Qantas A380 refurbishment news and updates

expect it will soon make its way to London to operate back to Aus all refurbished.

Probably more likely to come back empty, as there won't be a swap. All 12 A380s expected to operate over Dec/Jan, with the next refurb/maint starting sometime in Feb.

With 9 left and it seemingly taking 8+ wks, they'll have to be done 2 at a time for most of 2020 to meet the end 2020 target.

OQH showed up on FR24 on the 10th for 17min, which would normally suggest they are just doing final system checks before flying out.
 
I had been worried about the refurbed A380 being on our upcoming flight to HKG, and decided not to pick seats in upstairs Y. Well my fears were misplaced - its been subbed for a 787!
 
I'm on QF11 on Boxing Day and just got updated to a refurbished bird. I rang the call centre and they said I had VH-OQJ. I am usually able to snag row 24 on non-refusbished A380s and it works well because you can just get out but had to settle for an aisle seat in the 2nd row initially. Qantas reallocated me in the front row but in the middle 3 on the left hand side (31D).

Curiously I noticed all the seats except the middle seat next to me in Rows 31-34 were taken but only one from back there was taken. Maybe there are more passengers and they just haven't bothered to allocate their seats but if this is the only load maybe might be spread out.
 
Very exciting to see my favourite bird get a well deserved update. This means we will enjoy the A380 among Qantas's fleet for a few more years. The "sky beds" felt quite tired when compared with the premium products other airlines offer, specially QR's QSuite, which is a delight to fly in.

I'm flying on QF11 tomorrow (Wed 18th). Yesterday, while pre ordering my meals on Qantas.com, I noticed my seat selection had changed and now the website was not showing the seat map anymore.

I called QF and the lady told me the reason for this was because the plane between SYD and LAX had changed, and had gone from a 2, 2, 2 configuration in Business Class to a 1, 2, 1 configuration. From my knowledge, the 1, 2, 1 configuration means Refurbished A380 (VH-OQK or VH-OQJ (VH-OQH was still in Dresden last time I checked)) This excited me a bit, as I was not really looking forward to flying the "sky bed" but I'm very happy with the seats on the A330s and 787s.

Now checking FlightRadar24.com, the plane allocated for tomorrow's flight is VH-OQG which is not a refurbished bird. But wait, it gets even more confusing. FlightRadar24.com show VH-OQG ALSO doing today's Q11 flight. How is it possible the same plane is also doing tomorrow's? Would it not take it 26hr+ to come back? Am I miscalculating something? Is FlightRadar24.com not that accurate?

Cheers.
 

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QF11 is showing as OQJ tomorrow, which is a refurbished aircraft.

OQG is currently operating QF11 today.

Thank you for that, milehighclub.

Where do you get that information? I feel like a noob checking FlightRadar24, that apparently is not very reliable. Haha
 
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Sorry, my bad.
I meant ARMS - Aircrew Resource Management System.

Access would show where the refurbished A380s are planned to be operating. - YMMV
 
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Maybe there are more passengers and they just haven't bothered to allocate their seats but if this is the only load maybe might be spread out.
Considering NB passengers have to pay to select a seat until close to the flight it would be normal for a lot of seats to not be selected, though that many available does seem a lot.

Some travellers with status book closer to their flights.

I would suspect that Boxing Day after a long Christmas Day wouldn’t be the most popular day to travel.
 
Flying on QF17 on 22/12 and just saw the seat map which shows a refurbed bird. We're flying F but now have mixed feelings as even though we'll experience a newer F product I don't feel there's a huge difference between F and J.
 
Flying on QF17 on 22/12 and just saw the seat map which shows a refurbed bird. We're flying F but now have mixed feelings as even though we'll experience a newer F product I don't feel there's a huge difference between F and J.

F seats will be much nicer for resting with the better foot space and also less people.

Also a good safe measure if the plane gets reverted to a non-refurb.
 

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