Petition to preserve the A320-100.

All I’m saying is; ask the ‘common Joe’ who may have a small idea about aviation, what a ‘revolutionary aircraft’ would be and chances are they would say “Boeing 747”, “Concorde” or “Airbus A380”. I would be very surprised that anyone would say “Oh, yeah, what about that A320-100!”.

To me, the most important aspect of the A320 was it’s size. The 737’s largest customer, UAL, wanted an airplane that could fly all the way to the east coast from it’s hub in Denver (high altitude limited performance of the 737-300) and all the way to the west coast from it’s hub at IAD. Boeing would not consent to making a bigger 737.

Delta started talking about a 150 seat, 2 pilot airplane with high bypass ratio engines in the late 70’s that they could put into service in the early 80’s. They called this concept “delta three.” (Extra credit if you can name Delta one and Delta two.) Boeing refused, and Delta had to buy the 757, which is/was a little too big at 187 seats (in DL config.)

The engines were available, often a limiting factor in other airliner development. Only Boeing intransigence kept them from doing the right thing at the right time. Had Boeing built the right sized airplane instead of the too small 3-4-500 series, several other large carriers probably would have also bought them for competitive reasons. Boeing didn’t listen to what the market was demanding, and FINALLY built the 737NG series. By the time the NG entered the market, the A320 was firmly established, having been in service almost 10 YEARS. The NG was a Boeing RESPONSE to the A320 just like the Classic was a RESPONSE to the DC-9. By the time Boeing came around, UAL already had A320’s. Boeing will never sell NG’s to UAL now. Delta finally got what they wanted with the NG in 1998, almost 20 years later than they wanted, and not really interested in the A320 after having a bitter Airbus experience with the A310.

So to summarize MHO, Airbus “won” by providing the marketplace what it needed. The fly-by-wire is just fluff, as it hasn’t shown any clear advantage over the NG flight control system. Airbus did get the width of the fuselage right, along with the general size of the airplane.

You show complete arrogance in thinking that a common type-rating is based solely on similar flight decks, and that is just plain wrong.

No I do not, and that is not what I said.
I was talking Cockpit commonality. A commonality of layout and controls. I did not mean type ratings.
At the time the A320 was on its own. So had nothing to be common with.

I threw in the comment about the 757/767 to show that the A320 was not the first to have a common type rating with its stablemates. I should have made that point clearer. My bad.

I will concede however that you are correct with the use of computers to build in that flight envelope protection that has proven most successfull. Even if it did suffer some “glitches” at first. I’ll not go into that, so as not to pull this thread of course.

I think we should agree to disagree on some point.
But we both agree on one thing; The A320-100 should be preserved, preferrably MSN# 001.

Again, you do not cite anthing revolutionary.

Fly-by-wire had been around for 15 to 20 years by the time the A320 first flew. So it is not revolutionary in that sense.
Do now listen to Airbus hyperbole. Of course they’ll use revolutionary to describe the A320 and the media will havelapped that up and re-digested it into their articles.

Cockpit commonality has long been a design philosophy, way before Airbus was even founded. The 707, 727 and 737 all featured many common controls and parts.
The DC8 and DC9 too. These are the ones I know off hand. I know there are others from other manufacturers. Saab with their 340 and 2000 for example.
Boeing actually achieved a dual type rating with minimal conversion for the 757 and 767.
What Airbus did was to streamline the idea. They evolved the philisophy into what we know today. They eventually showed that it was selling point. But as you said, this did not come into play until the A330/A340 launched. So the A320 cannot be heralded as revolutionary for that.

There is no doubting the A320 was ahead of the 737 of the time. But that does not make it revolutionary.

Now, what the A320 should be remembered for, and rightly so, was its overwhelming success. And the way it showed the Boeing execs of the time that a new kid was on the block and was not going away.

The argument is largely irrelevent – if for no other reason than Bmused55 typically takes the view that only Boeing are capable of building anything revolutionary! :diablo:

Perhaps you should read ALL of my postings before making such blantly wrong accusations, be it in jest or not.

I’d like to see the first A320 preserved too. It was a real shame what happened to A300 #001.
But I do not agree that it was revolutionary. I see nothing about it to qualify for that title.

The argument is largely irrelevent – if for no other reason than Bmused55 typically takes the view that only Boeing are capable of building anything revolutionary! :diablo:

Personal views aside, the revolutionary aspect is indeed irrelevent. The A320 is a part of European airliner manufacturing history (a milestone in fact, if for no other reason that the quantities it has been and will be manufactured in) and sooner or later should find a place in preservation on that basis alone – if one can find a reason to preserve a Mercure (a design of which only 10 saw service) then there’s plenty of grounds to preserve an A320. And of course if one is going to be preserved, it should really be a very early one, ideally the number one prototype – the opportunity that was lost with the #1 A300 should not be missed with the A320.

I don’t “do” facebook, but for the reasons expressed above I think that the idea of making sure a very early A320 is preserved is a good one.

Andy

Frankly, you can argue this every which way – and I do enjoy a good, reasoned argument – but in my opinion, the aircraft was revolutionary – partly due to fly-by-wire, and partly due to the cockpit design philosophy, system design and manufacturing processes.

It was so good, that it forced Mr. Boeing’s hand into making the 737NG and that would be considered an evolutionary design.

Why do you consider the fly by wire revolutionary? Concorde had it years before.

Also, the A320 was not the first plane with a similar cockpit as its stablemates.
The DC-9 and 737 had that long before (I’m sure they weren’t the first either) The A320 evolved that concept to a more streamlined design.
It wasn’t even the first with MFDs either.

You’re right about Boeing needing to update the 737 because of it.

I agree the A320 was a milestone aircraft but this petition IMO is a silly idea.

such a revolutionary aircraft deserves to be preserved…..

A what now?
I hardly think the A320 classes as revolutionary. It didn’t bring about a change to the industry or to life in general. Not like the DC-3, DC-8 and 707, or the venerable 747.
If you mean the the Fly-by-wire, then I say thats not entirely revolutionary as the A320 wasn’t even the first commercial airliner with it, that honor befalls Concorde.

The A320 is certainly a success however. And if we are to consider aircraft for preservation on financial grounds, then the A320 certainly qualifies.

IMO, the A320 was an evolution of current design methods. An improvement on the two benchmarks the DC9 and the 737.

Preserve an A320-100 for being the first of its kind, yes.
For being a revolution? No, that is not true.

Again… in my opinion.

This is how threads get off topic.

Ooooo! He’s so masterful! 😎

Gentlemen (I assume you are male),

This is how threads get off topic. I specifically did not go into more detail WRT to the definition of a cycle to avoid this kind of haggling. Lets just say they are landings and be done with it, no?

Airbus was extremely conservative on the original spec, and airplanes which probably have many years of useful life left in them are being retired. At least some people would like to see one set aside for a museum. Others think the frame doesn’t represent a significant enough achievement to merit preservation. If you think it does, then join the group shown in the original post.

I thought it was a fancy term for “take-off, pressurisation in climb, cruise at altitude, depressurisation in descent and landing”, ideally in that approximate order. 🙂

If a plane depressurizes in descent, circles an airport but does not land, then pressurizes again in climbing back to cruise altitude, and then depressurizes again and lands, how many “cycles” have been logged?

Usually expressed in terms of flight hours and cycles (cycle basically being a fancy term for landing), airliner “age” is carefully monitored.

I thought it was a fancy term for “take-off, pressurisation in climb, cruise at altitude, depressurisation in descent and landing”, ideally in that approximate order. 🙂

Is Air France retiring their A320-100’s? If so, I never knew that. Such a shame to see the -100 disappear.
Hopefully atleast one will be preserved.

IIRC, Airbus was extremely conservative when they specified the “service life” of the A320. I think some of the older engineers working on the project at the time must have remembered, or perhaps even been involved with, the Comet.

Usually expressed in terms of flight hours and cycles (cycle basically being a fancy term for landing), airliner “age” is carefully monitored. I want to say the original numbers were something like 60,000 hours and 48,000 landings (these numbers may be wrong) for the A320. At any rate, the numbers are/were absurdly low for a modern airliner, a fact not often quoted in fanboy arguments. Airbus is currently conducting an engineering study with a view towards extending the life of the airplanes. The study is not yet complete. I think also, that later airframes off the production line had a slightly longer life.

As a result of the relatively short life of the A320, and cheap fuel, you see some strange things in the market. For example airlines like Northwest scrapping mid-late 1980’s build A320s while continuing to fly 1967 build DC-9s.

Cynics would also argue that by specifying a short service life Airbus ensures future sales, not unlike the old “trade every 2 years” mentality the U.S. car makers used to have (until the Japanese forced them to improve their quality).

Please see page 6 of the document linked below for more info on the life extension, although somewhat typically it reads like a sales brouchure, it does have some relevant information of the ESG (Extended Service Goal):
http://www.airbus.com/store/mm_repository/press_kits/att00005531/media_object_file_Airbus_Letter_EN.pdf

Is Air France retiring their A320-100’s? If so, I never knew that. Such a shame to see the -100 disappear.
Hopefully atleast one will be preserved.

How is it a milestone in Aviation history?
First airliner to crash in front of TV cameras when brand spanking new? :diablo: