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Trijet
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
A trijet is an aircraft powered by three jet engines. An aircraft with three piston engines is a trimotor.
Some trijets include:
- Boeing 727 (1963)
- Dassault Aviation Falcon 50, Falcon 900
- Hawker Siddeley Trident (1962)
- Lockheed L-1011 Tristar (1970)
- McDonnell Douglas DC-10 (1970), MD-11 (1990)
- Tupolev Tu-154 (1968)
- Yakovlev Yak-40 (1966)
- Yakovlev Yak-42
A trijet version of the Boeing 747 was planned, but never produced.
Today, trijet production has all but ceased. With engines being more reliable, two-engined aircraft are the most common except on the largest aircraft such as the Boeing 747 which have four engines. A real disadvantage with trijets is positioning the central engine. On most trijets they are placed at the tail along the middle, producing some technical difficulties. A "straight" layout such as the DC-10 and MD-11 leaves the engine high above the ground, making access difficult. Another option is an S-shaped duct like that found on the Boeing 727, Tupolev 154 and Lockheed Tristar, which is a complicated and costly design.
During the late 1970s and early 1980s three was the most common number of engines on US air carrier jets, making up a majority of all such airplanes in 1980. From 1985 to 2003 the number of such planes in service has sunk from 1488 to 602. The number of twin-jets has more than quadrupled in the same period.[1]
- Modern Commercial Aircraft Willian Green, Gordon Swanborough and John Mowinski, 1987
- ^ Table 1-13: Active U.S. Air Carrier and General Aviation Fleet by Type of Aircraft Bureau of Transportation Statistics
- Engine Placement Stanford University Aircraft Aerodynamics and Design Group.[1]Accessed 2007-03-13
