What is the most best, brilliant, sexiest, attractive, coolest, sleakest, boldest airliner ever made? Avoid obvious answers like the Concorde as its makes for better discussion. Please suggest your choice(s) and reasons why. The more detail the better.
My three picks:
Airbus A340
Convair C880/990 series
DC-8
I think a sleak fuselage and long wingspan make these birds really look magestic. The small cylindrical engines as well also add alot to its appearance. The way the wings blend into the fuselage as well is quite great.
Well, if you ask “ever”, then you don’t get three picks, do ya?
For me, no question, it’s the Lockheed Constellation- and yes, I specifically mean the original, not the later Super Connie. The original has pure flowing lines like a yacht.
For me it’s the Boeing 757. Something about the proportions of a long, thin, fuselage, elegant wings, and big engines. It looks like you would have to chain the thing down just to keep it from flying off the ramp. Also, until you have been in a 757 in a full power go-around (runway incursion), you have no idea the climb rate that engine-wing combination can generate.
I have an emotional attachment for the 727 (several hundred flights in those), the DC-8, and several others, but you said best looking.
I have had a lot of flights in DC-9’s, Super 80s, and the like, but somehow I could never warm to them aesthetically or emotionally. Still, I’ll model of them just because they have carried me to some interesting places.
I would have to vote for the Super Connie over the original because the latter had a longer nose, front and rear fuselage and the wing tip tanks which all together gave it more pleasing lines than the original.
Definately the 747-400… The long body, shapely tail, and attractive wing tips… I simply couldnt look past it!.. It commands the skies as the elite, and even with the entry of the A380, it will still be seen as the “1st class” of commercial airliners!..
[#ditto] I have to agree. There hasn’t been another airliner built since that had the flowing lines of the Connie. The original Connie was too squat compared to the Super Connie.
Maybe a distinction should be made as Jet or Recip. In either case IMHO it’s the Connies super or otherwise.As the wise man once said if it don’t have a prop its not an airplane.
