Chinese Aviation Industry
- Thread starter FriedRiceNSpice
- Start date
Right, MRJ like E2 was built on the hope that US scope clauses would change, which was a really stupid hope. And then they tried to downsize it to make it scope compliant, but that was a failure.
ARJ-21 is a write-off. That's what it is.
Not really. China is a large country. 50-70 seat turboprop doesn't work when competing against the world's great train system. turboprop doesn't even work in America and that's with scope clause and complete lack of high speed rail.
ARJ21, despite being an lukewarm seller, served its role well as the key stepping stone for China's next generation passenger airliners, i.e. C919 and C929.
Besides, China has built MD-80s and MD-90s for McDonnell Douglas in the past, so it is easier for COMAC to start from passenger aircrafts of similar size and category.
The regional aviation market in the US is practically filled with Embraer and Bombardier regional jets. There isn't many turboprop airliners remaining.
Turboprop airliners fell out of favor in the US mainly due to:
1. Deregulation of the airline industry, causing many smaller regional airlines who operated those turboprop airliners to either collapse, or merge with others/larger airlines in order to survive.
2. The demand for hub-to-spoke passenger flight services in the US has been steadily increasing since the 1990s, rendering turboprop airliners with limited seats to lose out compared to larger regional jets.
@crash8pilot Since you are a pilot, feel free to chip in if our understandings are flawed and/or need rectification.
well, generally the demand isn't there for turboprop. If the economy was there for Dash-8 and ER4s, it would still be operational. But having 2 pilots for 50 passengers is not economical. The passenger experience is also horrible on turboprops. I've done a few YYZ-LGA on ERJ-40 and they are not comfortable.
hub-to-spoke models is what supports the turboprops to being with. What killed them were jus the more efficient single aisle, single fleet LCC operators. There are a lot of markets in America that only supports a daily service to the nearest hub on a regional jet. But the operational cost and maintenance for turboprop is really high. After a while, the revenue doesn't justify the cost of keeping such a fleet around.
In China, train service is so convenient that it completely takes away the need to fly regional jet to a bigger airport. I don't see how turboprop could work there.
Even in Europe, you just don't see turboprops or even larger RJs. It only works in America due to the stupid scope clause.
I wonder if the domestic engine can make MA700 meet its design target. I am sure the qualified AEP500 is sufficient, but it's under development, isn't it?
China's railway system is the best long-range train system in the world, far from the greatest train system in the world. China aims to provide all the residential areas with fast connections to regional big cities. No matter how they work, it is just not possible to link all the small cities in the less developed area with railways. The railway is not only expensive to build, but also expensive to maintain and operate. Besides, there are ambitious plans for general aviation. Most class A1 general airfield meets the requirement to operate turboprop aircraft like ATR and Dash8. They can easily upgrade it to a regional civil airport if necessary. I see it as a much cheaper solution than railways in these marginal regions.
If I just look at all the train stations that I pass by while going from Beijing to my hometown. There is no way each of those little village stops have their own airport. That's just nonsense. You don't know what you are talking about.
This is a serious question, how many long train trips have you taken in China? The last time I was in China, I took a 14 hour train ride from Yantai to Beijing which passed through like every small village imaginable rather than the flight, because I liked taking the overnight train.
My thoughts on the ARJ project:
110% agree that the ARJ was a good initial step for COMAC to develop experience and break into building commercial jets. While longterm I can't see it being a money making project, I wouldn't call it a write off either. The project was an essential first step for COMAC not just to build a jet, but more importantly to create infrastructure and workforce experience for future projects. As the saying goes 成功不是一步登天, or in other words success isn't achieved in one step. In my honest opinion, the ARJ doesn't need to sell hundreds of thousands of airframes to be a success, as long as the project doesn't stumble too far into the red and lessons... The C919 project wouldn't be where it's at if it weren't for the ARJ.
My thoughts on turboprop planes and regional flying:
My first flying job was on the Dash-8 Q400, so bare with me cause I might just be a bit biased... That said the economics per passenger seat on the Q400 gets pretty wicked. We sat 78 passengers with my former airline, and the Dash burned ~800kgs per hour when we flew cost index speed. The airline wanted to transition all our Q400s for Embraer 175s and 195s, which sat 88 and 100 passengers respectively but burned ~2000-2500kgs an hour... that's almost as much as the A320ceo that I currently fly, except we seat almost double the passenger capacity on the E-Jet. Maintenance hours on the E-Jet tended to take longer and were more costly than the Dash, especially when it came to engines. The E-Jet sucked up so much of the company's budget and resources, the higher ups ended up pulling the plug halfway through their fleet renewal project to the point we were even returning E-Jets back to leasing companies. Trip times on the Q400 may have taken 15-30 minutes longer than if we flew the same trip on the E-Jet, but we'd always win out on economics. We flew into Heathrow as well - they absolutely loved having us in because we were much more quiet than the average jet, and we were quite "fast" in that we could fly jet speeds (210-230 knots) around the terminal area so we weren't creating a queue behind us for the approach.
