Airbus is confident its A350-1000 will give Qantas the ability to better achieve its ultra-long-range mission from Eastern Australia to London and New York than its Boeing rival.

The manufacturer officially confirmed this week that the biggest version of its A350 family is the contender in the race against Boeing to become the “hub buster” aircraft flying the world’s longest route as part of Project Sunrise.

Qantas has nursed the dream of flying non-stop to Europe for years and finally made it a reality in 2018 using a Boeing 787-9 aircraft to fly from London to Perth.

It is using the same aircraft to conduct test three test flights before Christmas but will need a  more capable jet with greater payload capacity to pursue its Project Sunrise aspirations.

READ: QF7879 set to make history.

Qantas is meticulous when it comes to choosing aircraft and the current competition running between pitting the  A350-1000 against Boeing’s 777-8  is being closely watched by other carriers.

But Boeing has yet to specify a launch date for the 777-8 and while it is reportedly offering the bigger 777-9 as an interim solution, this has given Airbus an edge.

Airbus revealed this week it expected by 2022 to have an aircraft with a slightly higher maximum take-off weight capable of carrying a payload of 375 passengers 8700 nautical miles, about 700 nautical miles further than the current range.

Airbus head of A350 marketing Marisa Lucas-Ugena told AirlineRatings the A350-1000 was in terms of payload and range capability “by far the closest to requirements Qantas has put on the table”.

The aircraft will not be exclusive to Qantas and Lucas-Ugena said it would be available to any of the manufacturer’s customers.

The European manufacturer  plans to achieve the increase through the tweaks to aerodynamics, airframe and engines that push up the efficiency of a jet through its lifetime.

This means the A350-1000, which has already incorporated many of the lessons learned from the A350-900, will not need the extra fuel tanks used by the A350-900ULR to perform ultra-long-range missions for Singapore Airlines.

The A350-1000’s extended range would see the plane reach New York from Sydney with 375 passengers on board but falls slightly short of London with that payload.

However, the plane would be capable of reaching both destinations from Sydney or Melbourne with the stated Qantas requirement of 300 passengers.

Lucas-Ugena was coy when it came to revealing specific details of the improvements but  said that the configuration Qantas was considering meant “we do offer an airplane that is capable of doing the mission with the payload Qantas wants to take  and more importantly we can deliver it on time.’’

She noted research into the needs of passengers on such a long flight showed will need to be able to sleep as well as a space to move around to socialize and exercise, something the Flying kangaroo has already said it wants to incorporate in the plane.

Asked how the A350-1000 compared with its rival, Lucas-Ugena said the main advantage was that it was an all-new aircraft with no compromises as well as the latest technology and engines.

It also has an airframe comprising 70 percent advanced materials which give it a weight advantage over the heavier 777X.

“That makes the airplane extremely light compared to 777X, which is at the end of the day a derivative of the 777 family,’’ she said.

While she acknowledged new wings and engines made the 777X more efficient, the Airbus executive described the aircraft as compromised by its old design and the additional weight from those bigger wings and engines.

She said the A350-1000 would be 45 tonnes lighter than 777-9 when additional fuel was taken into account, giving it a “tremendous advantage”.

She also estimated that the A350-1000 was 13 percent more efficient in terms of fuel per trip compared to the 777-9.

She said the 777-8 could operate at similar ranges to -1000 but was a smaller aircraft that was 5.5m shorter and could not take as many passengers.

This meant it did not have the same fuel efficiency per passenger, she added.

Other advantages included the operational reliability of the A350-1000, which was currently 99.5 percent, as well as its flexibility.

The Airbus executive pointed to Cathay pacific which used the -1000 to launch its longest route from Hong Kong to Washington DC but also used it other routes.

“It offers tremendous flexibility and that flexibility is something when you are looking at a project that is so extreme, so risky in a way —  it can go very well or it can go not that well depending on the season —  having an airplane that you can put anywhere in the network and will be equally efficient is a must,” she said.

The business case for low-cost long-haul airlines has been dismal so far.

