What is Air China's A330's Business Class like?
Apr 7, 2014, 5:22 am
#31
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Good to know about the IFE.
As for the A330s, I'm on CA 174 (SYD - PEK) in J on Thursday so I'll stop back in here and give an update and try and post some pictures (and in the meantime I'll download some stuff for my flight though it's an overnight so hopefully a large portion of the flight will be sleep).
As for the A330s, I'm on CA 174 (SYD - PEK) in J on Thursday so I'll stop back in here and give an update and try and post some pictures (and in the meantime I'll download some stuff for my flight though it's an overnight so hopefully a large portion of the flight will be sleep).
Last edited by Duke787; Apr 7, 2014 at 5:28 am
Apr 7, 2014, 5:51 am
#32
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Good to know about the IFE.
As for the A330s, I'm on CA 174 (SYD - PEK) in J on Thursday so I'll stop back in here and give an update and try and post some pictures (and in the meantime I'll download some stuff for my flight though it's an overnight so hopefully a large portion of the flight will be sleep).
As for the A330s, I'm on CA 174 (SYD - PEK) in J on Thursday so I'll stop back in here and give an update and try and post some pictures (and in the meantime I'll download some stuff for my flight though it's an overnight so hopefully a large portion of the flight will be sleep).
Apr 7, 2014, 9:21 am
#33
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don't trust seat guru for non-USA airlines... It's often hopelessly out of date.
some 777-200s have the full flat beds ... don't know how far they've got with the roll-out yet. For info see here (but that's from April 2013 and is on the Thai site from Air China... so specific only to the PEK-BKK route): http://www.airchina.com/th/en/travel...4/255307.shtml
If you have the old recliner configuration (2+3+2) at 42' pitch... nothing much is gonna help you unfortunately. But for short flights it's passable... (just).
some 777-200s have the full flat beds ... don't know how far they've got with the roll-out yet. For info see here (but that's from April 2013 and is on the Thai site from Air China... so specific only to the PEK-BKK route): http://www.airchina.com/th/en/travel...4/255307.shtml
If you have the old recliner configuration (2+3+2) at 42' pitch... nothing much is gonna help you unfortunately. But for short flights it's passable... (just).
Apr 7, 2014, 9:24 am
#34
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Apr 7, 2014, 10:04 am
#35
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Apr 7, 2014, 10:38 am
#36
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Apr 7, 2014, 2:11 pm
#37
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according to Air China the configuration is 30J/207Y - just five rows of J, not six as per seatguru...
Apr 7, 2014, 3:22 pm
#38
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(saver first sold out)
The HKG-PEK route is the harrasing no IFE. They put a piece of plastic blocking it.
Food is terrible, chicken and mushrooms mixed rice. Good service though, and full flat bed in the new island configuration 2-2-2. And that flight delays 90% of the time because it is inline with the military training. I was stuck in the cabin for one hour at the gate before we took off because the Beijing military had to do training and CLOSES ALL runways.
Prepare for that
Apr 7, 2014, 3:27 pm
#39
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Haha you're flying the same exact route i always fly. Now I wonder why sometimes I have to be on economy though I pay for O class
(saver first sold out)
The HKG-PEK route is the harrasing no IFE. They put a piece of plastic blocking it.
Food is terrible, chicken and mushrooms mixed rice. Good service though, and full flat bed in the new island configuration 2-2-2. And that flight delays 90% of the time because it is inline with the military training. I was stuck in the cabin for one hour at the gate before we took off because the Beijing military had to do training and CLOSES ALL runways.
Prepare for that
(saver first sold out)
The HKG-PEK route is the harrasing no IFE. They put a piece of plastic blocking it.
Food is terrible, chicken and mushrooms mixed rice. Good service though, and full flat bed in the new island configuration 2-2-2. And that flight delays 90% of the time because it is inline with the military training. I was stuck in the cabin for one hour at the gate before we took off because the Beijing military had to do training and CLOSES ALL runways.
Prepare for that
Apr 7, 2014, 3:51 pm
#40
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Some days during high season like I'm going in June, I was able to snatch 3 seats on F Class. This was because they fly 747's during Peak season and it's really nice.
