A340 new C and F...?
 

I am flying LAX-ZRH-LAX in late October and just wondered if anybody has any insight regarding refurbishing the A340-300 to the new C and F class (like the A330-300).

Any inside knowledge if there is a chance to have the new cabin on a A340 by then..?

If you're in F you're out of luck, as the A340 won't get the new F cabin, just C.

F = out of luck..?:rolleyes: I would still consider being in F as very lucky :p

Anyhow, so will the refurbished A340 not have a F anymore or will the old F stay in the A340???

I guess the later, but thought worth checking...

Does anybody know when they will start the refurbishment?

Everyone is speculating that the LX First class seats on the A340 will not be changed and the same seats will remain on for ever, however, I doubt that.

If Etihad will do that (change their first class seats to suite concept identical to LX) on their airbuses and both airlines are almost having the same First class seats so why LX will not do the same.

LX engineers are smarter than what many people think that they can easily deal with this little glitch ;)

Well to be honest the new F seat isn't a dramatic improvement over the older one in terms of comfort...
From a marketing perspective however is LX steps up the C seat on the A340 and does not change the F seat, the difference between the two may get too thin to justify the large difference in fare (for instance, discounted C currently sells roughly at 1/3 the cost of F). Also it may not be good a marketing strategy to offer the latest product on medium haul such as DXB and in the future India and Africa, whilst offering the older version on ultra-longhauls to HKG, GRU, LAX etc..

I hope your right. I have emailed Swiss asking and they are very good at replying without giving me an answer!

I don't have any first hand info on the subject, but I am with hilltopper on the notion that it would be strange not to have the superior F product on the longest routes.

However, LX and mothership LH are not exactly on a spending spree right now (unlike Etihad, say), so I can easily see how they would stretch the A340 refurbishment plans out for as long as possible. Keep in mind that replacing all C and F seats on such a bird is expensive, and the current seats haven't reachead end-of-life yet.

SWISS has decided for the time being to only upgrade Business Class on the A343's and will upgrade the F and Y seating at a later stage due to economic rasons. THe first A343 with the new C should be flying by the begining of October and by then almost every month another A343 is expected to be upgraded.

Interesting. But is there a significant difference between the Y seats on the A333 vs. the A343 (today)?

According to what has been said above, I would guess that Y seating on A343 is only changed, when it has to be changed anyway ...

I was in Zurich today for the new seat Concept of the Bombardier CSeries and had a chance to talk to the head of Cabin Product at SWISS.When asked about the refurbishement of the A340s he confirmed that there will be ONLY new Business Class Seats seats installed and Economy and First class Seats will REMAIN in the old layout. If they would install the new first class seats they would also have to exchange the AVOD System which is a generation older than on the A330-300. The old AVOD wouldn't be able to produce a sharp image on the new first class displays.

The first Airbus 340 goes into refurb in November, as he told me this is not because of financial issues but there is an issue with the quality of the business class seats and the manufacturer. With the A330 they were under pressure but now they have time and want to wait until everything is solved before they install them. However the time schedule will be unchanged and all aircraft should be rettrofitted until 2011.

so what... change the AVOD.
I cannot believe that they will not upgrade F on longer flights. So much for consistency....

IMO LX's First in the A340 doesn't even need to be updated. Except maybe for the AVOD (screen and selection). But I can perfectly live with the current product. It's still among the best and beats LH's enhanced Biz (or was it called F ;)) hands down.

HB-JMC will be the first to get the new product and is scheduled for maintenance from 7-30. september

chris

I can't understand the logic of LX. For the time being it is ok that they might only want to upgrade the C Class in order to save costs during the financial crisis. But in one or 2 years when the airline industry will do better again they should upgrade their First and Economy product in order to offer the same standard across the entire long haul fleet. If it takes to upgrade the IFE system they should do that. Airines such as SQ, CX and even BA have upgraded planes such as the B744 maybe 3 or even more times with a brand new cabin and new IFE system so why can't LX at least replace the entire cabin and IFE once on the A343's. After all it's a longer term investment.

Regarding the issues with the A333 seat, I would assume one of the trouble makers are the tray tables on the seats. It's quite a hastle to get those tables out and store them ;)?