A350 Troubles the latest news......

[Not_Karl]

Since the A350 is made out of an increased proportion of cheap composite materials rather than good american metal, the cabin pressure can be lower than previous generations, down to 6000 feet from the previous 8000 feet.

Fixed, but wouldn't that be higher cabin pressure?

[Gabriel]

Since the A350 is made out of an increased proportion of cheap composite materials rather than good american metal, the cabin pressure can be lower than previous generations, down to 6000 feet from the previous 8000 feet.

Fixed, but wouldn't that be higher cabin pressure?

Exactly, or lower "cabin altitude", you know, like in "down to 6000 feet from the previous 8000 feet".

The last time I checked, the foot was a unit of length, not presssure (well, the last time I checked the foot was a thing where I was putting my socks on).

[PurduePilot]

It's 18 inches wider? Well shit let's stick another seat in each row! That will make it more comfortable for passengers, right?

[Peminu]

Since the A350 is made out of an increased proportion of cheap composite materials rather than good american metal, the cabin pressure can be lower than previous generations, down to 6000 feet from the previous 8000 feet.

Fixed, but wouldn't that be higher cabin pressure?

Exactly, or lower "cabin altitude", you know, like in "down to 6000 feet from the previous 8000 feet".

The last time I checked, the foot was a unit of length, not presssure (well, the last time I checked the foot was a thing where I was putting my socks on).

Have you heard about feet, inches, mm, meters of water?, or of Hg?

I believe that when the controllers tell you to set your altimeters normally they use inches (a lenght messure) of Hg. And those are pressure units (just abbreviated if you say inches).

So, as you know, everything is relative.

C'mon ché! We kive in a world of abbreviatures.

[Gabriel]

Have you heard about feet, inches, mm, meters of water?, or of Hg?

I believe that when the controllers tell you to set your altimeters normally they use inches (a length messure) of Hg. And those are pressure units (just abbreviated if you say inches).

Yes, and these are units of length unless the length of water or Hg is measured vertically under 1g, case in which you might be referring to the increase of pressure produced by water or Hg when you increase the depth is such medium in that many inches or feet or mm. Of course, saying "Set your altimeter to the increase of pressure produced by an increase in depth of 29.92 inches in Hg under a gravitational field of 9.8 meters per squared second" is not very convenient, especially when you say "QNH twenty nine ninety two" and everybody (who cares) understands.

C'mon ché! We kive in a world of abbreviatures.

Yes and not only that but we also live in such a world.

But in this case, the 8000 or 6000 ft were of cabin altitude, not of cabin pressure. (both can be correlated though)

[3WE]

Since the A350 is made out of an increased proportion of cheap composite materials rather than good american metal, the cabin pressure can be lower than previous generations, down to 6000 feet from the previous 8000 feet.

Fixed, but wouldn't that be higher cabin pressure?

I'm with not in agreement either, Not_Karl.

The cabin is not under a lower pressure, it's under a higher pressure. Not withstanding, there's no reason they could not have said, that the cabin is pressurized to a lower altitude.

[GlennAB1]

"the cabin pressure can be lower than previous generations, down to 6000 feet from the previous 8000 feet."

It probably didn't make sense to them to write: the cabin pressure can be higher than previous generations, up to 6000 feet from the previous 8000 feet

[Sickbag]

Engineers developing the new Airbus A350 are racing to create an airliner that they promise will redefine comfort and efficiency. They also are trying to prove that they can build a plane without major delays or multibillion-dollar cost overruns.

Hope and Change

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142 ... 72788.html

[PurduePilot]

July 11, 2012

FARNBOROUGH-Airbus plans to confirm the A350’s first flight by the end of October, a decision that will coincide with delivery of the wing for MSN1, the first flight test aircraft.

The wing has been a concern for Airbus in recent weeks, with delays in the automatic drilling process forcing the airframer to defer the wing for the fatigue test aircraft by about four weeks.

A350 Program Head Didier Evrard says Airbus hopes to be able to mitigate that development and recoup some time with the help of a physical mock-up in Bremen, Germany, that will help accelerate the learning curve in production and the equipping process.

Five wings are being built in parallel, and the improvements will apply to all of them. Evrard now expects the wing for the fatigue test aircraft, which has been in final assembly since April, to arrive at the end of August.

Fuselage Section 11/14 for MSN1 will come to Toulouse from the plant in St. Nazaire, France, “in the coming days,” says Evrard; the rest of the fuselage is expected at the end of September.

