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Qantas is bringing back Airbus A380s from the California desert

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Re: Qantas is bringing back Airbus A380s from the California desert

#11

Post by InTheArena »

diebeforei485 wrote: post #4

It's a magnificent plane. It's very unfortunate that they launched the "shortened" version. The design and engineering was done for longer fuselage, so it actually has extra structure (and extra weight!) and larger wings than necessary. And it launched just before engines got a lot more efficient. The upside for passengers is that it's still the smoothest flying experience, even in turbulence. Boeing's 747 was incred…

This was a bad misreading of Boeing's financial state - which I think John Leahy eventually fessed up to. The 737 never needed any subsidizing. It is, to this day the most popular delivered jet plan (although the 320 now has more orders). If you count by airframe, the 707 + 737 family still dominates. JL simply never could understand why the A320 wasn't beating the 737 and placed the blame for the A320 not selling better than the 737 on mythical subsidies that Boeing was supposedly providing. The real reason was Airlines stuck with the 737 instead of the A320 because the price was competitive, they had trained pilots, staff, and mechanics, and some people didn't want fly-by-wire and CFRP.

The 777 had already passed the 747 as the main breadwinner well before the A380 took to the sky. Boeing had tried to launch two different 747 stretches and both failed. Airbus with government aid decided to launch the A380, even though there was significant evidence that the A340 was getting crushed against the 777.

Re: Qantas is bringing back Airbus A380s from the California desert

#12

Post by noahtallen »

InTheArena wrote: post #8
diebeforei485 wrote: post #4

It's a magnificent plane. It's very unfortunate that they launched the "shortened" version. The design and engineering was done for longer fuselage, so it actually has extra structure (and extra weight!) and larger wings than necessary. And it launched just before engines got a lot more efficient. The upside for passengers is that it's still the smoothest flying experience, even in turbulence. Boeing's 747 was incred…

The A380 was Airbus trying to out-American the Americans, by being the biggest plane, and by betting big on mega-hubs like Dubai, Heathrow, and LAX. There was a great paper that argued that Airbus could only do so because the risk of the decision was mitigated by government launch aid. Airbus's view of the market was wrong, and instead, we have the rise of more city pairs. Not small cities certainly - but right now,…

> Airbus walked away from what made them successful to go after the "we are the biggest" crown...

But they have direct competitors for these types of routes too. A350, A321-XLR, the various neo planes. All of which are as good as Boeing’s options! (And even some which Boeing doesn’t have, like the A220.) As an outsider, it seems like Airbus is in a fantastic spot, at least until Boeing starts shipping the 777X and working on a new single-aisle plane.

Re: Qantas is bringing back Airbus A380s from the California desert

#13

Post by llsf »

raulgalera wrote: post #5
diebeforei485 wrote: post #4

It's a magnificent plane. It's very unfortunate that they launched the "shortened" version. The design and engineering was done for longer fuselage, so it actually has extra structure (and extra weight!) and larger wings than necessary. And it launched just before engines got a lot more efficient. The upside for passengers is that it's still the smoothest flying experience, even in turbulence. Boeing's 747 was incred…

i totally agree re: the smoothest flying experience. the takeoff is so long and smooth you almost don't realize that you're up in the air. it was sad to learn that airlines were trying to get rid of it.

The landing surprised me too. Super soft compared to smaller planes.

I once landed in Johannesburg on a A380 Air France from Paris and the airport was in thick fog. You could not even tell we touched the ground. The captain made the announcement after landing that it was his very first time letting the plane land in itself... you could tell the excitement in his voice :)

Re: Qantas is bringing back Airbus A380s from the California desert

#14

Post by rconti »

diebeforei485 wrote: post #4

It's a magnificent plane. It's very unfortunate that they launched the "shortened" version. The design and engineering was done for longer fuselage, so it actually has extra structure (and extra weight!) and larger wings than necessary. And it launched just before engines got a lot more efficient. The upside for passengers is that it's still the smoothest flying experience, even in turbulence. Boeing's 747 was incred…

Source for the "they launched the shortened version"? I've never heard that before. Interesting.

