Since starting AWS, I have exclusively concentrated on domestic hubs. However, the last two games I played, I tried international hubs (Miami/Newark). Although starting well, I bombed out of both games. I have a suspicion it had to do with how I scheduled the aircraft. I'd have to say that my aircraft utilization (in general) was quite poor.
So, I wanted to find out, from you international route veterans, your best scheduling tips. How do you normally schedule flights? How do you get more daily use from the aircraft? What's the max range you should go for an international route? What are the major do's and don'ts?
Your help would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks!
7 day scheduling ftw
Quote from: JJP on June 24, 2011, 01:54:56 PM
Since starting AWS, I have exclusively concentrated on domestic hubs. However, the last two games I played, I tried international hubs (Miami/Newark). Although starting well, I bombed out of both games. I have a suspicion it had to do with how I scheduled the aircraft. I'd have to say that my aircraft utilization (in general) was quite poor.
So, I wanted to find out, from you international route veterans, your best scheduling tips. How do you normally schedule flights? How do you get more daily use from the aircraft? What's the max range you should go for an international route? What are the major do's and don'ts?
Your help would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks!
With international routes it's almost always worth your while to use 7-day scheduling (see attached screenshot). It's not much more work for international aircraft (as opposed to domestic aircraft, where I don't fool with it any more except occasionally for coast to coast US flights).
How far you should fly depends a lot on what aircraft you're using. Generally, the larger the aircraft, the further you can get away with flying it. For example, in my experience you don't fly the 762ER to it's max range because if fuel is anything other than cheap you will lose money. But those same 6500-7000NM routes are profitable with something in the 777 size range
Were you one of my fellow competitors at MIA in the current Jet Age game?
-Ryan
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Quote from: ucfknightryan on June 24, 2011, 02:22:06 PM
With international routes it's almost always worth your while to use 7-day scheduling (see attached screenshot). It's not much more work for international aircraft (as opposed to domestic aircraft, where I don't fool with it any more except occasionally for coast to coast US flights).
By this, do you mean a separate route number for each day of the week? Is this in order to get optimal spacing between flights in order to add extra routes to other destinations (I see you have squeezed in a couple shorter flights here and there)?
I had some international flights wherein I had quite a gap between flights, but it never seemed to be quite a large enough gap to place flights to other routes. These were some 777s I had which didn't seem to turn much of a profit unless I put them on longer routes (4k - 6k nm). Suggestions for this type of situation?
Quote from: ucfknightryan on June 24, 2011, 02:22:06 PM
How far you should fly depends a lot on what aircraft you're using. Generally, the larger the aircraft, the further you can get away with flying it. For example, in my experience you don't fly the 762ER to it's max range because if fuel is anything other than cheap you will lose money. But those same 6500-7000NM routes are profitable with something in the 777 size range
Just for fun and out of curiosity (and to say I did it!), I purchased (not leased) 2 A380s. It was cool, but they didn't make jack for profit. There was profit, but nothing special (no better than my leased 777s). I was flying (IIRC) Newark to Beijing. I thought I was going to rake in the dough becuase ticket prices were relatively high, and I had no lease cost. I wonder what happened there? Ideas?
Thanks for your help!
Quote from: JJP on June 24, 2011, 03:47:14 PM
By this, do you mean a separate route number for each day of the week? Is this in order to get optimal spacing between flights in order to add extra routes to other destinations (I see you have squeezed in a couple shorter flights here and there)?
I had some international flights wherein I had quite a gap between flights, but it never seemed to be quite a large enough gap to place flights to other routes. These were some 777s I had which didn't seem to turn much of a profit unless I put them on longer routes (4k - 6k nm). Suggestions for this type of situation?
If you schedule each day of a flight to a separate aircraft, you usually can have no more than the minimum necessary space between flights. The one shorter flight on that schedule in the screenshot was just to fill the dead space after there was no room to schedule another long haul flight on the rotation. Occasionally shorter flights will make it into the rotation because I can't find a destination where the arrival/departure times will be both during the travel day, but usually the only time I fly anything that isn't 3000NM+ on a long haul aircraft is to fill leftover space if I can't arrange the long-haul flights to avoid having said leftover space.
