QF Ferry Flights
 

Perhaps a dumb question, but why does QF ferry heavy aircraft between MEL and BNE to SYD after or before a long haul?

e.g. A380 MEL-SYD and B744 BNE-SYD-BNE

Esp since some days, one ferries up whilst another ferries to BNE/MEL to take up the flying line.

With SYD being the hub, how uncommon would it be for the 744/380 to not visit SYD? Surely it would be easier to do a tail swap on a revenue service and get the plane inbound to SYD rather than ferry? Big $$ in fuel alone to ferry big planes like that empty.

Perhaps I'm missing something.

In regards to the 747 that gets ferried between SYD and BNE you have to remember that only three routes are currently served by 2 class 747's which are SYD-SIN-FRA, BNE-LAX and AKL-LAX as the FRA flight is separated from the LAX flights it is necessary to position a 744 between SYD and BNE. The typical rotation may be SYD-SIN-FRA-SIN-SYD-BNE-LAX-AKL-LAX-BNE-SYD. IIRC this repositioning flight is only supposed to happen once a week but lately on the BNE-LAX route in particular 3 class 747's have been used lately necessitating a reposition as BNE currently doesn't have any 3 class routes.

This Month alone 3 class 747's OJG OJU OEG OEI have all done at least one BNE/LAX run.

They are ferried to SYD for maintenance. 'A' checks or a little bit of love and attention at Sydney Base Maintenance.
Sometimes if they remain away from base for a while they accumulate deferred defects. There is manpower and parts in SYD to repair these.:)