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✨ Polaris (& PP) Retrofits: Schedule, ....

Old May 29, 2017, 1:21 pm
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Last edit by: kirkwoodj
Check the current status of aircraft reconfigured (or delivered) with new Polaris seats: http://view.ceros.com/united/polaris...-desktop-4/p/3.

A Polaris Update and Polaris Mod Schedule to indicate the status of specific aircraft are maintained by those that manage the United Airlines Fleet Website.

Except for 773- and 781-operated flights, and those markets selling Premium Plus, Polaris-equipped planes have not been allocated to specific routes. You won't know until approx. 36-48 hours before departure if you'll have a newly reconfigured aircraft, and even then, it may be replaced with a non-retrofitted aircraft.

777-300ER - All 22 aircraft have Polaris (60 seats) and installation of Premium Plus cabins (24 seats) is complete.

767-300ER - As of September 2020, 31 of the 38 aircraft have been reconfigured with the Polaris seats.
- Retrofit is from 3-cabin to 2-cabin with direct-aisle-access seats. No 3-cabin 767s remain in service.
- 76A configuration is 30J/50Y+/134Y, total of 214; fleet to consist of 17 ships (former 3-cabin 767s).
- 76L configuration is 46J/22PE/47Y+/52Y; fleet to consist of 21 ships (18 former 2-cabin 76C and 3 used ships from Hawaiian).

767-400ER - [16 aircraft] None updated yet; modifications put on hold due to Covid-19.

777-200ER - As of September 2020, 46 of the 50 aircraft have been reconfigured with Polaris and Premium Plus seats.
- Configuration is 50 Polaris seats, 32 in the front cabin and 18 in the second cabin (behind 2L/R)
- Configuration is 10 across in economy, with 24 Premium Plus seats, 46 86 E+ seats and 156 E seats, with E+ in front economy cabin plus exit rows and bulkhead at 3L/R, i.e., almost the same as current pmCO planes, except with 4 seats in middle section.
- Seat map (v5) on united.com

787-8, 787-9 - As of November 2022, all 787-8/9 are converted or in mod. No chance of flying old configuration anymore.
- 788 configuration has 28 Polaris seats (20 in front cabin, 8 in rear mini-cabin), and 21 Premium Plus seats (2-3-2).
- 789 configuration has 48 Polaris seats (32 in front cabin, 16 in rear mini-cabin), and 21 Premium Plus seats (2-3-2).

787-10 - 13 787-10s have been delivered in 2020. All come with Polaris and Premium Plus cabins factory-installed. Another 19 should be added by 2024.

FAQ:
Q: Does a Polaris ticket mean the aircraft has the new Polaris seat?

A: No, Polaris is the label UA uses for long haul international business class. It is also the label UA uses for the new seats, so this does create some confusion.
All the 773s and 787-10s are 100% the new seat.
The rest of the long haul fleet in various stages of conversion, see http://view.ceros.com/united/polaris...-desktop-4/p/3

Q: How to tell if my aircraft is the new style Polaris seats?
A: If the unassigned business class section is showing orange seats or all the seats are side-by-side or there is a section for 4 adjacent seats in the middle, this is an old style lie-flat aircreaft
If the unassigned bussines class seats are dark blue seats or the all the seats appear to have direct aisle access, then you aircraft is the new Polaris seat.
You can also look at the FT maintained, United Fleet Site and crosscheck the tail number or check thePolaris Update tab

Q: How to tell if my aircraft has the new PremiumPlus (PP) / Premium Economy seats?
A: If the unassigned seats just behind business class are purple seats or the aircraft is 773 or 787-10, then yes. However, the purple color seat will only show on routes where PP is being sold.
Aircraft with PP seats are being used on some routes but are not being sold as PP. In those cases, the seats are considered to be a part of E+. In those cases, an indicator of PP sold as E+ will be if the first few rows of economy, there are just 2 seats on the sides (with the rest of E+ showing 3 seats).

Q: Will the aircraft I see at booking be the same configuration at flight time?
A: Unfortunately with the fleet in transit, aircraft swaps happen. UA tends to use placeholders until 2 days before travel and even after that last minute swaps do happen.

Q: My flight seat map shows 772 with polaris seats is it a retrofit?
A: Possibly. The flight status page shows the most accurate scheduled aircraft. If a 77W is swapped in, it will list the aircraft as 777-300ER. However, if the 772's seatmap shows blue rectangular boxes in the business class cabin instead of orange "pointy rounds", this would indicate that a retrofit aircraft has been swapped.

See also: United Future/Changed Routes w/ Polaris seats

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✨ Polaris (& PP) Retrofits: Schedule, ....

Old Jul 26, 2018, 7:32 pm
  #1126  
 
Join Date: Aug 2009
Location: EWR, BDL
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Originally Posted by Kacee
There is no schedule for deployment of the Polaris 772s. At least nothing that UA has made publicly available.
EWR-BOM switches to 77W late October.
GDL likes this.
JOSECONLSCREW28 is offline  
Old Jul 27, 2018, 6:45 am
  #1127  
 
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Flying UA 990 SFO-CDG tomorrow in J and noticed the plane configuration changed from 3-class to 2-class when I checked yesterday and looks like the new seats. Is that a retrofit with the new Polaris product? Excited to try it!
almostfrench0612 is offline  
Old Jul 27, 2018, 7:32 am
  #1128  
 