With regards to the 777, I wouldn't fly it on anything shorter than 4000NM anyways unless I was at an airport with no slots, and therefore didn't have to worry as much about somebody sticking 2x as many 757s on the route and clobbering you. How much and what kind of competition did you have on those shorter routes where you couldn't make money with the 777s?
Quote from: JJP on June 24, 2011, 03:47:14 PM
Just for fun and out of curiosity (and to say I did it!), I purchased (not leased) 2 A380s. It was cool, but they didn't make jack for profit. There was profit, but nothing special (no better than my leased 777s). I was flying (IIRC) Newark to Beijing. I thought I was going to rake in the dough becuase ticket prices were relatively high, and I had no lease cost. I wonder what happened there? Ideas?
Thanks for your help!
I've never operated the A380 so I can't speak about that from experience, but I would suspect the competition again. Frequency is king in this game, so smaller aircraft usually have the advantage, until the flight becomes long enough that they don't carry enough passengers to pay the overhead. I don't think I'd even look at the A380 unless I was slot constrained or was going to fly a bunch of extremely long routes.
Quote from: ucfknightryan on June 24, 2011, 05:05:08 PM
If you schedule each day of a flight to a separate aircraft, you usually can have no more than the minimum necessary space between flights.
But, isn't there only a certain "window of opportunity" you have to schedule flights (depending on the range) in order to not make it a flight that lands or takes off during "red eye" times? For example, I seem to remember my flights to Europe had to take off from the East Coast some time in the afternoon to arrive at a decent hour in Europe (and to arrive back in the States at a decent hour). This would leave me to believe that you can only shift your flight times so much. Maybe I'm making more out of this than it is.
Also, I don't like to spend hours on end setting up routes. It seems to me that setting up these optimal routes is possible but takes a lot of real life time to implement.
Quote from: ucfknightryan on June 24, 2011, 05:05:08 PM
With regards to the 777, I wouldn't fly it on anything shorter than 4000NM anyways unless I was at an airport with no slots, and therefore didn't have to worry as much about somebody sticking 2x as many 757s on the route and clobbering you. How much and what kind of competition did you have on those shorter routes where you couldn't make money with the 777s?
I started to get a lot of competition from the one main guy at my hub. He filled the routes to capacity, and so did I. Yikes!
Quote from: ucfknightryan on June 24, 2011, 05:05:08 PM
I've never operated the A380 so I can't speak about that from experience, but I would suspect the competition again. Frequency is king in this game, so smaller aircraft usually have the advantage, until the flight becomes long enough that they don't carry enough passengers to pay the overhead. I don't think I'd even look at the A380 unless I was slot constrained or was going to fly a bunch of extremely long routes.
At first, I had no competition. IIRC, I made less than $1 million profit/wk each on these birds which only compared modestly to what I was making on my leased birds to Europe! With competition, it was a losing cause.
Quote from: JJP on June 24, 2011, 06:52:21 PM
But, isn't there only a certain "window of opportunity" you have to schedule flights (depending on the range) in order to not make it a flight that lands or takes off during "red eye" times? For example, I seem to remember my flights to Europe had to take off from the East Coast some time in the afternoon to arrive at a decent hour in Europe (and to arrive back in the States at a decent hour). This would leave me to believe that you can only shift your flight times so much. Maybe I'm making more out of this than it is.
Also, I don't like to spend hours on end setting up routes. It seems to me that setting up these optimal routes is possible but takes a lot of real life time to implement.
usually you can start at one side of that window and the flights will slide across it, and you can also alternate flights going east and west, as times that usually don't work to Europe (from NA) usually work going to Asia. Usually it doesn't take too long to find destinations that work.
7-day scheduling isn't just for long haul routes--it's for all routes if you are looking to utilize your fleet as much as possible. I fly 100% domestic and 100% BAC 1-11 and use 7-day scheduling on all my planes. Yes, it can be tedious, but you only have to do it once and after you've done it a few times you get really quick at it (I go to an already scheduled aircraft and open new tabs for every route on a schedule and then add new route like this and then change the day of the week to create new routes). As a result, I have one of the top fleet utilizations in DOTM2 with 16.6 hours--and this is only flying routes under 1500nm! To answer your question about flight times and hitting desired windows, you can see from the screenshot that I schedule longer flights for overnight travel. I can leave Chicago and fly west at 2000 and take off from the west coast by 2300 for a redeye back to Chicago where it lands at 400 or 500 local time and I can then schedule my next flight early in the morning during rush hour. This way, I never miss a beat. Worst case scenario I can fly to the east coast at 2300, land around 300, take a 2 hour turnaround (versus 1 hour) and takeoff from the east coast during morning rush hour.
