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The Final Airbus A380 Has Been Assembled
- acomjean 6y agoThey're so huge. I'm surprised they didn't retrofit for cargo.
- tacostakohashi 6y agoThey can't lift the mass of a full load of cargo of any realistic density though. This is a nice summary: https://www.flexport.com/blog/airbus-a380-no-cargo-equivalent/ https://www.flexport.com/blog/airbus-a380-no-cargo-equivalen... Oops.
- duxup 6y agoThat's really interesting, I had no idea how density really plays a huge part in balancing the equation. Of course it makes sense after reading it but it didn't immediately occur to me.
- esaym 6y ago>The A380-F would be able to carry 60% more volume than the 747, but only 28% more weight That sounds really short-sited on airbus. How could they not see having a plane double as a freighter would mean more sales?
- TylerE 6y agoBecause it wouldn't mean more sales when it can only fly into a fraction of the worlds airports - the taxiways at most airports aren't strong or wide enough. Volume isn't generally the constraint on air freight, anyway.
- bigiain 6y agoIt's inevitable physics. Things get heavier with the cube of the dimensions (a 2m cube is 8 times heavier than a 1m cube in the most simplistic example). Lift is a function of wing area, which only goes up with the square of the dimensions (a stupid "cubic wing" that's a 2m cube only has 4 times as much surface area as a 1m cubic "wing. Bigger planes can fly in spite of this because they're hollow. If you start filling them up with dense stuff, they get heavier way faster than they gain wing area (and hence lift capacity). That's why big birds are rare (or flightless, like emus), ands huge flying birds don't exist. And why there's a lot of conjecture that pterosaurs didn't fly very well, perhaps more like sugar gliders (which do extended/controlled jumps from high places) rather than taking of and soaring like eagles or albatrosses.
- Hypx 6y agoModern research in Azhdarchids suggests that they could indeed fly. This is in spite of the fact that they largest of them would dwarf an ostrich.
- bigiain 6y agoI'm not sure anyones suggesting they couldn't fly at all, just that some researchers propose what they were capable was closer to jumping off trees or hills and gliding to the ground, rather than launching from flat ground and flapping their way across continents. Though there's at least one guy who ran some calculations for Quetzalcoatl's probable aerodynamics and came up with numbers suggesting it could fly ~10,000 miles. Other people criticise that saying it only takes into account estimates of bone/wing structure and body weight, and ignores energy requirements which reptilian metabolic possibly cannot provide. I hope they're wrong. I desperately want to believe that there once existed 35 foot wingspan "dragons" which were capable of trans continental flight :-)
- marvin 6y agoSoaring birds get most of their energy from currents of rising air, not flapping their wings. So it’s plausible it did a lot of soaring over land, assuming it could get in the air under its own power. Human-built gliders can fly thousands of kilometers in one go, admittedly uncomfortably and geographically constrained. But easily hundreds of kilometers on a day with good conditions, with a good degree of navigational freedom.
- Someone 6y ago“energy requirements which reptilian metabolic possibly cannot provide” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pterosaur#Pycnofibers https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pterosaur#Pycnofibers: “The presence of pycnofibers strongly indicates that pterosaurs were endothermic (warm-blooded)” (Warm-blooded reptiles sort of still exist. https://www.newscientist.com/article/2074982-first-warm-blooded-lizards-switch-on-mystery-heat-source-at-will/ https://www.newscientist.com/article/2074982-first-warm-bloo...: “The surprise came when the lizards reached the reproductive time of the year, from September to December. During the cold early hours of the morning in that season, their breathing and heart rates rose and their temperatures reached as much as 10 °C above those of their burrows”)
- duxup 6y agoOnce a planes hits a certain big size it looks like the math means it's probably going to generally be a passenger plane / move low density stuff only and won't be able to really compete for freight.
- cco 6y agoOne major mistake Airbus made, or perhaps tradeoff, is that they put the cockpit on the first level, you'll note the 747's is on the second level. This made it dead in the water for cargo, the ability to include an opening nose cargo door massively improves the cargo options of an airline freighter. As others have pointed out, the A380 brought volume more than tonnage to the game, and to utilize volume you need a way to get large objects into the plane, a nose door is the only way to do this on a passenger turned cargo jet, no backdoors. The Airbus Beluga is an example of getting around this limitation, but this isn't a scalable option for normal freighters.
