Originally Posted by elpilote
so to resume , you consume less fuel the higher you are but to get up there consume fuel, so what is the solution , climb to save fuel or stay a this altitude and consume more than higher but saving the fuel to get uo there???
Not necc. true... A major factor in choosing the optimum altitiude are the winds aloft. It is a common misconception that the higher you go, the less fuel you burn, but imagine this for a second.. And this is based on an actual flight recently.
A 10hr+ flight from Western Africa to the US. The flight is planned at FL320 across the pond. The crew takes off, and ask for a higher altitude when approaching the Atlantic, becuase their actual pyld was much less than planned at. The cneter offers them FL380 and they take it. Up to this point , the crew was running exactly on the dot in terms of fuel burns and time. Now cruising at a much higher altitude, the plane hit a major headwind from a pretty nasty jetstream.... To make a long story short, the flight arrived almost 35 minutes behind schedule and very close to min fuel.
The point is, while in zero wind conditions, the higher you get the less fuel you burn, in the real world, you have to consider the actual winds.