The end result is I can fly ~1-5 extra flights/week that I otherwise not be able to schedule and the gross margins basically go straight to my bottom line. All of my planes have 20-25 routes each:
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Quote from: LemonButt on June 24, 2011, 07:21:49 PM
7-day scheduling isn't just for long haul routes--it's for all routes if you are looking to utilize your fleet as much as possible. I fly 100% domestic and 100% BAC 1-11 and use 7-day scheduling on all my planes. Yes, it can be tedious, but you only have to do it once and after you've done it a few times you get really quick at it (I go to an already scheduled aircraft and open new tabs for every route on a schedule and then add new route like this and then change the day of the week to create new routes).
Heh, you've obviously never upgraded a fleet of airplanes with 7-day scheduling for domestic flights. I've done it, twice. First BAe 146s to 737-500s and then A320s to CSeries. It makes the tedium of the initial scheduling pale by comparison. After those experiences I have a hard time convincing myself that it's worth the effort.
Holy Toledo, Lemon. That's nuts! I think I'd agree with UcfKnight on the change over. I would go insane!
Quote from: JJP on June 24, 2011, 08:00:47 PM
Holy Toledo, Lemon. That's nuts! I think I'd agree with UcfKnight on the change over. I would go insane!
I leased the planes new and plan on buying them eventually and flying them the entire gameworld :) There are several ideas for 7 day schedule in feature requests to make it more painless, but until then it will remain tedious. I guess you could say I'm obsessed with efficiency.
Quote from: LemonButt on June 24, 2011, 08:42:18 PM
I leased the planes new and plan on buying them eventually and flying them the entire gameworld :) There are several ideas for 7 day schedule in feature requests to make it more painless, but until then it will remain tedious. I guess you could say I'm obsessed with efficiency.
I planned on flying the BAe 146s the entire scenario as well, then they closed the damn production line on me while I had no money to shell out to keep it open. Then I had to choose between operating a split fleet and replacing all the damn things. Since this was under v1.11 I could actually get the 735s very quickly, and eliminating a fleet was appealing since I'd been operating on paper thin margins for quite a number of years. In retrospect I should have passed and just concentrated on buying all the 146s.
JJP,
One or two steps down from 7-day scheduling - and a good introduction I suppose are two other methods I use:
For flights that take around 21hrs to 23hrs (including both turnarounds), you can 'slip' the times by an hour or so each day so that all those 1 or 2hrs gaps combine to let you fly a daily service. So, for example, depart on an eastbound transatlantic at 23:00 on day 1, 22:00 on day 2 etc. To be slightly more sophisticated, you can do this in two 'blocks' (sorry, this is difficult to describe and screenshots wouldn't help). Here's one of my schedules for TXL-YUL:
721/722 26 TXL-YUL 3239 nm 18:30 - 13:25 20hr50
719/720 37 TXL-YUL 3239 nm 15:30 - 10:25 20hr50
717/718 41 TXL-YUL 3239 nm 12:30 - 07:25 20hr50
715/716 5 TXL-YUL 3239 nm 11:05 - 06:00 20hr50
723/724 6 TXL-BCN 815 nm 08:00 - 15:15 9hr10
(Maint. Tue. 09:00 - 14:00)
Boeing 757-200, turn times 1hr55 (1%)
As you see, it only involves four 'flights' being set up, not seven on the YUL run and there is time for both maintenance and and extra leg (to BCN) once a week. This is on a flight where there isn't time to send the a/c daily at the same time.