- NikolaeVarius 6y agoI look forward to seeing the A350
- duxup 6y agoThe article references "the current situation" repeatedly but I thought the A380s fate was sealed long ago?
- Sophistifunk 6y agoSure, but if you blame the plague maybe some C-suiters will keep their jobs.
- hodgesrm 6y agoThe A380 era is ending with a whimper, not a bang. It never generated the love inspired by aircraft like the Douglas DC-3, the Lockheed Constellation, or the Boeing 747.
- virtue3 6y agoit launched straight into an era where hub and spoke had died. We don't need new jumbo jets, we need efficient and smaller jets that can go point to point directly.
- fulafel 6y agoWe need to drastically cut down on air travel, its growth and the excerbated effects from emissions in the upper atmosphere are really unsustainable pending technological developments that seem far off[1]. [1] excluding some very different modes of air travel, like lifting gas based aircraft.
- aventuri 6y agoIt looks like Airbus is betting on hydrogen as next fuel for planes.. https://www.theguardian.com/business/2020/sep/21/airbus-reveals-plans-zero-emission-aircraft-fuelled-hydrogen https://www.theguardian.com/business/2020/sep/21/airbus-reve...
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- BurritoAlPastor 6y agoIt takes about 80 hours to get from San Francisco to New York City by train.
- KozmoNau7 6y agoAnd it takes 2 minutes to set up a Zoom/Teams/Jitsi call. A lot of air travel is completely needless and only done "because we can".
- tus88 6y agoI thought they had stopped making them. The used market is flooded with 380s.
- z6 6y agoSad. A380 flights were always the smoothest in my experience.
- higeorge13 6y agoIndeed. A350-1000 are even smoother at the moment.
- W-Stool 6y agoFirst time I saw one of those in person (SFO) I could not believe a plane that large could fly and be reliably controlled in adverse situations. Maybe it wasn't a huge commercial success but it reminded me that sometimes huge and insanely complicated projects can still be successfully executed. We could use a reminder of that these days from time to time. RIP A380.
- Exmoor 6y agoI remember standing outside a few years ago and glancing up and seeing a plane which, even ~40,000ft up, appeared huge. I pulled out my phone and looked it up on an aircraft tracking app and it was an A380.
- bb123 6y agoThose red bellied Emirates A380s stand out so well against the sky.
- redis_mlc 6y ago> I could not believe a plane that large could fly and be reliably controlled in adverse situations. I suppose somebody outside the aviation industry could think that, but in general, the larger the airplane, the smoother the ride and control are. In fact, airliners have specific certification requirements to "be smooth" for IFR handling: FAA SFARS 14 CFR § 25.171 General (Stability) https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/14/25.171 https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/14/25.171 There's other FARS that list more specific requirements for airliners. The only transport category class that I've seen which looks surprising in flight is the C-5 on takeoff. It's huge (about the size of a 747) and climbs out so slowly that it looks like it will fall out of the sky: C-5 Takeoff at Abbotsford https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eCC6ZbZvG8I https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eCC6ZbZvG8I The US lost a cargo 747 in 2013 in the Middle East due to the load shifting - armored vehicles rolled backwards, moving the CG aft and damaging hydraulic lines. Notice how slow (and vertical) it gets: US Military 747 Takeoff and Crash at Bagram (caution: actual crash footage with flames) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M01RmcKsm2k https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M01RmcKsm2k
- bigiain 6y agoThe 747 first flew in 1969, and is still planned to be in production until 2022. Boeing _really_ used to do things right...
- GoOnThenDoTell 6y agoIt’s not like they’re still building the same model 50 years later though, I imagine every single thing about it has changed
- WalterBright 6y agoAbout every one off the line is slightly different. The engineers work on it continuously.
- bb123 6y agoI don't find that reassuring at all.
- alwaysanon 6y agoSpeaking as somebody who has flown one regularly between Australia and the US I'll really miss them when they go. They were a much nicer, quieter, smoother experience than the 747 or 777 - though the 787 is almost as good and I guess that'll be the way forward... I had hopes for a 787 from Sydney to Seattle and Chicago direct but I imagine that sort of expansion is likely off the cards for the foreseeable futute...
