Unmarked Chinese 747 rolls through SFO (San Francisco International airport)

Looks like it may be "B-18722", and if so, is a 747-409F(SCD) freighter.
See photos here.

That's it, delivered in 2006, probably refurbished. It seems to be the only cargo in all white, and it gets about.

It's a 747-400 freighter and specifically an F, not a 747-8 freighter nor a 747-100/200 with 400 series engines (they appear to be CF-6 or maybe Pratt 4000's). And certainly not a new build as they haven't made 400F's for several years. The 400 freighters have the same fuselage upper lobe as the early 100/200 series with just 3 windows instead of the extended upper deck of the passenger versions from the 300 series onward.

Now as for the all white paint job with no markings that is not unusual either. I know of several 747's operating as freighters that are painted all white, one of which is a particularly stunning pristine 200 series operating as a horse freighter for one of the Middle Eastern Royal families. The other is an old passenger version working for an Icelandic freight operator. I have also seen an A340 and A330 in all white, simply put it's cheaper to paint it white which is fine for freight operators who operate on thin margins and it has several advantages such as keeping down airframe temperatures in hot climates which reduces cooling and therefore APU fuel burn again on cost grounds.

LEE.

Originally posted by foxhoundone
Not sure what you guys think, But if i seen a plane with a "made in China" sticker in it i would not be totaly confident of its design.
From what i know the "made in China" planes are asembled at there destination countries that have a quality control certificate, Think ISO standard.. just my 2 bobs worth.

Yeah! I bet you'd rather want a good ol' Amerikun F22.. all red white and blue and made in the USA! Oh! Wait a minute.....

Originally posted by thebozeian
It's a 747-400 freighter and specifically an F, not a 747-8 freighter nor a 747-100/200 with 400 series engines (they appear to be CF-6 or maybe Pratt 4000's). And certainly not a new build as they haven't made 400F's for several years. The 400 freighters have the same fuselage upper lobe as the early 100/200 series with just 3 windows instead of the extended upper deck of the passenger versions from the 300 series onward.

Now as for the all white paint job with no markings that is not unusual either. I know of several 747's operating as freighters that are painted all white, one of which is a particularly stunning pristine 200 series operating as a horse freighter for one of the Middle Eastern Royal families. The other is an old passenger version working for an Icelandic freight operator. I have also seen an A340 and A330 in all white, simply put it's cheaper to paint it white which is fine for freight operators who operate on thin margins and it has several advantages such as keeping down airframe temperatures in hot climates which reduces cooling and therefore APU fuel burn again on cost grounds.

LEE.

Yes, but as part of China airlines fleet, it appears to be their only all-white cargo plane, the designation is 747-409F,

www.planespotters.net...

I did find out some more info on that plane. It seems that it was quite badly damaged during ground testing while still with Boeing, although it seems the tail number was already allocated. This happened in march 2006,

www.seattlepi.com...

Contrary to what some of us thought including me, this was a brand new plane at 2006. It also turns out that the 'no-livery' plane has been the subject of some debate in aircraft forums, since all the other transport aircraft in the Chinese airlines fleet are painted, and which is minimal anyway.

Airframe notes,
www.planespotters.net...

Originally posted by Asktheanimals
reply to post by hp1229

 

From your link:
english.people.com.cn...

Air China signed a formal agreement with Boeing on March 7 to buy five Boeing 747-8 Intercontinental passenger jets, making it the first Chinese buyer for Boeing's newest, fuel efficient intercontinental passenger jet.

Maybe they changed the contract to a few freight aircraft?
Or perhaps this is for more nefarious purposes than bringing junk to Walmart?

Well I think it was in the 90s that I had read about 1 out of every 10th plane from Boeing was destined for delivery to Chinese Airlines. The link I had posted is a recent one for the more fuel efficient version of the 747. It would make sense if they wish to receive the plane without the paintjob as they might want to custom paint it themselves?

Originally posted by hp1229

Originally posted by Asktheanimals
reply to post by hp1229

 

Maybe they changed the contract to a few freight aircraft?
Or perhaps this is for more nefarious purposes than bringing junk to Walmart?