Airbus still plans for the first A350-900 to fly before mid-2013.

By the time of entry into service, about 20 aircraft will be “in various stages of completion,” Evrard says. The flight test campaign will require four aircraft plus a fifth for route proving.

Evrard also says detailed load calculation has started on the redesigned A350-1000. “We are going to do what we decided a year ago.” Airbus is increasing the maximum takeoff weight from 298 to 308 tons and payload up by four tons. Engine thrust will be increased from 93,000 to 97,000 lb. Final assembly is planned to start in mid-2015, and service entry will follow in mid-2017. Evrard notes that because the aircraft is a stretched variant there is much less risk involved in future development, compared with the -900.

Because of the design changes, Airbus has delayed the A350-1000’s entry into service by about two years.

http://www.aviationweek.com/Article.asp ... 475609.xml

[OldSowBreath]

Remind me again - what's the A350 for?

[Verbal]

Remind me again - what's the A350 for?

The A350-1000, as it is currently configured, is within a foot in length and wingspan of the 777-300ER. Guess who its competition is?

The A350-900 is seen as filling the replacement market for the 777-200ER.

The A350-800 is competition for the 787-9.

Hope this helps.

[Not_Karl]

Remind me again - what's it doing now?

Fixed.

The A350-1000, as it is currently configured, is within a foot in length and wingspan of the 777-300ER. Guess who its competition is?

ATR-72?

[Rabbi O'Genius]

Surprise, surprise....

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-21477126

[J]

Sticking to the old rule that you never interrupt a rival when they making all the wrong noises Airbus has been rather quiet about the A350 lately.
But its Twitter feed did flash up this photo of the wing tip fences or feathers as have been sometimes called being fitted to what looks like the first of the new wide body twin jets that will fly at the start of its test and certification program sometime before early June.

There now seems to be a reasonable prospect of the A350-900 entering service by the end of next year, which should if things turn around on the Dreamliner program, be about the same time the first of extended fuselage 787-9s are also delivered.



http://blogs.crikey.com.au/planetalking ... -feathers/

[J]

A350 first flight in three months, after Paris air show

Airbus is planning to conduct the first flight of the A350 in about three months, likely after the Paris air show. "It will be around mid-year, just after Paris or a week later. It's difficult to say," Airbus chief executive Fabrice Bregier tells Flightglobal on the sidelines of an industry lunch in Washington DC.

Airbus has said that the first flight of the A350 will take place in mid-2013. Bregier notes that it is difficult to say when exactly the first flight will talke place. "There are many, many tests to pass. So far the progress is good... We are on track," he says.

http://www.flightglobal.com/news/articl ... ow-384427/

[J]

Exclusive Photos: First Look at a Complete Airbus A350

http://blogs.wsj.com/corporate-intellig ... rbus-a350/

Some of the comments are especially poignant:

1:57 pm May 8, 2013
Anonymous wrote :
Boeing will prevail. AirBus is more expensive, heavier, and domestic to a socialist country. Go Boeing.

2:24 pm May 8, 2013
Underwhelming wrote :
Wow, it just happens to look like 94% of every other plane that you see at an airport; and I suspect that the insides will look very familiar to travelers in all respects. Just call 1-800-No-Legroom for further details.

4:09 pm May 8, 2013
Marcus Aurelius wrote :
“Anonymous” and Chris might just work for Boeing. Talking about a company that has totally underestimated the opposition – that’s Boeing. A company which wanted to be the “global integrator” around the turn of the century turned out to be nothing but an incompetent, opportunistic, flag wrapping Lazy B when they had to go all out in order to deny EADS the tanker contract. Boeing thought that they could produce 747s for another 40 years, is now throwing the MAX into the market as a Hail Mary Pass while the NEO is grabbing Boeing customers one after the other, and hope that they can compete with the A350 with a warmed over 777. Only know-nothing cheerleaders believe Boeing is in an “enviable” position – and I haven’t mentioned the 787 disaster…

[J]

Haunting Skeletonized Livery



(CNN) -- The highly anticipated arrival of the Airbus A350 XWB took a small step closer, yesterday.

The European aircraft manufacturer unveiled the latest in its test fleet of the new jet, the MSN2, painted in a new "carbon" livery and the first to be equipped with a full passenger cabin interior.

Test flights of the aircraft began before the Paris Airshow last May. In the coming weeks Airbus will send the MSN2 into the skies on a series of Early Long Flights (ELF) with passengers onboard.

