I agree that confidence at take-off is well over 99%. :)

Thank you folks...that was very helpful, even if the answer is there is nothing close to an answer...I'll just keep avoiding UA Biz until those odds get better. Thanks for merging into the appropriate thread too :)

Newark - HongKong - reverts back to PMCO?
 

Another thread on Hong Kong - there is already 2 today! In Business Class, currently the B777-200's which are flying this daily route are the new Polaris Configuration (4 Across). However, starting mid-November they revert back to the 6 across Diamond backs PMCO seats. I notice that even the Chicago - Hong Kong are the 6 across old style seating. Only the SFO - HKG flights fly the new the new Polaris seating thru end of schedule

Any chance they get switched back to the new config (new polaris 4 across?). What are the chances, considering that there is about 4 1/2 months till my travel date. If they do get the new config - how do they manage the seat allocation, Does the new config 777-200's and the PMCO 6-across have the same # of business class seats.

Any comments, feedback welcome!

Thank you!

Both have 50 J seats. Rest assured, any time they switch aircraft, your carefully selected seat will end up somewhere entirely different!

Well, the EWR-HKG route is currently covered with the 77W, the 777-300ER. These planes are only available with the Polaris / PE layout because they are relatively new to the fleet.

The sCO 772 resumes on this route on the westbound departure from EWR on 27-Oct-19, which is one day after the SFO/HKG route looses its 77W and goes to a Polaris 772 twice daily. While I'm sure the changes are related, I can't explain how SFO going from a 77W to 2X 772s causes EWR to loose its 77W. I would assume this is just the date for the fall schedules to go into effect.

Related to your question, since SFO/HKG is going to utilize 4 Polaris 772s (2 per day, both directions), and there are only 5 of them in service now, I would expect the sCO 772 and be delighted if a Polaris bird appears on your flight. Keep in mind that there will probably be a few more retrofitted by then, but the ones not dedicated to flights with PE service will be few and far between.

If you're really interested in flying in Polaris, the only way to guarantee that now is to do a connection in SFO.

......

To HKG, perhaps, but EWR will have guaranteed Polaris hard product on EWR-LHR and EWR-NRT.

There's no indication that SFO-HKG will be on sCO772, they can use one of many retrofitted sUA772. But since EWR-HKG is not selling premium economy, it's a sign that it will revert back to 772 and be assigned whatever plane is available 24h before flight.

Actually there are far more than five Polaris 772s in service--the five you are talking about are specifically pmCO birds. I believe the SFO-HKG flights will for now be operated by the pmUA Polaris 772s, of which there are maybe 15-20. For now, the five (and counting) pmCO Polaris 772s are being randomly assigned onto routes that are operated by pmCO 772s in general, including EWR/ORD-HKG come this fall.

I don't believe so. The PMUA 772s with P&W engines don't have quite the range as the PMCO 772s with GE engines.

They don't, but you also don't need the full range of the GE-powered 772s to make it on SFO-HKG. In fact, before this year ORD-HKG was routinely run with P&W-powered 772s, and it did just fine. Maybe a few payload hits a year on the westbound, but nothing overly problematic.

My comment was with respect to EWR-HKG which was what the OP was inquiring about.

Yes, but since I forgot about the PW 772s, as my brain was fixated on the GE units, they could use the PW 772s on the SFO-HKG route, since the PW engine can handle this route and a bit more. I stated that 4 Polaris GE 772s would be tied up for the SFO-HKG route, thus they wouldn't be available for use elsewhere on the system, including EWR-HKG. I was wrong. That said, there will be 5 (plus any additional ones completed by November) GE Polaris units to go around the system, which, while still under 50%, dramatically increases OPs change of getting one.

The winter schedule is not finalized yet and I suspect we will see some changes and aircraft swaps in the next few weeks. I would be surprised to see United actually stop selling Premium Plus on EWR-HKG during the more realistic booking window (8 weeks and in).