DL may order Airbus and Boeing jets

[WorldTraveler]

Dawg,
there have been endless rumors about what additional aircraft DL will order. They are still looking to get one of the manufacturers to take over as many of the CRJs that DL is pulling out of service and that is supposedly the reason for a top off order for narrowbodies.
The widebody part of the order is more focused on int'l growth and replacement of some of the oldest int'l aircraft - of which there are both 767s and 744s.
The 777 is an outstanding longrange aircraft in all of its forms and I don't think there is any doubt DL would like some. The question is whether Boeing has any incentive to discount them much even for DL. Boeing recognizes the value of DL as a customer but the economics of building the 737 are different than from the 777.
I'm not saying that the 330 is a replacement for the 777 but rather that the high gross weight versions w/ the most powerful engines will be capable of pushing deep into transpac routes that would otherwise be in the realm of the 777 and beyond what the 767 can do. The engine choice NW made does affect what the current aircraft could do but that doesn't mean a sub-fleet of a "2nd generation" of the same model couldn't be used differently. DL has many non-standard subfleets.
DL is clearly focusing on enhancing its TPAC presence and needs the right aircraft to do that.
DL will always have a seasonality differences between its northern and southern hemisphere destinations; Brazil just happens to be a premium-heavy market like LHR that works well with the 764.

 

[topDawg]

Dawg,
there have been endless rumors about what additional aircraft DL will order. They are still looking to get one of the manufacturers to take over as many of the CRJs that DL is pulling out of service and that is supposedly the reason for a top off order for narrowbodies.
The widebody part of the order is more focused on int'l growth and replacement of some of the oldest int'l aircraft - of which there are both 767s and 744s. ​but Delta has its 767 replacement aircraft on order. Not only that but again, the 330 or 777 are to large to replace any 763s. No International 767 is leaving till around 2019. 787s on order will replace them(the ROI for the 767 is expected to be in the 5-7 year ball park. The 747 ROI is shorter, 3-5 years)
The 777 is an outstanding longrange aircraft in all of its forms and I don't think there is any doubt DL would like some. The question is whether Boeing has any incentive to discount them much even for DL. Boeing recognizes the value of DL as a customer but the economics of building the 737 are different than from the 777. ​how do you figure? the 777 is just the 737 on large scale. Boeing still gets very good margins off of the Aircraft. you know as well as I do they will give Delta a very good deal.
​
​of course....they are still required to via the contract.....
I'm not saying that the 330 is a replacement for the 777 but rather that the high gross weight versions w/ the most powerful engines will be capable of pushing deep into transpac routes that would otherwise be in the realm of the 777 and beyond what the 767 can do. The engine choice NW made does affect what the current aircraft could do but that doesn't mean a sub-fleet of a "2nd generation" of the same model couldn't be used differently. DL has many non-standard subfleets.​please, go a head and say what routes a 332 can do for Delta that a 767 cant. The 332 would really only be useful for two more tpac routes (LAX-PEK, SEA-HKG). the 767 can do SEA-TPE/ICN/NGO. LAX-ICN/NGO/KIX and only the T7 could do LAX-PVG/HKG/TPE/MEL (and for Delta) AKL.
​also Delta doesn't have a sub fleet of aircraft with different engines that is smaller than 30. (and even then. the cost of the CF6 and PW4000s fleets would be very questionable if it wasn't for all the MRO money that comes from both engines.)
​
​Adding a subfleet for basically two routes doesn't make any sense to me.
DL is clearly focusing on enhancing its TPAC presence and needs the right aircraft to do that. ​ and from all the areas of future growth (ATL/JFK/LAX/SEA/DTW) the 332 can only do two new routes. The 777 can basically do anything. Also India, a likely point of growth in the future, can only be done from the Delta hubs with a 777.
DL will always have a seasonality differences between its northern and southern hemisphere destinations; Brazil just happens to be a premium-heavy market like LHR that works well with the 764.​and if it was for the fact that basically 8 airplanes get sent to Brazil in the winter, they would be parking some kind of airplanes for the low season. Outside of LHR and ATL-FRA/MUC the rest of the euro 764 flying goes to 763s. So Delta runs them to Brazil and with a fairly low utilization. The same thing goes for the 333 which is basically to big for Delta outside of the summer to low yielding euro routes and euro hub to hub routes.

a small(5) top off order for 332s wouldn't be a bad idea. 20 of them are just more airplanes that can't over fly NRT. There is a reason UA has fleet of 70 strong 777s and zero 332s. For the flying Delta will be doing with any 330/777 aircraft, the 777 will out fly the 332 by a good bit.

