Beginner needs guidance - Aircraft and Growth

[MrHyde]

Hi,

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Airline ID: 42614
World ID: 1550
Current world year: 1999
Current bases: DEL, LHE
DOC: 1,036,475
Forum code: Airline Mogul - See my airline

Goals: Learning to play so that I will have a plan for the next world.
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I am new to Airline Mogul and have read the wikis and a lot of the forum posts.  I started two days ago with DEL as my first base and quickly grew to 7 airlines (6 leases) covering all airports within 500nm of DEL.  All aircraft are L-420s.  After reaching a DOC of 1million, I decided to open a base at LHE with the idea of covering all airports within 500nm.  With LHE and DEL nearby, I thought this will help in increasing utilisation at the other gates that are within range of both DEL and LHE.  However, that is when I learnt that LHE is too small to be a profitable base.  I need to target cities with traffic > 15m to make profitable networks.

1) What I have been unable to answer just yet is how should I grow my network?   Should I look at getting longer range aircraft with higher seat numbers and then replace my L-420s with them, for eg, ATR-72s.  In this way, I can slowly expand the network to higher ranges.  Or should I keep the smaller aircraft and use the newer bigger aircraft on longer routes (say between 500nm and 1000nm). 

2) Some of the smaller airports have traffic in the 100s, eg 750.  Is that annual or monthly or daily as that could affect which aircraft is used to fly to that airport.  I think it is annual, which would make the daily figure 2.6 which does not match up with me having 100% load factor on flights to that airport.  As part of my strategy, I would like to cover all airports within range, so making the most money is not the prime objective.

3) I've noticed that I have aircraft based out of DEL that have some time slot left.  These aircraft are showing up when creating routes from LHE?  How can that happen?  How can the plane magically reposition itself from DEL to LHE to undertake routes to and fro LHE?

4) How do you calculate whether a lease is on good terms or not?  I'm trying to calculate my break-even point with a lease.  Ie, if I can make the lease cost back in less than 2 days, the lease is ok.

Thats it for now.  Still need to think about whether to give up on LHE or continue trying to make something out of it.  I am making a profit, just not as much as I would like.

Cheers,
MrHyde

[dktc]

2) Figures are of annual. In AM, we only use the real life pax figures as a reference to the potential of an airport. We can't really say that because the identical airport in a parallel world had 750  pax last year, the airport in this world cannot have more than that this year. It is all about ticket price afterall. When you create a route, the is a line that shows the route potential, and that should be your reference as to what aircraft you use.

3) We have a script in place to check for teleporting. It is not always perfect though.

4) (24*DOC - Relevant portion of gate rent - Relevant portion of maint cost) would be the operation profit of the aircraft. Since the plane owner pays for the maint for leased aircraft, you don't need to figure that in. As long as (24*DOC - Gate rent) > Aircraft lease rate, you would be making a profit.

[pseudoswede]

3) I've noticed that I have aircraft based out of DEL that have some time slot left.  These aircraft are showing up when creating routes from LHE?  How can that happen?  How can the plane magically reposition itself from DEL to LHE to undertake routes to and fro LHE?

One possible explanation is when you overlap airports. For example, if you have a plane that flies DEL-KTM. If there are enough hours left on that plane when you decide to start LHE-KTM, that particular plane will show up on your available list.

[MrHyde]

2) Figures are of annual. In AM, we only use the real life pax figures as a reference to the potential of an airport. We can't really say that because the identical airport in a parallel world had 750  pax last year, the airport in this world cannot have more than that this year. It is all about ticket price afterall. When you create a route, the is a line that shows the route potential, and that should be your reference as to what aircraft you use.

At a smallish airport like LHE, all routes are pretty much Average (due to the sum of LHE and other airport being small).  You mention that is the reference to pick the aircraft.  Does that mean a smaller aircraft would be better on that route than a larger one.  Since I'm just starting out, a large aircraft is 30 seats and a small aircraft is 19 seats.

[dktc]

30 seaters and 19 seaters are more of less the same I would say.