Big changes for 787 program as manufacturing defects, demand and Covid-19 sends Dreamliners into storage

The past year has been a challenging one for the Boeing 787 program.

Even before COVID-19 became a household word, global commercial aviation was already facing a downtrend in the demand for widebody aircraft like the 787.  2019 saw a decrease in new 787 orders to such a point that Boeing was considering a rate cut. Covid-19 added to the production and delivery stresses for the 787 but now the manufacturing issues with the circumferential fuselage join where the skin of the airplane does not meet certain flatness or smoothness criteria at the the areas of fuselage join has all but stopped 787 deliveries though Boeing still is continuing to push production through both 787 final assembly lines though at a vastly reduced rate.  These two factors have created a glut of stored 787s at Charleston, Everett as well as at Victorville and a couple other smaller sites around the country.

However, the issue is not relegated to just newly assembled aircraft at Everett and Charleston or stored airplanes but also to those in service with airlines around the world.  Those Dreamliners will have to be checked during their next maintenance period and then repaired.

Some readers may recall that earlier this year, a few of Boeing's customers had to ground 8 newly built 787s because of 2 separate improper manufacturing issues that, when combined, had weakened the rear fuselage sections (sections 47/48) of the each of the grounded Dreamliners.  

Now the new issue surrounding the circumferential fuselage join where the sections of the 787 are mated and fastened together can have gaps that are created by the manufacturing flaw.  The flaw is not related to work done at any one location or by any one of Boeing's partners but is related to how the strips of carbon fiber tape are laid on the fuselage mold and cured in the high temperature and pressure autoclaves.  Boeing is still investigating how this issue has developed but it appears that they have a fix or are in the process of developing a fix.

Now this issue has huge implications for Everett and Charleston and the move of all final assembly work from Washington State to South Carolina.  The last Everett produced 787 will be a 787-9 for Hawaiian Airlines (ZE315, LN 1129).  

In a letter leaked to this blog, Lane Ballard, 787 program vice president and general manager and BSC site leader, says that Boeing has been "performing quality inspections related to fuselage skin flatness and shimming on all aspects of the 787 fuselage join. These inspections are taking place on yet-to-be-delivered airplanes" to ensure quality of the airplanes to be delivered. Boeing is also engaging in join verification requirements during in sequence assembly at each final assembly position.

However there is some big news concerning Everett's involvement in addressing the manufacturing issues amongst the fleet of built but yet to be delivered 787s that are being stored. Boeing is currently planning to simultaneously reduced the 787 build rate to 5/month and transfer all 787 final assembly to Charleston in March 2021. This means that there is freed up space at Everett to do the join verification and inspections as well as the rework of those affected joins thus while production has stopped at 40-26, there will be on going work to correct the manufacturing issues taking place at Everett's newly abandoned final assembly line. The join verification, inspection and rework to current in production 787s will also slow down final assembly in order that this work be done properly.

According to Ballard, Boeing South Carolina will also free up space in two final assembly positions in 88-30 for the inspections and rework: "All four of the current Everett 787 final assembly positions will become join verification positions, and two additional positions will continue to be utilized in the Butler building (building 45-12) at the Everett site. Additional join verification positions will be created in the South Carolina final assembly facility, while the balance will remain production positions." Boeing's "intent is to leverage additional resources in Mid Body, Aft Body and Everett Final Assembly to staff the respective join verification positions at their location. This join verification activity, however, will likely extend 787 work in Everett beyond the production consolidation plan." 

Ballard also added that "Airplanes that are stored until delivery, and airplanes currently in our production system, will go through this join verification process. Stored airplanes assembled in Everett will go to Everett for join inspection and delivery, and stored airplanes assembled in South Carolina will go to South Carolina for join inspection and delivery."

It remains to be seen how deliveries in 2021 will be impacted but currently Boeing has 88 787s that are in final assembly or in pre-delivery (including storage, and predelivery test flights or awaiting the start of test flights).  This back log will undoubtedly grow in the first quarter of 2021 but should start to shrink around March-April as the program breaks rate to 5 per month and the first few airplanes to complete the inspections and rework are delivered.

Boeing's ability to deliver 787s to customer's is also going to be impacted by the financial health of those customers themselves.  Covid-19 has hit the airlines extremely hard and I don't believe that some of these airlines will survive let alone be in a financially stable condition to accept new 787s.  Norwegian is one airline that comes to mind.  They have been in trouble even before the pandemic but the drastic reduction in revenues makes their viability to continue doubtful.  The airline recovery from Covid-19 as well as the 787 delivery skyline is dependent on the availability of the newly approved vaccines not just here in the United States but elsewhere around the world.  Transmission rates worldwide need to come down if intercontinental travel that utilizes the 787 is to recover.

