Aircraft Numbering

[Ukridge]

Airbus has recently placed many advertisements in the London newsmagazines. One in particular that struck me was for the proposed A350-800. Why the '800' label? What happened to the 100,200, and 300 series? Just a quick glance at some of the airlines' websites, I noticed that the 777 and 340 both started out with a series number other than 100.
Is there a tradition to this or some other explanation? It seems as if the 747 and 737 held to a 100,200 etc. nomenclature, but not the more recent models. Am I missing the obvious?
Cheers

 

[whlinder]

AFAIK the 777 started out with 200 in case they ever made a shorter version, which would be called the 100. Instead Boeing stretched the 767 with the 767-400. I assume this holds true for the 757 and 767 too, that if there was ever a demand for a smaller version of the airframe the numbering would make 'sense'.

 

[maddogdriver]

In Boeing aircraft, the "-xxx" number represents a new series of the particular aircraft, not size. For example, the 737-300 is larger than the 737-500.

 

[USAir757]

True, but that still doesn't explain why Airbus would sort of arbitrarily start off with A350-800....

 

[ual06]

Once upon a time, a certain company designed a new fighter aircraft. They designated it the
P-530.

Why?

It was 5:30 PM, everyone wanted to go home and they could not agree on a designation.

The aircraft did not go into production.