What are the Specs of the Airbus A380 Super Jumbo?

Yes, I always loved the gracefulness of the long wings.

Hi and thanks for stopping by. In answer to your question, the dimensions of the vertical and horizontal stabilisers of the Airbus A380 are:
Vertical Stabiliser (tail) = 2421.9 Sq ft
Horizontal Stabiliser (each side) = 2314.8 Sq ft

I hope that helps. Be sure to comer back as we add more pages to this site.

Regards Peter

Yes, don’t we all eh. Off to exciting destinations.

Hi Glen,

I have been on the QANTAS A380 in business class and premium economy class a few times and each time was wonderful. There is definitely a great concept of space and the flying is so smooth.
Fly well.
Peter

I totally agree, the feeling of space is certainly evident. I have only flown on the QANTAS one a few times but have enjoyed it immensely.

Hi Graham,
I think maybe your app might have misreported the altitude. The service ceiling of the Airbus A380 is 43,000 feet. That means it can fly that high carrying passengers and cargo. Empty, it could go higher, but I doubt 49,000 feet. It comes down to economics. An aircraft will burn less fuel at higher altitudes due to there being less resistance from the thinner air. However, you reach a tipping point where the air becomes too thin to remain in flight without putting on higher amounts of engine power to remain up there.
Typically, airliners will have a service ceiling in the late 30 thousands to the early 40 thousands. Executive jets can reach the late 40 thousands, whilst Concorde sat at around 60 thousand.
I hope that helps.
Cheers Peter

It’s a great experience. If you do get on one, share your experience with us.
Cheers Peter

Hi,
Yes I understand what you are saying. It was an early concept drawing which highlighted what some airlines might do with the space below the main deck. There were all sorts of ideas about cabins, lounges and other luxury options that airlines might order.

The reality of course is that economics takes over. Much like the Boeing 747 first class lounge upstairs in the bubble, it must give way to bottoms in seats and cargo below.

It was nice to dream though and pretend fuel was as cheap as it used to be.

Thanks for stopping by.

Cheers Peter

Hi and thank you for stopping by modernairliners.com. We appreciate any comments or insights that our visitors can give and your comment about the A380’s Trent 900 initial test bed is no different. We strive to make sure that our facts are correct and have rechecked our information. Several sources, including Airbus’ own press releases, concur that the initial test bed was, in fact, an Airbus A340-311, registration F-WWAI. I you click on this link you can see a picture of the aircraft taxying. It is really quite a bizarre sight.

All the best, regards Peter

Hi Deana,

Thank you for visiting Modern Airliners.
You pose a very interesting question, one that, like most things in aviation, doesn’t have a simple answer. Let’s try and make it as simple as possible.

There are 5 main variants of the 747, the 100, 200, 300, 400 and the 8. Whilst there are variations between the performance of these variants due to improved engine performance and aerodynamics the principals are much the same.

There are 5 distinct phases of of a flight where fuel burn is quite different. These are taxying, departure and arrival, take off, climb, cruise and descent. To each of these we need to add variables such as payload, that is passengers and cargo. Also the length of the flight. The longer the flight the more fuel you need. It adds to the overall weight of the aircraft. In some cases you need to leave payload behind so as to be able to be able to take enough fuel to get to where you’re going.
Weather is another factor, as well as the altitude of the departing airfield. These are important due to air pressure. Thinner air requires more power to get airborne and therefore more fuel. Departure from busy airports can also have an adverse effect. You may have to queue up for take off during which time your engines are at idle or slightly higher but never the less burning fuel. Once you do get airborne, you may not get to your desired altitude as quickly as you would like due to air traffic restrictions.
Our 747 operates at its optimum when it is cruising at high altitude. Jet engines are designed to work in the thinner air where the friction holding back our aircraft is far less than at sea level. So we want to get up there as fast as possible. On longer flights we may have to do it in steps. For example, initial climb to FL310 (31,000 feet) then after a few hours continue on up to the late 30s. This is because we are initially too heavy to go higher, but after a few hours we burn off enough fuel which makes us lighter and able to climb higher.
The descent at the end of a flight is essentially a glide. Engines on idle, other than the landing where the flaps and wheels are creating enough drag for us to need some thrust to prevent stalling. Most airfields have high speed exit ramps from the runway so that the momentum from the landing roll can help the aircraft get to the gate with minimal power applied. Sometimes half the engines can be shut down for this taxi phase.
So some ball park figures:

Let’s understand that 1 litre of Jet A1 fuel weighs around 80% of 1 litre of fresh water. With that in mind some ball park figures around a flight on a Boeing 747 weighing around 377,000kgs are as follows:

Taxi out to the runway – 1,000kg
Take-off and climb to initial cruise – 15,000kg
First hours at 31,000′ – 13,000kg per hour
Latter part of the cruise at around 39,000′ – slightly under 10,000kg per hour
Descent, approach and landing – 3,000kg
Taxi to the gate – 500kg to 1,000kg.

At the time of writing Jet A1 fuel was at around $0.55US per litre.

I hope that helps.