Again, split of 777-232LRs and 777-332ERs is what I expect. Along with a top off 737NG order. (though i expect at least some of the 30 737s to be 800s.)

 

[robbedagain]

whatever happen to the rumors that DL was to get the 321s in echange for the crj issue?

 

[yoyodyne]

whatever happen to the rumors that DL was to get the 321s in echange for the crj issue?

It would be like going from bad to worse...

 

[WorldTraveler]

Dawg,
DL actually does have two widebody fleets with 10 or fewer aircraft based on engines right now – the 777ER and 777LRs. In both cases, DL doesn’t do the engine overhauls on either engines for those fleets. DL’s engine MRO business is built heavily around operators of relatively small fleets where DL’s engine expertise and mass provide efficiencies of scale – but it doesn’t mean that DL can’t or won’t contract out some engine work based on having a small sub fleet.

Your assessment of TPAC needs and aircraft uses are based on DL’s current network and their current 330s. Both can and will change. Airbus is not competing in this order with the A330s that NW ordered but the highest thrust and TOW versions; DL almost always ordered highest MTOW versions of aircraft w/ highest thrust engine options.

744s were NW’s only real long-haul aircraft, DL had limited Pacific presence and thus had a small 777 fleet; the 767 fleet closely matched DL’s TATL network needs.

The 333 is capable of flying TPAC flights, again even in their current versions, even on a seasonal basis and w/ performance restrictions. Current 333s fly LAX-NRT, 332s have flown DTW-HND. CURRENT 332 could fly MSP-Asia. New version 330s would open new routes based on new capabilities.

The 333 is a smaller aircraft than the 777 so the per seat costs might not look any more favorable; the 333 is one of DL’s lowest CASM widebodies. The new generation 333 could comfortably do 12 hour flights which opens up a lot of routes to a lower CASM aircraft than DL presently has.

Right now, the 767 can fly LAX-Japan and SEA-NE Asia.

We don’t know how DL will develop its TPAC network but they are building redundancy to eliminate the possibility that the NRT hub will be marginalized by increases in US-HND flights as well as increased LCCs within Asia that will impact the viability of DL’s intra-Asia flying.

DL may never take delivery of the 787-8, no viable replacement for 767-300ER or TATL 757 but the 332 is actually the closest match next to the 764. The trip costs of the 764 are not a whole lot higher than the 763 but the extra 35 seats make a big difference in the economics. The VS deal will likely mean many LHR flights will be upgraded to larger aircraft; the 764s will probably become the backfill for early-retiring 763 aircraft.

Whatever aircraft is used for deep S. America will have certain inefficiencies because of the typical double red-eye schedules. Fares have to justify that inefficiency. The 764 is no more to blame for the economics of that market than any other aircraft that would be used in that region. AA’s 777s have the same issue compared to DL’s 777s which DL uses very aggressively on much longer flights.
333 works as a great hub-to-hub TATL aircraft on a year round basis; majorit of NW’s TATL network was to/from AMS. The part of the TATL that is shrinking and will continue to shrink is the hub to secondary cities, leaving US hub to AMS and CDG. The joint ventures exist to allow capacity to be changed between hub overflight and hub to hub routes with minimal revenue impact.

DL’s relationship with AS is clearly part of all this as well. DL wants a SEA TPAC hub and appears to be leaning heavily toward providing much more of the domestic fleet on its own which isn’t surprising. An airline simply cannot operate a large int’l presence like they do at SEA while sub-contracting out feed to a company they cannot control.

