A380-800

Engine Alliance has been given a boost by Airbus in its battle with Rolls-Royce on the A380 after the airframer officially recognised a further improvement in the GP7200-powered version's fuel burn.
"In April we received a nice boost from Airbus, which gave our fuel burn advantage over the competition further validation when it revised the 'Orange Book' performance handbook to give us an additional 0.5% credit," says Engine Alliance president Mary Ellen Jones.
She says that this was on top of the 1% credit that Engine Alliance already has. "So this puts us 1.5% ahead of our own specification to Airbus. So in our view we are 1.5% ahead of the competition."
Airbus's A380 marketing chief Richard Carcaillet confirms the Orange Book adjustment, saying that the airframer wanted to reflect the improved performance over the original specification that the GP7200-powered aircraft now that sufficient in-service data has been accumulated.

aeroduO5 a écrit:Salut

Pour moi elles n'en ont pas besoin et les 747 ont peu de chances d'être remplacés par des avions de plus de 350 places.
D'autre part il y a des fréquences mais elles sont réparties entre plusieurs hubs donc pour une route intercontinentale donnée ça dépasse rarement le bi-quotidien.
Sinon les aéroports sont plutôt bien équipés pour les gros-porteurs et les compagnies étrangères utilisent des 747 et des A 380 vers les US. Le cas de La Guardia est particulier mais JFK et Newark reçoivent des gros-porteurs chaque jour.

Over in Hamburg, both MSN047 (Qantas #7) and MSN056 (Emirates #14) have
finished cabin furnishing and are now awaiting to be painted.
http://a380production.com/

PARIS, 6 septembre (Reuters) - EADS est en mesure de livrer "au moins" 20 appareils A380 en 2010, a déclaré lundi un porte-parole du groupe.
* Il dément ainsi des informations de la Lettre de L'Expansion selon lesquelles le constructeur aéronautique n'atteindrait pas son objectif de 20 livraisons d'A380 cette année.

Well, you never know:
We had the problems with the galleys for EKs and QFs airframe
We had the seat problems of SQ’s airframes
We had one A 380 damaged during cabin outfitting

The current status in terms of 2010-deliveries is as follows:
1) MSN 029 - QF - VH-OQF delivered
2) MSN 040 - AF - F-HPJB - delivered
3) MSN 025 - EK - A6-EDH - delivered
4) MSN 051 - SQ - 9V-SKK - delivered
5) MSN 043 - AF - F-HPJC - delivered
6) MSN 038 - LH - D-AIMA - delivered
7) MSN 009 - EK - A6-EDI - delivered
MSN 028 - EK - A6-EDJ - delivered
9) MSN 041 - LH - D-AIMB - delivered
10) MSN 030 - EK - A6-EDK - delivered
11) MSN 049 - AF - F-HPJD - delivered
12) MSN 046 - EK - A6-EDL - delivered
13) MSN 044 - LH - D-AIMC - delivered
14) MSN 042 - EK - A6-EDO, flightline, currently making test-flights
15) MSN 048 - LH - D-AIMD, in XFW since 29-04-10
16) MSN 056 - EK - A6-EDM, in XFW since 17-05-10
17) MSN 047 - QF - VH-OQG, in XFW since 27-05-10, flightline but not yet painted
18) MSN 057 - EK - A6-EDN, in XFW since 11-06-10

I think these 18 airframes should be no problem, unless airframe-specific problems occur as described above.

To deliver 20 A 380s in 2010, Airbus will have to complete two additional A 380s, e.g. (in the order of the arrival date in XFW), most probably these two candidates:

MSN 050 - QF - VH-OQH - in XFW since 02-06-10
MSN 058 - SQ - 9V-SKL - in XFW since 23-07-10

(theoretically also MSN 055 - QF - VH-OQI - in XFW since 16-07-10 but this doesn't fit to QF's announcements)

The reason, why Airbus thought they could deliver even more than 20 A 380s was eventually MSN 052 for AF. However, this is no longer possible as MSN 052 is still in TLS (will be transferred maybe even this week). It seems as if some unplanned works were necessary for MSN 052.

Lufthansa boasts of 100% A380 technical dispatch reliabilityBy Kerry Reals


Lufthansa has consistently experienced 100% technical dispatch reliability on its Airbus A380s, but Air France is frequently dropping below its 98.5% target.Speaking at Aviation Week's MRO Europe conference in London today, Air France Industries vice-president line maintenance and airframe engineering Herve Page said the carrier is "more or less" at its targeted 98.5% technical dispatch reliability, "sometimes above, but more often below".However, he adds that technical issues are being resolved and he is confident Air France will reach its 98.5% target "rapidly".Lufthansa Technik director of new aircraft readiness line maintenance, Dean Raineri, says that on Lufthansa's A380s technical dispatch reliability within 15 minutes has not dropped below 100%."So far we've been fortunate, we've only had two delays but they were within 15 minutes," says Raineri. He adds that the 100% reliability record is due largely to the fact that Lufthansa's A380s are 'Wave 2' models, which have a "higher modification level" than earlier models."It's worthwhile not being the launch customer," says Raineri, adding that Lufthansa's dispatch reliability on its A380s is also the result of the carrier's "preventive maintenance" strategy. "We don't wait until failure occurs."Lufthansa's A380s have clocked up 2,200 flight hours, or 600 flight cycles, since they were delivered to the carrier in May. Air France's A380s have operated 8,913 flight hours and 1,606 flight cycles.

Airbus A380 Bypasses Hubs as Smaller Cities Clamor for Flights


Airbus SAS’s A380 superjumbo, designed to carry 500 people per flight between the world’s biggest airport interchanges, is carving out an unexpected new market with direct travel to non-hub cities.