Lastly, I want to add a word about the future of this blog and the spreadsheets I use to track the 787 program.  I know I've been away for over a year (due to demands of my regular job) but I plan on continuing to post 787 updates when I can but unfortunately I have lost several sources that have been invaluable to this blog and to posting updates to the 787 spreadsheets.  I'll try to update the spreadsheets as best as I can but unless I get new sources of solid information it will be difficult.  If there are any followers/readers of this blog out there who can supply me with information, I as well well as the followers of this blog will be most appreciative.  Please reach out to me.

787 Spreadsheets

Air Canada give glimpse of its new 787...and Boeing's revised assembly line

Air Canada posted photos of its first 787, that is due to be delivered later this spring, in assembly in building 40-24.  In my last post, I talked about Boeing revised assembly process which now integrates an additional line position for a total of 5.  The first position of the assembly process now appears to be a dedicated to assembly of large sub-assemblies. 


Specifically the fully assembled wings (with all movable surfaces) is integrated to the main fuselage section in the 1st position.  Next to this large sub-assembly is the rear fuselage (sections 47/48) is integrated with the vertical and horizontal stabilizers.  The forward fuselage (section 41) is positioned ahead next to the 2nd line position. It is at this second line position where all three fuselage sections will be joined together.  Once the second position is cleared the forward fuselage in transferred into the line position, then the main fuselage with the wings attached is moved forward right behind the section 41.  The rear fuselage assembly is then shifted to the left and then moved forward to a place behind the main fuselage assembly.  The three sections are then joined and all appropriate connections are made before the aircraft is moved to the third line position where it would receive its gear and engines.


The new process is part of Boeing's efforts to reduce the build time for each 787 as well as reduce production costs.  It has been reported that Boeing is still assembling 787s at a cost greater than the sales price thus the drive to find efficiencies through efforts like revising the production process as well as programs like "Partnering For Success" will be key to reducing those production costs.


You can see the Air Canada production photos on Facebook by clicking here.

Boeing restarts 787 part deliveries into Everett

As I had reported last week, Boeing will restart 787 final assembly on Monday, June 14th. This is reinforced with the restart of LCF flights bringing the required fuselage sections into Everett. Yesterday and LCF flew in the rear fuselage for the next 787 to be built...ZA177 (LN 23) for Japan Airlines and horizontal stabs for Air India's first 787, ZA230 (LN 25). Later this afternoon, the forward fuselage will be flown from Wichita to Everett. There should be a line move late this weekend to allow parts for the 23rd 787 to be located in the assembly tool in building 40-26.

Flight Test

ZA002 flew a 2 hour and 35 minute mission this morning (June 8th) out of Victorville. In completing this test flight, the 787 test fleet has completed over 30% of the required 3,100 test flight hours for the program. ZA005 continues its gauntlet testing ahead of a planned first flight on June 16th.

More info on the rear fuselage shear ties from Seattle Times

UPDATE: Dominic Gates reports that Boeing had made an error regarding the number of shear ties that have to be modified. Dominic writes:

Business: Because of incorrect information supplied by Boeing, a Tuesday story on a design flaw in the 787 said "less than a dozen shear ties" would have to be replaced on each airplane. Boeing corrected that misinformation Tuesday, saying mechanics will replace portions of 12 shear ties and also will have to reinforce many other shear ties in the rear fuselage of each plane.

Dominic Gates of the Seattle Times has more information on the shear tie issue in the section 48 and section 48 aft on the 787. In his article Dominic says that Boeing will use reinforcements that will be retrofitted into the airplanes already built as well as the future builds up to airplane 54. Starting with airplane 55, Boeing will use a redesign shear tie that is thicker than the one that is currently used.

Interestingly Boeing does characterize the problem as a potential issue over time but will be addressing it now as the will not deliver any airplanes without the reinforcements installed.

Boeing will implement the fix on airplanes 4 to 22. Boeing reiterated that this problem won't delay first delivery or the flight test program. Indeed, the 787 test fleet continues to post more flight test hours.

Dominic Gates: Another 787 design flaw — but no delays, says Boeing

Breaking: Flightblogger reports on new design flaw in 787 aft fuselage

Jon "Flightblogger" Ostrower reported that the prime reason for the production halt was not just for suppliers to catch up with production work but also to allow Boeing and it's suppliers to fix a design flaw. The flaw can potentially compromise the structural integrity of the airplane. Flightblogger reported that the flaw was discovered in December, 5 months ago.