The company says it remains on track to deliver the new aircraft to its first customer, Qatar Airways, in the fourth quarter of this year.
* * *
The distinctive carbon livery of the latest A350 XWB plane reflects how much of the aircraft is made from advanced materials; 53% of the A350 XWB is made up of carbon-fiber reinforced polymer and is Airbus' first carbon-fiber fuselage.
http://edition.cnn.com/2014/01/02/busin ... xwb-plane/

[666]

Hey, this thread is for posting A350 troubles, not for posting communist propaganda about tests running as scheduled. Come back here when the next test flight goes up in smoke and delivery deadlines go down the toilet. This site is called AirDisaster for a reason, you know?

[Verbal]

Hey, this thread is for posting A350 troubles, not for posting communist propaganda about tests running as scheduled. Come back here when the next test flight goes up in smoke and delivery deadlines go down the toilet. This site is called AirDisaster for a reason, you know?

Welcome back, Karl.

[Ancient Mariner]

666, Boing have reserved all the trouble for themselves. Greedy Americans!
Per

[666]

666, Boing have reserved all the trouble for themselves. Greedy Americans!
Per

Those greedy americans even stole winter! They have all the fun and snow and so far we in AMS didn't get a single day below 0 C and it's already halfway down january!

[Ancient Mariner]

666, Boing have reserved all the trouble for themselves. Greedy Americans!
Per

Those greedy americans even stole winter! They have all the fun and snow and so far we in AMS didn't get a single day below 0 C and it's already halfway down january!

Yeah, I know. We just managed to grab some of that white stuff, just enough to go skiing.
Per

[Verbal]

Emirates Cancels Airbus A350 Order
Aviation Week.com 06/10/2014
Author: Jens Flottau

Emirates Airline has cancelled an order for 70 AirbusA350s, Airbus confirmed on Wednesday. “The decision follows ongoing discussions with the airline in light of their fleet requirement review, as demonstrated by their order for 50 additional A380s”, the company stated.

Emirates placed its order for 50 A350-900s and 20 -1000s in 2007. The first delivery slot was scheduled for 2019. The airline has been publicly voicing its unhappiness with the performance of the -1000 version even after Airbus decided to delay the entry into service of the type by almost two years to allow Rolls-Royce more time for a significant engine upgrade. Emirates Airline President Tim Clark therefore left open whether he was going to take the aircraft. However, his public criticism never included the -900.

In November 2012, Clark told Aviation Week the airline's A350-1000 was in limbo, and the A350-900 “is starting to look a bit marginal to us because of size,” he said. “Gauge is the way we grow, you cannot get any more aircraft into the Dubai hub.”

“It is not the world’s greatest news,” Airbus Chief Operating Officer Customers John Leahy said on Wednesday. “Tim does change his mind from time to time.” Leahy stated there was no impact financially given that first deliveries were only planned for 2019 and spanned out to 2034. “There is certainly no hole in production, I’m not particularly worried at all.” Leahy pointed out that he has already received expressions of interest from other A350 customers who would like to pick up production slots now freed up as a result of the Emirates decision.

The cancellation is not so much a problem in terms of order numbers – Airbus still holds 742 commitments for the aircraft – but it does raise the question whether other airlines are as unsatisfied with the -1000. Other Gulf carriers have also placed large orders for the -1000 variant –- Qatar Airways has bought 37 and Etihad 22 of the type.

The Emirates cancellation does leave a significant dent in the -1000 backlog which has now shrunk from 189 to 169 aircraft. Cancellations are no new experience for Airbus as far as the A350 is concerned. The backlog of the smallest version, the A350-800, is now down to 34 aircraft from a high of around 200. Airbus officially plans to delay that aircraft to revamp it, but industry insiders claim it actually would like to cancel it.

Since the A350 order, Emirates has been increasingly focused on even larger aircraft. It placed an order for 150 Boeing777Xs and 50 more A380s. While the expansion of the new Dubai World Central Airport has been accelerated, the airline still faces significant capacity constraints for a number of years which would typically lead it to increase average aircraft size for maximum passenger throughput. Emirates stated that “the contract which we signed in 2007 for 70 A350 aircraft has lapsed. We are reviewing our fleet requirements.”

[J]

Airbus Preparing A350-900 For First Delivery
Airbus’s most important widebody receives EASA certification Oct 6, 2014
With European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) certification now in place for the A350-900, Airbus is shifting gears to prepare for first delivery of the aircraft and a steep production ramp-up.

