Plane Spotting - The Quiz

[RabC]

Air Asia A320.... File name has a 326 in it, guessing that's the reference?

Is it Thai Air Asia, or Air Asia?

Think 'time' re: reference.

Thought I would show off my rig and what I used for my shot above. Table is right next to my upstairs balcony door. Absolutely perfectly clear day today considering where I am located.

Slightly off topic but are you using the attached remote to cut down on "shake" with a lens like that? I am new to real cameras and always have trouble when using a large lens and the resulting blur of my pictures.

[Tywais]

Slightly off topic but are you using the attached remote to cut down on "shake" with a lens like that? I am new to real cameras and always have trouble when using a large lens and the resulting blur of my pictures.

That is a Vello intervalometer RF remote control. And yes, needed for long lenses or long exposure night shots. In the case of my photo above though it was plenty bright out and wasn't necessary. Besides, by the time I set up the tripod he would be long gone. The lens has built in image stabilization of around 3-4 f-stops (Panasonic calls it Mega OIS). If you look at the EXIF data for the above shot you can see stability of the shot was of no real concern. I locked the ISO at 200 and let the camera do the rest. 1/1000 Second. If I turned on the 1:1 crop feature of the camera the focal length would be 2.6 times more or around 1500mm, that would need the tripod most likely. But then I would be taking photos of peoples faces in the planes windows.

[David48]

Air Asia A320.... File name has a 326 in it, guessing that's the reference?

Is it Thai Air Asia, or Air Asia?

Think 'time' re: reference.

Thought I would show off my rig and what I used for my shot above. Table is right next to my upstairs balcony door. Absolutely perfectly clear day today considering where I am located.

Well sir ... since you showed me yours ... I'll 'flash' mine.

Well ... not so flash a camera and soooooooooooo difficult to focus on the incoming plane, especially with the sun behind the plane.

Plus I borrowed it from the gf ... mine is just an Olympus Happy Snapper.

Not expensive to buy (maybe 7,000 Baht now ... she bought it a year ago) and a 15x zoom ... I like that feature.

I think that you would have had a ball at the Farm ... the planes landed 24 hours a day!

.

[Tywais]

Actually, as you know by now ... I'm no expert when it comes to planes ... I know the inside from the outside and that's about it.

It just looks like a bog standard AirAsia Airbus a320-216 ?

.

though SeaVisionBurma got there first.

Not sure how long one should wait for full details but here you go. That's where the time hint comes in handy plus looking at my profile will have a hint where it was taken.

[SeaVisionBurma]

Actually, as you know by now ... I'm no expert when it comes to planes ... I know the inside from the outside and that's about it.

It just looks like a bog standard AirAsia Airbus a320-216 ?

.

though SeaVisionBurma got there first.

Not sure how long one should wait for full details but here you go. That's where the time hint comes in handy plus looking at my profile will have a hint where it was taken.

No complaints about Air Asia's on time performance then.....

[Tywais]

No complaints about Air Asia's on time performance then.....

Pretty impressive. I just looked at the EXIF data above and it shows 15:29:39 at time taken.

[RabC]

Slightly off topic but are you using the attached remote to cut down on "shake" with a lens like that? I am new to real cameras and always have trouble when using a large lens and the resulting blur of my pictures.

That is a Vello intervalometer RF remote control. And yes, needed for long lenses or long exposure night shots. In the case of my photo above though it was plenty bright out and wasn't necessary. Besides, by the time I set up the tripod he would be long gone. The lens has built in image stabilization of around 3-4 f-stops (Panasonic calls it Mega OIS). If you look at the EXIF data for the above shot you can see stability of the shot was of no real concern. I locked the ISO at 200 and let the camera do the rest. 1/1000 Second. If I turned on the 1:1 crop feature of the camera the focal length would be 2.6 times more or around 1500mm, that would need the tripod most likely. But then I would be taking photos of peoples faces in the planes windows.

Thanks for that, guess its head back in books for me.

[Terry Newman]

I must say I have really been enjoying this thread - I'm a shameless aviation nerd

Pity I am nowhere near an airport and seem to only be around boats & islands this week.....

Sounds ideal for a seaplane then !!! Pardon the pun

[SeaVisionBurma]

I must say I have really been enjoying this thread - I'm a shameless aviation nerd

Pity I am nowhere near an airport and seem to only be around boats & islands this week.....

Sounds ideal for a seaplane then !!! Pardon the pun

Used to go to work in this :

http://www.airliners.net/photo/Morgan-&-Co/Cessna-206-Float/0081461/&sid=53168a64d8188c86f295e8b54d204406

Appropriate here I think, especially with that pun!

