NAC Airline Review Boeing 737 edition

 

Airline review presents the NAC Boeing 737

Contents page and NAC's Choice

NAC's choice of the Boeing 737

The Boeing 737 for NAC

Boeing 737-200 dimensions

Boeing 737 cross-section and sample cabin

Boeing 737 side view, furnishings and equipment and features

Pratt & Whitney JT8D engine

Pratt & Whitney JT8D engine

Why wing mounted engines for the 737

More on engines

The Boeing Company

The Boeing Company

The 737 under construction

What was the fate of the first Boeing plane?

The Government-owned National Airways Corporation was set up to be the national domestic air carrier with a statutory monopoly, in the mid 1960s it was considering the next generation of airliners. It had the Vickers Viscount as its turboprop main trunk aircraft, the Fokker Friendship F27 was already the turboprop regional route mainstay as it phased out the Douglas DC-3.  NAC was under pressure in the 1960s to order the British made BAC 1-11 as its first jet aircraft, but eventually convinced the Government of the day that it should order the Boeing 737. This was the first Boeing airliner order by a New Zealand Government owned airline.  The Boeing 737 at the time was not considered a great success by Boeing, as sales had been slow for the small jet, squeezed by the McDonnell Douglas DC-9 as a larger competitor (which itself was chosen as the smaller jet for TAA and Ansett in Australia.  NAC ordered three Boeing 737s initially and ended up with eight before merging with Air New Zealand in 1978.  Subsequently, Air New Zealand had a fleet of 10 Boeing 737s, renewing then in the mid 1980s with the 200 Advanced series and in 1998 with the last production series of the 737-300 model (ultimately replaced in 2015 by Airbus A320s.

After choosing the Boeing 737(200 series), NAC produced this special edition of its magazine, airline review. It contains the following interesting information:

• A brief comparison with the economics of the 737 vs. the BAC 1-11
• The cabin width was initially a 3-2 configuration (with the middle seat having a width of 20 inches), in the 1970s this would be come 3-3. Initially NAC was intending to operate 737s with 90 seats, subsequently increased to 115
• Detailed description of the 737 history and design elements
• Boeing 737 diagrams of side, cross section across and sideways and Pratt & Whitney JT8D low-bypass turbofans
• Story of the Pratt & Whitney JT8D low-bypass turbofan
• Why engines for the 737 are wing-mounted? (noting at the time the BAC 1-11, DC-9 and Boeing 727 all had rear-mounted engines, and wing-mounted engines are the norm for almost all jet airliners in 2023)
• Profile of the Boeing Company
• A link to the first Boeing plane and New Zealand.

The Boeing 737-200 was a great success for NAC and Air New Zealand subsequently.  Not visible in this magazine, but the 737 also saw NAC launch a new (and its final) airline livery.