Another idea is to combine just two (or three) destinations (instead of five or six) on your 7-day rotating schedule like this:
1099/1100 1 ITM-KBL 3204 nm 15:20 - 09:30 19hr50
1127/1128 2 ITM-KOJ 297 nm 11:20 - 15:50 6hr10
1095/1096 2 ITM-KBL 3204 nm 18:00 - 12:10 19hr50
1097/1098 3 ITM-KBL 3204 nm 13:50 - 08:00 19hr50
1107/1108 4 ITM-AUH 4150 nm 09:45 - 08:20 24hr15
1101/1102 5 ITM-AUH 4150 nm 10:15 - 08:50 24hr15
1103/1104 6 ITM-AUH 4150 nm 10:30 - 09:05 24hr15
1105/1106 7 ITM-AUH 4150 nm 10:45 - 09:20 24hr15
(maint. Tue. 10:15 - 15:15)
Vickers Super-VC10, turn times 1hr40 (1%)
1117/1118 1 ITM-AUH 4150 nm 10:15 - 08:50 24hr15
1119/1120 2 ITM-AUH 4150 nm 10:35 - 09:10 24hr15
1121/1122 3 ITM-AUH 4150 nm 10:55 - 09:30 24hr15
1109/1110 4 ITM-KBL 3204 nm 14:55 - 09:05 19hr50
1125/1126 5 ITM-KOJ 297 nm 11:00 - 15:30 6hr10
1111/1112 5 ITM-KBL 3204 nm 18:05 - 12:15 19hr50
1113/1114 6 ITM-KBL 3204 nm 13:55 - 08:05 19hr50
1123/1124 7 ITM-KBL 3204 nm 14:15 - 08:25 19hr50
(maint. Sun. 09:10 - 14:10)
Vickers Super-VC10, turn times 1hr40 (1%)
So I basically have two aircraft covering seven days a week to two destinations, where there would only be time for six to AUH and seven to KBL (using the first method above), with maintenance time and an extra leg thrown in.
Either of these methods might be a good introduction to 7-day scheduling without the risk and work of having to obtain seven large aircraft to practice on.
Hope this helps.
Wow, that's cool, Knobby. That's the kind of info I was looking for. The only thing: doesn't it take a LOT of time to figure out just the right combo to fill up all the plane's time?
Quote from: JJP on June 25, 2011, 11:22:59 AM
Wow, that's cool, Knobby. That's the kind of info I was looking for. The only thing: doesn't it take a LOT of time to figure out just the right combo to fill up all the plane's time?
No. You can basically figure out which routes would max out a schedules utilization by it's mileage. If you are looking for a route of a specific length, simply take a route of x nm and schedule it for 0:00 and you can easily see how many hours (plus turnaround time at the end) it takes to fly the route round trip. If it's too long or short, adjust the mileage accordingly until you find a viable route.
QuoteYou can basically figure out which routes would max out a schedules utilization by it's mileage
Almost but not always exactly. Routes into large airports tend to take longer due to taxi time etc. This isn't a big issue with long haul but with short haul, say, a 200nm flight into ATL or ORD may take the same time as a 300nm flight to Nowheresville. I don't have a specific example to hand but it CAN make a difference. Also, on long haul the winds can make a difference. I've noticed east/west return trips can take longer than those that are the same distance but are predominantly north/south (or is it the other way round?).
Don't worry TOO much about maxing out the schedule. the NUMBER of trips is most important. If you fly, say, two round trips per day then it doesn't really matter if they take 20hr + 4hrs = 24hr or 19hr+3hrs = 22hrs - you'll probably make the same profit on either. Of course - fitting that elusive third route into the schedule makes a HUGE difference.
And yes, doing this scheduling CAN take a long time. You get quicker with practice and it becomes almost instinctive (which is what I think LemonButt sorta means). I like to think of it as getting good value for my credits on a Tuesday night when there's nothing on TV and I've no beer money. Honestly, I promise that I absolutely NEVER get up at 5am on a Sunday because I have an aircraft due and I need to get it's rotational schedule sorted while slots are available. Wouldn't ever even consider it. Honest. ;)
Give it a try and let us know how you go on. I promise it's MUCH more satisfying to "beat the system" and fly a route it at first appears you can't.
Quote from: knobbygb on June 25, 2011, 04:43:37 PM
Almost but not always exactly. Routes into large airports tend to take longer due to taxi time etc. This isn't a big issue with long haul but with short haul, say, a 200nm flight into ATL or ORD may take the same time as a 300nm flight to Nowheresville. I don't have a specific example to hand but it CAN make a difference. Also, on long haul the winds can make a difference. I've noticed east/west return trips can take longer than those that are the same distance but are predominantly north/south (or is it the other way round?).
