Just Curious: What Commercial Airliners, Have Really High Power-To-Weight Ratios>?

[Richard M. A. Wood]

Boeing 707 200 series. Only a few, I think 4 or 5 were made for Braniff originally then they were traded for B727's from BWIA. They were the rocket ships of that time. Fast and could climb very quickly, especially from a hot and relatively high runway but extremely fuel INEFFICIENT. There are a few pix of these in Braniff and BWIA colors in the D/B.

In my opinion the A300-600 has a very good performance as well. I did many flights (66) on it and their climbouts were impressive.
Another pretty powerful airplane is the MD11F Love those take offs

[Alex - Spot-This !]

Worst? 727's and DC-9

727 are well known for their pretty good thrust performance... One of the worst got to be the 340.... They couldn't take if if the earth was flat....

[SYDCBRWOD]

I'd be looking when fuel was cheap and the many manufacturers back then were searching for a USP (Unique Selling Proposition for any non marketing types).

How about Convair 990? Haven't checked the thrust to weight ratios but high speed comes from aerodynamics and power - don't know the 990 was particularly clean (despite the "Kuchemann Carrots"), so fairly well powered?

Either that or the 747SP - that had a reputation as a hot rod.

[UncleFire]

I've been on quite a few 757 flights that seemed like they climbed like bats out of hell.

Worst? 727's and DC-9

[Gabriel]

What commercial airliners, both past & present, are considered "hotrods?"

I'm told the Boeing 777 is "king." Others have mentioned that the 757 w/ Rolls Royce engines is up there, too.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uMaR66OZyrw

As a kid, I thought the stretched 60-series DC-8's, looked "lean & mean" , but I don't know if they were especially powerful.

Thanks for the opinions...

While thrust-to-weight ratio is the main factor affecting steady (i.e. constant speed and constant vertical speed) climbs, this video has nothing to do with that.

- In airshows the planes can be very light (no payload, little fuel), and thrust-to-weight is measured at MTOW which is a more typical take-off and climb weight.
- The plane in this video has a BIG LOT of energy stored as kinetic energy. Even a glider with a thrust-to-weight ratio of 0, zero, nill, nothing, nada, can climb like hell after a very fast low fly-by.

[Spectator]

On topic

Can we move this out of the Safety forum?

[old timer]

MD-90 - class of its own.

Agree

[HalcyonDays]

MD-90 - class of its own.

[Alessandro]

IL-62 is pretty powerful...

[xspeedy]

Just from a seat of the pants passenger perspective, I have always thought the smaller jets were powerful. The older 737 series and the DC-9/MD80. Nothing seemed to rocket to altitude from takeoff like them. Maybe some of that has to do with more than power/weight though.

[Ulver]

What commercial airliners, both past & present, are considered "hotrods?"

I'm told the Boeing 777 is "king." Others have mentioned that the 757 w/ Rolls Royce engines is up there, too.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uMaR66OZyrw

As a kid, I thought the stretched 60-series DC-8's, looked "lean & mean" , but I don't know if they were especially powerful.

Thanks for the opinions...