An American Airlines Boeing 787-8 emerged from the factory with a strange paint job. Is AA experimenting with a slight modification to its existing livery or this aircraft simply not finished?
Fluke Or Sleek New American Airlines Livery?
The 787-8 was photographed at Paine Field (PAE), home of Boeing’s Everett assembly plant. If you click on the link below, you’ll notice the Dreamliner sports an all-white fuselage instead of the usual gray. Compare the belly of the plane with the gray bar under the tail. That gray color usually covers the entire belly.
For reference, here is what every other American 787 looks like:
Members of airliners.net have identified the aircraft as N877BF. There, a debate is raging whether this is indeed the new livery or simply an unfinished one.
Recall that American Airlines last changed its livery in 2013 and has begun repainting its fleet, an exercise requried every 8-10 years:
Starting this month, as aircraft approach their regularly scheduled paint refresh date, American will begin repainting them with a new, non-mica gray paint that looks nearly identical to what is soaring across the skies today, but is less expensive, lighter, more fuel efficient and better for the environment.
The repaint will update American’s current livery with a new, mica-free paint color created specifically for the airline: Silver Eagle.
These are the Silver Eagle photos presented by AA:
I don’t think the white picture linked to above is the new Silver Eagle. Frankly, I’m not sure what it is.
But I like it. I’ve never been a great fan of the AA livery (I realize the composite material made the old metallic finish unworkable, but really don’t care for the new backslash logo), but I see this as an improvement.
Sadly, we don’t know if this is just a work in progress, an error, or indeed a new trial. Maybe this 787 will get a oneworld paint job?
Update: I reached out to American Airlines and asked. A spokesperson confirmed the paint job is simply unfinished:
Rest assured we’re not changing out livery (however we did introduce a new paint process in January). As you suspected, the aircraft in the photo is unfinished. There’s no registration number painted on the plane yet, so it can’t legally leave the ground.
Oh well…
CONCLUSION
I’m intrigued by the unfinished livery from American Airlines as a nicer (and perhaps cheaper) alternative to gray. While this picture is ultimately much ado about nothing, it it still presents a more attractive contrast to the currently livery.
What is your thought on the “new” American Airlines livery?
Seems odd to me that the titles would have been put onto the fuselage before the grey undercoating. That seems counter intuitive to me. I would think you would first paint the entire fuelgae with grey, then add the titles. I guess we will see …
Was gonna say its pretty common for the non-AA OneWorld Liveries (ie QR, CX, and BA) to have the fuselage white and the giant blue OW Logo plastered across the side. AA typically kept the color scheme with the OWs
I thought that too at first, then I remembered how large the tail and logo are. Something that size would be applied directly to the primer rather than have an extra coat of paint below. The weight savings on that is about a million dollars in fuel savings across the fleet,
I, too, am not a fan of the current livery. It’s just passable.
The tail is sort of a representation of an American flag but doesn’t create any link to American Airlines. Similarly, the very attractive Australian flag-like tail of Ansett did nothing to convey the Ansett brand. Neither does the Continental globe, which is why they should bring back the United tulip, either the original or the last rendition of it in blue. Delta’s tail does represent Delta well as does Alaska’s Chester representing Alaska.
@Derek, Have you ever seen the Cubans Airways livery from Cuba? If you look close enough, you’ll notice an eerie resemblance especially from the tail logo. Back during my AA days, we used to joke about it a lot!
Ooops….I meant to say Cubana Airways.
DEREK, explain how Delta tail represents Delta well and AA’s does not?
Lol
Please enlightens us.
The American paint job is just sad… for such a dynamic and wonderful country, it is bland and without spirit (pardon the pun). If at least the word American was in bold blue or red then you’d have something distinctive, not a muted gray… it looks like the airline is ashamed of the name by trying to blend it into the fuselage.
The Aeroclassics model airliner company is releasing a 1:400 scale Diecast model registration N277AY with the white livery
BORING…..they should paint the body siliver metalic and do the AMERICAN titles in BLUE