ft101

They did move the crew rest area, but that takes the ULR ones up to 426 as you say, not 429 as reported now.

Metanoia

Ah, missed that minor detail, 6 and 9 look awfully alike.

ZRHMD11

Next A380 in the pipeline, A6-EUS (nr. 101) to be delivered soon

Metanoia

A6-EUV (#100) just flew an Americas route (DXB-GRU) as EK261/262, certainly this 16+ hour blocked flight would be a ULR configuration, amirite?

ZRHMD11

You are right....A6-EUT was in GRU a few days ago as well.

It is very hard to find a good source in the net....in this case, I got the wrong information twice.....:-(

So, I would say now that both frames, EUT and EUV have F14 C76 Y426 ULR.

skywardhunter

I'm not sure that there's a hard and fast rule that ULR routes always get ULR frames. ULR frames just have the crew rest right? In aircraft without a CRC they usually block an F Seat for the pilots and Y seats for cabin crew.

ZRHMD11

I am pretty sure for ULR flights are used frames with the Crew Rest Area only.....it is the same with the B777....

ULR flights like ORD, DFW, IAH, BOS, GIG or KIX for example, we always see B777 with the Crew Rest Area

ULR flights like SFO, LAX, JFK, GRU, MEL, BNE, SYD or YYZ we only see A380 with the Crew Rest Area.

ULR frames have the advantage that they can be used on all flights, but the opposite is not the case, LR frames can only be used for flights to
Europa, Africa or Asia.....

There are some exemptions; for example, the flight DXB-SIN-MEL normally we see LR frames, this is possible because there is a Crew
change in SIN.

The same is the flight DXB-MXP-JFK....at the beginning EK used LR frames since there was a crew change in MXP....but since a few months
I only see ULR frames on this route.....may be the same crew flyes DXB-MXP-JFK?

eternaltransit

For ULR operations horizontal rest is required for crew, so blocking seats would not be sufficient: CRC equipped aircraft would be required.

skywardhunter

All crew or flight deck crew? An F Seat goes horizontal after all ...

Flaneurs

I fly this just after the new year and can report back with airframe and whether or not the crew changes in MXP.

Bravo2K

The A380’s delivered from A6-EUM onwards have the Rolls Royce engines and so the routes they can operate are restricted. I believe the only ULR route being operated by the RR aircraft is GRU until outstation engineers are qualified for the RR birds. I suspect that the new birds will operate very specific routes for some time.

This is the same for the LR RR aircraft that operate to NCE, KUL, BKK, MRU, MAN, HKG and CPH.

eternaltransit

All crew - I presume EK want to sell their F seats, rather than use it as an expensive CRC

Metanoia

Does EK use contract engineers at outstations? LAX and SFO both receive RR powered A380s (QF, SQ, LH, BA), so hopefully they can get the new birds too. I'm guessing the same is true of JFK.

FN-GM

I thought it was the engine manufacturer that supported the engines anyway?

eternaltransit

Depends on the fault - sometimes a manufacturer's local engineer (or engineering company) will be up to the job, sometimes they dispatch someone from DXB.