More bad news for the A380

[Rick in Maine]

I hate to see these orders getting cancelled. I can certainly understand the business decision, though. These airlines need new equipment and can't wait years and years.

I'm for Boeing. I also think having competition is healthy and want Airbus to succeed for that reason in addition to the fact that they make good planes.

Rick in Maine

[polar911]

what's the status of the 787?

[Don]

what's the status of the 787?

Here is the web site:

http://www.boeing.com/commercial/787family/

There is a list of "News Releases" if you scroll down.

HTH

[Chorse6]

Been reading about the engineering issues of the A380. Not sure the specifics; however, think the issue is bigger than just the A380, but the whole Airbus/EADS model. Airbus is the major money maker for EADS. The issue is the government involvement in running the business. The governments of France and Germany have their hands deeply into the boardroom decision making. Neither want to lose jobs that are located in each of their countries; however, if they don't make sound fiscal decisions mutually exclusive of politics, then they will continue to be in trouble.

[Mark S.]

To add to the discussion I think the nature of the labor laws in those countries, job security issues and the roles of the unions have an impact on the organization. It reminds me of what the U.S. auto industry has gone through.

Mark

[Julien (UK)]

I am certainly A fan of airbus being from the UK, and it is sad to see orders being cancelled, however it is clear Airbus have dropped the ball on this one.

In addition Fed ex is a business and need to keep their customers happy. A few years ago when I worked in the high speed freight area I can say that Fed Ex was the on;y one of the major parcel/fast carriers that never let me down, so as a customer I can see where they are comming from.

Julien

[SimFixer]

...I always had my doubts that such a large plane as the 380 could be a good idea in a logistical point of view. Seems to me that, apart from a few high traffic routes, operators are now looking (both for passengers and cargo) for smaller and easier to operate planes instead, but I could be wrong.

We had planned to operate the 380 on our long-haul Pac Rim routes from Memphis, Indy, and one or two other larger hubs in the CONUS with a stop en route in Anchorage if needed. Also on some of the non-stop CONUS-to-Europe routes. The idea was to fit 2 MD-11 loads into one 380, thereby cutting overall route expenditures substantially (less fuel, less crews per leg, less maintenance man hours, etc.). Every model we did said it'd work but we had to have the jets relatively on-time to coordinate the new arrivals with the retirement of older ships (in some cases, mandated retirement by the FAA). After 4 delays and another year or more of waiting, the models were now obsolete.

Since 777F production was already underway, Boeing could guarantee delivery dates and build slots for less per plane. If you go by Boeing's spec sheet on the 777F, we lose some range and payload per jet but both are still more than the MD-10s and MD-11s we have now. I guess Mr. Smith thought is was still a good choice given the new circumstances.

For the short- to medium-haul domestic, Canadian, and South American stuff, we have the 757s comin' online to replace the 727-200s and we're still the largest operator of A300s and A310s in the world. So once the 727s are gone, the fleet will once again be fairly young with a lot of years left on the wings.

Edited November 9, 2006 by SimFixer

[Spongebob]

what's the status of the 787?

So many orders they are opening a second production line...

As for FedEx, they stated their main goal with the A380 was to fly Memphis to China without stopping in Anchorage like the MD-11's have to, and they wanted the capability yesterday. The 777F can do this, just not as much cargo on each trip. But it will have a full load whereas with the 380 they were giving away some cargo for fuel. The smaller load on the 777 is the reason for bumping the order up to 15. (SimFixer, just going with what was on CNBC yesterday)

Airbus needs a serious makeover between this and the 350.

Edited November 9, 2006 by Spongebob

[Dan 88]

The 787 is causing a lot of trouble for Airbus. It's so far taken 6 different variants of the A350 to at least be a competetor to the 787. The A350 is still not ready to be launched...

BTW Sponge, Boeing hasn't officially announced a second line yet, but we know it's inevitable.

Daniel

[Don]

Wow this is all interesting reading guys. It seems as though Airbus needs to pull their fingers out and right quick or else...

