Walked past a 727 at the boneyard last weekend and it hit me different

I was out at the Mojave boneyard helping a buddy pull some parts off an old Gulfstream. On the way out we walked past this 727 that's been sitting there since like 2005. I remember working on those birds back in the late 90s when I first started. The difference in how those things were built compared to modern airliners is wild. Everything on that 727 was mechanical cables and hydraulic lines you could trace with your finger. No fly by wire, no fancy computers. Just pure mechanical linkage from the yoke to the control surfaces. We spend so much time troubleshooting avionics boxes now that I forgot how simple things used to be. Has anyone else spent time on the older iron and felt like we lost something when we went all digital?

2 comments

2 Comments

ray3631mo ago

Remember crawling around in the tail of one of those things and you could see the actual cables running up through the ribs? You could feel the tension in them just by touching the metal. When you pulled on the yoke in a 727 you were physically moving cables and pulleys that stretched the whole length of the fuselage. There was this raw mechanical feel to it you just don't get anymore. I miss that tactile feedback where you knew exactly what the plane was doing because you could feel it through your hands.

seth6831mo ago

Wait, you're saying you could literally feel the tension in the cables through the metal frame just by touching it? I never got to fly anything that old school, that sounds terrifying and amazing at the same time.