Turboprop vs. Turbofan

Real world airlines tell us that on short routes turboprop aircraft are just as fast as jets. I’ve done the same analysis in FS to see if this is true and valuable information for virtual airlines.

Many airlines use Dash 8’s and ATR’s on short routes to compete against rival airlines that use jets such as Fokker 70/100’s, CRJ 200/700’s, and the newer Embraer 190/195’s. They claim that modern day turboprops are more fuel efficient and just as fast as jets on short routes that demand less than 100 passengers per flight. Also, maintaining turboprop aircraft are said to be cheaper than jets. I’ll leave that topic alone because airlines are very tight about their costs of running an aircraft making research impossible. Indeed, if the government was as good at keeping secrets as the airlines, WikiLeaks would be out of business.

So, let’s go through the parameters I’ve set. First I’ve chosen the aircraft listed below in the chart. The ATR-72 is from Flight1, CRJ’s and EMB’s from Wilco, Dash 8-Q300 from PSS, and the Fokkers are the freeware Project Fokker offerings. All were tested in FS 2004 in order to maintain equality.

There were 322 flights done in all. Now, I won’t lie to you, I did not do all of these flights since my last article on the A320/B738 comparison. I’ve been running a Virtual Airline, AmEuro (http://www.ameurova.com), for over 10 years and I’ve taken my FS 2004 flight records from our database. I keep very accurate records of all my flights because I am a statistics freak and now I get to use this info for the good of the community, too.

I looked at flights 200nm or less, between 201 and 300nm, and between 301 and 400 nm to see where the point is that we start seeing an advantage of one over the other in terms of flight times and fuel burn. I did not have enough data for flights over 400 nm to make a fair comparison and that’s where I stopped.

So we have all this data and now you are wondering, “how did I come up with the score?” I ranked each stat and gave the best a score of 1. The scores for the others in the category are calculated by dividing the stat by the same stat for the best aircraft. In effect, it tells you how many times worst the aircraft is than the best aircraft.  The lower the score the better the aircraft is overall. Within each category you can see the score so that you may determine the best aircraft in that particular sector.

Overall, the ATR-72 was the best aircraft but to be honest the scores were very close. The Dash 8 Q300 was second and the CRJ-700 third. Take into consideration the fuel burn of each aircraft over the distance of the route. For example, on a route of less than 200nm the ERJ 190 may burn up two and a half times as much fuel as the ATR-72 while only reaching its destination 6 minutes earlier. That can cost your virtual airline $350 with today’s fuel prices.

One may consider using turboprops on routes less than 300nm and then switching to jets over 300nm due to the time enroute. At this point you will probably see more daily flights (higher utilization) with the jet and will then make more profit per day.

Now why do turboprop aircraft perform so well on short routes? The answer is in physics. A jet will fly faster and therefore will take more distance to make a turn. A wider arc you can say. If you are taking off on runway 18 and then turn to a heading of 360 the turboprop, typically traveling at 170 knots gs (groundspeed), will make a tighter turn than the jet traveling at 240 knots gs. The same goes for landing. The turboprop can turn faster and therefore you can turn onto final sooner than a jet. Also, the take-off run is shorter for turboprops and you will begin your turn to the 360 heading sooner. I can attest to this as I’ve seen it in action. At CYYZ a Dash 8 will take-off on runway 23 and begin it’s turn to 360 before it’s even reached the end of the runway. A CRJ, on the other hand, will start it’s turn a couple of nm beyond the end of the runway and be at a higher gs making a bigger turn. This may also have to do with noise regulations but that’s another advantage of the turboprop.

Out of interest I threw in the BAE 146-200. It has 4 jet engines and I was curious to see how it stacked up against the other aircraft in this category. Not too good, but I still enjoy flying this aircraft.

I hope you have found this article interesting and helpful in choosing an aircraft for your routes.

Keep simming!
Andrew Barter