Airbus A350 successfully completes maiden test flight

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-22899952

by marban • 13 years ago

64 50 13 years ago

bbc.co.uk

marban3• 13 years ago

Pilot on the test flight: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xJrLAktTWBo

arethuza• 13 years ago

A related BBC article about the advanced engines developed by Rolls Royce for the A350:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-22889969

brianbreslin• 13 years ago

So can someone clear up what model this replaces or competes with?

adrinavarro• 13 years ago

Competes with the B787.

Doesn't really replace much. I'd say the A330, as it's a twin, and wide-body. In fact, it's called 'XWB', standing for 'extra wide body'.

Better fuel consumption and better cabin for passengers. That's pretty much everything these days… B787/B737MAX, and A350XWB/A320NEO for the two big players for new generation (aside from B777-300ER and B747-800 as "renewed classics" for Boeing, and A380 and A330 for Airbus).

dombili• 13 years ago

Some people may disagree with me, but I think 350 replaces 340. 350's got a long range and it's extremely fuel efficient (more so than the new 787). 340 is a four engine airliner and it's not fuel efficient at all. That fact alone makes 340 pretty much obsolete. Operating costs for both 787 and 350 is probably much less than 340 (totally speculating here) so it's hard to justify operating 340s when there are much better airliners out there that can save you a lot of money in the long term. Operating other 4 engine airliners like 747 and 380 is justifiable because they carry way more people than 340 does AND their new models (380 is already a new plane and 747 has gotten an upgrade) are fuel efficient as well.

340s are already out of production and I'm pretty sure it's gonna be rare to see one of them in the skies over time. Which is a shame. I like 340s.

TylerE• 13 years ago

747's are being phased out in passenger service, actually. The larger 777 variants can carry almost as many (~375 for a 777-300 vs 415 for a 747-400), while being more efficient. The current 747 fleet is rapidly being transitioned by most operators into freighter roles.

dustywusty• 13 years ago

Depending upon configuration, it competes with the upper range 767/777/787s. http://i.minus.com/ibue0fziZTMd11.jpg shows the comparisons pretty well, as far as size alone is concerned.

TillE2• 13 years ago

They say it's very quiet from the outside during takeoff, but has there been any word on what the cabin noise is like, compared to the A380?

That's the main reason I'll choose an A380 whenever possible. It makes a big difference in how exhausting and miserable a long flight can be.

enraged_camel• 13 years ago

Doesn't cabin noise become white noise after a while? That has been my experience with trans-Atlantic flights.

marban3• 13 years ago

Only if you're flying in F

joonix2• 13 years ago

I tend to agree with you. It's not the engine sound that bothers me, it's little kids screaming, hearing sneezes, etc. that get to me. In fact, many people have actually found the quietness of the A380 engines to be a detriment to the flying experience because suddenly they can hear others' quiet conversations and other such noises that remind you you're tightly packed with 300+ other people.

FigBug• 13 years ago

If you haven't already, buy noise cancelling headphones. It's amazing the difference they make. The almost completely cut out the droning noise.

joonix2• 13 years ago

Are there good noise cancelling headphones < $100? I'm not interested in paying Bose $300. It doesn't seem like good ones should cost so much. By "good" I mean degree of noise cancellation, not quality of stereo speakers in the earphones.

meepmorp• 13 years ago

Or, save ourself some money and get a package of disposable earplugs at a pharmacy.

VeejayRampay2• 13 years ago

Airbus plans are a silly source of pride for me as a French 30-something. They're one of the very few tokens of pan-European success in tech and engineering. Airbus being a subsidiary of EADS, a company that works across European lines (Germany, France, the UK), it's living proof that despite all the natural hurdles and bickering, we can still be competitive and innovative as a continental entity.

I wish there were more examples like this one in the midst of this silly Eurozone crisis.

danmaz742• 13 years ago

Why silly? Pride is a very strong motivation. The important thing is that pride for our own successes doesn't become hate for others' successes.

jobigoud2• 13 years ago

It's silly because we haven't contributed to the achievement in any way.

VeejayRampay2• 13 years ago

Well I find all manners of nationalistic pride kind of silly. Like someone said below, it's not like I did anything to make that happen, besides the taxes I'm paying.

The pride I'm feeling in this case is more a measure of the fact that Europe still produces great engineers and can sometimes cooperate to make great things happen. It's hope for the future.

raphaelj• 13 years ago

Actually there is a few other successful engineering examples in France, such Alstom with its TGV, or even Dassault.

I find this really strange that whereas "traditional engineering" is pretty strong and remarkable in France, there is almost nothing in computer sciences.

jobigoud2• 13 years ago

there is almost nothing in computer sciences.

