VC10 vs 707

[Scott Kenny]

I think the core of the problem was the attitude to air travel in the 1950s in US and UK.
The US increasingly used its air routes in the bus style as transport systems. British long range airliners focussed on the old Imperial Airways routes to Johannesburg and the Far East. They were luxury birds for the few.
Concorde was another product of this mindset which also led to Cunard's never-built Q3 liner.
The 707 feeds directly into the 747.Mass air travel is born in the USA.

Very much this.

BOAC was thinking that they were only going to fly Ministers etc around to whatever forced their personal appearance, while Boeing and the American airlines were trying to replace the railroads for passenger travel.

 

[alertken]

The late Pres. Jimmy Carter 10/78 signed the Airline Deregulation Act, which removed artificial constraints on US domestic air travel, so causing Peanuts fares and orders for batches of 100 a/c. International Open Skies took awhile longer, and is still not quite there.

Until 1970 UK citizens' access to foreign currency (for non-business purposes) was constrained to £50 p/person, p.a. Nation States owned Traffic Rights and their Designated Scheduled Carriers, and defined fares, frequencies, size of sandwiches, all to avoid "wasteful" competition. So, when Launching (to be) A300B Airbus, Nations put up (most/all) the R&D money in expectation that AF, BA, LH would each take...6.

When Juan Trippe Launched 707-100 (20) and DC-8/30 (25) his Fleet was computed around 2 US Customs Ports of Entry, no domestic feed to them (where Howard Hughes' TWA had hefty feed), and must battle with all political might to force foreigners to let him in, pick up local treasure and repatriate it into $: Nations all wanted at least equal capacity for their own parastatals and imposed fares at rates minimising their losses - they all made losses.

I am deeply disdainful of Vickers, DH, for permitting BOAC/BEAC to define their products and expecting the State either to pay the whole R&D bill or to guarantee a Breakeven Launch Order. But the past is a place where things were done differently.

 

[Hood]

I am deeply disdainful of Vickers, DH, for permitting BOAC/BEAC to define their products and expecting the State either to pay the whole R&D bill or to guarantee a Breakeven Launch Order. But the past is a place where things were done differently.

But they couldn't have funded such developments any other way. British banks would not have lent the credit and as you say, the penny packet orders from State airlines and those nations economically tied to UK credit were never going to be enough to recoup any profit.

In theory Vickers should have made a tidy profit on the Viscount but there is no evidence that those sales helped it fund subsequent programmes (Vanguard probably wasted a large chunk of R&D cash - again down to BEA).

In hindsight, Vickers should have ignored the VC.10 and put their eggs into the VC.11 basket, that might have had more success.

No VC10 was sold in open market competition - Ghana/EAAC were Aid, BUA was cultivating political favour, its evolution as BCal, wholly 707. That was for a reason: weight, like all Brit brick dunnies.

I suspect the large factor that has often been overlooked is Capital - US banks bankrolling purchases of 707s etc. in this period. The US funded a several airport developments in Africa with big loans and doubtless any airline wanting jet airliners to go with their new jet airliner capable airport was 'steered' into an attractive loan for Boeings or Douglases.
Today the lease companies hold massive sway.
I feel that for British airliners to succeed The City needed to loosen its purse strings - though the decline of Sterling in favour of the Dollar area would have made that more difficult. Certainly the overall UK economic situation had quite a big impact on export success (in many fields, as has been pointed out BMC fared no better selling under-priced cars).

Perhaps a slightly far-fetched solution would be a national (i.e. with State shareholding) leasing company, the banks and State bankroll a fleet of airliners for overseas airlines to lease. Tie in a firm like Airwork and you can offer maintenance packages, airfield operations. Give Taylor Woodrow a shareholding and get them building airports for people. Sure its expensive and capital intensive but you've got to buy customer loyalty. A smooth ride in a VC.10 might please the passengers but means nothing to the bean counters.

