Bigger & better

Various bigger 747 designs were examined from early in the programme including fuselage stretches and/or extensions to the upper deck. A version with a full upper deck, combined with a 7.6m (25ft) stretch could have carried 730 passengers in a long-range layout, or 1,000 in a JAL-style short-haul arrangement.

© Boeing

In the end the first enlarged 747 derivative was the "Stretched Upper Deck" version of the -200, which entered service as the 747-300 with Swissair in 1983. Three years later, this development would provide the springboard for the first major reworking of the airframe, the -400. Offered with the then latest derivatives of the "big three's" high-thrust turbofans, the -400 featured a raft of improvements - not least of which was an advanced two-crew flightdeck and increased wingspan incorporating winglets. The changes provided a significant performance boost, and the new variant quickly proved just as popular as the original Jumbo.

The -400 took to the air on 29 April 1988, but like its predecessor, its development brought headaches. The first aircraft was handed over to launch customer Northwest Airlines in 26 January 1989, but Boeing found itself tangled up with the vast array of configuration differences it had undertaken to produce for customers (it was also highly ambitious in trying to certificate the airframe with three different powerplants almost simultaneously).

© Boeing

But once early glitches were ironed out, the new model established itself as the cornerstone of every major carrier's long-haul fleet, with Everett's output averaging in excess of 50 aircraft a year in the early 1990s. By now, the original 747 - dubbed the "Classic" with the advent of the -400 - had run out of steam. The last passenger Classic had been delivered to All Nippon Airways in August 1989 (although the USAF's two 747-200 VC-25A "Air Force One" aircraft were delivered the following year). Production then continued at a trickle as the final -200Fs were produced, with the last of 724 Classics being handed over to Nippon Cargo Airlines in November 1991.

SLOW START

A freighter version of the -400 arrived in 1993 and, after a slow start, found similar sales success to its passenger sister. Extended-range -400ER/400ERF versions arrived in 2002 to keep the existing product fresh into the 21st century, but the next major 747 step would be a long time coming and follow several trips up blind alleys and various U-turns.