Sent from my ALCATEL_one_touch_918D

[marstons]

Dozens of these disappeared, about 70 years ago.. Can someone explain why and where?

Quite a lot more of these also disappeared around the same era.

[marstons]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Reid_(VC)

Another merlin engine WW 2 the Lanc, I have the print and got it signed by a gentleman I worked with who got the VC flying one. Some pilot he was, the wiki link is worth a read on his mission to Düsseldorf.

[lubbkis]

It just looks like a bog standard AirAsia Airbus a320-216 ?

.

Judging from the day I was at Chek Lap Kok last month, Mr. Fernandez is bog standard on the Aircraft type but paints the Malaysian ones as flying billboards. Notice the Thai registered one in bog standard Air Asia colours. Don't ask me "why".

[Ricardo]

Is that close-spacing of Air Asia aircraft perhaps a cunning ploy, to reduce landing-charges, by taking-up only the one slot, for three different flights ?

We mere button-counters can only admire the ingenious cost-control, and flying-skills, involved in this !

[Rimmer]

One of the most feared planes from the Vietnam War era, now in Thai AF colors. Anyone?

Sorry about the person in the pic its not me OK

[lubbkis]

Is that close-spacing of Air Asia aircraft perhaps a cunning ploy, to reduce landing-charges, by taking-up only the one slot, for three different flights ?

We mere button-counters can only admire the ingenious cost-control, and flying-skills, involved in this !

Your joke hits some truths that I have a actually set an exam question on to my business students. Stellios Haji-Ioannou gave a guest lecture at his Alma Mater in London some years ago, His main theme that evening was demand elasticity. I was able to take my class to this talk and he exposed part of the Easyjet business model. Much of it was based on heuristics first deployed by South West Airlines in the US and Tony Fernandez has developed it for Asean and a bit beyond. Fernandez demonstrated that it is difficult to apply to long-haul with the Stansted-Sepang flights as did OASIS who did London-Hong Kong-Vancouver with a very small ageing 747 fleet. My partner was on the last OASIS flight into HK and eventually got a credit card payment for the flight on Cathy back from HK to London.

WRT these three three pics HS-ABK went out three minutes before 9M-AHQ and 9M-AFG went out 46 minutes before that. The times on the EXIF are from my UK domiciled camera. You will have noticed that many carriers, not just low-cost, will try to get all their flights off from a particular airport within a single shift so that they minimize their ground costs.

I'm fond of the low cost entrepreneurs. In Europe, they have forced the line companies/national carriers to cut their margins and give the traveller a better deal for regional flights and they seem to treat their staff OK, whilst the passengers are walking cargo. There are many more cunning ploys to come and lang may their lum reek whilst anyone can fly.

[Tywais]

One of the most feared planes from the Vietnam War era, now in Thai AF colors. Anyone?

Sorry about the person in the pic its not me OK

Cessna O-1 Bird Dog (L-19)? Not a great plane to be flying then as 469 were lost during the era.

[marstons]

It just looks like a bog standard AirAsia Airbus a320-216 ?

.

Judging from the day I was at Chek Lap Kok last month, Mr. Fernandez is bog standard on the Aircraft type but paints the Malaysian ones as flying billboards. Notice the Thai registered one in bog standard Air Asia colours. Don't ask me "why".

British Airways tried painting all there long haul planes with a theme for the countries they flew to, Margaret Thatcher when shown a model of one by the BA big wigs covered it up with her handkerchief as a protest at the Union flag being replaced, then Branson put it on Virgin planes. So back on topic ground crews shall we say in the intellectually challenged countries struggled finding the planes as they looked for tail fins to find planes. So my conclusion is ground crews at Thailand may well have same problem. Just a thought

[airconsult]

On request - reposted this youtube here for enjoyment.

cheers

[Terry Newman]

Yeah, a Bird-Dog then call in an air strike from its big brother launched form Thailand and woooosh......

[Rimmer]

Awwww that was too easy Yes a Bird Dog Here's one but from the inside to make it harder.

And a bonus point if you can id where the pic was taken

[Terry Newman]

C-117 (DC-3)

I don't know where it is, but I would love to mount a few chrome polls in between the rows of seats and some ice buckets for some beer

[David48]

# 017

Try for the ...

• Airline
  

• Make and Model
  

Something a little different ...

EDIT ... apologies Rimmer ... didn't open your post (I started this an hour ago) ... didn't want to clash ...