The IFE sucks anyways but better have an IFE rather than a plastic piece covering it :P
Apr 14, 2014, 1:04 pm
#41
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As promised here are a few pictures from CA 174 and CA 181 from last Thursday and Friday respectively. Both were operated by A330s with lie-flat seats. CA 174 was in *A livery and seemed a bit older than CA 181 which was in normal CA livery and was slightly newer (main difference - CA 174 had no USB plug and had an older IFE remote while CA 181 had a newer and much smaller remote as well as a USB plug). The seats are basically the TK J seats. Of note all the seats in row 11 (the bulkhead) have monitors that are pop-up. Given the layout of the seat there's no need to get the bulkhead since it doesn't provide any added footspace (since it's the ottoman style footrest and not the tapered ones we see on the UA and others)
CA 174:
I was originally 12D and sat down in 12D but moved to 12B when a family of 4 sat down and their daughter was orphaned in 12B while the rest of the family was in the middle set.
CA 181 (I was in 12D and remained in 12D for this one):
CA 174:
I was originally 12D and sat down in 12D but moved to 12B when a family of 4 sat down and their daughter was orphaned in 12B while the rest of the family was in the middle set.
CA 181 (I was in 12D and remained in 12D for this one):
Last edited by Duke787; Apr 15, 2014 at 3:02 pm
Apr 14, 2014, 2:58 pm
#42
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As promised here are a few pictures from CA 174 and CA 181 from last Thursday and Friday respectively. Both were operated by A330s with lie-flat seats. CA 174 was in *A livery and seemed a bit older than CA 181 which was in normal CA livery and was slightly newer (main difference - CA 174 had no USB plug and had an older IFE remote while CA 181 had a newer and much smaller remote as well as a USB plug). The seats are basically the TK J seats. Of note all the seats in row 11 (the bulkhead) have monitors that are pop-up. Given the layout of the seat there's no need to get the bulkhead since it doesn't provide any added footspace (since it's the ottoman style footrest and not the tapered ones we see on the UA and others)
CA 174:
I was originally 12D and sat down in 12D but moved to 12B when a family of 4 sat down and their daughter was orphaned in 12B while the rest of the family was in the middle set.
CA 181 (I was in 12D and remained in 12D for this one):
CA 174:
I was originally 12D and sat down in 12D but moved to 12B when a family of 4 sat down and their daughter was orphaned in 12B while the rest of the family was in the middle set.
CA 181 (I was in 12D and remained in 12D for this one):
nice you had IFE!!! Food was mediocre right?
Apr 14, 2014, 9:40 pm
#43
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Yep IFE was on for both flights (though I slept for 7.5/11 hours on SYD - PEK and watched Top Gear on PEK - HND on my laptop).
Food was mediocre but a strong mediocre. I wasn't being adventurous so went with the western meal which was a "herb marinated lamb rack with honey and garlice (sic) sauce served with smashed potato and sauted (sic) spinach." Wine consisted of two French options (a red and a white both of which they ran out of after meal service was over) and two Chinese options (again both red and white). The Chinese Riesling was decent but I didn't try the red. The liquor was pretty bottom shelf (again commensurate with US domestic carriers).
IMO it felt like flying an international flight on a US carrier with a good crew and a better seat (compared to the UA J seat I thought it was infinitely better primarily because of the ottoman at the end preventing the need to worry about foot room).
Food was mediocre but a strong mediocre. I wasn't being adventurous so went with the western meal which was a "herb marinated lamb rack with honey and garlice (sic) sauce served with smashed potato and sauted (sic) spinach." Wine consisted of two French options (a red and a white both of which they ran out of after meal service was over) and two Chinese options (again both red and white). The Chinese Riesling was decent but I didn't try the red. The liquor was pretty bottom shelf (again commensurate with US domestic carriers).
IMO it felt like flying an international flight on a US carrier with a good crew and a better seat (compared to the UA J seat I thought it was infinitely better primarily because of the ottoman at the end preventing the need to worry about foot room).