It will be interesting to see how this all pans out. Could the A380 be the jet version of the Spruce Goose ?

Regards.

[SimFixer]

The smaller load on the 777 is the reason for bumping the order up to 15. (SimFixer, just going with what was on CNBC yesterday)

No problemo. I hadn't seen that piece on CNBC but it certainly make sense. We got a shotgun email from AOD HQ regarding the deal but they didn't specify why the order amounts were different. I ain't complainin' though. The more jets we get, the more sims we'll need....and I'm just the guy to fix 'em!

Wow this is all interesting reading guys. It seems as though Airbus needs to pull their fingers out and right quick or else...

Edited November 9, 2006 by Ken Middleton

[MHaz]

We had planned to operate the 380 on our long-haul Pac Rim routes from Memphis, Indy, and one or two other larger hubs in the CONUS with a stop en route in Anchorage if needed. Also on some of the non-stop CONUS-to-Europe routes... After 4 delays and another year or more of waiting, the models were now obsolete...

I wouldn't toss those models just yet... Anyone want to bet that FedEx will pick up some 380's cheap out of wherever Emirates, Lufthansa, Qantas, etc park 'em when they can't fill the planes they bought? As neat as the 380 is, I doubt anyone will ever make money from the bird, except maybe the Pac Rim countries, where planes are always full...

Note: I work for a major subcontractor on both Airbus and Boeing airplanes - I've got stuff on the A330/340 and the 787, so I don't really care who wins out, I'll build either company's planes...

My $.02

[Yuri]

We had planned to operate the 380 on our long-haul Pac Rim routes from Memphis, Indy, and one or two other larger hubs in the CONUS with a stop en route in Anchorage if needed. Also on some of the non-stop CONUS-to-Europe routes. The idea was to fit 2 MD-11 loads into one 380, thereby cutting overall route expenditures substantially (less fuel, less crews per leg, less maintenance man hours, etc.). Every model we did said it'd work but we had to have the jets relatively on-time to coordinate the new arrivals with the retirement of older ships (in some cases, mandated retirement by the FAA). After 4 delays and another year or more of waiting, the models were now obsolete.

I see, what I was thinking about is that in case the operational conditions change (different routes and so on) you can relocate 2 MD-11, but you can't split the A-380 in half...

[jbrundt]

Time out - what's the latest on the setbacks on the A380?? last I heard they fired a chief designer for something on the wings....

Take Care

OCTOBER 23, 2006

Wayward Airbus

Cross-border clashes have led to costly production

errors making Job One for a new CEO to unify the Jet

maker.

Airbus' A380 double-decker jet is two years behind

schedule, sending billions of dollars in potential

profits down the drain. But the reason sounds too

simple to be true: Airbus factories in Germany and

France were using incompatible design software, so the

wiring produced in Hamburg didn't fit properly into

the plane on the assembly line in Toulouse.

It's one of the costliest blunders in the history of

commercial aviation, and it has plunged Airbus into

crisis. Chief Executive Christian Streiff quit on Oct.

9 after only three months on the job, following

clashes with Airbus' parent, European Aeronautic

Defense & Space Co., over how to sort out the mess.

The delays in the A380 mean EADS will take a $6

billion profit hit over the next four years, and the

resulting cash crunch could slow Airbus' plans for a

new midsize wide body to challenge Boeing Co.'s (BA)

hot-selling 787 Dreamliner. Airbus has fallen far

behind Boeing on total aircraft orders this year,

logging only 226 through September vs. 723 for its

U.S. rival.

How could the Europeans have blown it so badly? The

software debacle exposes a fundamental flaw in Airbus.

Far from the seamless, pan-European image it likes to

project, Airbus is terribly balkanized, with its

factories in Germany, France, Britain, and Spain

clinging to traditional operating methods and

harboring cross-border jealousies. "It is still, in

part, a juxtaposition of four companies," Streiff told

the French newspaper Le Figaro in the only interview

he has given since resigning.

