Unit costs per aircraft type

[EI-BUD]

Setting as purchase price of the various aircraft, can anybody provide robust stats or links to any studies/articles/ documents outlining comparative analysis on fuel burn by the following types;
A320,319,320N,220-100 and 300
738,737Max
Embraer 190/95
Sukhoi Superjet

There are a lot of comments on various thread suggesting that 190 burns as much fuel over the same distance as a 320/738.

This seems hard to comprehend. Take KLM, a large fleet of these flying into a large slot scarce hub like AMS, they see the benefits. If fuel burn is the same, it would seem that fewer crew and a lower price tag are what tips the balance in favour of the smaller machine. I understand the broad theory, working in the industry, but what I'm missing are some hard facts.

All the best for 2020 to all readers and contributors.
EI-BUD

[TartinTon]

Wikipedia has a comprehensive list. Look for fuel economy in aircraft and sort on fuel efficiency per seat.

[nighthawk117]

You might as well make it a link to save people having to search: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuel_economy_in_aircraft

It's worth pointing out that most charges such as landing fees and air navigation charges are based on the aircraft's max takeoff weight (MTOW). These wont be factored in to the fuel burn calculations listed above, so that will swing things in favour of the lighter E190. Also bear in mind the fuel calculations are averages, and dont take in to account climb performance. Some aircraft are more efficient than others in the climb phase of flight, and less efficient than others in cruise. These aircraft will therefore perform better on shorter segments than longer ones.

There's no one size fits all solution - if there was, then that would be the only aircraft airlines would buy.

[brian_dromey]

There isn't one definitive, publicly available list, that I have seen. That wikipedia list is interesting, but uses various values for the seating configurations, so the per-seat fuel burn is all over the place.

It also worth remembering that different aircraft types have different maintenance costs. I believe the E-Jet is particularly expensive to maintain, the engines in particular I think? There are other costs too such as staffing - the regional aircraft generally have cheaper pay-scales. The cost of leasing also plays into things, new aircraft with poor residual value can be expensive to lease, compared with older aircraft. There are a lot of airlines retiring A319s at the moment for scrap value. Some of these do go on to the likes of Allegiant in the US and Volotea who build their business on low-value, modern aircraft.

[esscee]

Still some useful information in the Wiki link though.

[EI-BUD]

Thanks to all who contributed.

[Reversethrustset]

I've flown both the Embraer 195 and Airbus 320 family and the Embraer fuel burn in the cruise is negligible compared to the Airbus, I'd say a rough fag packet calculation it's about 150-200kg per hour less so if you consider the 195 holds 118 and an Airbus holds 186 that makes the 195 a commercial dog. Worldwide delivery numbers would dictate this too.

[Asturias56]

Horses for courses tho' you might be able to make money on a 50% load factor on either aircraft - that's 50 pax for the 195 or 93 for the Airbus - smaller airports just don't generate enough pax on many routes to justify a bigger plane - otherwise everyone would only buy A380's

[brian_dromey]

Horses for courses tho' you might be able to make money on a 50% load factor on either aircraft - that's 50 pax for the 195 or 93 for the Airbus - smaller airports just don't generate enough pax on many routes to justify a bigger plane - otherwise everyone would only buy A380's

But if you can only sell 50% of your seats you are using the wrong aircraft in the first place! For any given load you still need a much higher average fare on the E95 than you would on an A320 to cover similar fuel burn, more expensive maintenance but slightly cheaper crewing and navigation fees. If your airport can generate that sort of revenue the E95 will work well - BACF at LCY is the only p2p airline I can think of using E90s.

Let's say you can sell 100 seats on a given route on a given day. 84% load for the E95, 53% load on the 320, but those 100 seats have to cover a similar cost. On the return journey you can sell 150, the E95 operator has to leave people behind, the 320 operator does not, so they lost out in both a high and low load factor scenario, assuming similar fares. LCCs make a lot of their revenue from ancillary revenue, so every extra passenger is more potential revenue too. More seats in the market might push the average sales price down, frequencies might be affected, the flip-side of thins being potential new routes for an airline or airport. The additional 68 seats in an A320 are basically "free", easyJet have always crewed the 319 with 4 cabin crew for just 6 extra seats its not surprising the E95 isn't that popular.

[Asturias56]

True as far as it goes but you're thinking of an LCC - if you were right no-one would ever buy a smaller aircraft ever - it would all be A321's sold. There is clearly some gain in fitting the plane to the market rather than providing seats that may never be filled.

You also haven't factored in purchase cost - the E190/195 were about US$ 30 mm - and A 320 is over $100 mm sticker price - that's a lot of money for a small airline

And although they haven't sold as many as the A.320 the 190/195 family has still sold over 800 airframes - which isn't too shabby IMHO.

[brian_dromey]

And although they haven't sold as many as the A.320 the 190/195 family has still sold over 800 airframes - which isn't too shabby IMHO.

There is certainly a place for it, but the sales numbers speak for themselves. The momentum is very much towards dense configurations in the A320 and A321 size. The A319neo has sold 56 out of 6000+ NEO orders. There are just 160 outstanding E190/195 E2, even with the latest GTFs. Big E-190 customers like Air Canada and JetBlue have ordered the A220, again the orders for that are overwhelmingly for the larger -300 version.

Im a huge fan of aircraft of ~130-150 size. I think there is huge opportunity in Europe between the 70 seat ATR and 180 seat A320s. 180 is very much a mainline configuration these days, BA, LH Group all configure them this way. The A220 is the only aircraft in the class that can compete with A320/737 per-seat and trip costs, but for many airlines with the 737/A320 already it’s easier to add to what they have, use the extra revenue possibilities and take a hit on the load factor and/or average fare.

[Asturias56]

"I think there is huge opportunity in Europe between the 70 seat ATR and 180 seat A320s."

Agreed but Airbus refused to allow ATR to develope the 90 in case it cut into their A318 sales/ It looks as if the gap will be filled instead with the A220

Interestingly on numbers the 190/195 series wasn't too short of the total number of BAC 111's sold................... shows how the world has changed............