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Italy moves to Airbus A330 tankers

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Re: Italy moves to Airbus A330 tankers

#51

Post by ericmay »

wolvoleo wrote: post #37
ericmay wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are a lot of issues in the American political system but the structure of the Senate is not one of those. It was explicitly created as a way to balance sovereignty of the states against populism, such as that enacted by MAGA or leftists. If you are a small state like Vermont, you don’t want to just have California, New York, and Texas dictating all rules and laws for the country by sheer weight of their populat…

> That is expressed in the House, but the Senate serves to balance that and ensure that populists don’t run roughshod over the country. Yet that is exactly what has been happening twice now.

Well, dissolving the Senate would just make that problem even worse if that's your viewpoint. "Twice now" seems to be a dig at Trump as though MAGA is the only populist movement, but ANTIFA/BLM and other, similar populist groups have taken hold of power in various forms as well, primarily in certain west coast states and cities.

Re: Italy moves to Airbus A330 tankers

#52

Post by lysace »

ksec wrote: post #47

This is a noob question but wondering if anyone here could answer. There are plenty of choices for Small and Medium size plane as well as private jet. Why are most commercial airline only buying Boeing and Airbus? And why others aren't making bigger planes to compete?

The Chinese government has spent 18 years and an unknown amount of funds trying to compete:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comac

They have delivered 185 aircraft to domestic airlines. Maybe Africa is next?

Note that they so far use engines from western companies - GE and Safran. In fact, the vast majority of their primary suppliers are from outside of China: https://www.csis.org/blogs/trustee-china-hand/chinas-comac-a...

I guess it takes a bit of a war chest to get into this business simply because it isn't very easy.

Re: Italy moves to Airbus A330 tankers

#53

Post by ericmay »

oscillonoscope wrote: post #43
ericmay wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are a lot of issues in the American political system but the structure of the Senate is not one of those. It was explicitly created as a way to balance sovereignty of the states against populism, such as that enacted by MAGA or leftists. If you are a small state like Vermont, you don’t want to just have California, New York, and Texas dictating all rules and laws for the country by sheer weight of their populat…

This might have made sense for the original 13 colonies but after westward expansion, it clearly does not. Most of the western state borders were formed for administrative reasons

It still makes sense today. It's not perfect but it's a pretty good balance most of the time.

Re: Italy moves to Airbus A330 tankers

#54

Post by iancmceachern »

ksec wrote: post #47

This is a noob question but wondering if anyone here could answer. There are plenty of choices for Small and Medium size plane as well as private jet. Why are most commercial airline only buying Boeing and Airbus? And why others aren't making bigger planes to compete?

There are really only 2 choices.

There is a third, Embrarer. They have most of the market in small regional jets in some cases, but those are in reality very different than say a 777 or 787.

These two choices are conglomerates of what used to be a much larger set of manufacturers. In short Boeing, Airbus and it's suppliers are basically what is left of all the old big aerospace manufacturers.

Re: Italy moves to Airbus A330 tankers

#55

Post by tremon »

iancmceachern wrote: post #54
ksec wrote: post #47

This is a noob question but wondering if anyone here could answer. There are plenty of choices for Small and Medium size plane as well as private jet. Why are most commercial airline only buying Boeing and Airbus? And why others aren't making bigger planes to compete?

There are really only 2 choices. There is a third, Embrarer. They have most of the market in small regional jets in some cases, but those are in reality very different than say a 777 or 787. These two choices are conglomerates of what used to be a much larger set of manufacturers. In short Boeing, Airbus and it's suppliers are basically what is left of all the old big aerospace manufacturers.

These two choices are conglomerates of what used to be a much larger set of manufacturers

This. The entire market has been allowed to be monopolized through mergers and buy-outs. Russia used to have their own aerospace industry (and that fleet was reliable enough to be allowed to fly in Europe) but then Russia happened.

Re: Italy moves to Airbus A330 tankers

#56

Post by ksec »

iancmceachern wrote: post #54
ksec wrote: post #47

This is a noob question but wondering if anyone here could answer. There are plenty of choices for Small and Medium size plane as well as private jet. Why are most commercial airline only buying Boeing and Airbus? And why others aren't making bigger planes to compete?

There are really only 2 choices. There is a third, Embrarer. They have most of the market in small regional jets in some cases, but those are in reality very different than say a 777 or 787. These two choices are conglomerates of what used to be a much larger set of manufacturers. In short Boeing, Airbus and it's suppliers are basically what is left of all the old big aerospace manufacturers.