French carrier XL Airways was the last one to exit the market, following WOW Air from Iceland and Primera Air from Scandinavia.

The biggest remaining players Norwegian Air Shutte and Air Asia X are deeply in the red, producing heavy losses. Others like Jetstar, Canadian operator WestJet, Air Canada Rouge or start-up French Bee are either following a hybrid model or are too small to make a meaningful impact.

So far the business case of low-cost long-haul flying has not been proven.

READ: Modified 767 not seen as a replacement for the NMA: Boeing exec.

This is mostly due to the fact that overhead costs are fairly similar to legacy carriers on very long routes, giving the low-cost operators less leverage to lower operating costs as they have on successful short- and medium-haul runs.

But there is hope: new narrow-body aircraft with an ultra-long-range like the Airbus A321neoLR and even more the A321XLR are all the rage and breathe new life into a so-far unstable area of the airline business.

“With the new long-haul narrow-bodies now everybody can join the segment. The Airbus A321XLR causes a disruption similar to what the Airbus A380 and Boeing 777-300ER did for the Gulf carriers,” said Peter Harbison, Chairman Emeritus of the Sydney-based CAPA Centre for Aviation at an industry conference recently held in Hamburg.

“This is a remarkable change, as these aircraft can do Hamburg to Dallas with 220 seats or almost make it to Tokyo or China from here.”

Harbison pointed out the growing role of long-haul low-cost airlines from the Persian Gulf, especially independent ones like Air Arabia, based in Sharjah in the UAE, close to Dubai. The carrier, founded in 2003, is among the most profitable ones and has only recently entered longer-haul markets thanks to the first of six leased A321neoLRs joining the fleet.

On Wednesday, Air Arabia has announced to set up a new entity jointly with Etihad called Air Arabia Abu Dhabi, based in the capital of the UAE.

“From our hub in Sharjah we currently fly routes of up to eight hours with the LRs, like from Sharjah to Prague, Vienna, Moscow and Nairobi,” said Air Arabia CEO Adel Ali. “We have a good experience with the LRs, they are very fuel-efficient and the number of seats, 215 in our case, pays back.”

That argument was underscored by Steven Udvar-Hazy, leasing guru and owner of Air Lease Corporation.

He first shared his insight on the demise of Icelandic carrier WOW Air,, saying “They did fine until they introduced A330 wide-bodies prematurely, these aircraft lost money during eight or nine months of a year, wiping out all other profits.

“The A330s sat on dead-ends in San Francisco and Los Angeles, where they had no local feed.”

So for the multi-billionaire, it is clear: “Wide-bodies caused WOW’s demise.”

He also advocates the A321XLR, entering service in 2023, as a low-risk way for airlines to enter long haul markets.

“The XLR will have only 5 percent higher operating costs than the current A321neoLR, we don’t have that option on the 737 MAX,” Udvar-Hazy said.

He then let slip an industry secret: “Boeing is working on a 737 MAX 9ER, which also could play a role in low-cost long-haul in the future. The A321XLR is a fine machine, but I wouldn’t discount the Boeing product just yet.”

Airbus has seen a smooth and swift introduction this year of its A321neoLR model boasting a range of 4,000nm (7,400 km).

“Aer Lingus utilizes it 18 hours a day, doing Dublin-Washington/Dulles-Dublin-London-Dublin with them,” explained  Yves Renard from Airbus.

TAP Air Portugal will deploy it from Lisbon to Belem in Brazil from October 29, replacing an A330, and announced this week it’ll do the same on Lisbon to Natal from late March 2020.

“The A321XLR, doing 4,700 nm (8,700 km), offers wide-body seat-mile costs with the economical advantages of a narrow-body,” stressed Renard.

And at the same time, he brought into play the newest member of the Airbus family for the task.

“The A220 with its range of 3,400 nm (6,300 km) is promising for future low-cost operations,” Airbus Market Intelligence manager said.

