SQ A350 Economy / Premium Economy to Jakarta

[yflyer]

Some TR’s write themselves. This is one of them.

Last week I was booked to fly AMS-SIN on SQ’s new A350. At the last moment, my plans (and my planes) changed, and I had to switch to flying CDG-SIN instead on a very comfortable SQ A380. But the whalejet has been around for a while, and in SQ’s fleet, the Airbus A350-900 is the svelte, young debutante…

As a consolation prize, I had to head to Jakarta this week, so I booked myself on SQ956, a 9.25am departure to Jakarta in Economy class operated by an A350. This was just one and a half hours of flying time – not nearly enough to get to know the latest addition to SQ’s fleet, but good enough to get a sense of the A350 experience.

And as a bonus, when I checked in online and picked a seat, there was, miraculously, a Premium Economy seat open for selection. This was a PEY cabin probably sold as Y.

It was a wet morning when I checked in for my flight. I walked up to the gate, anxious to know if there had been a last minute substitution.

From the holding area I spied the mask-of-zorro cockpit, and the elegant, curved wingtips. No substitution today! The A350 was ready to go!

[yflyer]

Boarding was announced. PPS and Business first. No mention of Star Gold. I played the part of obedient passenger and waited for Star / KF Gold to be called. Lines had formed, and the ground staff were boarding pax from two lines without turning anyone away. Who were all those pax boarding? They couldn’t ALL be PPS? Eventually they called for Gold to board, but by then almost half the plane had boarded. So much for my chance to snap pics of an empty cabin. Never mind, I would go from nose to tail to take pictures in any case, even if arms and legs got in the way.

[yflyer]

This is a 3-class aircraft: Business, Premium Economy and Economy.

First, the softly lit J cabin, in a spacious 1-2-1 layout, very similar to the latest J seats on the 77WN.



Bulkhead seats in the 2nd J cabin…



Window-side bulkhead seat…



These seats fold down flat to bed mode, although I doubt anyone did that on such a short sector (If I were in J, I would have…).



A brunch menu at each seat…



As good as it gets in J, I thought to myself.

[yflyer]

3 rows of PEY, arranged 2-4-2. One seat less per row than the 9-abreast 3-3-3 configuration in Y.



These seats are done in the same style as PEY on the A380 and 77WR, but the actual seats look to be based on a different seat frame.





PEY bulkhead seats…

[yflyer]

I stowed my luggage and strolled through the Y cabin with my iPhone.



This was a comfortable 3-3-3 layout.



There were two Y cabins, done up in different pastel colours.



Legroom was good, with no underseat obstructions.



They resemble the newest Y seats on the 77WN in shape and features.

Window side seats…



IFE in Y looked very good as well: Large high definition wide touchscreen, and USB ports as well as A/C power.



On this sector, earbud headphones may or may not be given out, so if you want to check out the IFE, bring your own headphones with airline headphone adapter. In fact, even on longer flights, bring your own headphones as the standard SQ Y earbuds are not great.

I sat down… very comfortable!



Seat width was average.

Recline was very good, and the whole seat pivots forward.



There is a paddle shaped footrest.

I checked out the last rows in both the 1st and 2nd Y cabin. All these seats have sufficient space to recline. None of this “limited recline” nonsense.



A large galley in the rear of the aircraft.

[yflyer]

Row 47 emergency row has a lot of space…



The row 48 window seat is a desirable seat as well, as there is no seat in front of it.



That said, it has a strange protrusion in front of the seat to store the IFE screen.



Sinks in the toilet are sensor operated.

[yflyer]

I headed back to my seat in Premium Economy.



Hot towels…



A very quiet take-off roll and fairly steep take-off despite the flight being 100% full.



A very comfortable PEY seat, with movable reading light.



Superb IFE wide touchscreen….very high quality video and audio.



Multiple seat pockets and cubby holes to hold your stuff.





Two USB ports per pax. One next to the seat, and one by the screen. Note the airline headphone socket.