 

[Rule of cool]

But they couldn't have funded such developments any other way. British banks would not have lent the credit and as you say, the penny packet orders from State airlines and those nations economically tied to UK credit were never going to be enough to recoup any profit.

In theory Vickers should have made a tidy profit on the Viscount but there is no evidence that those sales helped it fund subsequent programmes (Vanguard probably wasted a large chunk of R&D cash - again down to BEA).

In hindsight, Vickers should have ignored the VC.10 and put their eggs into the VC.11 basket, that might have had more success.


I suspect the large factor that has often been overlooked is Capital - US banks bankrolling purchases of 707s etc. in this period. The US funded a several airport developments in Africa with big loans and doubtless any airline wanting jet airliners to go with their new jet airliner capable airport was 'steered' into an attractive loan for Boeings or Douglases.
Today the lease companies hold massive sway.
I feel that for British airliners to succeed The City needed to loosen its purse strings - though the decline of Sterling in favour of the Dollar area would have made that more difficult. Certainly the overall UK economic situation had quite a big impact on export success (in many fields, as has been pointed out BMC fared no better selling under-priced cars).

Perhaps a slightly far-fetched solution would be a national (i.e. with State shareholding) leasing company, the banks and State bankroll a fleet of airliners for overseas airlines to lease. Tie in a firm like Airwork and you can offer maintenance packages, airfield operations. Give Taylor Woodrow a shareholding and get them building airports for people. Sure its expensive and capital intensive but you've got to buy customer loyalty. A smooth ride in a VC.10 might please the passengers but means nothing to the bean counters.

The BOAC order for 35 + 20 VC10s was the largest civil order in British history, with BEA's order for 24 + 10 Tridents he same year being the second largest. IIUC the Government believed that only Hawker Siddeley approached the market capitalisation to handle orders of that size, so 'encouraged' industry consolidation. Given how Vickers got into financial trouble developing the VC10 despite a 'firm' order for 35 and options for 20 its hard to fault the Government's logic that a company approaching triple the size could far more easily handle such a financial burden.

 

[Foo Fighter]

That's the most frustrating thing about British history, they had the tools (or the makings of the tools) but failed to capitalise on them.

I think they made plenty of tools, problem is they proceeded to employ them.....

 

[Hood]

Given how Vickers got into financial trouble developing the VC10 despite a 'firm' order for 35 and options for 20

The break even point was 80 - so they needed to shift another 45-25 to recoup the costs, let alone a profit.
The British airline industry at that time couldn't take enough aircraft to make a viable production run without export orders.

And given the British airlines are state owned, it's taxpayers money funding the purchases anyway regardless of any R&D launch cost aid.

 

[Rule of cool]

The break even point was 80 - so they needed to shift another 45-25 to recoup the costs, let alone a profit.
The British airline industry at that time couldn't take enough aircraft to make a viable production run without export orders.

And given the British airlines are state owned, it's taxpayers money funding the purchases anyway regardless of any R&D launch cost aid.

Firstly, allow me to re-iterate my interest is in the Super 200. I'm aware that by the time it reached production the raison d'être for the standard VC10 was quickly vanishing and I am more than satisfied that BOAC dropping it's order down to 12 was the right thing to do.

The break-even point fluctuated, it was initially 80 and BOAC initially ordered (or optioned?) 25. Vickers then changed it's production plans to re-use Vangaurd jigs from a break-even point of 35 and BOAC ordered 35 with an option for 20, the biggest civil order in British history. With the BOAC order alone making the revised break-even point Vickers decided to make new production jigs, again bringing the break-even point back to 80 as they only needed to sell 25 (or 45) after BOAC. BOAC changed it's order in September 1961 to 15 VC10s and 35 of the now cut-down Supers, which is still a big order and within 30 units of the break-even point of 80.

IIUC at the time of the damaging public spat BOAC management was pushing for more B707s and was an early adopter of the B747, so the capacity was there. What's more the shrunken Super BC10 was profitable in BOAC/BA service due to its popularity and subsequent high load factor.

