The Boeing 737-800 Winglet of Sriwijaya Air PK-CLA

As the frequent traveler, I use so many airline companies with many type of aircraft. One of my favorite aircraft is Boeing 737-800 with winglet. The Boeing company said that winglet option is for fuel efficiency. I just think that winglet is just for new Boeing aircraft.



I just arrived at 1 August 2012 using Garuda Indonesia PK-GMU when I spotted Sriwijaya Air Boeing 737-800 series with registration number PK-CLA. The I search and got the history from planesplotter.net that PK_CLA is used aircraft and it's first flight was at year 1999. After search for the pictures, I noticed that this aircraft not used winglet before.

So, the old aircraft is available to have winglet. Winglets cost about 725,000 USD and take about 1 week to install which costs an extra $25-80,000 USD. Once fitted, they add 170-235kg (375-518lbs) to the weight of the aircraft, depending upon whether they were installed at production or a retrofit (b737.org.uk).

The moral story: Don't judge aircraft age by it's winglet.