Don't worry TOO much about maxing out the schedule. the NUMBER of trips is most important. If you fly, say, two round trips per day then it doesn't really matter if they take 20hr + 4hrs = 24hr or 19hr+3hrs = 22hrs - you'll probably make the same profit on either. Of course - fitting that elusive third route into the schedule makes a HUGE difference.
And yes, doing this scheduling CAN take a long time. You get quicker with practice and it becomes almost instinctive (which is what I think LemonButt sorta means). I like to think of it as getting good value for my credits on a Tuesday night when there's nothing on TV and I've no beer money. Honestly, I promise that I absolutely NEVER get up at 5am on a Sunday because I have an aircraft due and I need to get it's rotational schedule sorted while slots are available. Wouldn't ever even consider it. Honest. ;)
Give it a try and let us know how you go on. I promise it's MUCH more satisfying to "beat the system" and fly a route it at first appears you can't.
East/West are the jet stream/tradewinds, which are stronger towards the equator (created by the earth's rotation). Assuming you aren't flying into a different latitude zone (I think there's only 4 in each hemisphere in real life, but not sure how it's modeled in AWS) where the winds change, it's a non-factor :) An ideal strategy if you fill up the major routes at a base is to determine how many miles you can fly in a given day assuming x number of routes per day. For example, if you have a regional jet and can fly 4000nm/day (2000nm each way) across 3 routes (6 turnarounds), you can simply add up the routes you want to schedule to see if it will fit. You might have 500/500/1000 or 250/250/1500. Either way the numbers should be accurate enough to figure out which routes are possible and which ones aren't. You may also want to build in an extra 5-10 minute turnaround time so if you need to shave a few minutes off a route, you can.
The way I actually do it for a typical medium/short haul a/c like the 737 is...
First decide how many routes per day each aircraft should fly - for a 737 it's typically three.
List in Excel ALL the destinations I'd like to fly from my base and sort them in to distance order (remembering to list routes multiple times if I need to fly them more than once)
For each aircraft...
Take the one from the top of the list (longest)
Take the one from the bottom of the list (shortest)
Take one from the middle of the list that then fills the schedule out as much as possible.
Cross those three of the list and repeat...
As the final one or two aircraft are delivered, swap a few of the routes about to make sure everything fits and everything is covered as much as possible.
In this way, with a lot of planning, it's possible to open up at a new base, with the appropriate aircraft about to arrive and cover everything efficiently within just a few game days. The planning really pays off.
Quote from: knobbygb on June 26, 2011, 04:40:58 AM
The way I actually do it for a typical medium/short haul a/c like the 737 is...
First decide how many routes per day each aircraft should fly - for a 737 it's typically three.
List in Excel ALL the destinations I'd like to fly from my base and sort them in to distance order (remembering to list routes multiple times if I need to fly them more than once)
For each aircraft...
Take the one from the top of the list (longest)
Take the one from the bottom of the list (shortest)
Take one from the middle of the list that then fills the schedule out as much as possible.
Cross those three of the list and repeat...
As the final one or two aircraft are delivered, swap a few of the routes about to make sure everything fits and everything is covered as much as possible.
In this way, with a lot of planning, it's possible to open up at a new base, with the appropriate aircraft about to arrive and cover everything efficiently within just a few game days. The planning really pays off.
I do this to an extent as well, but I don't list the distance of the flights--I list the total route time. I also note how many flights per day it would take to satisfy the demand. If I have a flight with ~500 pax/daily that is at least 5 hours, I can successfully schedule five 100 seaters flying that route once/day while incorporating A-checks on -234-67 so that I have extra supply on Monday/Friday for the heavy routes. For routes that have 2 or 3 flights/day you can simply put A-checks on -----67. By doing this, you can ensure a destination with only 1 flight/day doesn't get bumped from 7 days/week to 6 days/week due to maintenance.
Quote from: LemonButt on June 25, 2011, 05:01:51 PM
(I think there's only 4 in each hemisphere in real life, but not sure how it's modeled in AWS)
Just to clarify the weather aspects. I apologize for this simple tangent.
