More 762 / 767-200 trouble on the JFK - SFO / LAX route (consolidated)
 

I saw that another poster experienced MX problems on the SFO-JFK route last week. They continued over the weekend.
On Friday, AA177 was downgraded to a 757. (I lost my upgrade, but at the last minute, was rescued from my coach seat.) The inbound was delayed, so the scheduled 1-hour delay stretched to 2+.
On Sunday, AA16 was canceled at about 222 am PST. It was reinstated about 10 minutes later, but meanwhile the system had rebooked pax on assorted less appealing alternatives. Presumably at the same time, AA20 was canceled, and many of its pax rebooked on 16. (No one at SFO or on the EXP desk could explain this boneheaded process.) I managed to get myself back on AA16, though of course my UG was lost (this time irretrievably), and without the intervention of an absolutely superb AAngel, I'd have spent 6 excrutiating hours in 33E.
Anyway, good luck to anyone flying this route in the near future.

Yesterday, Sunday, AA177 was again downgraded to a 757 and delayed almost three hours.

AA 16 was cancelled last Thursday. Most EXPs were rebooked the next day as AA 20 was already oversold and AA 18 quickly got fully booked.

Seems like the 762s are fast becoming the mechnical nightmares that the Airbus 300s were.

My recollection is that the 762s are some of the older aircraft that AA has. I think I remember reading someplace that as newer widebodies come online, the 762s will be retired and some 763s will be reconfigured to 3-class to replace them.

I do recall speculation that the 763 would be used to replace the 762 on certain routes, but this is the first time I've heard about a conversion back to three-class. I thought that AA was doing less and less F (as evidenced by them halving the F cabin on the new 773).

IIRC AA has not yet stated its plans for the JFK/SFO/LAX routes or even if a three class a/c will be used. Options include using existing 763 (upon 787s arriving) or 757s or waiting for either new A321s or B739s to arrive. But yes the 762s I believe all are now 25+ with some just about at 30 years.

Well, then AA is just about to violate my (28yrs old) rule: I don't get on flights where the plane is older than me and the pilot is younger ;).

Will likely be moving to NY or SF soon (and needing to commute to whichever of the two I don't move to quite a bit), and although I've never flown one, for some reason I'm dreading the 762s. MX delays, for sure, but also... just a bit uneasy about their age with regards to safety. I know AA wouldn't operate them if they were anywhere near dangerous, but just one of those things.

That said, spent countless hours on "Super" 80s, and they don't bother me for whatever reason... flight length, maybe?

Fly the 763 or connect.

I wouldn't dread the 762's. Sure they're a bit older, but a widebody is MUCH nicer for transcon. Dread the 757's. They're almost as old, have more cycles and are much less comfortable.

The obvious answer would be to replace the 762's with 787's but I'm sure they would prefer to replace the 763's with 787's first. Ultimately due to fuel economy they will need to replace all 767's with 787's. Although a321-neo might be a possilbity for the transcon's.

There's been a lot of speculation about what planes will fly JFK-LAX/SFO. Maybe 763s (two or three class). Maybe 757s, which is what UA has used on its JFK-LAX/SFO transcons for a decade now since it retired its 762s. Maybe a mix of planes, similar to what we see now on LAX-MIA.

While the three-class transcons have been nice, I wouldn't be surprised to see them disappear in the next couple of years.

As mentioned above, the 763s would be nice, but they're slated to be replaced by the the 787s (if and when they're ever built and delivered).

The safety of the a/c does not bother me. The delays are annoying but at least the JFK, LAX, and particularly SFO ACs are the nicest out there as far as a place to wait (although nearly 12 hours at the SFO AC and I was stir crazy.) Not to mention being able to take a shower during the long wait.

Completely unnecessary fear. On the weekends, I fly a plane with an airframe that's 35 years old but to put it in perspective, the engine is only 200 hours old.

Airframes rarely -- I mean almost never -- break apart so the biggest concern with maintenance should be losing an engine. Be sure that AA repairs and replaces those engines on the same aggressive schedule no matter when the airframe was built.

If you're going to have a fear about anything's age it should be the crew (not always, but age frequently equals experience) and even then, the crews flying 757, 763 and 777 often have 20+ years of experience.

Further, I don't recall seeing any info about cabin sizes for the 773 (and I don't count the cabin photo mock-ups as evidence). I would be very interested in that if the info is out there.

The only source we have is one Flyertalker, sxf24, who posted that he/she has seen the seat maps and that the 77Ws will be configured with 8F and 52J (don't remember how many Y). That Flyertalker also posted (without any posted sources or links) that the extra-legroom Y would be 3-3-3 and that the really lousy economy section would be 3-4-3.

AA has not released any info beyond the photos that came out around the time of the OW Mega-do.

Since the pilots will probably not get the two F seats in their new contract (the 77Ws have the overhead crew rest pod with bunks and F seats), it would make sense for AA to reduce the F cabin to 12 (slight reduction from the current 14 available for sale on very long flights). A reduction to eight seems extreme, but there are plenty of Flyertalkers who purport to know that AA's F cabins are too large.