As for the public funding, that was how many (most) Western economies were run in the post-war 'Bretton Woods' system in order to maintain full employment. My musings are to learn if within this system better commercial results could be obtained.

 

[Mike Pryce]

In theory Vickers should have made a tidy profit on the Viscount

A marketing chap from HSA HQ told me Vickers' famed high quality manufacturing came with a high cost and no profits on any civil contract, including the Viscount. Valiant and mil VC10s, plus TSR2 R&D, kept them going.

 

[uk 75]

Building and operating civil airliners has proved so difficult that only two giant manufacturers in the West provide all the heirs to VC10 and Trident.
Created out of BOAC and BEA and then privatised, British Airways no longer has to defer to Whitehall or British Aerospace when it selects its aircraft.
The UK has sold off the manufacture of private aircraft to others and focuses on military machines. RAF orders alone are no longer sufficient to get these built and multi national collaboration is the order of the day.
The once mighty United States has seen its great airlines like Pan Am, TWA and American go to the wall. Boeing has swallowed up its competitors and is now plagued with UK levels of mismanagement and poor build quality.

 

[Scott Kenny]

As for the public funding, that was how many (most) Western economies were run in the post-war 'Bretton Woods' system in order to maintain full employment. My musings are to learn if within this system better commercial results could be obtained.

It should be, but I'd need a whole lot of documents that I'm not sure are even available to know for sure...

Let's start with a simple one: Design was optimized for hot and high.

Denver and Salt Lake City. Reno and Las Vegas. Albuquerque. Phoenix. Any large flight from any one of those cities would be well served by them. And that's just in the US.

 

[Rule of cool]

It should be, but I'd need a whole lot of documents that I'm not sure are even available to know for sure...

Let's start with a simple one: Design was optimized for hot and high.

Denver and Salt Lake City. Reno and Las Vegas. Albuquerque. Phoenix. Any large flight from any one of those cities would be well served by them. And that's just in the US.

Sorry, I meant for the airline building company rather than the airlines themselves. Was it possible for Vickers/BAC to make a profit from VC10 production if the Super 200 had been persisted with, rather than being truncated down into something that had worse operating economics that the B707?

 

[Rule of cool]

Building and operating civil airliners has proved so difficult that only two giant manufacturers in the West provide all the heirs to VC10 and Trident.
Created out of BOAC and BEA and then privatised, British Airways no longer has to defer to Whitehall or British Aerospace when it selects its aircraft.
The UK has sold off the manufacture of private aircraft to others and focuses on military machines. RAF orders alone are no longer sufficient to get these built and multi national collaboration is the order of the day.
The once mighty United States has seen its great airlines like Pan Am, TWA and American go to the wall. Boeing has swallowed up its competitors and is now plagued with UK levels of mismanagement and poor build quality.

That's a very long story arc that took decades to play out compressed down to a couple of sentences. That story arc had dozens of even hundreds of major, consequential decisions that might have altered the trajectory of the arc significantly.

Personally I find it more difficult to believe that the countries that gave us the Mercure and VFW 614 formed the most powerful airliner production company while the country that gave us VC10, Trident and BAC1-11 didn't take the next step. I find it far more believable to think that with the tools at their disposal Britain could take the lead with airliners in the 70s, perhaps in conjunction with the other successful European airline manufacturer of the 60s; Fokker.

 

[uk 75]

The UK opted to go where the money was both in civil aviation and space.
British Airways has been despite ups and downs far more successful than Lufthansa and Air France not to mention Pan Am and TWA.
British Satelites and related technologies have carved out lucrative business for the UK leaving launchers to others.
The Boys Own Paper romantics who wanted us to persevere with obsolete before they flew rear engined airliners based on Trident, VC10 and 111 could not match these success stories.

