[Captainpaintball]

Who did they rip off, design wise?

[Nick Danger]

It's a Boeing 717 with the winglets from a later-model 737. You can tell from the tail that it's an MD-series design that got turned into a "Boeing" after the merger.

[Nick Danger]

By the way, these 717’s are used by the Air Tran corporation in experiments designed to test whether long-legged humans can be turned into paraplegics by cutting off all circulation to their legs.

[PAR35]

Who did they rip off, design wise?

The basic design follows that of the BAC 1-11, which pre-dated the DC-9 by a couple of years. So it is pretty much a basic early 1960s British design that's been followed by the Americans (DC-9, MD-80, 717) , Russians (TU-134, RRJ), Brazilians, and Canadians (CRJ). The Dutch also used a similar layout, the French Caravelle has a noticeably different tail.

Of course, the larger and earlier VC-10 has a similar layout, but with 4 engines. (See also the similar Russian IL-52 and the much smaller Lockheed Jetstar for similar 4 engine designs.)

Since it predates the BAC, I guess the answer to your question is "Vickers".

[A.A. Cunningham]

China began assembling MD-82s for McDonnell Douglas in Shanghai in 1986. A case of makee, learnee, copy.

[Non-Sequitur]

Who did they rip off, design wise?

Looks like the DC-9/717.

[Moose4]

Looks to me like a cross between a Boeing 717 (formerly the McDonnell-Douglas MD-95, the last member of the DC-9/MD-80/MD-90 family) and a Fokker 100.

}:-)4