But then Angus Clarke, EVP Strategy at Air France-KLM, countered that the A321XLR “is a bit slow” with its max speed of Mach 0.8 and that both new Airbus long-range narrow-bodies are “very expensive aircraft.”

He added: “We believe in Ryanair’s strategy to buy aircraft when they are at their lowest price. As the Airbus facility in Montréal-Mirabel was in a slightly distressed environment as their US customers needed aircraft manufactured in Mobile/Alabama, we had our Ryanair moment when we recently ordered 60 A220 for Air France.”

Boeing is not looking at a re-engined version of its venerable 767  as a replacement for the New Midsize Airplane (NMA), a senior executive has said.

Media reports have suggested the manufacturer might look at adding GenX engines to the 767 as a cheaper alternative to the NMA.

Boeing marketing executive Darren Hulst said the manufacturer was always looking at ways to make its products more efficient.

“But we don’t have any plans for the 767 in terms of a replacement what we’re looking at with the NMA or other products,’’ he told a briefing in Sydney Australia Wednesday.

“I would say we’re just continuing to look at what we can do with our existing products and what the market needs.”

Analysis: Boeing 767-400 makeover does not make a 797.

Australia’s Qantas is among a number of carriers that have expressed interest in the NMA, which Hulst said was  “shooting the gap’ between the top of the single-aisle market and the bottom of the widebody equivalent.

He said Boeing saw demand for the aircraft in three complementary market sectors.

There were markets that were dense today and had limited ability to grow due to slot constraints,  capacity growth issues and infrastructure challenges.

Hulst said there as a need for an aircraft to break through what the single-aisle aircraft were offering without the inefficiency of a widebody,

The second type of market is these medium-haul markets that don’t truly need the range of today’s advanced technology long-haul planes but a medium-size solution.

From Australia, that could mean routes to South-east Asia orbit beyond as well as into high-density markets where a larger than single-aisle aircraft was really “a break-through value for revenue, productivity and profitability”.

Going along with this was the ability to open new markets.

He pointed to the expansion of the long-haul networks with aircraft such as Boeing 787.

“If you have a tool that‘s 50 to 80 seats smaller than a widebody with 30 to 50 percent lower trip costs than a 787 or an A330, what does that enable airlines to do to create even more of these city-pair connections with even more opportunities,’’ he said.

“I think it’s three complementary spaces in the market and I think all of those exist here in this region as well;  from trans-con, to the trans-Tasman all the way to finding new markets in Asia.”

On the question of when a decision would be made on the NMA, Hulst said it would become more of a focus once the 737 MAX returns to service.

“In the meantime, there’s still a team that’s focused on it but the company’s focused on the MAX,’’ he said.

Asked how confident he was that the 737 MAX would re-enter service later this year, Hulst said the manufacturer believed it had done all it could from a software and hardware perspective with enhancements to the aircraft.

But it was really up to the regulators.

“It’s the FAA, it’s other global regulators … and their timing that dictates when the airplane will return to service,’’ he said.

On other new planes, Hulst said the timetable for when the ultra-long-range 777-8 might enter service was still under service but he expected the first flight of the 777-9 and the plane’s first delivery next year.

Qantas is looking at the 777-8 and as a contender in its Project Sunrise plans to launch non-stop flights to Australia’s east coast. There has since been speculation Boeing will offer the bigger 777-9 with a reduced payload as an interim solution.

Hulst said Boeing was “absolutely committed to the 777-8 as a product and as a model: but when it would enter service depended on a combination of customer demand and how it aligned with the 777X program design and production system.

He said the manufacturer was committed to what the plane could do and working with Qantas to provide a solution that fitted the airline’s needs.

“I don’t have a specific date but we are absolutely committed to the 777-8 and think that it provides unique product capability that nothing else can on the market,’’ he said.

The suggestion that a re-engined Boeing 767-400ER – dubbed the XF – could be a cheaper New Mid-Size aircraft, or 797, is flawed.

While the 767-400X would make a great freighter aircraft, that model with an exit limit seating capacity of 375 is way too big for the NMA mission which is put at between 250 and 270 seats.

