets simply deviate from the historical design to make it easier to maintain, for exactly that reason. For example, Lufthansa's retro 747 has a pearl gray in place of the original natural metal, which is hardly noticeable unless you find it in the right lighting. At that point, they should have just saved the effort and done it BAC 707 gray all over. See this thread where it goes into the weeds on it:
https://airlinercafe.com/forums.php?m=p ... 7526#77526
Several other airlines have taken creative liberties as well. IINM AA messed up with one of the Astrojet 738s and painted the logo too low on the fin. I bet 99% of people don't notice anyway....
https://airlinercafe.com/forums.php?m=p ... 7526#77526
Several other airlines have taken creative liberties as well. IINM AA messed up with one of the Astrojet 738s and painted the logo too low on the fin. I bet 99% of people don't notice anyway....
Re: Retro-jet maintenance
AA’s polished metal looked like crap unless the plane was brand new. They did awful jobs at polishing them if they ever did
Re: Retro-jet maintenance
UA444 wrote:AA’s polished metal looked like crap unless the plane was brand new. They did awful jobs at polishing them if they ever did
I couldn’t disagree more, AA did a very good job keeping up the polished metal finish, the worst I saw was not bad, most were very good to excellent
If you want to see an airline that did a terrible job with a polished metal finish look at the Northwest or Flying Tiger 747 freighters
Looked amazing when brand new then I don’t think they polished them again, they looked terrible, like they had a skin disease
Re: Retro-jet maintenance
Max Q wrote:
Looked amazing when brand new then I don’t think they polished them again, they looked terrible, like they had a skin disease
Oxidation on NWs bare metal surfaces always looked like crap. Especially around the doors where jetway rubber rubbed against the metal. Every time I heard the NW gong on the radio I’d see that oxidized metal in my minds eye - yuck.
Re: Retro-jet maintenance
zanl188 wrote:Max Q wrote:
Looked amazing when brand new then I don’t think they polished them again, they looked terrible, like they had a skin disease
Oxidation on NWs bare metal surfaces always looked like crap. Especially around the doors where jetway rubber rubbed against the metal. Every time I heard the NW gong on the radio I’d see that oxidized metal in my minds eye - yuck.
Yes
It’s a shame, if you’re going to go with polished metal you have to maintain it, otherwise just paint
Re: Retro-jet maintenance
Max Q wrote:UA444 wrote:AA’s polished metal looked like crap unless the plane was brand new. They did awful jobs at polishing them if they ever did
I couldn’t disagree more, AA did a very good job keeping up the polished metal finish, the worst I saw was not bad, most were very good to excellent
If you want to see an airline that did a terrible job with a polished metal finish look at the Northwest or Flying Tiger 747 freighters
Looked amazing when brand new then I don’t think they polished them again, they looked terrible, like they had a skin disease
NW’s 742 cargo Jets also looked bad but even they started painting them with their newest livery by the end.
I just would see too many AA’s with swirls and polish marks or scratches and it just made them look tired.
The worst I’ve seen was when AC and US stripped some planes as an experiment. AC had a 767 and US had a 737 in the mid 2000s. Those were bad.
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