Which is why it can't be considered an ambitious or technically brilliant project.
The C919 and 929 are far more impressive than the ARJ.
Chinese Aviation Industry
- Thread starter FriedRiceNSpice
- Start date
Which is why it can't be considered an ambitious or technically brilliant project.
The C919 and 929 are far more impressive than the ARJ.
broadsword
Brigadier
If commercial success was the only criterion for the launch of an airplane, the Wright bros first plane would never leave the ground.
Skywatcher
Captain
For civil aviation, if it's your first time in building an aircraft in a larger category, don't shoot for the moon.
See the Mitsubishi Spacejet: absolutely brilliant design, but took forever to test. Not to mention a bunch of marketing decisions (seriously, did they account for the possibility that the US scope clauses wouldn't change?)
Fair enough, you can legitimately disagree with Aboulafia (and I certainly have, on other occasions!) for judging the project according to inappropriate criteria. From the airline customer's point of view, his criticisms are entirely valid however...
... because I *sincerely* doubt it is profitable in operation at this point. Given the monthly utilization rates on the order of 30h* implied by the comparison I posted, it's difficult to see how it would not be losing money left and right. Think about it, CityJet found it impossible to turn a profit with the SSJ despite its aircraft spending *several times* longer than that per month earning revenue.
*This is corroborated by an earlier flightglobal.com article, BTW:
Well, the comparison of cold, hard operating metrics you so conveniently left out in the quote, for example?
Well, the delays in rolling out software updates to the F-35 fleet are no secret, and Saab has developed a modular architecture (Avionics Platform Software) for Gripen NG to specifically avoid these issues:
That article is from 2018, when the jet was just introduced to the market. Got a more recent data on the utilization rate?
I hope you do know it is perfectly normal for new entrant to a mature market to lose money at the beginning. That’s why it is impossible for developing countries to move up the value chain without the state support. Look how many billions EU burned to get Airbus off the ground. China will have an easier time because it got a captive market.
Some people want only to start something when they can earn big bucks. The capitalistic mindset that has infested their minds with zero to little place for nuances. That sort of people would only invest in food/real estate and other basic necessities from which they can profit. Parasites. That is why the Wright Bros deserve all accolades. They started experimenting without the drive for big bucks.
Well, per the original source the Azimuth SSJ100 data I used equates to an average of ~240h, and is roughly 9x better than the July 2020 ARJ21 info Hendrik_2000 posted. So between 2018 and last year utilization does not appear to have gotten meaningfully better.
Sure, but the comparison is still decidedly unflattering for the ARJ21 - other examples (Airbus A300 etc.) at least managed to operate profitably after a short while. Some more SSJ100 stats for comparison: for both CityJet (non-Russian, so outside established MRO network) and Yakutia (one of the earliest customers, EIS in 2012), the initial pair of aircraft already averaged 100 to 120h in the first few months after introduction.
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D
Deleted member 15949
Guest
What does ~240h mean in context? sorry, don't know much about aviation
240 hours of revenue-generating flight per month.
Quickie
Colonel
I suppose you meant this?
Well, first of all, from Hendrik's post it's 1.5 million passengers, not 1 million (The youtube video is a bit dated). From Wikipedia, the number of active ARJ-21 in operation is 48, not 33 as you have so conveniently quote with a lower number again.
The bulk of the increase in the number of passengers and active aircraft in operation comes from the last 2 years, which include 2020 where traveling by air was banned for almost the entire year.
That's why there's bound to a major distortion if you compare these figures with those of the Azimuth where passenger traffic was more evenly distributed in the number of years since in operation and production/delivery of the Superjet was already in full swing.
The production rate of the ARJ-21 is now at 30 per year, which is over 50% of the total number of ARJ-21 that has been built (52), and that is in just ONE year.
There's bound to be an exponential increase in the number of active ARJ-21 in operation and the number of passengers in the coming years especially if they manage to get the pandemic under control and air traffic return to normal.
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