There are three atmosphere cells in each hemisphere. The cells are (Equator to Pole) Hadley, Ferrell, and Polar. Between these cells, various jet streams occur- i.e. between the Polar and Ferrell cells, the polar jet exists. There is sinking air above both poles, in essence creating a boundary, but because the Polar cells surround this sinking region, it's not really counted as a boundary.
My very simple illustration depicting where the cells exist:
\ Polar (~60˚-90˚)
\ Ferrell (~30˚-60˚)
| Hadley (~0˚-30˚)
| Hadley
/ Ferrell
/ Polar
The boundary between the various cells are called:
Polar & Ferrell: Polar Jet -> Generally associated with rising air and rain. One of the main reasons for forests and lush lands around 60˚N/S across the world
Ferrell & Hadley: Sub Tropical Jet -> This is typically associated with sinking air, just doesn't develop a lot of rain. One of the main reasons why deserts exist around 30˚ N/S across the world
Between both Hadleys: Inter Tropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ) -> Associated with VERY strong updrafts and almost constant thunderstorm (and rain) activity. Aka: Rain forests and 'tropical' weather.
Tip: I remember the cell names because the actor, Will Ferrell, lives in the Ferrell Cell (not named for him :P). The polar cell makes sense, leaving the Hadley cell at the equator.
Hope that it all made some sense.
Cameron
PS: In order to regain the thread's course, I generally use a 7 day rotation when doing LH Intl' Operations. Though, when I can fit a simple daily schedule on a LH route, I will probably do it, merely out of laziness.
I am resurrecting this thread because I am running into an issue I've never had before.
Depending on which link I click on, I get two different reports for my flights. I have received a monopoly warning for one of my routes, but when I scheduled the flights, they were just fine. In fact, I currently still show two different schedules. The link from my monopoly warning e-mail shows 2 flights overlapping on the same day. The "globe" link from my scheduling page shows only 1 flight per day. Please see below for details.
Here is what Sanabas told me:
Quote from: Sanabas on November 24, 2013, 02:27:37 AM
The first picture shows the outbound flight, and is fine.
The second picture shows the return flight, which is where the oversupply is.
. . . and Sami basically told me "works as intended".
Here's my dilemma: when I am scheduling I see everything beautifully scheduled as in Pic 1. I don't see Pic 2 until I get a warning. So tell me, how I am to deal with this situation? How is it resolved? How do I gain access to the information in the second pic? Why am I
NOT given this information the first time around when I am scheduling? Do I always have to be sure to have to manually perform "Route Planning" and schedule the flight from my destination just to view the proper scheduling?
This all does not make sense to me and seems to be completely not user friendly. But, perhaps, since I am so inexperienced at this, I am missing some very obvious tools. I would greatly appreciate if someone could enlighten me on this matter and give me some useful advice.
Thanks!
One more thing: I just happened to notice that the passenger demand is back to my home base is less than the passenger demand to Chicago. How come I do not receive this information when deciding to set up the route? Obviously, I will always have a return flight. Would it not be helpful to know the demand on the return flight as well when making your decision (I had always assumed it was the same)?
Call me ignorant, but I am stunned to learn this. How can you intelligently set up a flight when you do not have all the information? Will I always have to perform a fake route planning from my destination just to view the return flight demand data?
I did some further investigating. I opened all of my KORD flights in order to reschedule the offending ones. After viewing these routes, I do not see any that are outbound from Chicago on the same day. Below is my 7-day schedule. Could someone please shed some light on this?
And my KORD departure schedule from another source:
As you can see, none of the flights leave KORD on the same day.
Quote from: JJP on November 24, 2013, 10:31:31 PM
Here's my dilemma: when I am scheduling I see everything beautifully scheduled as in Pic 1. I don't see Pic 2 until I get a warning. So tell me, how I am to deal with this situation? How is it resolved? How do I gain access to the information in the second pic? Why am I NOT given this information the first time around when I am scheduling? Do I always have to be sure to have to manually perform "Route Planning" and schedule the flight from my destination just to view the proper scheduling?