Re: Qantas is bringing back Airbus A380s from the California desert

#15

Post by ramesh31 »

diebeforei485 wrote: post #4

It's a magnificent plane. It's very unfortunate that they launched the "shortened" version. The design and engineering was done for longer fuselage, so it actually has extra structure (and extra weight!) and larger wings than necessary. And it launched just before engines got a lot more efficient. The upside for passengers is that it's still the smoothest flying experience, even in turbulence. Boeing's 747 was incred…

>Boeing's 747 was incredibly profitable at the time, so it cross-subsidized other aircraft like the 737 (which competed with the A320). Launching the A380 countered that effect, and it made all segments more competitive.

It all comes down to fuel prices. Lamenting for the age of the 747 is the same as missing those boat size finned Cadillacs. It was another era. The ETOPS ratings of modern engines and fuel efficiency of high bypass designs means we will never see a four engined passenger liner ever again.

The A380 itself was outdated by the time it flew its first passengers, as the 787 was in its final stages of testing at the time. They will live on as cargo planes for outsized loads, and possibly long haul first class configurations, but the economics are simply not there for mainline passenger use.

Re: Qantas is bringing back Airbus A380s from the California desert

#16

Post by S201 »

rconti wrote: post #14
diebeforei485 wrote: post #4

It's a magnificent plane. It's very unfortunate that they launched the "shortened" version. The design and engineering was done for longer fuselage, so it actually has extra structure (and extra weight!) and larger wings than necessary. And it launched just before engines got a lot more efficient. The upside for passengers is that it's still the smoothest flying experience, even in turbulence. Boeing's 747 was incred…

Source for the "they launched the shortened version"? I've never heard that before. Interesting.

It's not so much as there is a "longer version" designed and sitting around, but more that the wings were built with a potential future, longer fuselage variant in mind. This is more evident if you look at a top-down view of it and note that the wing-to-fuselage ratio is higher than that of other planes, similar to how the 747-SP looks much shorter in length than its wings should be designed for. There's more details on the Wikipedia page for it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airbus_A380#Variants_proposed_...

Re: Qantas is bringing back Airbus A380s from the California desert

#17

Post by aziaziazi »

diebeforei485 wrote: post #4

It's a magnificent plane. It's very unfortunate that they launched the "shortened" version. The design and engineering was done for longer fuselage, so it actually has extra structure (and extra weight!) and larger wings than necessary. And it launched just before engines got a lot more efficient. The upside for passengers is that it's still the smoothest flying experience, even in turbulence. Boeing's 747 was incred…

> demand for flying is higher than ever

Is it ? Trafic is close to prependemic but still below.

> The industry is now just about 15% below 2019 levels of demand [0]

[0]https://www.iata.org/en/pressroom/2023-releases/2023-04-04-0...

Re: Qantas is bringing back Airbus A380s from the California desert

#19

Post by rob74 »

coredog64 wrote: post #10
diebeforei485 wrote: post #4

It's a magnificent plane. It's very unfortunate that they launched the "shortened" version. The design and engineering was done for longer fuselage, so it actually has extra structure (and extra weight!) and larger wings than necessary. And it launched just before engines got a lot more efficient. The upside for passengers is that it's still the smoothest flying experience, even in turbulence. Boeing's 747 was incred…

I’d be interested in a source for that. The 737 is an unqualified success. IIRC, at the turn of the century, one out of every three commercial flights was undertaken on a 737. (At around the same time, another third would have been DC-9 and derivatives) The 737 wasn’t particularly expensive to design or build. It shares a 41 section with the 707 and 727 for example.

Let's not get too carried away, shall we? At least the 346 people that died in the two 737-MAX crashes would probably question your "unqualified success" statement. But yes, no one can deny that the 737 has been a cash cow for Boeing (for far too long, some would say).
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