A350-900 range
 

Hello,
Has anybody heard of any A350 range issues?
A few guys in my company claim that Airbus overpromised with the -900.
Apparently, The airplane would be challenged on routes that are around 7500 NM.
Airbus advertises the 350-900 with 325 seats in 3 class arrangement and a range of 8100 NM.
The configuration we have is 306 seats.
The aircraft should be capable of connecting those dots.
Thanks for your replies in advance.

If the aircraft was significantly overweight, or burned more fuel than the book, I think we'd have heard by now.

It sounds more like different policies: pax weight, reserves, temperatures, etc.

Company I'm at appears to be quite pleased with the 350-900. Operates on 15hr sectors efficiently.

Company tech engineer that flies both A and B products - “we think one company’s estimates are more accurate. We do our own analysis.”

He wouldn’t say which was more accurate. But shortly after that comment was made Boeing lowered their published range estimates.

Rumors always exist - pilots “the company is unhappy with our XYZ’s range performance.” Fleet manager “who said that? It’s not true.”

The plot thickens.

A year, or two ago I heard rumors that Goat Airlines were not entirely satisfied with the A350 performance.

Not sure, though if there’s any substance to that. Also, they had very early airframes, that could be overweight...

What about manual handling of this aircraft, especially during final approach ?

KayPam: it's really nice!

Much more responsive than the 330.

@OK4wire,

How does the 350 land compared to the 330? One operator I know had a bunch of hard landings when they got them. Wonder if it’s the plane, or their landing technique ;)

Apparently the problem was with the HUD, then vector was far too sensitive

?

The 330 is far from difficult, not exactly graceful, however that is where the challenge lies.

But the wheel must be reinvented by some.

@Maggot,

I think you got me wrong - the 330 is the sweetest plane to land I know of. I wondered how the 350 was, as I heard some rumors it’s not as easy and my previous mob had a couple of hard ldgs on the 350. Never heard of one on the 330 :)

@TurningFinal,

Heard of the HUD issue as well and was told that manual landings with HUD were not allowed. Is it still the case, or have they fixed it?

Airbus published an OEB last year that required the HUD to be selected off by 1,000 ft AGL for manual landings. The OEB was published after several operators experienced hard landings that were attributed to high sidestick activity during the flare, caused by an over sensitive HUD FPV. I suspect the pilots involved were distracted by the FPV bouncing around and missed the cues they would normally use during the flare. I believe the problem was worse at night-time, because the display is quite bright, even at the dimmest setting. A new HUD standard is now available that cancels the OEB and manual landings can once again be flown using the HUD.

The A350 isn't difficult to land, but it is different to the A330; if you flare it like an A330 you generally end up floating a long way down the runway. The A350 is also much more sensitive in pitch and roll.

“The OEB was published after several operators experienced hard landings that were attributed to high sidestick activity during the flare, caused by an over sensitive HUD FPV. I suspect the pilots involved were distracted by the FPV bouncing around and missed the cues they would normally use during the flare.”

If you’re chasing ‘the magic’, and the big ball disagrees, I’d recommend trusting the big ball.

The planes are getting slicker and slicker. They like to float.
Old 727 guys would be going off the far end, at Vref, using some of their ‘techniques’ like advancing the throttles to medium thrust in the flare.

I wish we had some real data/ numbers.....everyone says it is the best but from my limited perspective it struggles to carry any payload past 13 hours.....If I see more than 150 passengers on ULR flight I avoid it as a staff traveler because you will be offloaded! But then again I don't know what type of cargo loads they are carrying.
But in fairness every plane in the world will have start to have payload restrictions when max fuel required( except 77LR)

You're right, that does sound like a limited perspective

Yeah, I did get you wrong!
Ta, no problemo

If it’s anything like the 767 the forward trail on the
main landing gear will be unforgiving

As the A380 appears to be

Not sure what AB is thinking persisting with
that design

casablanca

Definitely no the case, had almost a full pax load on a 15hr flight not long ago. Burn of 90T over that time,total fuel ~100T, MTOW 277T, OEW ~138T gives us a rough usable payload of 39T