Onceapilot wrote:
The cutting edge of technology has not made the A330 a better AT/AAR platform than well maintained TriStar, except in fuel burn, but renting FSTA costs ten times as much as the TriStar we already have (had)!
'Well maintained' is the crux. As the age of the TriStar approaches the right hand side of the bucket curve, the cost of maintenance would obviously increase hugely, with spares becoming rare and costly. But perhaps not to £1.2M per day.....
The ZD949 scandal wasted mi££ions and yielded nothing. Perhaps if that Tab bunch of metal bashers had converted it on time and on budget, then someone had warmed over the TriStar wing AAR pod issue again, it would have been worth keeping the TriStars until 2020-ish at least.
But then there's an exclusivity clause in the PFI deal which has stitched the RAF like a kipper. Which wouldn't be
quite so bad if the Voyager actually met its user requirements....eh, Arty Fufkin? High speed variable drag drogues working yet? Or the centreline FRU? Or the MPS.....??? As a dual-aisle people-tube, it works as well as a grey-painted A330 should, apart from the still-unexplained mysterious 9 Feb Turkish plummet, but as for the full AAR clearance and support for other NATO receivers - such as those the TriStar could support.....