Cheers Peter

Hi Mijnheer de Bruin,
thank you for stopping by. I know what you mean and there is great truth in what you say. We are quite shameless in the way we consume resources in today’s world and that just seems to be the kind of animal we are. Like anything in today’s world, if there is a way to make a dollar out of something then someone will be there to do it and plane makers are no different. There is a market there to be satisfied, so they make sure they develop the best tools possible to meet that market demand. To their credit, many billions of dollars have been poured into research to enable modern airliners to fly more efficiently and cleaner than ever before. Take the Boeing 747 which brought air travel to the common man. Back in 1969, her engines and those of other aircraft of that era left huge amounts of pollution behind them. Things have come a long way since then. Today’s aircraft, like the A380, have highly developed engines which enable much higher fuel efficiency as well as producing a much cleaner burn. The result is that the Super Jumbo is able to move a person from A to B much more cheaply and with a much smaller pollution footprint than was possible in the past. Additionally, tests are being done on most aircraft types at the moment to establish the viability of biofuels.
I don’t think we have the ability to change the way people want to live their lives. It may well be a case of, people want to go out and do these things while they can, the possibility might not always be there. In addition, a high percentage of those travelling are doing so on business, keeping the economic powerhouse turning over.
It’s a complicated world, that is for sure.

de groeten

Peter

Selamat Datang Nuratika,

in the table above we give the maximum weights as well as the different passenger loads depending on the configuration. That is whether it is for high density all economy or a typical 3 class configuration. Also the volume of cargo. Any mix of these factors will, of course, affect the range an aircraft can fly, along with other weather-related conditions. The range as stated above is around 15,000 kilometres which relates to around 16 hours in the air.

I hope that helps.

Terimah kaseh

Peter

Yes, it is true. Even worse after a curfew when all those airliners come in at once.

Hi Oly,
thanks for stopping by. Some of these measurements are a bit hard to come by. What we can advise is the approximate eye height of the pilot above the tarmac is around 7.17 metres (23 Ft 6 In). This is approximate, as it depends on the load of the A380. A heavier loaded plane will site lower on its suspension.
We haven’t been able to get the measurements of the landing struts of the gear. There are of course three different sets of gear, the Nose Landing Gear (NLG) which has two wheels, the Body Landing Gear (BLG) which sit below the main fuselage and have six wheels apiece and the Wing Landing Gear (WLG) with four wheels apiece. As you can imagine the three different types have different lengths and are made up of many parts.
I hope that helps.
Cheers Peter

Hi Violet,

thank you for checking in here at Modern Airliners.

I understand your concern about claustrophobia and how that can translate into comfort in an aircraft cabin. I understand that you would be concerned about the ceiling height in the main cabin, so let’s have a look at this.
The first thing you notice on entering the A380 is the extra room. The ceiling height in the main cabin is two feet higher than the Boeing 747 Jumbo, which is the closest aircraft in size to the Airbus A380. In addition the cabin, at 23 feet wide, is two feet wider than any other commercial aircraft. The feeling is spacious, so i think you will enjoy the ride on the Super Jumbo.
Cheers Peter

Hi Alee,
The G forces you feel on a commercial airliner are quite tame and felt mainly on takeoff and landing. Even a reasonably steep turn will only push the G force up to around 1.5. That is one and half times what you normally weigh, but that is extreme.
When we feel that, many of us think, oh I hope the wings are strong enough. In actual fact the wings for an A380 are required to be able to withstand a load 150% above its maximum weight. In the development of the A380 they do the wing pressure test until it breaks and it failed at 145%. They had to add more strength until it passed which aded a bit more weight to the structure.
I hope that helps.
Cheers Peter

Hi Ja Hoffmann,
thank you for asking this great question. The short answer is, yes absolutely there are instruments to measure the speed, among many other aspects of all four engines.

Due to the complexity and highly critical designs of present-day engines, the monitoring and control of them is also a lot more complex than it was in the past. Reliability and safety, of course, are one aspect, but also the economy of optimal running of an engine is a high priority for airlines. For this reason, the control of the engines is entrusted to a FADEC(Full Autonomy Digital Electronic Control) system. This system, with autothrottles, ensures that engines are always running at their optimum level considering the situation that aircraft finds itself in at any given time.

More to your question, the feedback of information to the flight crew comes back via the Engine Indication and Crew Alerting System (EICAS). These computer screens can be used to dialup information about the engines and also enables the drilling down to more detailed information about any one of the engines if required.

I hope that answers your question.
Cheers Peter

Hi Rudy,
thanks for stopping and sharing this great insight.
Yes, it is a crying shame to see such modern and recently released machines being put out to pasture. Vision is everything and having the foresight to see which way the market is heading in the future is the key to it all. How excited we were when the A380 came out, it was almost like the next chapter in the Jumbo jet era was upon us. I remember the excitement when I built the first pages of Modern Airliners and getting those first pictures of the Singapore Airlines A380 as we in Sydney were the first destination from Singapore. A few good years but then it started to dry up. As you say, the advent of the giant and not so giant twins enabling flights between lesser airfields significantly eroded the Jumbo market. Not to mention the lower maintenance costs of those twins.

It seems strange that airlines like Emirates are retiring their first A380s but have not yet concluded their order of that aircraft with Airbus.

The cargo option is interesting and yes, it is great seeing some of those iconic aircraft getting another lease on life. The problem with the A380 is the location of the cockpit midway bet