Tools for finding tail numbers?
 

Like a lot of people, I use FlightMemory/OpenFlights/FlightDiary. Before I started using them, I kept a spreadsheet. But I've been flying longer than I've been using spreadsheets, and even now, sometimes I forget to jot down a tail number or other useful information.

I know that, for example, UA's web site will tell me what ship number operated a flight today or yesterday (and where it came in from, and so on). But if I want to know what planes I was on EWR-DEN-LAX-ITO (UA 1643/235/1004) on June 23, 2013... I'm not sure if that's info I can find.

Far enough back, I might not even know what specific days I flew (although I'm pretty sure my Dad still has paper ticket receipts from PeoplExpress EWR-BTV in '84 or '85, so I could find out), and might just be wondering "hmm, what type was that airline using on that route in that year?"

Are there tools out there for getting that kind of historical info?

(And yes, I've looked at SPOTTERS and ACARSD - it looks like my flights are too far back.)

Tool to find tail number for a given flight
 

I record the tail number of all aircraft I was in.

What tool would you use to find this information after the flight?

Is it possible to find out before the flight? (a few hours before should be possible I guess)

I'm a big fan of Flight Radar, the registrations will usually be available about a day in advance as well as during or after the flight. Just remember that it doesn't always work every time for every airline but is generally pretty reliable.

I use FlightTrack 5 on my phone. The flight info page has the aircraft registration in there, and it'll save it until you delete the flight from the app.

Unfortunately, the developers focused more on making the app pretty vs. being super useful and reliable.

Cool, thank you for the hints

As you are based in London, this might be of interest to you:
http://www.lhr-lgw.co.uk/ (earliest record is from January 1955!)

Blogger and FTer sbm12 has a lookup site with data going back to 1995: http://wandr.me/BTS

I think it's free for US domestic flights and premium for other flights.

Wow, impressive work! Very useful for me living in southwest London.

Thank you

Ah yes, I follow Seth's blog. will give this a try.

Thank you

Finding tail numbers for old flights
 

Hi,

The bureau of transportation statistics has some good information, even if it takes them a while to update it:

http://apps.bts.gov/xml/ontimesummar...ryArrivals.xml

one shortcoming of this tool, though, is that it's only domestic US flights, and a lot of regional airlines are not included.

1) is there a way to get this sort of data for the smaller regionals? Endeavor, Compass, etc are not in there.

2) Is this information for international flights originating or arriving in the US available?

3) this is a stretch, but how about flights inside the EU?

If you have the ship number, you can find the tail number and other info at planespotters.net

Eg, Start here, https://www.planespotters.net/airline/United-Airlines

if you click on the fleet count for the type you want, you'll get a page with a table of all the aircraft, you can sort by fleet number and see the rest of the info.