| Quoting Leelaw (Reply 47): SQ are not purchasing the A330s, they're leasing them directly from Airbus on what appear to be extraordinary terms indeed, at least vis-a-vis the duration of the leases. |
Guess this is a situation where you both are correct. SQ is not directly ordering these A330-300s, however these 19 A330-300 will be specifically manufactured for SQ´s lease with the clear (??) intention of placing them with other carriers afterwards - if SQ is not keeping them. That basically means that SQ is ordering them, however on very creative "ordering terms".
| Quoting Stitch (Reply 45): The next five to ten years will probably be the most critical for each plane to garner as many orders as it can as the "wonder twins" - the 787 and A350X - prepare to enter service. |
Guess this is one of the best quotes here. IMO both the B787 and A350 are over-hyped. They just reflect the next generation of wide-body twins, but are certainly no revolution. As with basicaly all previous designs of whatever size they are likely to open up some new business opportunities, but that´s it. Don´t know where the "wonder" is supposed to be.
| Quoting Planemaker (Reply 43): CFRP VLA's, they won't be around for a long time. Perhaps the best one can expect in the interim is an increase in CFRP use on the exisiting designs with improved engines. |
Absolutely correct. One shouldn´t forget in this entire discussion that even our supposed "wonder twins" will be nowhere near 100% CFRP, but will both hang around the 50-60% of "advanced materials".
| Quoting Zvezda (Reply 46): Those already sold would saturate that tiny niche. |
Capacity-wise: probably yes. Adjusting for constrains such as time differences and airport slots: no.
1. There is no real chance to replace two current B747-400 flights operating from SIN to FRA within minutes (23:55 and 23:59 AFAIK) with 4 B787 or A350. Slot availability simply puts limits on it.
2. Consider crew availability and costs. While it might be less of an issue in South-East Asia, crew costs certainly come into play in US and Europe. Whilst you would need a set of 3 pilots (one counted as back up) and a cabin crew of say 20 for one A380 flight, you would need for a similar operation with B787/A350 2 sets of pilots (=6) and 2 set of cabin crews (=20). 3 additional pilots doesn´t sound much, but now multiply this with 4 sets of crew for each plane, and a fleet of 20 planes. That makes 240 additional pilots - and THAT´s clearly a cost factor, at least in high-salary countries.
I'm guessing that you are not easily impressed. Application of a new material and new method of fabricating large fuselages is a milestone in aviation. A shame if we don't appreciate what we are witnessing.
No place & time to be down to earth Tiger, we are talking carefully cultivated market campaigns with true believers here. I did a similar topic a year ago telling a.net the 787 would probably be a great aircraft, but not a game changer. Explaining why in detail was oil on the fire. People still come back on it 