Well I think it was in the 90s that I had read about 1 out of every 10th plane from Boeing was destined for delivery to Chinese Airlines. The link I had posted is a recent one for the more fuel efficient version of the 747. It would make sense if they wish to receive the plane without the paintjob as they might want to custom paint it themselves?

Air China is the mainland flagship airlines. The plane here belongs to Chinese airlines, (Taiwan)

It has it's registration mark, so clearly it is NOT unmarked.

It has no livery - not the same thing.

"White" aircraft are so painted because the company that owns them can't be arsed spending money to paint their own livery on them. White is a useful colour because if it sold or otherwise needs to be repainted it is easy to paint over.

If it is B1722 then there's a lot of info around on it - google search

there is also a short discussion of white China Airlines freighters here

In aviation parlance "white tails" are also brand new aircraft built without an order - so they do not have company livery on them when they come out of the factory.

It is not uncommon, not "unmarked" and not secret.

reply to post by Aloysius the Gaul


All the 19 other cargo planes belonging to China airlines have their livery, and there's not even much of that, so not being arsed doesn't hold up, in fact they are pretty fussy, and have changed livery often, the current one is for their 47th anniversary in 2007. As for not being secret, it is obviously not, there are pictures of it everywhere. As for having a secret agenda who knows, I don't, and I dare say neither do you. China airlines is still mostly goverment owned, so it is worth bearing that in mind.

reply to post by smurfy


There are many possible commercial reasons - from the aircraft is actually owned by a leasing company who don't want it painted or they couldn't come to an arrangement about painting, to they are so busy and profitable flying it that they do not want to take it out of service for 1-2-3 weeks or however long it would take to paint.

They're probably flying the recently escaped Chinese immigrants back home for party reeducation.

Nothing to see here.

reply to post by foxhoundone


Xenophobia is ignorance.

Deny it.

reply to post by smurfy

Smurfy,

You are correct the designation for the aircraft is 747-409F, it is however just part of the 400F series of freighters. In fact the "09" in the 409 is the Boeing customer number for that operator as they ordered the aircraft. All customers who order aircraft are given a unique identifier code, for example British Airways are given the designator of 36, QANTAS Airlines are given 38. In these two cases it is because they were the 36th and 38th airlines respectively to order Boeing airliners. All aircraft regardless of type will always have this customer number attached for the life of the airframe no matter who ends up operating it. So it is possible to have a 707-338, 737-838, 747-438, 767-238 and so on.

Now back to the issue of the paint job, I think Aloysius the Gaul made a good point that some leasing companies prefer to not paint the aircraft in company colours if the lease is on a year to year basis. It is often the case that airlines own some aircraft and lease others, sometimes to a host of different leasing companies and a maze of parent holding companies, usually to avoid paying any more tax than they have to. So it is possible that this particular aircraft is under a different ownership/leasing arrangement than others in the China Airlines fleet. Another reason could be that China Airlines have chosen to not paint up the aircraft in it's colours as they intend to wet lease the aircraft on a regular basis as well as using it for charters to many different customers. Also some people, particularly Govt's dont like to advertise too much when using third party operators so a nondescript aircraft suits them. It doesn't mean they are up to anything nefarious, it just means they would rather not advertise too much for security reasons. My own Govt had a long term lease on an all white A340 for moving troops back and forth to the Middle East, the owner/operator was from Portugal. Having taken a look at the link you provided to Planespotters.net I noticed several photos on their database of all white aircraft, including several 747's, in some cases a single aircraft amongst a fleet so again not hugely common, but certainly not all that unusual.

It was certainly interesting that the aircraft appears to have failed it's high blow test during manufacture, I have done them myself on a number of occasions and gone well beyond the claimed 3 PSIG figure so its always advisable to have everybody on board strapped in unless it is absolutely necessary for example when searching for leaks. I bet that made one hell of a bang when the nose door blew out!

Wow, that was my 500th post.

LEE.