EASA issued the type certificate for the Airbus A350-900 on Sept. 30 following an almost flawless flight-test campaign that started in June 2013 and involved five test aircraft. “We dealt with a very mature aircraft,” EASA Executive Director Patrick Ky says. “Airbus and EASA have learnt from experience and have established pragmatic working methods which have proved to be the recipe for the successful type certification and the way forward for future certification programs.” The A350 was the first all-new Airbus aircraft certified by EASA.

While the latter phase of development and flights tests took place without the huge delays and disruptions to which the industry has become accustomed, the A350 went through several iterations in the early project phase that included an updated version of the A330 initially and later several material selections or fuselage changes. The latest turn in the A350 strategy affects the A350-800, development of which Airbus says is “frozen,” a euphemism for being scrapped. In its August statistics for orders and deliveries, Airbus still listed 34 firm orders for the type, but program head Didier Evrard says more airlines have agreed to transition either to the recently launched A330neo or the larger A350-900.

The aircraft maker plans to deliver the first A350-900 to Qatar Airways before year-end. That aircraft, MSN006, is now “ready to be transferred to the flight-test team,” Evrard says. The exact delivery date will be determined jointly with the carrier in the coming weeks, he says, during which time Airbus is working on familiarizing Qatar Airways with the aircraft. Evard says that will require “a number of flights,” but it is difficult to predict just how many flights or hours. But he says, “If I were a golf player, I would say we are on the green.”

Meanwhile, the next challenge, ramp up of production, is nearing. Airbus plans by year-end to reach a build rate of three per month from the current two, and by the end of 2015, it aims to produce five A350s per month. Output is to be expanded to 10 aircraft per month by 2018. However, chief salesman John Leahy is concerned that Airbus may not build enough A350s to meet demand. “We are being prudent, but it bothers me,” he says. Airbus might soon decide to raise production rates, he indicated at the Istat conference in Istanbul late last month. “I believe this will be decided sometime next year,” he said.

Airbus had orders for 750 A350s at the time of certification of the first version. The -900 is by far the most popular version, with 547 firm commitments, followed by 169 orders for the A350-1000 and 34 for the -800, which will most likely never be built. Leahy said the further stretch represented by the -800, while technically possible, might not be a good idea.

For the A350-900, Airbus expects to receive FAA approvals “very shortly,” according to chief engineer Gordon McConnell. “It is in process just now, but not completed yet,” he says. The initial extended twin operations (ETOPS) clearance also has not yet been published by EASA, and McConnell believes it may take several more weeks. He says initial ETOPS will be “perfectly adequate” for the needs of the operators. The EASA certification document indicates there will be a 180-min. ETOPS approval and a separate one beyond that limit.

Airbus will return to lithium-ion-batteries—all A350s will be delivered with those batteries from 2016. As a consequence of the lithium-ion battery fires experienced on the Boeing 787, Airbus decided to use more conventional nickel-cadmium batteries temporarily to avoid schedule risk in case certification requirements changed. As it turns out, Airbus did not need to alter its original design. “We were fully aware of the risks inherent in the [battery] design,” Evrard said. “We have put measures in place to mitigate that to zero.”

The A350-900 has been certified by EASA for a maximum of 440 passengers, depending on the exit configuration. That will require at least eight cabin crew.

The maximum takeoff weight for the basic variant is 268 tons, although EASA has certified the aircraft for up to 275 tons, giving Airbus room for higher-weight versions later, even as part of the initial certification. While the A350 is available only in the basic 268-ton variant at this point, the A350-900 is about three tons heavier than initially planned. The aircraft is certified with a maximum operating altitude of 43,100 ft.

EASA has also determined that the A350-900 “is a variant of the A330/340 series aircraft” and, more precisely, is considered to be “a variant of the A330-200.” Pilots will be able to fly both the A330 and the A350 with the same type rating.

Video Watch the A350 test-aircraft formation flight at

http://aviationweek.com/commercial-avia ... ion-flight


Gallery See photos of the A350 test-aircraft formation flight at
http://aviationweek.com/commercial-avia ... ght-photos

http://aviationweek.com/commercial-avia ... t-delivery

[elaw]

“We were fully aware of the risks inherent in the [battery] design,” Evrard said. “We have put measures in place to mitigate that to zero.”

"We are fully aware of the risks involved in sea travel. That is why we have put measures in place to ensure that this ship is unsinkable." (paraphrased, of course)

What's old is new again...