With all that being said, regional flying is dependent on the market. For the airline I worked for in the UK, we did 30 minutes to 1.5 hour trips connecting Scotland and Northern Ireland with the South Coast, Midlands, and Channel Islands. The Dash worked and made sense for us. Regional airlines in North America is a completely different animal though - I remember my mom having to fly from Toronto to Houston on a CRJ, and that in itself was like a 3 hour flight. Looking at United Express, Delta Connection, and American Eagle's route network, jets make much more sense from a time-fuel burn standpoint as well as resource allocation. The Dash has the endurance to fly 3 hour trips (I've done a couple painful summer charter flights between Manchester and Salzburg that took that long), it just didn't have the range to cover as much distance as the jet.
Despite advances in HSR, I wouldn't quite say that the world is ready to chuck regional flying aside. HSR is ultimately dependent on the infrastructure available, and that also in turn is reliant on geography. As it currently stands it'd probably be easier connecting Xinjiang and Tibet with regional flying... I could also see some opportunity for the ARJ to do well serving the northeast in Heilongjiang and Jilin, as well as the southwest around Yunnan. I'll also add that as part of the poverty alleviation campaign that the State Council seem pretty adept and building and revamping/modernizing airport infrastructure across the country. Short term in just makes sense until more rail infrastructure becomes available.... But yea my career is largely dependent on people needing to fly, so I'm definitely biased lol.
Let me make myself more clear (again): for less developed, marginal, less dense regions including Xinjiang, Tibetan plateau, Inner Mongolia, and Forest areas in Northeast China, regional aircraft is a more suitable way to provide fast connections to regional big cities than the railway. I was not talking about everywhere in China, especially I was not mentioning the East.
Nobody needs regional flights in the East for sure. With large populations, limited land resources, dense motorways/highways system, and also developed intercity/high speed/fast railway system, the requirement of fast connection to regional big cities has been met. But in the marginal regions that I mentioned above, it's a totally different story.
I want to point out one difference between MRJ and ARJ that nobody seems have mentioned.
Japan is a small country compared to China and US. For long distance travel there is the airplane, for shorter distance there is the HSR. MRJ has no market. That is reflected by Mitsubishi's hope on FAA clause, they rely on US market which is never going to happen.
China is large country with regions like Xinjiang, Tibet and Inner Mongolia, scarcely populated. These regions are similar to many areas in US. So there is a market for ARJ. And most importantly, ARJ does not need market outside of China to survive, although going abroad is a bonus. This means that no matter the economy performance, ARJ can go to its finishing line, MRJ is dead at birth. ARJ is a stepping stone for C-919 and CR-929, that is its key value, I regard it as success.
If we look over all the major players of aviation, we can see that the one who survives are the one with self-sustainable (home) market of population and landmass. Airbus has the whole Europe, US has the whole north America. Japan's failure is just like Brazil and Canada. Technology is the enabler, but home market is the decisive factor.
Japan is a small country compared to China and US. For long distance travel there is the airplane, for shorter distance there is the HSR. MRJ has no market. That is reflected by Mitsubishi's hope on FAA clause, they rely on US market which is never going to happen.
China is large country with regions like Xinjiang, Tibet and Inner Mongolia, scarcely populated. These regions are similar to many areas in US. So there is a market for ARJ. And most importantly, ARJ does not need market outside of China to survive, although going abroad is a bonus. This means that no matter the economy performance, ARJ can go to its finishing line, MRJ is dead at birth. ARJ is a stepping stone for C-919 and CR-929, that is its key value, I regard it as success.
If we look over all the major players of aviation, we can see that the one who survives are the one with self-sustainable (home) market of population and landmass. Airbus has the whole Europe, US has the whole north America. Japan's failure is just like Brazil and Canada. Technology is the enabler, but home market is the decisive factor.
Generally, I agree with you. The domestic market and economic scale are why ARJ and C919 could continue and finally accomplish.
But actually, ARJ is a mistake in the market decision. The project was initially proposed in 2000 when they forecasted that the demand for regional jets would be more than 900 by 2010. Some inertial affected too, as all the previous commercial aircraft jointly developed with foreign manufacturers were regional jets. But gradually the actual demand becomes 0. What the Chinese market needs is mainline narrowbody jets, and C919 was quickly rolled-out.
ARJ is indeed a stepping stone for consequent projects. Nobody likes ARJ tbh, but backed up by the government, the ARJ project continues. So many problems occurred in the initial period and of course, COMAC learned a lot from them. For ARJ itself, it still works as a stepping stone now. We have seen its business jet version, passenger-to-cargo version, and medical version. ARJ also helps build up its service in China. If China stopped the ARJ project when they found it would be a failure financially, we could have expected more problems and difficulties on C919. At least for the Chinese aviation industry, ARJ has done its job well.
Japanese choose to suspend MRJ. Doubtlessly, it's a correct idea from the business aspect. But it also means they abandon all the efforts they have made and they still know nothing about designing a commercial aircraft. Their next bird will probably be a disaster too, even though they find the correct market. The cake is there, but the Japanese just cannot take a bite.