 

[BROF]

That's a very long story arc that took decades to play out compressed down to a couple of sentences. That story arc had dozens of even hundreds of major, consequential decisions that might have altered the trajectory of the arc significantly.

Personally I find it more difficult to believe that the countries that gave us the Mercure and VFW 614 formed the most powerful airliner production company while the country that gave us VC10, Trident and BAC1-11 didn't take the next step. I find it far more believable to think that with the tools at their disposal Britain could take the lead with airliners in the 70s, perhaps in conjunction with the other successful European airline manufacturer of the 60s; Fokker.

Thinking on supremacist ethnic or nationalistic terms brings nothing here. Mercure was not all of "France", it was Dassault, not Aérospatiale and had nothing to do with Airbus. VFW was also not all of "Germany". And it had became VFW-Fokker in 1969 when Fokker, that had started to decline after the peak of F-27 production, joined it.
There were absolutely no reasons why we would trust them to lead Airbus. We were perfectly aware that all they wanted was us to fund their terrible new design (BAC 3-11, a wide-body with rear engines!), stemming from their past failures (VC-10, Trident and 1-11) and stick on it their Rolls-Royce engines. We all knew that it was a trap to kill our airframe industry in the same way they already had killed theirs, and to save Rolls-Royce to achieve the supreme goal: RR engines on US airliners (L-1011, 757, etc.).
Don't always believe your are dealing with idiots.

 

[Scott Kenny]

The UK opted to go where the money was both in civil aviation and space.
British Airways has been despite ups and downs far more successful than Lufthansa and Air France not to mention Pan Am and TWA.
British Satelites and related technologies have carved out lucrative business for the UK leaving launchers to others.
The Boys Own Paper romantics who wanted us to persevere with obsolete before they flew rear engined airliners based on Trident, VC10 and 111 could not match these success stories.

"Obsolete before they flew rear engined" 727s flew from 1964 until 2019 in passenger service and are still in limited executive and cargo service. And were produced from 1962 until 1984, with a total of 1,832 produced over those 22 years.

An appropriately sized and good performing aircraft would not be an issue. The VC10's good hot-and-high performance could definitely have taken a couple hundred of those sales.

 

[Rule of cool]

Thinking on supremacist ethnic or nationalistic terms brings nothing here.

Supremacist ethnic terms?

You may not be aware, but in the first few decades after WW2 the various national Governments were heavily involved in all sorts of industries as it was thought that unemployment radicalised people prewar. In Britain there was a Ministry of Aviation and the 2 biggest airlines BOAC and BEA were wholly state owned and the Government 'encouraged' industry consolidation in the late 50s under the threat of denying Government business for those that did not. It is entirely appropriate to talk about a country as a catch-all term for what was happening in the era.

There were absolutely no reasons why we would trust them to lead Airbus. We were perfectly aware that all they wanted was us to fund their terrible new design (BAC 3-11, a wide-body with rear engines!), stemming from their past failures (VC-10, Trident and 1-11) and stick on it their Rolls-Royce engines. We all knew that it was a trap to kill our airframe industry in the same way they already had killed theirs, and to save Rolls-Royce to achieve the supreme goal: RR engines on US airliners (L-1011, 757, etc.).
Don't always believe your are dealing with idiots.

Who is 'we/us'?

 

[Rule of cool]

The VC10's good hot-and-high performance could definitely have taken a couple hundred of those sales.

The hot and high wasn't a seller, but the VC10 Super 200 would have had the greatest seat capacity of any trans-Atlantic airliner until the widebodies appeared. That is a point of difference that might have translated into sales.

 

[Scott Kenny]

The hot and high wasn't a seller, but the VC10 Super 200 would have had the greatest seat capacity of any trans-Atlantic airliner until the widebodies appeared. That is a point of difference that might have translated into sales.

Hot and high was absolutely a seller for the 727. Flights out of Denver, to start with.

Flying a VC10 into and out of Denver with a load of US airline execs onboard would have made an impression!