- gok 6y agoSYD->ORD is around 8100 nm, a bit outside the range of any 787. You'd need a 777-200LR or A350 for that, or a 777-8 if they ever get made.
- alwaysanon 6y agoI thought it was ex SYD but it looks like what Qantas was planning on doing was ex BNE. https://www.qantasnewsroom.com.au/media-releases/qantas-sets-sights-on-direct-flights-from-brisbane-to-chicago-and-san-francisco/ https://www.qantasnewsroom.com.au/media-releases/qantas-sets...
- jesterson 6y agoSecond that - frequenting between OZ, Singapore and Japan I'd always prefer A380 against 777/787. It's unbeatable beast when it comes to long haul flights. Too sad we are left with A350 and B777 for now.
- WildGreenLeave 6y agoI feel like Airbus planes in general are much quieter than Boeing planes. I flew in a A320 from Bangkok - Singapore and Amsterdam - Moscow and both of these times the flight was much quieter then all of my other flights. Other flights included a diversity of (Boeing) planes including the 737, 747, 777 (300ER) and Embraer 190 (KLMs city hopper). I do usually sit in the front of the plane so it wasn't just the engine noise that was quieter.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- tehabe 6y agoRecently Lufthansa announced that they (will) remove all A380 airliners from active service earlier than planned. The Covid-19 pandemic hit the airlines hard and those big airliners are the first to go.
- jesterson 6y agoActually they are second, first farewell we have sang for passenger 747 fleet.
- ashtonkem 6y agoYes, but a lot of those were old, I imagine. They've been making that plane for half a century now, surely they're pulling the old ones first?
- tehabe 6y agoLufthansa has 8 Boeing 747-400 and 19 Boeing 747-8i, which came to the fleet recently. They will keep the 747-8i for now I think. But you are right, the 747 will also disappear sooner than later.
- sjdegraeve 6y agoGoogle Street View of the interior of an Emirates A380 from 2013: https://www.google.com/maps/@25.242676,55.3718716,2a,75y,38.53h,68.92t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sD8Exd_XJqRoAAAQIt3wdRA!2e0!7i13312!8i6656 https://www.google.com/maps/@25.242676,55.3718716,2a,75y,38.... via: https://www.wired.com/2013/08/google-street-view-a380/ https://www.wired.com/2013/08/google-street-view-a380/
- mrtksn 6y agoI am sure that it's comfy but the colors choices makes it look like a hospital's intensive care ward.
- CGamesPlay 6y agoTIL Google employs vampires to make the StreetView photos. https://www.google.com/maps/@25.242908,55.3720413,2a,86.7y,96.24h,72.78t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sNaI1gtwfOFoAAAQIt3wdGw!2e0!7i13312!8i6656 https://www.google.com/maps/@25.242908,55.3720413,2a,86.7y,9...
- Jaruzel 6y agoYou can just see the operators' hand controlling the remote shutter button. It's interesting that the street view pics, are ONLY of the upper deck. I'm guessing the poor peoples deck doesn't look nearly as good.
- ThePadawan 6y ago> It's interesting that the street view pics, are ONLY of the upper deck. I'm guessing the poor peoples deck doesn't look nearly as good. You can switch the "floors" (like Street View supports for multi-floor buildings) using the selector for "B"/"E" on the lower right (desktop version): https://goo.gl/maps/tcEAYdDpjRfyktBp6 https://goo.gl/maps/tcEAYdDpjRfyktBp6
- Jaruzel 6y agoAhhh, thanks. It looks the same as cattle-class on all other planes tbh. I'd rather not travel, than fly like that.
- catherd 6y agoI worked on some of the automated machinery that manufactured these, and the scale of it all really is impressive. It was fun building a robot bigger than most houses. We had to be careful to design it in small and light enough pieces that they could be safely transported to the final install location. Any time we talked to a supplier about a widget to go on the machines, it was always "What is the biggest X you make? OK, we need that one." The wing assembly bay was built on a scale such that the curvature of the earth was an important factor in our machine install process.
- ashtonkem 6y agoI imagine that produced a few funny conversations, that combined with the inevitable "I will take all of the ball screws that you have available, thank you" call.
