So I’ve been playing for quite some time, had many non-starters on Tempelhof and my current airline founded 3rd January 2012 seems to be working out well for me.
But I have a question re effective A/C. With my airline being based on a small Island, the bigger airports are some 2500-3500km away. To get there, I have been using A318-Heavy A/C. They are making a profit, I have 105 Economy seats on them. I also recently tried adding capacity by also flying Dash8-Q400B’s to some of these reachable destinations giving me 65 Economy seats with a sold on board service. These Dash8’s are bringing roughly $1000 extra in profit per flight than the 105 seat A318. The problem is now however that the Dash8 just cannot reach SOME of the destinations and the flight time… well one is 4 hrs on the A318 and is 6 hrs on the Dash8.
I’ve been using the evaluation tool to look at the CRJ900LR - but it shows it up as a loss making A/C for the ~3000-3500km routes. But strangely it also shows the A318 as loss making (when it isn’t). Can anyone who flies these types of distances successfully advise on an A/C that they have found to work well with min 70 Economy-Economy seats?
The AET have to be used carefully. It is in fact not such an “evaluation”-tool but more a “compare”-tool (if you understand where the difference is ). You can see if a plane can make profit but you have always to take another type into the evaluation to see how profitable this airplane would really be. You made it right and compare the CR9L with the 318H of which you know how profitable it is.
For example: I chose the route PNH - HKG with a Boeing 737-900ER HGW/wl and I get with "standard seats" & "100% price" a margin of 25%. To be honest, I have about 40% margin with 139 seats. You have to set anyting to fit with your actual results of a full flight to get good numbers while evaluating other planes.
Something additional: If you only operate routes up to 3500km, you don’t need an A318 heavy to transport 105 passengers.
105 passengers have a total weight of 9975kg (95kg per passenger). On a 3500km long route, the A318 light still has a payload of roughly 10300kg. So you can replace the A318 heavy with a A318 light - cheaper to lease and operate.
I think my longest is 3886km. a318 light will fly 9313kg at this distance, but that being said, medium at least would work fine. I just wanted the flexibility on some routes that are 4800km such as HNL.
how far was the destination you checked ? Say a return flight takes 11 or 12 hours. In this case the Aircraft Evaluation Tool will tell you the plane can perform 14 flights per week. So the Evaluation tool will divide the leasing cost over these 14 flights (one daily outbound and one daily return flight). As a result, the plane will not be profitable on that route.
If you follow the logic of the Evaluation Tool, your plane would be sitting on the ground 12 hours per day. In reality, your plane may do that one long return flight and then do a second (shorter) flight and still get enough maintenance. So in reality the leasing cost is divided over 28 flights instead of 14. That makes your plane profitable.
Another reason may be that you are using a fast and efficiently working maintenance contractor. And that may allow you to perform 28 flights per day instead of 14.
Ive stuck with Amethyst Engineering for maintenance (all average). I do one return of 3000-3800km each way and one return of 1800-2500km each way and have scheduled them as such. One AC does 2x 2500km each way and due to extra space has a 500km round trip island hop also.
I use 737-700 BGWs and 737-900ER HGW - they’re a little bigger than what you may be looking for, but give excellent economics on small routes as well as longer ones.
I see a LOT of people using the 73G/739’s for practically every route they operate. But what I want it to add a smaller capacity AC slightly bigger and better range than the Dash8-Q400B and slightly smaller than the A318.
I must revive this issue, now not for these short haul A/C but for long haul.
I’m looking to add NAN-LAX in the near future, a journey of 8,870km by AS calculations. But once again, the middle economy seating with 105% pricing shows any A/C I review as loss making by the evaluation tool. Any recommendations for this type of sector?
). You can see if a plane 