I have been following the thread for a while and I understand completely how difficult it is to get an answer about take home pay but like everything with Qantas nothing is set in stone, so it is even difficult to estimate, but I will try and help out. The base salary is exactly that, the base on top of that you get all the extra's as detailed in the QF Domestic EBA. At QF Domestic there is no bidding for trips therefore not as easy to control your fortnightly pay as other crew who are able to bid.
I spoke with a friend in Perth and they will sometimes have 150-300 hours of DTA per month. As you can see that is quite a variable as thats a $750.00 difference from month to month and clearly effects your take home pay. As some months he will do a lot of day trips and a couple of overnights meaning his DTA is around 150 and some of that is taxed due to day trips and other times he will just do trips for the whole month meaning he will have something like 300 hours of DTA untaxed being an additional $1500.00 on top of your base pay per month.
As I explained its not easy to estimate as the flying may and will change sometimes from month to month. My advice to you is if you can live off the base plus say 150 hours of DTA per month @ $5 than apply and good luck and anything extra that you get is a total bonus but if you cant live off that maybe QF Domestic is not for you.
Just my advice on the salary because you have zero control over your flying.
As for CSM promotion dont go into QF Domestic thinking that is an easy way to increase your salary. Very rarely has Qantas over the past 3 years offered promotions and as already noted these positions are VERY difficult to achieve at the best of times. Thats not to say you wont be successful but dont go into role thinking that way. There are prob hundreds of ex Ansett on board managers at Qantas Domestic not to mention ex Emirates, BA and list goes on and on.