[Terry Newman]

SQ B744

Gezz, how many chrome poles could you get into that I wonder?

The average SQ hostie would look much better to my eye swinging off a chrome pole than the average TG hag?

And I have a Thai "fetish" so that is saying something !!!!

(Just not THAI)

[Ricardo]

Fernandez demonstrated that it is difficult to apply to long-haul with the Stansted-Sepang flights as did OASIS who did London-Hong Kong-Vancouver with a very small ageing 747 fleet. My partner was on the last OASIS flight into HK and eventually got a credit card payment for the flight on Cathy back from HK to London.

I certainly have my doubts about true-LCC long-haul operations, on the SouthWest/RyanAir/EasyJet model. On 1-hour sectors, a 30-minute turn-round saves a lot of time compared to legacy-airline operations, on long-haul the utilisation is already higher, and with fewer turn-rounds to accelerate, for example.

When I was at Britannia Airways (end-80s), we were in the process of developing long-haul charter-flights, both twin-jet (B762) EROPS across-the-Pond to Florida and to Australia/New-Zealand. But we did this partly to generate extra flying-time during the European winter, there was then a 2:1 summer:winter bias in demand, so we had spare aircraft in the off-season. We also scheduled major-maintenance for the off-season, or tried to lease-out aircraft to airlines in the southern-hemisphere, for the same reason.

It did help that we were already configured (for European charter-flying) in a fairly-dense single-class system, with basic-catering and lower expectations from our customers, in return for their cheaper-flight. But for long-haul LCC the commercial-temptation to offer at-least one upgraded-class seems very strong, and a no-catering/drinks option is IMO inhumane on 10-hour-plus flights, better to offer a basic-service in-the-price IMO.

I suspect that the Gulf-based hub-and-spoke operations, with a modern/reliable-fleet & relatively-basic Economy-service, is going to prove a successful competitor over long-haul LCC airlines. The commercial advantages of flying a wave of Europe-Gulf flights from a dozen countries, having a 2-hour ground-stop to refuel/clean the aircraft & swap the passengers round, and then flying them out to a dozen Far-Eastern destinations are pretty strong, compared to point-to-point non-stop flights.

Then again Norwegian's new B787 fleet, flying long-haul with short-haul feed from many places within Europe, may give them a run for their money ? Or perhaps that's where Etihad/Air-Berlin is going ( I'm not up-to-date on developments). As a customer I hope so ! Either way the legacy-carriers, with fat overheads or older-fleets or a burocratic-mindset, have unhappy times ahead.

It's all a long way from good old Laker-SkyTrain !

[David48]

It's an off-topic question ... but it's my thread so <deleted> ... and so many knowledgeable minds here

Why do THAI charge sooooooooooooo much for a 1 way fare when the price asked bares no resemblance to 1/2 the return flight?

[lubbkis]

Great post Ricardo. Of course the Winter/Summer split helped develop the ski-tour market and Britannia's mid-week passengers were often in Khaki.

It's interesting you cite the Gulf/Norwegian hub/spoke cases. Both oil rich areas whilst the greens would like us to fly less. As we think in Mercator projections we think that the Gulf is nicely situated for hubbing, whilst Norway might be off the beaten track. However, the Finns are demonstrating that they provide a good hub between Europe and Asia as well as the US West Coast. The mid point of the surface of a globe is any point on it, init.

And on David's question, I don't think it's just Thai who don't relate a single fare to a return fare.

[Ricardo]

Purely personal opinion, David ? Off-the-cuff ? Without looking-up my text-books ?

1. Because Thai are not a point-to-point 1-way carrier, and even they will often charge more in one direction than the other, for example a 'Sale' price one-way which links to an expensive return-flight. Good marketing or sharp-practice ?

2. Marketing-reasons ? The return-fare is perhaps the fare which is discounted, rather than the one-way being inflated ?

3. Cost-driven ? Perhaps there are cost-factors which differ, depending on which way you're flying, a one-way would thus be different from half the return-cost ?

... Catering costs might be lower for an overnight-flight (1 meal + 1 snack/breakfast) than a day-flight (with 2 full meals)

... Airports might price peak-time/slack-time take-offs/landings differently

... Bangkok departure-tax might be less than LHR, so the BKK-LHR tax-cost one-way is less than half the average on a round-trip

... West-East flights are generally shorter than East-West ones, due to jetstream tail-wind/head-wind, so use less fuel per-passenger

... In the old days of IATA-BSP ticketing, perhaps there was a slight difference in the cost of ticketing & collecting the cash

... Perhaps reservation-system-costs are being allocated/recovered on a per-booking basis, rather than a per-sector basis

4. The old favourite 'supply & demand', seasonal-flows Europe to Thailand pre-Christmas & back again after Christmas, for example ?