Universal A/C power socket.

[yflyer]

Buttons to recline and also to extend the thigh rest (Every seat has a thigh rest, not just the first row. Thumbs up!).



The thigh rest and large footrest.



Recline is very, very good in PEY…the whole seat pivots and cradles to a very comfortable angle…





This looks to be a wonderful PEY seat for a longhaul flight.

Safety Card…



The armrest in the middle two seats of the row of 4 PEY seats folds all the way up (There is a small button underneath the armrest, towards the base).

[yflyer]

IFE is superb. They have ironed out the minor quirks the system had in earlier versions of this Krisworld system. The UI is now very easy to use, and I really could not find any faults in the system. This must be the best IFE systems I have used on any airline.



Fantastic selection of movies and TV…



…including The Jungle Book…



…and Ip Man 3, all looking and sounding great.



And you can finally browse music by album cover!



There are still a couple of minor niggling issues, though: on my system today, when watching movies, the audio was very slightly out of synch with the video. Not enough to ruin the movie, but just noticeable.

The Airshow is Panasonic’s latest version…





Because of turbulence, the seatbelt sign (Full colour LCD panel) remained on for a very long time after take-off, and through meal service as well…

[yflyer]

Once cabin service started, the crew had very little time to serve meals to this chock full A350…



Fold out tray table in PEY…



A large table, even when half-extended…



Fully extended. Not the flattest or stiffest table out there, but sufficiently large…



Meal service…this appeared to be Y meal service in the PEY cabin…



Choice of noodles with chicken, or a western egg dish. I chose noodles…



Very generous meal for a short sector. It was also good to see that SQ is back to using proper glasses in Y / PEY!

It was a satisfying meal.

[yflyer]

There was wifi internet on this flight, based on time and not usage – another thumbs up. Obviously for such a short flight I doubt anyone signed up, but for longer sectors, time based internet is the way to go.



The companion app link feature was functional on the A350, where you link your iPhone or tablet to your IFE, and with the Singapore Airlines App, you can control the IFE with your device.






The controller acts like a remote – you can’t actually watch a movie on your tablet or phone.

[yflyer]

Inflight cabin ambience in PEY…



Cabin ambience in Y…



Spacious and comfortable. I can’t help thinking that while this was good, the overall spaciousness of the same new gen seat and cabin in the 77WN is just slightly greater, with the seats and cabin of the 77WN being slightly, but noticeably more spacious. So while both the A350 and 77WN new Y cabins are very good, I have a slight preference for the greater seat and cabin width of the 77WN, which is also 9-abreast in Y and 8-abreast in PEY.

A very short sector, and soon it was time to prepare for landing.



The cabin crew were kept very busy on this sector serving food to a full flight in very short time, while remaining cheerful and poised. A great set of cabin crew.

We landed smoothly in Jakarta and from there it was a short taxi to the terminal.

[yflyer]

The SQ A350 is a great addition to the fleet, and offers a near state-of-the art experience in Y and PEY. I say almost because I think the 77WN just pips it, with essentially the same hard product in Y (And probably PEY) but with slightly more space and spaciousness.

And although I have not yet tried J on the A350 , it did look very comfortable – very similar to new J on the 77WN.

Overall impressions? An excellent flight with a great hard product and wonderful cabin crew. A short sector like SIN-JKT probably doesn’t get any better than the SQ A350. I hope to try the SQ A350 on a longhaul sector soon.

Thanks for reading!

[9V-SIA]

I've yet to fly on the A350 but tried the Premium Economy product on my way back from Hong Kong.

It's a great product and I see myself using it on day flights up to 6 hours.

Red eyes? I still need to be horizontal!

How does noise compare to A380 (quietest) to 777 (rock concert)?

Notice differences in humidity and cabin pressure?

Great report as always. Thanks for sharing!

[banoffi]

Thanks for the report. I personally can't wait to scrounge up enough miles to redeem a J saver on an A350 on a long haul flight.