Each of those four companies comes with a government

attached. Constant political meddling, it seems, is

the price Airbus must pay for billions of dollars in

low-interest government loans that have helped fuel

its growth. Politicians lean on the company to spread

work across its 16 European factories, sapping

efficiency and increasing the risk of production

glitches. "The fairy tale has turned into a nightmare

that even the fiercest Euro-skeptics wouldn't have

imagined possible," according to Eric Chaney, Morgan

Stanley's (MS) chief European economist.

The $16 billion A380 project was a victim of that

nightmare. The plane's mismatched wiring was produced

by Airbus' Finkenwerder factory, a vast complex near

the port of Hamburg that employs more than 10,000

people. In many respects, Finkenwerder would be the

most logical site for the A380's final assembly line.

Thanks to the plant's waterfront location, the plane's

wings and fuselage, too big for conventional land and

air transport, could have been delivered by ship

directly to the factory door. Instead, political

horse-trading led Airbus to put the assembly line in

landlocked Toulouse, where the huge components have to

be shipped on custom-built river barges and flatbed

trucks. More than 100 miles of highway had to be

widened and straightened so the trucks could get

through.

Hamburg, though, did get a piece of the action.

Finkenwerder was assigned to build some sections of

the A380 fuselage, as well as the wiring for the cabin

power supply, lighting, and electronic systems such as

video-on-demand for passengers. There was just one

problem, Airbus' French factories, where the rest of

the fuselage was manufactured, used the latest version

of computer-aided design software made by Dassault

Systems, a spin-off of French airplane maker Dassault

Aviation. But, Hamburg design engineers were using an

earlier version of the software, from the 1980s. "The

two systems are completely different. They have

nothing to do with each other," says Robert Weigl, the

Munich-based director of professional services for

Proficiency, a Waltham (Mass.) company that advises

manufacturers on design software.

When bundles of the cabin wiring started arriving in

Toulouse early this year, assembly slowed to a crawl.

Workers tried to make them fit into the fuselage by

pulling them apart and rethreading the wires, but that

proved to be impractical, and the effort was

abandoned. Airbus says it has introduced new software

to correct the wiring design, but it will take months

for engineers to get up to speed on the new system.

That's why Airbus now predicts it won't deliver the

first A380 orders until late 2007.

Why didn't Airbus spot the problem earlier? The

company isn't talking, but people familiar with the

situation say that some workers and mid-level managers

tried to raise alarms and were rebuffed by their

superiors. "The management in Toulouse didn't listen,"

says Rüdiger Lütjen, a labor-union leader who sits on

the Hamburg factory's workers' council. Adds Heinrich

Grossbongardt, a Hamburg aerospace consultant who

works with A380 suppliers: "Anyone who could look

behind the scenes and wanted to see the problems, saw

them."

Another stumbling block was the lack of a full digital

mock-up of the A380. Such three-dimensional models are

especially useful for electrical wires, which are

difficult to track in two dimensions as they twist and

bend through the plane. Boeing has such a mock-up for

the 787, and Dassault Aviation uses one to build its

corporate jets. Yet Airbus signed its first major

contract for mock-up software only within the past

year, when the A380 was already in production. "Airbus

just didn't put a high priority on [updating its

software]," says Hans Weber, CEO of San Diego-based

aviation consultant Tecop International, who has close

contacts with the company's Germ an operations.

"WE TAKE THE BLAME"

Streiff proposed tightening management control over

the A380 by reassigning the Hamburg factory's share of

the project to Toulouse. Not surprisingly, Hamburg

employees are furious. "The management screws up, and

we take the blame," fumes a grim-faced worker leaving

the Finkenwerder plant at shift change.