Singapore Airlines Ltd., the first company to operate the A380 in 2007, is cutting costs by using the plane to reduce the number of flights to Zurich without slashing capacity. Gulf carrier Emirates has deployed it to Manchester in northern England, adding seats without the expense of extra services.
More than 70 airports are equipped to handle the A380, which has a 262-foot (80-meter) wingspan and is 239 feet long, with Munich and Berlin among non-hubs seeking to secure flights from the five carriers that operate the plane and the 10 others with orders. The development is a boost for the Airbus flagship, which has won only one new airline buyer since it first flew.

“The A380 was designed as a replacement for the 747, but as it’s deployed we’re finding that the execution is very often different than the forecast,” said Chris Tarry, an independent analyst in London who has followed the industry for almost 30 years. “Airlines need to match capacity with demand, and if you want to move lots of people in one go the A380 does just that.”
Auckland, Jeddah
Of the 20 destinations that the A380 currently serves, six -- Manchester, Zurich, Auckland, Melbourne, Montreal and Jeddah, the second-largest city in Saudi Arabia -- are absent from Airbus’s list of what it predicts will be the top 20 airports for the plane.
For flights from smaller cities the A380 works best as a “strategic tool” when there’s no need for a high number of daily frequencies, Richard Carcaillet, Airbus’s marketing director for the model, said in an interview.
“It’s logical to use the A380 where there’s the potential to increase traffic with one well-timed flight that catches the peak of demand and reduces your spill, or traffic that’s left behind because an aircraft is too small,” the executive said.
Emirates, the No. 1 A380 customer with 13 in its fleet out of 90 on order, began operating the superjumbo to Jeddah four times a week in February, switching to a daily service in June.
Manchester was added to the network last month, with the A380 replacing one of two daily Boeing Co. 777s and funneling a potential 525 more people a week to the Dubai hub the carrier is building as a rival to airports such as London Heathrow.

“There were some very clear traffic flows which were calling for the A380,” Emirates Chief Executive Officer Tim Clark said in an interview. “The seat factors on Manchester flights were very high, which required an increase in gauge.”
Crowd Puller
The coming of the A380, which attracted 20,000 spectators for its first flight to Manchester, is “massively important” and was secured at a cost of 10 million pounds ($15.9 million) in upgrades, said Andrew Harrison, the airport’s managing director, who is hopeful the remaining 777 service might be switched to the superjumbo.
Manchester, which handled 22 million people last year, ranking it fourth among U.K. airports, had initially regarded Boeing’s 787 Dreamliner as a more likely candidate for flights because the model is smaller and designed for direct services that don’t involve hub transfers, Harrison said in an interview.
“We always talked about the Dreamliner being potentially more our kind of aircraft,” he said. “It would support longer haul and what we call in the business ‘thinner routes.’ But the Emirates route has proved to have loads of demand.”
Emirates’ Clark says “similar points” in Germany, France, Asia, South Africa, Italy and China could support the superjumbo and lists Hamburg, Munich, Dusseldorf, Rome and Milan as possible destinations for the future.
Singapore Switch

Singapore Airlines deployed the A380 strategically in March when it replaced 12 weekly Boeing Co. 777 flights to Zurich -- which ranks as Switzerland’s biggest city but isn’t among the largest 150 in Europe -- with a daily superjumbo service.
With the 777 seating 278 people and the A380 some 471, flights were reduced at a cost of 39 seats a week, maintaining feed to Singapore for connections across Asia and Australia while allowing a spare Boeing to be used for services to Munich.

“This is operationally more efficient as mounting more flights carries incremental costs for landing, parking, over- flight and air traffic control, as well as for a full set of cabin and technical crew and additional fuel consumption,” said Nicholas Ionides, a spokesman for the carrier, which is the second-largest in the world by market value.
Among secondary airports identified by Clark as likely A380 destinations, Munich, which opened in 1992, is “well prepared” for the superjumbo, having been built with a plane of its size in mind, according to spokesman Peter Pruemm.
Berlin Ambitions
The model has operated test flights to the south-German city “several times,” though no airlines have plans for scheduled services this year or next, he said.
Berlin’s new airport, which opens in June 2012, will have a gate that is A380 compatible and is expecting to receive flights, said spokesman Leif Erichsen. Berlin is almost unique in being a capital city while lacking a major hub, with long- haul German flights focused on Frankfurt, he said.
Airbus, which is owned by European Aeronautic, Defence & Space Co., markets the A380 as more fuel-efficient than older, smaller jets and says it helps alleviate congestion at major airports. EADS was trading down 5.5 cents, or 0.2 percent, at 17.82 euros as of 1:18 p.m. in Paris, paring gains this year to 26 percent and valuing the company at 14.5 billion euros.
Cocktail Bars
Airlines that operate the superjumbo -- which include Air France, Deutsche Lufthansa SA and Qantas Airways Ltd., as well as Emirates and Singapore Air -- say the plane is also creating its own market, luring flyers with a double-decker layout and on-board perks such as first-class cabins and cocktail bars.
According to Airbus’s projections the five busiest airports for so-called very large aircraft by 2028 will be Hong Kong, Heathrow, Beijing, Dubai and Tokyo Narita, with 12 of the top 20 located in the Asia-Pacific.

David Gamper, Geneva-based director of safety and technical affairs at the Airports Council International group, said the A380’s natural home may be “thicker hub-to-hub routes,” but that it will “migrate to thinner routes” as deliveries mount.
“There are a lot of airports around the world which can accept the A380, usually with very little modification,” he said in an interview. “And more will need to accommodate it simply due to the number of airlines getting the plane.”