There are many moving parts to DL’s fleet strategy which are closely tied to its network strategy which itself continues to develop. Fleet decisions are usually much more long-range than network strategies. Finding aircraft w/ the flexibility to match changing network strategies while keeping favorable economics is no small task. Add in that DL has a strong overriding concern to change the financial paradigm for US carriers that has involved high levels of debt w/ low rates of return and inadequate recovery of capital costs, and DL is going to make fleet decisions differently than other carriers and perhaps contrary to what most “wisdom” would say they should do.

Hopefully they’ll make this decision public soon…and it likely does involve both widebody and and narrowbody aircraft since both manufacturers don't want to split "top off" orders for widebody and narrowbody aircraft while offering the large discounts DL undoubtedly expects and both would be willing to give DL for an appropriately sized order.

 

[robbedagain]

how could going from the crj to the 321 be like going from bad to worse? ive work the 321 aircraft and its much much more friendlier to work vs the crj.... just from a ramper's point of view the airbus is much better to work...

 

[yoyodyne]

how could going from the crj to the 321 be like going from bad to worse? ive work the 321 aircraft and its much much more friendlier to work vs the crj.... just from a ramper's point of view the airbus is much better to work...

And airlines always pick the aircraft in their fleet based on how much rampers like to work them vs. what passengers want, and the airline needs...

 

[Kev3188]

We should be so lucky!

That said, I think it's a pretty safe assumption that no customer "wants" a CRJ-200...

 

[robbedagain]

YOU know thats not what im talking about... im simply asking you how is it going from bad to worse in terms of a 321 vs a crj as far as passenger wise id bet they prefer the 321 over the crj anyday ive been on both types and its not hard to tell which they would prefer

 

[yoyodyne]

We should be so lucky!

That said, I think it's a pretty safe assumption that no customer "wants" a CRJ-200...

I would rather sit in a CRJ-200 for a couple of hours, than to have to drive more than 12 hrs.

YOU know thats not what im talking about... im simply asking you how is it going from bad to worse in terms of a 321 vs a crj as far as passenger wise id bet they prefer the 321 over the crj anyday ive been on both types and its not hard to tell which they would prefer

The 321 has NO LEGS. Its an excellent plane if you are flying from JFK to LGA, or LGA to EWR, or EWR to HPN, maybe even might make it to BDL, perhaps bingo fuel to BOS.

 

[700UW]

US flies the A321 from CLT to LAX, SFO and SEA.

http://www.airbus.com/aircraftfamilies/passengeraircraft/a320family/a321/performance/

 

[robbedagain]

I was going to say that the 321 does a lot of cross country flyin bec ive personelly workd the 321 going to clt cont on to sea

 

[yoyodyne]

US flies the A321 from CLT to LAX, SFO and SEA.http://www.airbus.co...21/performance/

From the website..The A321 accommodates 185 passengers in a two-class configuration over a range of up to 3,200nm/5,950km, and up to 220 passengers in a high-density configuration. It can be powered by CFM56-5 or IAE V2500-A5 engines.What they forgot to mention..In so long as there is no cargo, mail, and that 184 of those passengers have NO bags..

I remember working HP's A320's ships 620 or 621 (if not both) and they couldn't make it from the east coast back to PHX without stopping for fuel, or carrying no bags or cargo.

 

[robbedagain]

then explain how yesterday i offloaded over 100 bags mail n freight and then turned around and put close to 130 bags on the 321 to phx flight 82 to be exact i dont know how hp did it but i work with some former hp folks including a load master and he told me number of times how the 320 would go out full and cargo mail etc

as for ships 620 and 621 they can do cross country nonstop but it depends on the configurations and fuel and everything else but ship 620 was in my station just last week

 

[700UW]

From the website..The A321 accommodates 185 passengers in a two-class configuration over a range of up to 3,200nm/5,950km, and up to 220 passengers in a high-density configuration. It can be powered by CFM56-5 or IAE V2500-A5 engines.What they forgot to mention..In so long as there is no cargo, mail, and that 184 of those passengers have NO bags..

I remember working HP's A320's ships 620 or 621 (if not both) and they couldn't make it from the east coast back to PHX without stopping for fuel, or carrying no bags or cargo.

Then explain how US flies full flights without fuel stops from CLT or PHL to LAX, PHX, SEA and SFO.