It's not clear whether Streiff's turnaround plan will

survive. The CEO said he quit because the EADS board

of directors, sensitive to pressure from the various

national constituencies, would not give him the

freedom he needed to restructure. But Louis Gallois,

the EADS co-chief executive who was named to succeed

Streiff, has promised a "rigorous" revamp of

manufacturing operations. "We have to ask questions

about our assembly lines, to rationalize them," he

said in a radio interview in Paris on Oct. 10. Any

plan to cut jobs in Germany will face stiff headwinds,

though, as politicians and labor leaders are already

mobilizing for a fight.

Airbus customers, meanwhile, are rooting for it to

cast off its old ways. Airlines and other buyers

depend on the fierce rivalry between Airbus and Boeing

to foster development of new technologies and keep

aircraft prices in check. "It would not do the

industry well to have one of the jet makers severely

weakened," says John L. Plueger, president of Los

Angeles-based International Lease Finance Corp., one

of Airbus' largest customers, with 10 A380s on order.

"I think this is an incredible opportunity for Airbus

to right the ship."

[DPD1]

Airbus' A380 double-decker jet is two years behind

schedule, sending billions of dollars in potential

profits down the drain. But the reason sounds too

simple to be true: Airbus factories in Germany and

France were using incompatible design software, so the

wiring produced in Hamburg didn't fit properly into

the plane on the assembly line in Toulouse.

When they first showed the complexity of how all the plants, parts and people had to come together into one plane, it seemed to me like it left a huge opportunity for errors in the system. Not to mention the great lengths they have to go to just to move the parts, and also all the political ramifications. Sure, building different sections in different places is nothing new in today's air and space industry, but the 380 just seems to take it to a level that's a little too much.

Dave

- The North Spin - The Place for Everything Flight Test

http://www.thenorthspin.com

[janman]

Hey guys! Still remember the Raptor's stuck canopy? :huh:

Joking aside. Were it an American jet, this conversation would be locked up for good.

EADS will get that bird in the air and some day it will inherit the Jumbo's throne.

[ipms33206]

Boeing has been having parts made in many different places for years without major problems. Not sure why Airbus screwed this one so bad when the technology is there for this kind of manufacturing. I wonder if museums should start putting dibbs on A380's for their collections?

Edited November 9, 2006 by ipms33206

[Ken Middleton]

Hey guys! Still remember the Raptor's stuck canopy? :huh:

Joking aside. Were it an American jet, this conversation would be locked up for good.

EADS will get that bird in the air and some day it will inherit the Jumbo's throne.

no it wouldn't be locked - people are discussing facts, and not ragging on the plane

[Vliegenier]

Hey guys! Still remember the Raptor's stuck canopy? :D

Joking aside. Were it an American jet, this conversation would be locked up for good.

EADS will get that bird in the air and some day it will inherit the Jumbo's throne.

The undertone is a bit arrogant sometimes but if it would be otherwise you'd be doing the same with no matter what manufacturer .

Fact is Airbus apparently messed up big and we can only hope it won't have to much effect on the European aircraft industry as a whole .

And : every aircraft has/had it's dark side ... never been different, never will be .

:huh:

Stef

[Vesper]

*un kooth comment*

Ves

[davetur]

no it wouldn't be locked - people are discussing facts, and not ragging on the plane

Sorry, but I tend to agree with Janman.

And facts are not always seen as facts: once in a thread I introduced a discussion based on historical facts (the topic being Hiroshima and other WWII bombings) and the thead was in the end locked for being political.

BTW, I am not an EADS shareholder, on the contrary, I work for an EADS competitor.

Regards

Davide

Edited November 9, 2006 by Ken Middleton

[Nev]

All I'll say is that this thread has more than a whiff of schadenfreude about it.

[Ken Middleton]

Sorry, but I tend to agree with Janman.

And facts are not always seen as facts: once in a thread I introduced a discussion based on historical facts (the topic being Hiroshima and other WWII bombings) and the thead was in the end locked for being political.

This is political. Not Real Aviation stuff. And I am not going to reply, it would be too easy.

BTW, I am not an EADS shareholder, on the contrary, I work for an EADS competitor.