This all does not make sense to me and seems to be completely not user friendly. But, perhaps, since I am so inexperienced at this, I am missing some very obvious tools. I would greatly appreciate if someone could enlighten me on this matter and give me some useful advice.
From the route planning page that you're being sent to by linking on the globe, or that you went to when opening the route, there is a link in the top right corner. You can even see it on your screenshot. On the chicago-tel aviv page, the one that is ok, there is a link that says 'route planning llbg-ord', that'll take you to the same flight in the oposite direction, the one that is violating the rules.
If you open the information on any particular route, there will be two globes. One for each direction.
QuoteOne more thing: I just happened to notice that the passenger demand is back to my home base is less than the passenger demand to Chicago. How come I do not receive this information when deciding to set up the route? Obviously, I will always have a return flight. Would it not be helpful to know the demand on the return flight as well when making your decision (I had always assumed it was the same)?
Call me ignorant, but I am stunned to learn this. How can you intelligently set up a flight when you do not have all the information? Will I always have to perform a fake route planning from my destination just to view the return flight demand data?
It is practically the same in most cases. It is in this case, too. 180 vs 190 is basically no difference, you could refresh both pages and then easily see 190 vs 180. I've never bothered to look at the return planning to check the demand when setting up routes, and never had a problem.
QuoteAnd my KORD departure schedule from another source:
As you can see, none of the flights leave KORD on the same day.
No, they don't. But the problem direction is Tel Aviv TO Chicago. Chicago to Tel Aviv is ok.
QuoteI did some further investigating. I opened all of my KORD flights in order to reschedule the offending ones. After viewing these routes, I do not see any that are outbound from Chicago on the same day. Below is my 7-day schedule. Could someone please shed some light on this?
Again, the problem is the flights outbound from Tel Aviv. And the first two routes you've listed both leave Tel Aviv on a Monday. The first returns on a Monday, the second returns on a Tuesday. Same deal for the final two flights, they both leave Tel Aviv on a Saturday. Which lines up perfectly with the first screenies, that Mon & Sat have 2 flights, Wed & Sun none. From your origianl post, I assumed you were based in ORD. But apparently you're actually in Tel Aviv, so it's actually the outbound flights that are the offending ones, you've lined up the return flights ok. Which is the first time I've seen that done.
This is why 7 day scheduling is the best method in general for LH
The method you're using, is based on [SC] knobbygb's suggestion, and that doesn't work with all routes (especially ones > 4000 nm, and have to pay extra attention to landing/departing time of the whole 7 flights. But it has some benefits: need 1 A/C to fill route under 4000 nm, and you can configure the exact seats for specific routes
Quote from: Sanabas on November 25, 2013, 01:57:10 AM
No, they don't. But the problem direction is Tel Aviv TO Chicago. Chicago to Tel Aviv is ok.
Well, it's no wonder I didn't understand since I was told the exact opposite of this. I was told the offending direction was Chicago to Tel Aviv.
Thank you for your help.
Quote from: Mr.HP on November 25, 2013, 07:32:05 AM
This is why 7 day scheduling is the best method in general for LH
The method you're using, is based on [SC] knobbygb's suggestion, and that doesn't work with all routes (especially ones > 4000 nm, and have to pay extra attention to landing/departing time of the whole 7 flights. But it has some benefits: need 1 A/C to fill route under 4000 nm, and you can configure the exact seats for specific routes
I guess I don't understand this answer. I thought 7-day scheduling is simply having a different route (route number-scheduling only 1 day) for each day. This is what I did. Since I wanted to use good time slots, I used 2 different aircraft to fit the schedule in. Perhaps you are referring to my departure times from LLBG overlapping. This was not intentional.
Thanks for your help.
Quote from: Sanabas on November 25, 2013, 01:57:10 AM
From the route planning page that you're being sent to by linking on the globe, or that you went to when opening the route, there is a link in the top right corner. You can even see it on your screenshot. On the chicago-tel aviv page, the one that is ok, there is a link that says 'route planning llbg-ord', that'll take you to the same flight in the oposite direction, the one that is violating the rules.
If you open the information on any particular route, there will be two globes. One for each direction.
This might sound stupid to all of you veterans, but this is a big revelation for me. I kept wondering why I would get different views when clicking on the globe. I thought both globes simply gave me the same information, and I would simply click one of them to give me the information I needed. Obviously, I now know differently. Thanks for your help.
