18 replies to this topic

[Worldlines]

I am opening routes and the fuel costs are way too high. I was trying to open SFO-LAX and the fuel cost on 28x weekly bombardier crj200-lr was over 100,000 dollars. I checked my own PHL-CLT route, which is longer, and operated by the same plane, and the fuel cost was below 40,000 dollars.

[Conor]

Shorter route = more acceleration and deceleration and engines work harder because of lower altitude flying

[9M-TKS]

Shorter routes tend to make less money than longer ones. I think we need a guide that tells new players all these

[Conor]

Its being worked on

[flightsimer]

Shorter route = more acceleration and deceleration and engines work harder because of lower altitude flying

first
there is no more accel or decel in a shorter route than a longer.

Second, what makes longer routes "more fuel efficient" is the fact that they spend more time at cruise not because of the altitude they fly at. while yes altitude makes a difference, that isn’t the main cause. Regional flights are Climb-cruise-decent. Longer flights are climb-cruissseeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee-decent. no matter what altitude they end up at if two identical aircraft take off with the same weight and use the same power settings they will burn the same amount of fuel on climb out until the first airplane levels off.

to prove this point… If 747 A takes off at MTOW and climbs to say 35K feet and 747 B (both are same models, same engines, etc) also takes off at MTOW and climbs directly to say 40k feet... Aircraft B is burning more fuel than aircraft A even though its higher up because the engines have to produce more thrust to keep that weight up higher. Both aircraft burned the same amount of fuel up until 35k feet when 747 a leveled off.

now its true, at lower alts a jet engine is less efficient than out higher alt, but its not just that simple. Weight is a major factor in how efficient the engine is. See above.

Now putting this into AE perspectives... If a320 A flyies 1000 miles and burns $20K in fuel but a320 B that flies only 500miles but burns $40k in fuel, something is seriously wrong. I have had this happen on an even more extreme case in my airline. I had a ATR72-500 fly a similar distance route as my atr42-200 yet, my atr42's fuel bill was nearly 4 times as much yet the 42 burns 7 times less fuel. Something isn’t right there no matter what you say.

[Worldlines]

"Now putting this into AE perspectives... If a320 A flyies 1000 miles and burns $20K in fuel but a320 B that flies only 500miles but burns $40k in fuel, something is seriously wrong. I have had this happen on an even more extreme case in my airline. I had a ATR72-500 fly a similar distance route as my atr42-200 yet, my atr42's fuel bill was nearly 4 times as much yet the 42 burns 7 times less fuel. Something isn’t right there no matter what you say."

This is what I'm saying. I have a Bombardier CRJ-200LR flying PHL-CLT (448 miles) 14x weekly with fuel costs $18,829. I also have a Bombardier CRJ-200LR flying SFO-SEA (678 miles) also 14x weekly, but the fuel costs are $47,516. Something has to be wrong here.

[Yuxi]

Have you taken frequency into account when comparing fuel costs?

[flightsimer]

Have you taken frequency into account when comparing fuel costs?

read above

[AD999]

Hey...
i have a Caravelle VI flying 324 miles and the fuelcost are $137,072 is that a bug?
the flight is 100% booked out but i make still a daily loose of more than 30,000$!
what could be the causes for this problem???

AD999

[bolli]

the Caravelle is a very uneconomical aircraft, thats probably why...

[AD999]

the Caravelle is a very uneconomical aircraft, thats probably why...

is there somewhere a guidline where it is explained to new players what you should do or what not...
\which planes you should consider to buy or not...
and is there also somewhere explained on what the fuel flow depends because that plane had a fuel flow from 2400...
and a ATR machine i have with less seats has 2000 but makes a lot profit...

[Stevphfeniey]

I'm no math wizz, but I'm pretty sure 2000 is significantly less than 2400. Just sayin'

[mischkaffee]

is there somewhere a guidline where it is explained to new players what you should do or what not...
\which planes you should consider to buy or not...
and is there also somewhere explained on what the fuel flow depends because that plane had a fuel flow from 2400...
and a ATR machine i have with less seats has 2000 but makes a lot profit...

I'm no math wizz, but I'm pretty sure 2000 is significantly less than 2400. Just sayin'

Fuel flow on the caravelle is 24,290 for a whopping 80 seats.
The ATR 72-500 is 2,387 fuel flow for 74 seats.

Therefore the caravelle uses (24290/80)/(2387/74)= 9.4 x more fuel per passenger than the ATR 72-500. make sense?

[h3llr4iser]

I know exactly what the OP is talking about, I experienced a similar problem.

I was setting up a route between Milan Malpensa (MXP) and Istanbul (IST) on AE6. The route was to be flown by a Boeing 737-800 (brand new). When I finished the setup, I noticed the route had a very very very marginal profit (around $ 3,000) while having a demand of over 700 pax/day, and 100% load factor. I took a look at the costs and the fuel item was eating up almost all the income.

For the sake of curiosity, I took a look at a similar length route (VCE-IST), with the same frequency (14x) and the fuel costs were much lower with the same type of aircraft.

I got back into the MXP-IST route, closed it and reopened with the same aircraft, same problem. I closed it again, reopened with same frequency, different aircraft (this time an A320-200, similar fuel flow, similar pax number) and surprise, the fuel cost was down to the normal level.

The same 737-800 that was giving me headaches on MXP-IST worked perfectly on NAP-IST, with the fuel cost into the expected range for the set flight lenght and frequency.

There is definitely some fuel calculation bug happening randomly when setting up a route.

[bolli]

if this is only in the old worlds then nothing is going to be done about it...
I believe the fuel system is one thing that has been changed in the beta

[Klobo747]

Hi all, I'm new here. Very nice online simulation.

Unfortunately I have experienced the same problem: i'm in AE4 and I operate Nice - Ljubljana (396mi) with an ATR42-400 with a fuel cost of 6696$, on Munich - Nice (392mi) with an other ATR42-400 (one year older, but on other routes it gives me more "realistic" fuel cost) the fuel cost is 23688$

Is that a bug? Or is something related to the age of the aircraft?

And by the way, what influance has the aircraft age on its performance and/or costs?

Thanks

[bolli]

I think there is a bug in the fuel system... but its problably not going to be fixed in the old worlds for the reasons outlined above
Weclome to AE btw

[LordMontenegro]

Is fuel cost the same at all airports or does it vary?

[Yuxi]

Is fuel cost the same at all airports or does it vary?

Fuel cost is the same at all airports.

The fuel cost problem should be fixed within the next couple of weeks.