- catherd 6y agoThe worst issue we had was competing with the windmill people for giant bearings. We were actually ordering those 1.5 years out at one point, for machines that no one had ordered and weren't designed yet.
- Cthulhu_ 6y agoAt least you could sell them on to the windmill people if you never got an order for said machine, I guess.
- danieltrembath 6y ago"Wait…I'm worried what you just heard was give me a lot of balls screws. What I said..."
- lippel82 6y agoWas it the curvature of the coordinate system you were using during machine install, or was it the actual curvature of earth's surface that was important here?
- leejo 6y agoFor those interested in some pictures from the early days, Mark Power shot the initial construction of the A380 and construction of the things required to construct the A380: https://www.markpower.co.uk/projects/a-380 https://www.markpower.co.uk/projects/a-380
- newdude116 6y agoThat is unfortunate. The plane was too early and too late at the same time. It was too early. With better engines that are available now and in a longer version with over 1000 passengers it would have been more cost efficient and interesting for price sensitive customers in some Asian countries. It was too late since the HUB airport model is currently out of fashion.
- ddalex 6y agoThe too early is easily fixed - you can upgrade the engines; the current version (-800) is also the baby version; it has the wings and tail designed for a large expansion (-1000) that would sit over 1000 passengers in economy-only class comfortable. The plan was to reach that stage. What really doomed it was the proliferation of small airports where large planes can easily land (737NG or Airbus's own A321). One stroke of business genius on Airbus's part was buying the share in Bombardier - the A220 is gonna see massive usage in Europe). Airbus really played on the whole spectrum - the company is well positioned on all segments of the market. Unfortunately the market is dwindling, and this marvelous piece of engineering is dying. I only hope I'll get to fly one before it retires.
- tremon 6y agoWhat really doomed it was the proliferation of small airports where large planes can easily land The way I've heard it expressed is that the commercial aviators are moving away from the hub-and-spoke model: it used to be that there were few long-haul airports in any region, and to get to the smaller airports you'd need to transfer at the hub. But nowadays it's much more common to fly directly on a regional airport, even for long-haul flights. That means the passenger number per long-haul flight gets smaller (it no longer includes the regional destinations), and the regional airports don't have the size nor the capacity to handle these large planes. The airlines flying these planes are the ones still using a hub-and-spoke model, like Emirates.
- newdude116 6y ago"The too early is easily fixed" You can not just stick some new engines to a plane and elongate the body. This needs more investments and certification. Less costly than a new plane but still costs. "What really doomed it was the proliferation of small airports " It is hard to predict the future. Just as an example: Many small EU airports may close due to new EU regulation and limited subsidiaries. Many of the small airports create heavy losses that are financed by taxes. This may come to an end. Also, Europe is thinking to revive the TEE trains (Trans Europe Express). The bottom line: things can change.
- bb123 6y agoIt is sad to me that the aviation industry doesn't appear to be able reward the manufacturers that take risks with their designs. Both Concorde and the A380 have been disasters commercially. It seems like we will be stuck with the current widebody, single deck, subsonic planes for most of our lifetimes with little real advancement in comfort or speed.
- newdude116 6y agoRussian supersonic airliner by 2022? https://www.airlineratings.com/news/russian-supersonic-airliner-2022/ https://www.airlineratings.com/news/russian-supersonic-airli... Not sure it makes economic sense but good for dick comparisons :-)
- marvin 6y agoThe aviation startups that are in the development phase today, e.g. Boom and Lilium, seem to my casual observation to be planning on operating the service themselves. And thereby forcing change directly, instead of trying to convince the incumbents. This seems like the way to do it when pioneering a new technological approach in an entrenched industry with an established status quo. The incumbents must be dragged into the future by their hair.
- lotsofpulp 6y ago> the aviation industry doesn't appear to be able reward the manufacturers that take risks with their designs. Both Concorde and the A380 have been disasters commercially. The aviation industry (for passenger planes) is people that purchase flights. Evidently, sufficient people don’t value the time a Concorde saves with the extra operating costs, and they don’t value the advantages of the A380 versus the disadvantages, such as time spent transferring to smaller planes. It would take a lot for me to prefer a longer flight with more stops than a shorter non stop flight.
- redis_mlc 6y ago> It is sad to me that the aviation industry doesn't appear to be able reward the manufacturers that take risks with their designs. Well, there's a lot of incorrect assumptions in that one sentence. Most Boeing airliners had significant pre-orders from airlines, like the 747, making those designs possible economically. Airbus offered a design and mfg. partnership with Boeing for the A380, but Boeing knew that hub-and-spoke was dead and let Airbus burn $50 billion or more on it. Also, Airbus' wiring harness CAD mistakes delayed the A380 an entire year: https://calleam.com/WTPF/?p=4700 https://calleam.com/WTPF/?p=4700 Regarding airlines, their sole criterion for an airliner is that it's more efficient than the last one. The A380 was both overweight (by tons) and had an operating cost up to 4x as much as smaller airplanes (around $25,000/hr vs $7,500/hr for a 777.) Considering even 2% is huge for an airline, you can see why nobody wants the A380 even for free. FYI: You won't see any of the supersonic startups build a certified model for cost and time reasons. Ain't gonna happen. Even the US government couldn't afford to operate the SR-71 after satellite imaging was good enough because everything was special for it (special fuel, a dozen dedicated tanker jets for that fuel, high-temperature engines, maintenance, backup flight, etc.) What actually killed the Concorde was the number of WTC passengers (many approving managers) who were killed, as well as the year-long retrofit of wing fuel Kevlar liners, etc. Also France treats air accidents as criminal investigations, unlike the US, so that doesn't help. https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2000/nov/19/concorde.world https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2000/nov/19/concorde.world
- 4cao 6y agoA380s are much more comfortable to fly in, even in Economy: there's more space around, cabin air is better (thanks to higher humidity). They're also much quieter and apparently less likely to suffer turbulence. In Business/First (depending on the carrier), they came with private suites, on-board shower, and a bar. Also, I believe the 4-engine design is still considered safer, just less fuel efficient. Such a beautiful piece of engineering gets discontinued at the time something like the 737 Max, which should have never been built, is on its way to be reapproved. This is a sad day for airline passengers.
- madeofpalk 6y agoWhat I appreciated about Business/First on the A380, depending on the carrier, was the stairs. On a long 13 hour flight, going for a walk up down the stairs to the snack bar or whatever was good. I will never forget the bathroom/shower onboard the Emirates A380s. Being able to show onboard a plane in a bathroom bigger than that of some apartments was extremely decadant.
- apexalpha 6y agoSad day for passengers? I disagree, and here's why: This thing was built for one thing only: hub and spoke model. That's a model of flying where you don't go directly from A to B with a smaller plane but you always go through a hub. This adds a ton of time to your route. Point to point is way more efficient and relaxed for passengers. Only Airlines with big hubs prefer that model; they gladly sacrifice your time to make more money. Lots of people in this thread say the A380 was luxurious and had a lot of leg space. But that what airlines configure it to be. And most A380 went to luxury airlines like Emirates. The A380 was dead on arrival. Built for a model of aviation that the world departing from just as the A380 arrived.
- yardie 6y agoSadly, this is it. You know why Boeing didn’t build a competitor? Because they weren’t competing planes they were competing business models. When the A380 was announced Boeing announced the 747-900 and then said this was the last iteration of this line. Their largest plane now is the 777. But I wouldn’t call the A380 doa. When it arrived the Middle East and Asia were booming. Newly minted millionaires wanted to travel and for a while they did. But the hub and spoke wasn’t enough. You can only stop in DXB so many times before realizing this isn’t your destination just another distraction from where you really want to be. And those destination terminals figured it out. Expanded the airport accommodate more flights. And the hubs became less relevant. And so did the A380.
- rjsw 6y agoI have been on a tour of the assembly hall in Toulouse. Was with some senior Airbus people so we got the "customer" tour rather than the public one.
- pjmlp 6y agoBye and thanks for all the fish, I attend both shows on Paris when it was demoed. The first one traditionally carriage down, due to security regulations and the following air show already flying properly.
- yardie 6y agoI was there as well for both shows at Le Bourget. I remember the low level flybys and thinking how absolutely massive and nimble this thing was.