A350XWB, the Plane Airbus Did Not Want To Build, Makes Maiden Flight 135
McGruber writes "The BBC reports that the Airbus A350XWB (extra wide body) has made its first flight. Like the Boeing 787, the A350 offers airlines the chance to combine long-range services with improved fuel efficiency. The A350's fuselage is made of carbon fibre reinforced plastic, while many other parts of the aircraft use titanium and advanced alloys to save weight. It also has state-of-the-art aerodynamics, and engine manufacturer Rolls Royce has produced a new custom-designed power unit. Airbus claims that all of this means the A350 will use 25% less fuel than the current generation of equivalent aircraft. It also points out that noise and emissions will be well below current limits."
Re:Hmm... (Score:4, Interesting)
Because they got blindsided by Boeing. Boeing was publicly showing off their "SST" designs and hinting at a new supersized 747. Meanwhile someone at Boeing was doing their market research and saw the need for a new generation of planes with lower cost per mile for medium/long haul to replace aging fleets of 757, 767, and 777's.
Airbus was more interested in proving they could "build the biggest plane" more as an ego measure than a design that addressed a real need to their customers (airlines).
When Boeing announced the 787 they completely caught Airbus off guard as they had just spent billions and a decade on the A380.
Re:"Plane Airbus Did Not Want To Build" (Score:5, Interesting)
My understanding of why they didn't want to do the A350 was because between the A320, A330, and A340, all the service areas covered by this A350 were already covered, and now they have a whole new production line which will only pull sales away from their already-established production lines.
Re:Interesting (Score:4, Interesting)
The B-52 is not magic, it lasts longer because... (Score:4, Interesting)
it was originally designed to fly very long flights at high altitudes (one pressurization/depressurization cycle per large number of flight hours) which would allow a long airframe life. They're not tactical aircraft.... they are intercontinental bombers. Even after Soviet anti-aircraft missiles improved in their ability vs high-fliers and B-52 plans were re-aligned for low-altitude strikes... they still involved very long flights and few pressure cycles. 20 years of B-52 operations probably inflate/deflate the fuselage as much as 3 or 4 years of airliner activity. Most machines that are lightly-used and well-maintained will last a long time. The B-52 is is a brilliant design for its day... but it's obsolete and while it would not fare well penetrating Russian defenses in 2013, it's still fine for bombing bronze-age targets into the stone-age; it's therefore still useful given the targets that are being bombed these days.
Re:At that price (Score:3, Interesting)
metal fatigue is not so much a function age, it's more a function of usage. if a plane has a design life of 20,000 takeoff cycles, it will last 30 years of being flown twice a day 300 days a year. if it's only being flown a couple of times a month, you can do the math. and with the b52 largely obsolete and usage therefore declining, lifetime limitation caused by metal fatigue becomes more and more remote as other factors like corrosion take precedence.