No worries.
And yeah, 7 day scheduling requires a group of 7 planes. Instead of a 24 hour long schedule that the same plane flies every day, you make a 168 hour long schedule, plane A flies it starting on Monday, plane B flies it starting on Tuesday, plane G flies it starting on Sunday. End result is that each route in the 168 hour schedule gets flown once per day at the exact same time, and there's no danger of those accidental oversupplies.
Quote from: JJP on November 24, 2013, 10:54:12 PM
I did some further investigating. I opened all of my KORD flights in order to reschedule the offending ones. After viewing these routes, I do not see any that are outbound from Chicago on the same day. Below is my 7-day schedule. Could someone please shed some light on this?
It is clear from your schedule that they are taking off on the same day. You have several flights scheduled to leave the next day as the schedule pushes into the next morning versus leaving the same day you took off. If you look at the days you bought slots for, it is pretty clear you are doubled up on some days. If the return flight leaves at 23:55 it will take pax from the same day, but if you take off at 0:00 or later you are in a different day with a different pax pool.
If you click the globe to see demand, you'll see there is a ~95% accuracy or similar--the demand numbers are randomized and you won't get the same demand every time you click the globe, but an approximation from your route planning department.
Also, seven day scheduling DOES NOT require 7 planes. You can start with one aircraft flying a single route seven days a week and start peeling off the routes as you get more aircraft if the ultimate plan is to have 7 planes. You can also just use two planes if you have a long route and short route alternating that would be impossible to fit on one schedule (i.e. a 36 hour route and a 12 hour route).
In regards to your first screenshots, you cut off the actual flights at the bottom of that page that would show the oversupply source clear as day--you have multiple flights taking off on the same day. You should be paying attention the time tables more than the bar charts as you also need to make sure you're scheduling flights far enough apart to count as separate flights in terms of frequency.
Quote from: LemonButt on November 25, 2013, 03:46:59 PM
Also, seven day scheduling DOES NOT require 7 planes. You can start with one aircraft flying a single route seven days a week and start peeling off the routes as you get more aircraft if the ultimate plan is to have 7 planes. You can also just use two planes if you have a long route and short route alternating that would be impossible to fit on one schedule (i.e. a 36 hour route and a 12 hour route).
You can, but you'll only be flying the 36 hour route 6 times/week. And I'd call it a 2-day schedule. But yes, with less than 7 planes, you can still fly the same longhaul route at the same time once per day. It'll just be a much less efficient schedule, with plenty of unused time. Usually, when people talk in the forums about 7 day scheduling, it's safe to assume they mean groups of 7 planes, with each plane's schedule shifted 1 day forward. That's the key concept to get the hang of.
Quote from: Sanabas on November 26, 2013, 02:37:50 AM
You can, but you'll only be flying the 36 hour route 6 times/week. And I'd call it a 2-day schedule. But yes, with less than 7 planes, you can still fly the same longhaul route at the same time once per day. It'll just be a much less efficient schedule, with plenty of unused time. Usually, when people talk in the forums about 7 day scheduling, it's safe to assume they mean groups of 7 planes, with each plane's schedule shifted 1 day forward. That's the key concept to get the hang of.
I think LemonButt is talking about phasing in the flights before you have full 7 aircraft....
I think, the 7-day scheduling is best for getting a high "plan time" what I call it (the time the aircraft has to do something, that includes flight, turnaround or a-check, so basicly everything except the gaps you were not able to fill or didn't want to fill). The other question is, how much flight time (or airborne time) you want to have... but this time can be adjusted by using different flight lengths for an aircraft. I think, the main question should be, how many hours and how many flights you have to have for a specific aircraft type to be profitable. In this question you also have to see, that if e.g. you fly all your 1h flights on one aircraft and all your 7h flights on another, you may get a huge amount of profit on one, but almost none on the other aircraft... and, I personally distribute the flights evenly. But, as I sayed... if my strategy is the right one (in my case it's flying MD80/90 with 14 flights a week and 16.3h airborne per day), that's an other question... maybe it would be bether not to fly the long routes, but... others do fly them with aircrafts of the same size, so ... I think you got the point :laugh: