When I was a little kid, I was mad for all things that involved planes. My father knew some people in the travel trade, so once or twice I was given a set of goodies that the agencies were issued. One particular item contains Qantas seat maps in all their glory.
The brochure is called “Passenger Product” and in the back it says it is issue number one from August 1986. Inside are all the details on each Qantas aircraft type at the time, complete seating plans, and a section on what was offered both on board and on the ground in each of the three classes.
Qantas Seat Maps From 1986
The Australian airline really did issue the gold standard in aircraft seating plans. All the details are marked, including the little wavy lines indicating where the curtains closing off sections were located. Qantas seat maps today still have the same level of information, incidentally.
All Together Now!
All the Qantas seat maps in the Passenger Product were featured across two pages, so it was a bit of a chore to put the two halves together relatively seamlessly. I decided to make one file with all of them together, in the same order as the brochure, in case anyone wants it. I have to say, when I scanned a different brochure for the Australian Airlines (TAA) seat maps from the same year, it was much easier!
Overall Thoughts
It’s fun to see how these old Qantas seat maps are pretty much identical to the current ones. All the details of the cabin are there for you to see. Barring the massive changes to business class and first class, economy looks the same as it always was.
People who flew down the back in those times do point out the seats were far more padded and thus far more comfortable. I guess they had to be, considering the entertainment was one screen at the front of each cabin section.
What do you think of these Qantas seating plans? Did you ever fly on them back in this era? Thank you for reading and if you have any comments or questions, please leave them below.
Like planes? See my “Does anyone remember” series.
Flight reviews your thing? Mine are all indexed here.
Follow me on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
Featured image by Chris Finney on Airliners.net via Wikimedia Commons.
What, no drawing of a “pie-anna??” 🙂 At least. there a strict wall where the smoke never drifted back into …
Hahahaha! Yes, that invisible force field on every Boeing 🙂
Lovely compilation. I read somewhere that Qantas once had the world’s only all-747 fleet. That must’ve been quite a sight.
I noticed the same about the smoking seats. I really would have thought that smokers would have been pushed to the back of each respective cabin to keep more of the plane smoke free.
Yes, from 1979 with the withdrawal of the Boeing 707 until 1985 with the introduction of the Boeing 767, they were all 747. It would have been all of the ones above, apart from the -338.
Agreed, it has to be to do with ventilation for the location of the seats, otherwise it seems a bit weird.
I distinctly remember American Airlines providing similar seating charts within their timetables – many pleasurable hours were spent reviewing those pages. Thanks for reminding me of those moments
Yes, though I remember a lot of the timetable ones were in black and white like the rest of the timetable. Nothing wrong with that though, it was always fun looking through them back in the day!