Regards

Davide

OK great, please provide some contrary facts about the A380 delays and cancellations (not the F-22 please) - that's what this discussion board is all about. I am serious - this is how we all get educated on subjects

Your Hiroshima comparison is not valid when talking about the A380

we fail to see how talking about the set backs of the A380 is political

[ron]

I fly allot, this A380 scares me. It's to damn big. Just the though of having to stand in line to get onto it has me flustered. The 747 is bad enough to get on and off. It's so big that it dwarfs runways and leaves absolutely no room for error on landing or take off. We've all see the videos over the years of Jumbo's almost loosing it on landing in cross winds, over shooting runways etc. what will happen with this white elephant?

This beast is a recipe for disaster. I am willing to bet that it’s size combined with all the development problems they have been having will lead to a major air disaster within the first year of service. This thing is so big it puts simple avoidable occurrences into easy to happen occurrences like Overshot runways, ground collisions, ground loops from missing half the width of the runway, running out of runway on takeoff or just a plain old crash (god forbid)

I happen to be leaving for Dubai tomorrow and have flown Emirates for years. The 777 bothered me but at least I trust it. When Emirates get this A380 up and running I will not use their services anymore. I for one will never get on this plane if it makes it into service.

[Don]

You know folks, I really feel sorry for the Moderators of ARC at times (many times make that). I for one was quite enjoying this thread until things started to get heated for no apparent reason. Unlike others who seem to have strong opinions based on "anti-something" sentiment, I fully admit that I know nothing about the A380 or Boeings direct competition to it. As I stated earlier, I am neither anti-Airbus, nor am I pro-Boeing. Rather I am an aviation enthusiast who is interested in learning more about the A380 by asking questions and having those questions answered by folks who know a heck of a lot more then I do. Individuals, who work in the industry and in the case of this thread, work for some of the companies mentioned in the news releases. What was once a nice educational thread that in my opinion in no way was bashing Airbus (at least not bashing them outside the realm of what the news has already done nor based on what’s out there information wise…again, outside of ARC) has turned into an intentional attempt by a few to have this thread locked down. Why ? Honestly, what was written in this thread to make one or two people feel the need to force…yes…force…this thread to be locked from the majority who obviously want to discuss it and educate themselves in a calm non-inflammatory and non-antagonistic manner (until recently thanks to previous comments)?

News, financial, and aviation agencies from around the world have all written about how Airbus has dropped the ball on the A380 thus far. So what is the problem :blink: ? Not one person to my knowledge here on ARC has said/stated with finality that Airbus should be dissolved nor have they wished or stated that they hope Airbus or the A380 dies! If anyone here has information that contradicts what has been written by the media, financial institutions, FedEx, Airbus or Boeing then please share it with us. That is why I am here...to learn! Rather then throwing out flippant remarks that are done in the seeming hopes that someone will bite and the thread will be locked down, if you have nothing constructive to add then move on. Honestly, can someone please point me to the spot on the computer screen where the gun pops out, gets pointed to your head, and forces you, the ARC user, to read the threads that you feel necessary to ruin for no apparent reason. Why does Ken and the other Moderators have to monitor this thread that less then 24 hours ago was flowing fine without any gasoline or flames to ignite said gasoline? Honestly.

Now the odds are this thread will end up locked and lost for all to read and contribute to because some people feel the need to achieve some sense of victory or self satisfaction…â€YES I showed them! I got that thread locked downâ€. Well if that’s you then congratulations! It will in all likelihood get locked down. Therefore, instead of having an open and non-inflammatory discussion about the A380, we will all await the next thread to come along, go south, and be locked tomorrow or the next day.That seems to be the pattern.

Moderators…and my fellow ARC members…my apologies for this post/rant and by all means remove it. Please, I will in no way feel slighted or wrongly censored. Moderators, I honestly do not know how you do it? I really and truly do not. the pay must be darned good :D ! However, may I suggest that you add Boeing and the A380 to Religion, Politics, and flaps up or down to the list of topics not to be discussed here on ARC.

Regards,

Don