On Aug 29, 8:02 pm, Ned aioe.org> wrote:

G'Day Ned it is a wee bit more complicated than that .

Just one factor to consider i (may be) , over the period you
mention Engines selection and power SFC have matured and the Etops
factors have matured and been lengthened from day one when the first
777's came into service . And Qantas had just received newish hulls
and they had to me amortised .

QF (and SAA ) routes are some of the longest over water in the world
and in cheap fuel days 744 RPK on super long haul compared to the
then 90 Minutes etops
numbers just did not stack up . Other issue I am guessing here may
have been spares inventory When we financed Cx and MH 777
(different engines )
Cx had no end of gear box troubles and many of their 777 were not as
profitable as QF 747 300 even

This logic of course got blown out the window when for reasons best
known to themselves acquired the ugly sisters ? (which imo ) where
not very nice examples and required far too much work & $ to get into
QF type condition . Right down to little things like galleys toilets
crew rest areas bunks etc They ere just bloody horrible things
(IMO)

What is NOt lost on me either is the other 777 operators you mention
many are not in as nice a profit position as QF . So some bean
counters may take you to task on that alone .

However, I have always loved the numbers of 777's especially the 300/
s on the right routes and SIA (who used the same data as me---- or
at least had access to it)
Got the fleet mix pretty well right and at one stage were paying
their tech crews heaps more than QF Even if they had a weird
attitude to MEL and next bids which concerned me from a human
resources and safety aspect .

Poor old Air Lanka I suggest you study re twin engine ops when they
had to go bloody miles out of their way using twins (767) because of
Etops
Ordered A340 /s and bugger me the ink was not dry on the contracts
and the rules changed and the poor buggers were locked in although the
777 would now be far better earners .

MH got caught out a bit with their A330 and the bizarre config set
up they chose and strange fwd cargo door for long haul config .
Cost them a bomb
and thanks to a cargo spill allowed them to get another 777 which is
a top earner ( probably the French "incentives" to the then Chairman
may have had something to do with what they did in the face of all
logic and numbers )

TG blew Billions on wrong mix then could not unload their MD11.s
( lovely things BTW)

Back to Qantas they even got caught out on A330 and happily re
scheduled and re weighed them to make a profit ( lessons Learned from
the A300B4 Days )

It is complex cobber I assure you . But for one would love to see 777
with skippy on the tail

There is no Iron Clad Guarantee that the paper airbus alternative
will not suffer the Normal airbus obesity propensity that all
airbus sem to suffer prior to introduction .Thus a new generation 777
may save not only Boeings bacon but some fleets also