Hi, I recently started to try pure cargo airlines, and I noticed Tu-204 freighters are great options when 757-200F are not available in many servers. However, what’s the difference between the two variants: 100C and 120C?
I noticed 120C is slightly newer and more expensive, but has less MPL and Cargo capacity than 100C. Then what are the advantages of 120C over 100C? When should I use 100C and when 120C?
I don’t know why, but somehow the TU204-100C is much more likely to make profits (even with the same load factor) than the -120C…
therefore the 120C is a quite unpopular aircraft.
The main difference in real life is the engines. While the -100 uses the russian power plants the -120 use western engines (RB211) but unfortunately not really modern ones. For AS I guess in most cases the -100 variant is the better choice.
For cargo it’s all about keeping the cost down so always take the cheapest option especially since in short/medium range cargo you wont be operating your planes to the fullest. Only when it comes to high utilisation long range cargo might it be good to go with efficient planes. If i remeber correctly the Tupolevs have long turn around times so it might be beneficial to use 737s instead.