What secondary advantage did the Caravelle's rear-mounted engines offer?

When the SE 210 was defined, most designs placed the engines under the wing, where they could be mounted on the spar with a lower total weight; this weight saving was judged not to be worth the effort. Moving them to the tail allowed for a clean low wing, aerodynamically free of nacelles and of any structure that could disturb a critical airflow. The result was a wing that could be optimised solely for lift, and a tidy, balanced silhouette.

The decision ended up proving advantageous for the design, because cabin noise was markedly reduced. With the engines behind the passenger compartment, the cabin was far quieter than that of any existing commercial jet. The Caravelle was the world's second mass-produced passenger jet and the first commercial aircraft with jet engines on the rear fuselage, a solution that significantly reduced cabin noise and improved passenger comfort. Among the formula's notable advantages were also ease of maintenance and engine accessibility, along with a clear low wing that made ground handling and boarding simpler and faster.

The Caravelle was the world's first successful short- and medium-haul jet and introduced such a sensible layout that half the industry copied it. The idea came out of Toulouse and a sleek-lined French aircraft. The configuration was later retained in many narrow-body aircraft and regional jets. 282 Caravelles were built before production ended in 1972.