Boeing eying new 50 seater RJ.
 

Interesting that now Boeing is taking notice on the lack of a new fifty seat jet.

"Sao Paulo - Boeing considers various opportunities in the planned joint venture with Embraer, including a new 50-seater aircraft that will be developed with the know-how of its Brazilian partner "

https://airlinerwatch.com/untitled-2/

Is there some special sauce that would make a 50 seater economical now?

Tough.

In their favor: Fuel efficiency of newer engines.

The big hurdle: New design airplanes (ex. 175) have a lot of expensive tech, FBW, advanced engines, gucci cockpit stuff. All that extra cost has to be amortized over the life of the plane. Imagine a 50 seat version of the E-Jet... essentially the same cost, minus X amount of structural materials and cabin fittings. But only 2/3 of the revenue potential of a 76-seater.

Would be economical on a few select high dollar markets, but then you have to amortize R&D over a small number of planes, driving unit cost even higher.

Boeing/Embraer will have to come up with some pretty revolutionary mfg processes (BA is actually working on that) to cut costs, or somehow design a very bare-bones jet with all the costly bells and whistles removed.

Or they retool the Praetor for the regional market... Wouldn't be that much of a stretch.

A LOT of avionics are getting cheape
 

AVIONICS COSTS ARE COMING DOWN. The technology is maturing.


And it is not necessarily a SMALL number of planes. Replacement of US 50 seaters alone would be 1500 aircraft. By way of comparison, the entire Delta fleet is under a thousand aircraft (exclusive of their regional aircraft).

It will be done because Mainline managers will need a new whipsaw device.

701EV

Retool the what?
Let's hope they don't have any intention of remaking the emb-145.
It will have to be comparable to the 175 or CRJ atmosphere cabin for comfort and room. Avionics- the EMB package will be fine, doesn’t need to have all the “bells and whistles” like a 787.
Engines- geared will be too heavy, I don’t know what’s out there but there must be something more efficient today?

If there is an interest from the legacy carriers to keep 50 seat flying after 2030ish I think they will start building them again in some fashion. We have to keep in mind that Boeing has big airplanes to sell so they have the ability to scale pricing up and down to be able to make a profit on one jet order if they commit to order another at a loss of profit as long as an overall profit is made. We will see how it works out though. I personally think that as long as the economy holds some what and travel demand keeps growing the new 50 seater is dead unless we go with a turboprop like the the ATR which legacies hate.

Embraer could design a clean-sheet, true large-cabin competitor to the Global 6500/7500 and Gulfstream 600/650 in a way the Legacy 650E and Lineage 1000 are not...and use that airframe as basis for a new 50 seat regional jet.

The crj200 is a 53k lb airplane. The large-cabin competition referenced is around twice that. I doubt there’s much design overlap between a 50,000 lb plane that will do 7-100 mile legs a day and a 100,000lb one designed to do 7,100 miles at 0.9

Different wing, different pressurization, different systems.

You might be surprised...remember, the CRJ is just a stretched Challenger.

The Praetor is the same tube as a 145, which means something tweening it and the E-Jet family is more optimal.

Initial design with both markets in mind can allow engineering to address those issues.

Or...not.

The cost savings will come from the removal of at least one pilot of which all this wonderful technology is supporting.

I don’t understand why this is so hard. They need to make a Falcon 7x RJ. End of story;)

Stretches work much better than shrinks. And I'm not sure that the CRJ is a good example of that process working well anyway.

Maybe they can kill two birds with 1.84 stones, but I have a hard time imagining much commonality between a wing optimized for FL490 0.9 and FL240 0.76.

All the technology in the world cannot fully replace an incapacitated pilot, so single pilot is a very long way off. Technically possible does not mean safe, economical, insurable, or certifiable.

They would have to build a full auto system, and then fly it two pilot for a long time to demonstrate it's level of safety, and then go single pilot. Who's going to pay for that? Hint: Not airlines, they only buy planes with equipment which is regulatory or will provide an immediate and predictable cost savings. Management gets paid to enhance shareholder value by next quarter, not by next century.

Agreed, but we are talking about 15 years from now, plus Boeing and Airbus have already come out and said they have the technology for it. The implementation of new technologies such as 5g, AI, super computing etc will only speed up the process of making computers smart enough to do this, not to mention speed up communication between them. This would also allow for one pilot to be ground based, in charge of multiple aircraft while each plane has only one, the ground pilot only stepping in for emergencies or incapacitation.

To your point about pay, that same argument can be made for every technology that is introduced and it hasn't stopped them from developing it. If there is money to be made, or saved, it will happen.

I am firmly in the group that feels the pilots coming in now in their early 20's are the last true pilots we will see. If my children wanted to be pilots, I would strongly urge them not to solely because I feel there won't be a big need for them in 40 years.

All speculation of course, none of us know for sure how the tech will advance or what the future holds.

The technology already exists in high end drones that will automatically follow a pre set flight plan and land in the event of loss of signal from the drone operator. It probably wouldn’t be too much of a stretch to equip airplanes with similar technology for single pilot ops. You’d have some sort of button or control that needs to be pushed or manipulated at regular intervals, if the pilot fails to push the button at the right time, the autonomous aircraft would simply squawk emergency and land at the nearest airport.

I seriously don’t see this happening within the remainder of my flying career, but there’s absolutely no stopping technological advances, no matter how hard we fight it. Once it presents a significant cost savings and is “safe enough”, it will be implemented.

I wonder if reduced maintenance costs could make a new 50 seater economic. Longer check intervals etc. or does fuel burn drive everything?