>There are really only 2 choices.

For private jets there are Gulfstream, Bombardier, Textron, Dassault, and as you said Embraer. I think there was a recent new Entry, Honda from Japan.

Re: Italy moves to Airbus A330 tankers

#57

Post by joe_mamba »

tremon wrote: post #55
iancmceachern wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are really only 2 choices. There is a third, Embrarer. They have most of the market in small regional jets in some cases, but those are in reality very different than say a 777 or 787. These two choices are conglomerates of what used to be a much larger set of manufacturers. In short Boeing, Airbus and it's suppliers are basically what is left of all the old big aerospace manufacturers.

These two choices are conglomerates of what used to be a much larger set of manufacturers This. The entire market has been allowed to be monopolized through mergers and buy-outs. Russia used to have their own aerospace industry (and that fleet was reliable enough to be allowed to fly in Europe) but then Russia happened.

>Russia used to have their own aerospace industry (and that fleet was reliable enough to be allowed to fly in Europe) but then Russia happened.

It's absolutely irrelevant what Russia did or could have done here in this industry.

Same with Chinese planes. If they ever manage to make a competitive passenger plane, it will not be allowed certification by US and European authorities purely for political reasons, the same way how their EVs are not allowed for sale in the US or how they aren't allowed to have ASML EUV machines. This isn't a fair game, never was.

The decisions on purchase of aerospace units is 90% (inter-)national politics and only 10% meritocracy, since both Boeing and Airbus are massive defense players making advanced killing machines, and no country wants to directly or indirectly fund the defense industry of their geopolitical rivals.

When a third country needs to chooses between Airbus or Boeing for their flag carrier fleet, they don't objectively compare the operational history and tech specs of Airbus vs Boeing and make the decision based on that, they just ask themselves "do I want to be in bed with EU-France or with Uncle Sam as my main ally and provider for the next 30+ years". Hence why most oil-rich middle eastern states chose Boeing as the US is their main defense provider anyway and don't want to anger them, especially when Donald Orange makes a visit to your state.

That's just how politics works when you operate at that level. Handshakes, dinners and bribes. Always has.

Re: Italy moves to Airbus A330 tankers

#58

Post by throw1234567891 »

rassimmoc wrote: post #38
kevin_thibedeau wrote: post #3

The USAF also selected the MRTT but corruption took care of that threat to Boeing.

I am surprised that USAF selecting MRTT even got so far as to be made public. I would expect it would die in some draft document on someones office PC

It’s good for propaganda.

Re: Italy moves to Airbus A330 tankers

#59

Post by Sammi »

joe_mamba wrote: post #57
tremon wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These two choices are conglomerates of what used to be a much larger set of manufacturers This. The entire market has been allowed to be monopolized through mergers and buy-outs. Russia used to have their own aerospace industry (and that fleet was reliable enough to be allowed to fly in Europe) but then Russia happened.

>Russia used to have their own aerospace industry (and that fleet was reliable enough to be allowed to fly in Europe) but then Russia happened. It's absolutely irrelevant what Russia did or could have done here in this industry. Same with Chinese planes. If they ever manage to make a competitive passenger plane, it will not be allowed certification by US and European authorities purely for political reasons, the same…

Sensible.

Re: Italy moves to Airbus A330 tankers

#60

Post by maxglute »

ksec wrote: post #47

This is a noob question but wondering if anyone here could answer. There are plenty of choices for Small and Medium size plane as well as private jet. Why are most commercial airline only buying Boeing and Airbus? And why others aren't making bigger planes to compete?

Industrially boeing / airbus are 100k large companies, i.e. need 300m+ base country size (or in EU case, block size) to support specialized workforce large enough for modern commercial aviation. Economically, fuel costs, i.e. engine maturity makes any entrant that's doesn't have parity engine core tech automatically none viable because simply higher costs due to lifetime fuel costs. (Geo)politically, there's lots of certification / safety drama that incumbents like US/EU will throw to undermine competitors so really also matter of geopolitical power - i.e. apart from engines, PRC COMAC using western components mostly for easier certification, they have large enough internal market to sustain development against economics. Almost no one else has those conditions, except India but they don't have industrial base.

Since topic is tankers, PRC/RU has their own tankers, i.e. for military aviation it's not strictly as difficult since fuel cost less issue. But for strategic aviation (transport/tanking) big efficiency working with commercial chassis / turbofan efficiency.

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