The smaller 767-200 with a 290 limit and the -300 with a 350 limit make more sense.

According to FlightGlobal Boeing is studying a re-engine derivative of the 767 widebodies primarily for the cargo market, with service entry slated for the mid-2020s.

FlightGlobal says that the 767-XF would be powered by GE Aviation GEnx engine.

It says that to “accommodate the larger-fan engines, the aircraft would incorporate extended landing gear to provide the necessary ground clearance.”

Boeing is building 767-300Fs for FedEx and UPS and has 60 firm orders.

However, to really get the economics right Boeing would probably have to build an all-new composite wing for a passenger version of the 767-XF.

The company has gained extensive experience with this on the 777X.

Certainly, the study is an excellent baseline to judge the NMA but an all-new aircraft is needed to deliver the passenger X factor and to prove up the production system for the follow on 737 replacement.

Earlier this month one of the world’s leading aviation analysts New York-based Bernstein said that Boeing would launch the 797.

In a special report, Commercial Aircraft: Demand, MAX, NEO, engines, widebodies Berstein says “we expect it will be launched, although no decisions should be expected before resolution of MAX issues.”

“Boeing’s New Midsize Airplane (NMA) appears to still have significant momentum toward launch despite the fact that we do not believe there is complete agreement within Boeing.

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Berstein says there is considerable interest from airlines for the twin-aisle 240-270 seat aircraft. In fact only last month Delta Air Lines CEO Ed Bastian told Bloomberg that his airline wants 200 to replace its 757 and 767s.

Bernstein said: “We continue to find substantial customer interest in this model for a variety of routes, but pricing will be a major issue. The ingoing position of most airlines has been that Boeing should price the NMA at a level comparable to the A321XLR, even though the airplane would be much more capable. We see that kind of pricing as a non-starter. But, we also do not expect airlines to start from anything but a low price position in this process.”

The latest Qantas Boeing 747 to exit the airline’s dwindling fleet of much-loved jumbo jets is getting a new lease on life as a Rolls-Royce flying test bed.

The Boeing 747-400, registration VH-OJU and named Lord Howe Island,  retired from commercial service October 13 with a Sydney-Los Angeles flight and will be used to test current and future jet engine technology.

Rolls-Royce is investing $A70m (£56m) in the acquisition and refurbishment of the aircraft.

READ: First pictures of Qantas’ 100th anniversary 787

The  Qantas RB211-powered jumbo had been in service for two decades and was the last Rolls-Royce-powered aircraft in the fleet.

During its service, it flew more than 70 million kilometres, or the equivalent of almost 100 return trips to the moon, operating to dozens of countries and carrying 2.5 million passengers.

After completing its final commercial flight, it flew to AeroTEC’s flight test center at Moses Lake in the US state of Washington where it will undergo an extensive two-year transformation.

AeroTEC engineers and technicians will convert the Boeing 747-400 from a 364-seat commercial aircraft to a state-of-the-art flying testbed equipped with extensive instrumentation and systems to take sophisticated measurements of engine performance in flight.

It will work alongside Rolls-Royce’s existing flying testbed, a Boeing 747-200, which has completed 285 test flights to date.

“The Queen of the skies will become the jewel in the crown of our global test programs,’’ said Rolls-Royce director of development and experimental engineering Gareth Hedicker.

“This is a significant investment that will expand our world-leading test capabilities even further and will allow us to obtain more flight test data than ever before. “

Chris Snook, Executive Manager of Engineering for Qantas added: “The Boeing 747 has been an integral and much-loved member of the Qantas fleet for many years.

“We’ve operated almost every variant and while it is sad to see them go, the 747s are making way for Boeing 787 Dreamliners.

“OJU has proudly worn the flying kangaroo for more than 20 years and we’re delighted that she has a long life ahead of her to help test and support the development of the next generation of aircraft engines.”

Qantas still has six B747s flying but will retire the fleet in 2020 as they make way for the more efficient Boeing 787.

The “Queen of the Skies” played a major role in opening up travel to and from Australia.