How much fuel does a painted plane use vs bare metal?

[bofie]

I remember reading years ago that somebody at AA figured that they saved zillions by using bare metal planes. If true, why does anybody paint their planes in these days of expensive fuel? Can branding be that important? How many pax even notice a plane's livery?

 

[luvn737s]

The aluminum that Airbus uses does not lend itself well to polishing I am told.

 

[ua767fo]

If true, why does anybody paint their planes in these days of expensive fuel?

I dont have any FAR PART 25 certified aircraft performance manuals at my disposal right now, so as an order of magnitude only, you can assume that somewhere around zero wind LRC, an aircraft burns roughly 100 lbs of fuel per 400 lbs of incramental weight carried over 6 hours.

Therefore at approximately 400lbs paint for a mid size (DC9 or similar) aircraft, for every 6 hours of flying, figure an added burn of 100# fuel, which equates to 15 gallons of fuel. So lets call this 2 1/2 gal/hour, and at $1.80/gal, we're looking at $4.50/hour to carry the paint. So on an aircraft with a 12 hour/day utilization, thats $4.50 X 12 X 365= $19500/year (aproximately).

Again, this is just an approximation, but if you multiply that by a 400 aircraft fleet, you can see that there is a substantial cost. In this case almost $8 Million. ( I believe a B757 typically has approximately 800-1000 lbs of paint on it)

Now as food for thought, some aircraft are required to be painted by their certification. For non painted aircraft, there is the maintenance cost associated with buffing/cleaning for anti corrosion purposes (not to mention asthetics). And then there is also the value of being a flying billboard. Recall that Western Pacific Airlines (out of COS) were flying billboard B737s. And then to some, there is the marketing value of just being seen. Why else would SWA aircraft be so darn ugly (not a slam at SWA, but recognition of their brilliant feet of marketing)

Anyways, your question was very interesting and deserved a reply. Im a pilot, not a maintenance type, so take what I posted with a non technical grain of salt.

DENVER, CO 🙄

 

[N965VJ]

Total maintenance cost including paint application/maintenance/stripping - versus - keeping bare aluminum shiny?

About the same, at least according to the cost study I saw in a trade mag around 1990.

We blew a bunch of money telling Fokker we wanted shiny F100s, and then Wolfe painted them blue.

 

[ua767fo]

We blew a bunch of money telling Fokker we wanted shiny F100s, and then Wolfe painted them blue.

Well this is not suprising. Since when would you expect any management to listen to you????

On the other hand, the one trick pony Wolfe's modus aperandi was to paint airplanes, and package a company for sale....so his screw you answer was to be expected.

Btw, I believe the olf F28-1/4000 series required paint. Correct me if I'm wrong.

DENVER, CO

 

[700UW]

Yes the original F28s were required to be painted, US found out the hard way when they stripped A/C 453US to bare metal (the silver bullet) it has pressurization problems ever since and Fokker even told them don't strip it.

 

[ua767fo]

US found out the hard way when they stripped A/C 453US to bare metal (the silver bullet)

Boy, thats a sad commentary on management. Thanks for the reply.

DENVER,CO brrrrrrr 😛h34r:

 

[FWAAA]

Here's a Boeing document discussing paint v. polish:

http://www.boeing.com/commercial/aeromagaz...ly/fo01txt.html