I really would like to see some hard numbers on this- AA has had the same livery for 40 years now, vs. UA has had what, 4 different corporate liveries in the same time, not counting Shuttle and Ted? I have heard that Boeing has to take extra precautions with AA skins for color matching, and have seen that some airplanes, when stripped of paint, have some ugly surprises like greenish panels.
It seems to me that AA has a huge cost advantage when you look at the amount of paint they haven't bought, versus UA having to repaint their fleet constantly. Not to mention the 600 pounds or so of paint that a wide-body carries around on every flight. And I don't remember seeing an AA airplane that looked bad, but I can find a UA airplane looking ratty any time I want.
With 2024 clad sheet having a thin outside surface of relatively pure aluminum, I don't think corrosion is a huge problem, and it sure seems like skin inspections would be easier w/o paint.
I wonder what AA's gonna do when they get their 787s? Gotta have paint on those...