Or you don't know them or don't realize they are French…

- OVH (Biggest server host in the world) (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OVH)

- Ubisoft (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ubisoft),

- Capgemini (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capgemini),

- STMicroelectronics (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/STMicroelectronics),

- Bull (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Groupe_Bull),

- DailyMotion (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dailymotion),

- etc.

CaptainZapp• 13 years ago

And lest we forget the Concorde as a French / English engineering marvel.

True, it was - despite the outrageous ticket prices - a money loser of the highest order. Nevertheless, a beautiful piece of engineering and arguably the most beautiful civilian plane ever built.

I, for one, regret never to have flown in it.

grkvlt• 13 years ago

in France, there is almost nothing in computer sciences

What about INRIA?

"Inria is a public research body dedicated to digital science and technology" - http://www.inria.fr/en/‎

steeve• 13 years ago

Fabrice Bellard is french.

He is the father of FFmpeg (which pretty much makes online video possible), and QEmu (which is one of the most versatile emulator/virtualization software).

trust-me2• 13 years ago

What? Europe is literally world's first industrial power. Take any phone, laptop, car, etc. and trace back where the machines that made the machines that made the machines .... that made the parts of the device come from and most of the time you will end in UK, Germany, France, Netherlands, Belgium, Switzerland ...

alexose• 13 years ago

There's a surprising lack of information about this plane. From what I can tell, it's similar to the 787 (in that it's made from composites) but with marginally better fuel efficiency.

Does anybody know if it has a similar turbulence-dampening system? Or increased cabin pressure? As an airline customer, I don't really care about how many seats it has or its operating costs...

OldSchool• 13 years ago

As an engineer, I find it amazing that aside from cleaner, more efficient, quieter, and safer, we really haven't significantly improved mainstream jet travel speed for over 50 years. Supersonic must be a major barrier for all practical purposes.

Gmo• 13 years ago

We had supersonic flight (Concorde, also by airbus btw) and it was far too fuel inefficient (that and I think also they were not allowed in some countries if I remember correctly)

jacquesm• 13 years ago

also by airbus btw

By its predecessor Sud Aviation and BAC.

joezydeco• 13 years ago

"You're Too Cheap to Fly Faster"

https://medium.com/we-live-in-the-future/7885a299bca2

megablast• 13 years ago

You think cars have changed? Trains? Most things have not changed much.

potatolicious• 13 years ago

Cars and trains have changed a lot.

This video shows the difference pretty clearly: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1_ptUrQOMPs (it's a head-on crash test between a 1959 Bel Air and a 2009 Malibu).

Cars are immensely safer than the death-traps they were in the past. They're also immensely more comfortable, mind-bogglingly more fuel efficient, and produce a hell of a lot less pollution.

These aren't marginal improvements.

Shivetya• 13 years ago

Well http://www.risingup.com/fars/info/part91-817-FAR.shtml pretty much sums up the whys.

The passenger miles per unit of fuel were not in favor of super sonic planes which were originally developed to compete with the smaller jets (707) that were around when development started. Those jumbos (747) made air travel really cheap.

nawitus2• 13 years ago

It's a matter of cost. It's "easy" to build Mach 2.5 jetliners, but customers actually prefer to fly really, really cheap instead of flying really, really fast.

trust-me2• 13 years ago

The newer, lighter planes are using a lot of plastic and are worse at isolating passengers and crew from the radiation at high altitudes.

smackfu2• 13 years ago

People do not like sonic booms, at all.

archon2• 13 years ago

So does "successfully completes maiden test flight" mean "the aircraft passed all of the tests we put it through" or "the aircraft didn't fall out of the sky"?

JshWright• 13 years ago

Generally speaking the purpose of the maiden flight isn't to actually test anything (other than the obvious "does it fly"), but rather it's more to collect that will be used to design the scope and scale of future tests.

archon2• 13 years ago

Thanks, that's what I wanted to know.

chollida1• 13 years ago

Well to give you a frame of reference the Boeing 787 completed its maiden flight on December 15th 2009 and actually flew commercially on October 26, 2011.

On the other had the Boeing 747 had better luck. From its wikipedia page:

First flight February 9, 1969 Introduction January 22, 1970 with Pan Am

nawitus2• 13 years ago

I wonder if the test pilots wore parachutes.

jloughry• 13 years ago

I wonder if the test pilots wore parachutes.

They did, and the test article has a special escape hatch installed (good photo here):

http://www.wired.com/autopia/2013/06/test-pilots-discuss-a35...

Airbus A350 successfully completes maiden test flight

Related Stories