At the end of the day, while we may tend to think of prices (for almost anything) as being cost+margin based, this is often a fallacy. Suppliers tend to charge whatever they can get away with ! This is what makes costing and pricing such fun for marketeers and button-counters !

[Ricardo]

Great post Ricardo. Of course the Winter/Summer split helped develop the ski-tour market and Britannia's mid-week passengers were often in Khaki.

Thanks lubbkis !

Charterers of course come in all colours, including khaki or dayglo-Hawaian-shirted.

Low-cost ones didn't/don't mind flying mid-week/overnight, for a better price, think 'Club 18-30s here ! Been there ... done that, myself !

While premium-priced passengers, heading for a cruise-ship in Florida or the Caribbean, might spring for week-end day-time departures and an up-graded meal-service or unlimited free-drinks, of course. Luxury ... we used to live in a paper-bag etcetera ...

[marstons]

Fernandez demonstrated that it is difficult to apply to long-haul with the Stansted-Sepang flights as did OASIS who did London-Hong Kong-Vancouver with a very small ageing 747 fleet. My partner was on the last OASIS flight into HK and eventually got a credit card payment for the flight on Cathy back from HK to London.

I certainly have my doubts about true-LCC long-haul operations, on the SouthWest/RyanAir/EasyJet model. On 1-hour sectors, a 30-minute turn-round saves a lot of time compared to legacy-airline operations, on long-haul the utilisation is already higher, and with fewer turn-rounds to accelerate, for example.

When I was at Britannia Airways (end-80s), we were in the process of developing long-haul charter-flights, both twin-jet (B762) EROPS across-the-Pond to Florida and to Australia/New-Zealand. But we did this partly to generate extra flying-time during the European winter, there was then a 2:1 summer:winter bias in demand, so we had spare aircraft in the off-season. We also scheduled major-maintenance for the off-season, or tried to lease-out aircraft to airlines in the southern-hemisphere, for the same reason.

It did help that we were already configured (for European charter-flying) in a fairly-dense single-class system, with basic-catering and lower expectations from our customers, in return for their cheaper-flight. But for long-haul LCC the commercial-temptation to offer at-least one upgraded-class seems very strong, and a no-catering/drinks option is IMO inhumane on 10-hour-plus flights, better to offer a basic-service in-the-price IMO.

I suspect that the Gulf-based hub-and-spoke operations, with a modern/reliable-fleet & relatively-basic Economy-service, is going to prove a successful competitor over long-haul LCC airlines. The commercial advantages of flying a wave of Europe-Gulf flights from a dozen countries, having a 2-hour ground-stop to refuel/clean the aircraft & swap the passengers round, and then flying them out to a dozen Far-Eastern destinations are pretty strong, compared to point-to-point non-stop flights.

Then again Norwegian's new B787 fleet, flying long-haul with short-haul feed from many places within Europe, may give them a run for their money ? Or perhaps that's where Etihad/Air-Berlin is going ( I'm not up-to-date on developments). As a customer I hope so ! Either way the legacy-carriers, with fat overheads or older-fleets or a burocratic-mindset, have unhappy times ahead.

It's all a long way from good old Laker-SkyTrain !

At that time I did a Luton- Accapulco with monarch on a 757 charter. Nightmare 29 inch seat pitch went on for ever. Also a few Britannia via Bangor Maine with Brittania also painful. Used to see a lot of Britannia planes at Phuket in winter times in late 90's leased out to Swedish companies. Shared hotel with the crew for a week Amarai Coral Beach in Phuket. Good trip for the crew.

[marstons]

Great post Ricardo. Of course the Winter/Summer split helped develop the ski-tour market and Britannia's mid-week passengers were often in Khaki.

It's interesting you cite the Gulf/Norwegian hub/spoke cases. Both oil rich areas whilst the greens would like us to fly less. As we think in Mercator projections we think that the Gulf is nicely situated for hubbing, whilst Norway might be off the beaten track. However, the Finns are demonstrating that they provide a good hub between Europe and Asia as well as the US West Coast. The mid point of the surface of a globe is any point on it, init.

And on David's question, I don't think it's just Thai who don't relate a single fare to a return fare.

Emirates certainly don't almost as much for a single as a return.