Fuel and payroll are the two biggest expenses at the airlines, by a pretty far margin.

You definitely do not want a GTF in a 50 seater, GTF's actually burn more fuel on short routes than regular engines. The most likely candidates for the new engine, will be the PW800, Silvercrest, or the Passport, and they all burn about 10% less fuel than the CF34.

This is you being funny, right?

It is usually foolish to bet against technological progress. But there is another side to this “progress”: the technical savvy of those who attack and compromise these advanced systems.

Unless and until automated vehicles can be reliably demonstrated to be “unhackable,” l don’t expect them to be whizzing by in large numbers in the next lane or over our heads.

Technology exists- yes.
The success rate of this technology is not at a level that the flying public will accept.
One model of drone right now (the MQ-9) is running at a accident of 4 accidents for every 292,000 hours.
And that one is the most successful drone in operation.
https://www.militarytimes.com/news/y...dy-since-2011/

That’s why I think it won’t be remotely feasible until well after I’m retired. My best uneducated guess would be a least 30-40 years out.

And the MQ-9 is still flown by two human pilots for takeoff and landing, and the pilots are within close proximity at the airfield.

As long as regional airports survive, there will be a market for 50-70 seat aircraft.

The mainline system can’t function without regionals feeding passengers to it.

Southwest, Spirit and Frontier seem to be doing just fine without regional feeders. Not every one-horse town needs to have scheduled air service since 99% of America lives within a two hour drive of a major airport.

Not to mention back in the day those one horse towns got 100+ seat service...

Oh, so true!

People have forgotten about the days of small airports served by F100s, DC-9s, and 737-200s.

How do you think United, Delta and American fill up their widebody planes? It is with feed off the regionals! Look at how many wide bodies Southwest, Spirit and Frontier have-Zero.

Regionals expand the mainline airline’s route system allowing for more destinations and larger aircraft out of their hubs to many international destinations that would be unprofitable without the feed!

then they will make stops with 100 seaters. i could see MQT-TVC-ORD with e195 or MLU-GTR-ATL with a 717 if mainline decides to up gauge aircraft or if there are no new 50 seat AC when the 145/200 time out.

If those people wanted to go on their trips, they would still do it. It's not like they are going to say "it's another 30 minutes or hour away, so I won't take this 16 hour trip now."

The only reason some cities have service at all is because the airlines don't want one of the others to have the convenience of the only closer airport. For many of those RJs are just more flights per day vs a larger aircraft that could serve them instead. It's a convenience, not a necessity.

A recent rest of this theory has been run using the 787 and A380. Convenience won. Outside of a centrally planned economy, you aren't going to get a "logical" air transport network.

And I would also dispute the "well it's only another 30 minutes"

Yes GSP-CLT and AVL-CLT is silly. But I live somewhere that has daily RJ service to 4 hubs all of which are 6 hour drives away. They are the closest international gateways. Lots of americans live within a 2 hour drive of a major airport. The percentage that live within a 2 hour drive of LHR direct (let alone CDG or NRT) is much lower.

And there are people for whom another hour makes a difference ... the high value business travelers who prop up the whole enterprise.

You have low cost carriers filling 150-200 seat airplanes out of the same markets where Ual, Aal, and Dal run 50 seaters. Airlines now make more money off of ancillary expenses like extra legroom, seat selection, credit card signups, buy on board, etc that makes high volume sales more profitable then charging more for only 50 seats. They also see more volume for connecting passengers and much easier recovery when the plane breaks or weather hits. If you have 300 Airbus you can find a spare or shuffle another flight to cover the open segment and have crews all over the country to pick up the pieces after weather.

50 seaters hold onto market share, for example LGA has hourly departure restrictions that limit aircraft to 55 seats or less. The question of a 50 seater is not always about the TRASM.

A new clean sheet 50 seater? Single-piloted? GTF? That's hilarious. This story is 100% for the UALPA's consumption and has zero chance of actually happening. First the CRJ550 and now this fairy tale.

Don't be fooled. Just say no.

Your example proves my point. If you have RJ service to that many airports your airport could support a mainline aircraft. There also aren't very many of those airports without multiple flights a day that could be consolidated.

Totally agree. There are even credible rumors now that one route at my airport is being up-gauged from RJ to a 737.

But "could be consolidated" and "market supports consolidation" are different things. An airline running 6X day two class RJ will take market share from a competitor running 2X day 737. (Same as 2/day 787 beats 1/day A380)

Notice that I said “regional airports”. The airlines you mentioned are LCC’s and ULCC’s and not majors and don’t really serve the regional airports.

I’d like to see the percentage of passengers on the legacy airlines that utilize regional airports to travel. I imagine it’s pretty significant.

See, that demonstrates that there isn't a NEED for the RJs, even if there is a desire for frequency it doesn't really have as much of an impact if there aren't really any RJs out there. There isn't really a good example of the RJs taking market share from the 737s either.

Nevermind that you used two class RJs as your example when the discussion is about whether there is a need for single class 50 seaters. When it comes to those, it's already known that there are passengers who book away from the 50 seat RJs.

The 787 vs 380 comparison isn't really a good one though as the A380 apparently has the highest cost per seat mile of any mainline aircraft currently in service.

And again, this discussion is about whether there is really a need for them in the entire industry, not speculation on how much benefit there is to the higher frequency, although I maintain that there are diminishing returns with that as well. There are many cases where a better product that isn't as often might provide a higher yield and market share. Of course, with American's current drive towards making the experience on mainline as uncomfortable as possible, it might actually be a better experience on the RJs at this point.