Join Date: Jun 2015
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Originally Posted by almostfrench0612
Flying UA 990 SFO-CDG tomorrow in J and noticed the plane configuration changed from 3-class to 2-class when I checked yesterday and looks like the new seats. Is that a retrofit with the new Polaris product? Excited to try it!
If the seat map shows dark blue stagger seats in business, those are the Polaris seats. Enjoy...
glbltvlr is offline  
Old Jul 27, 2018, 7:36 am
  #1129  
 
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Originally Posted by glbltvlr
If the seat map shows dark blue stagger seats in business, those are the Polaris seats. Enjoy...
yes it does...yay!
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Old Jul 27, 2018, 11:01 am
  #1130  
 
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Originally Posted by skycrab
Looks like the middle flight (UA928) moved to 2 class some time ago (non-Polaris 2 class), but UA929/UA959 are still scheduled as 3 class.
I believe they've dedicated these 2 planes to the route, so I would say it's very unlikely.
Even with UA928 moving to 2-class, the likelihood of getting Polaris J seems very low. Route history shows that only non-Polaris J is being offered.

Any chances of that changing? Where is UA flying Polaris 763s from ORD?
bowzer91 is offline  
Old Jul 27, 2018, 11:07 am
  #1131  
 
Join Date: Jun 2015
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If you look at the flight status seat map (not the booking map), UA928 has been Polaris pretty consistently for the past month or so. Today was the first time in a long time it wasn't Polaris. Noticed it was coming from AMS inbound at least once, not sure where else they use it. I'm on UA 958 next month. Depressingly, that hasn't been Polaris at all. Not sure what the route assignment criteria is - certainly not random. I think two more Polaris 767s are suppose to arrive shortly. That should improve the coverage odds.
glbltvlr is offline  
Old Jul 27, 2018, 11:15 am
  #1132  
 
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Originally Posted by glbltvlr
I think two more Polaris 767s are suppose to arrive shortly. That should improve the coverage odds.
Per https://sites.google.com/site/united...fleet-tracking, it looks like the two 767s entered Polaris mod on 6/25 and 7/3... I think they usually take about two months, so I'd expect it's not *that* shortly.
LXFlyer is offline  
Old Jul 27, 2018, 11:17 am
  #1133  
 
Join Date: Jun 2015
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Originally Posted by LXFlyer
Per https://sites.google.com/site/united...fleet-tracking, it looks like the two 767s entered Polaris mod on 6/25 and 7/3... I think they usually take about two months, so I'd expect it's not *that* shortly.
Bummer.
glbltvlr is offline  
Old Jul 27, 2018, 1:53 pm
  #1134  
 
Join Date: Mar 2015
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Originally Posted by LXFlyer
Per https://sites.google.com/site/united...fleet-tracking, it looks like the two 767s entered Polaris mod on 6/25 and 7/3... I think they usually take about two months, so I'd expect it's not *that* shortly.
I thought it was supposed to be once every 10 days!
PsiFighter37 is offline  
Old Jul 28, 2018, 2:11 am
  #1135  
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Originally Posted by PsiFighter37


I thought it was supposed to be once every 10 days!
10 days is 30 days on United.
mellon is offline  
Old Jul 28, 2018, 9:21 am
  #1136  
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Originally Posted by PsiFighter37
I thought it was supposed to be once every 10 days!
I think your comment is tongue in cheek, but if they had 7 in mods, it would be one every 10 days. They're not on that pace though. Currently working on 4 or 5 (according to Fleetsite), which would be more like every 14-23 days.
Kacee is offline  
Old Jul 29, 2018, 1:48 am
  #1137  
 
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Well, we have 4 birds in MOD right now, two 763s and two 772s (I'm considering N794UA to not be in for MOD since it replaced N222UA which also did not receive a MOD). These 4 all entered between 13-Jun-18 and 03-Jul-18, a span of less than 3 weeks. While we've had a bit of a dry spell as far as releases, we should see 4 birds being released within the span of a month starting in about a month. We saw this with the last batch of retros being released all in a short time span.

4 retros in 80 days (80 being conservative) = 1 in 20, which is closer to the 1 in 10 than it feels to me.

Maybe once October rolls around, we'll see one or two more mod lines.

Also to consider is that since the 763s are about finished, they could sub in on 772 routes over the winter that have lower demand, enabling more 772 mod lines.
phkc070408 is offline  
Old Jul 29, 2018, 6:06 am
  #1138  
 
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Originally Posted by phkc070408
Also to consider is that since the 763s are about finished, they could sub in on 772 routes over the winter that have lower demand, enabling more 772 mod lines.
Including the two in mod, there are five UA 763s plus the four used ex-HA birds still to be done. Whether the HA birds go to HKG for mod I don’t know. But including them and the two currently in mod there are still nine to go.

There will have to be additional mod lines for the 772s, because at an 8 week turnaround each line can only do 6-7 retrofits per year, or with a 6 week turnaround it’s 8-9. With the 787-10 new deliveries and the final 77W there should be more coverage to enable more 772s to be retrofitted simultaneously.
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Old Jul 29, 2018, 10:00 am
  #1139  
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Originally Posted by phkc070408
4 retros in 80 days (80 being conservative) = 1 in 20, which is closer to the 1 in 10 than it feels to me.
I appreciate your positive thinking, but half the promised speed means finished in 2022, not 2020.
Kacee is offline  
Old Jul 29, 2018, 10:57 am
  #1140  
 
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Originally Posted by Kacee
I appreciate your positive thinking, but half the promised speed means finished in 2022, not 2020.
Maybe the positive thinking is better for passengers flying in Economy: 3-3-3 replaced by a 3-4-3 will be a nightmare.
StuckinITH is offline  

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