The flaw involves shear ties which attaches the fuselage skin to the fuselage structure in section 48 and 48 aft. When there are repeated changes in the thermal condition of the rear fuselage, the shear ties can detach from the aircraft skin thus creating the structural issue.

The Fix

Flightblogger reports that the situation does not represent an immediate safety of flight issue to the test flight fleet and that a fix is identified. The fix involves using thicker shear ties and radius filler alongside the existing shear ties. Boeing says that all airplanes will meet FAA requirements.
Production

LN 23 and LN 24 are being modified now at Charleston with some modification work to be done at Everett. LN 25 will have the fix installed partly in Charleston and partly in Korea where the section 48 Aft is manufactured. The existing airplanes will be modified though apparently ZA001, ZA002 and ZA003 will not receive them as they will not be sold to customers. All customer airplanes are going to receive the modifications. Thus airplanes from LN 4 to LN 22 will all have to receive the modifications and starting with LN 55 the 787 will have a permanent fix in the section 48. Now while there has been some supplier issues that have lead to the temporary halt in production, Flightblogger's sources has said that the shear tie issue is the main reason for the halt. I will try to get more details about this issue.

Boeing said that the issue will not effect first delivery or continued production of the 787.

Flightblogger: Source: 787 design flaw drives supplier freeze

Vought may shut down North Charleston plant

In a press release, Vought is considering shutting down it's 787 operations in North Charleston. Currently, Vought has stopped production of the rear fuselage section (sections 47 and 48), reduced outside contractors, and redeployed most of the current workforce towards completing the existing sections (up to airplane 19).

Here is the relevant section of the press release pertaining to Vought's 787 production:

"787 Dreamliner Program A number of actions are being taken on the 787 program at Vought’s North Charleston facility because of the continuing Boeing IAM strike, coupled with the effects of previous 787 program schedule delays. Given that Vought has already fabricated enough barrels to support deliveries through airplane 19, the company must continue to slow its production rate and take the necessary actions across the program. Up until now, Vought has only released most of its outside assembly contractor workforce. Today, in addition to continuing this action, the company announced it is suspending its 787 composite bond fabrication operations, which will affect production and production support personnel. Assembly employees will also be redeployed to concentrate on existing fuselages closest to completion. Over the next 30 days, a variety of additional actions related to its 787 program activities are being considered, including the possible temporary shutdown of the entire plant. “This is a challenging time for all of us who support the Dreamliner program,“ said Joy Romero, vice president and general manager, 787 Program. “Since the beginning of the Boeing strike, we’ve been looking at ways to mitigate potential employee job loss in North Charleston, including the initial reduction of outside contract labor. We plan to work with our employees to identify temporary redeployment opportunities at other Vought locations, where possible. This activity will require everyone’s patience, focused attention, and best effort to ensure a smooth continuation of required work activities, while continuing to provide customer support.”

LCFs evacuate Charleston

Two of Boeing LCFs left Charleston, SC this morning. The two flight plans filed showed one aircraft heading to Pinal Airpark in Arizona and another heading for Anchorage, Alaska. Here are the flightaware flight plans here and here.

Hurricane Hannah is over Bermuda and the current projected track shows it heading to the Charleston, SC area by Saturday morning. I'm not sure what other preparations Vought, Boeing and Alenia are making for the 787 plant in Charleston.

787 production slow down

News out of Charleston, SC that Vought will temporarily stop producing the rear fuselage barrels for the 787 is the first indication that the bottleneck at Everett may not improve for a few months. An article in Charleston's Post and Courier News quotes Elmer Doty as saying that they do plan on resuming production of the rear fuselages later this year. It looks like Vought's line is as full as it can be especially since they're shipping only one complete rear fuselage section each month. Additionally, Spirit is also slowing its production of 787 forward fuselages.

The production issues and the travelled work all contributed to a bottleneck at Boeing's Everett's plant where scaffolding has to be put up around the air frames that have delivered thus far in order to finish all the travelled work. That as well as other issues has hindered Boeing from pulling out even one shop complete 787.

While the rest of the supply chain seems to be recovering, Boeing is still dealing with the issues left behind from the earlier issues thus the suppliers will have to slow down their production though it does seem that Global Aeronautica does have room and doesn't need to slow down their production of main fuselages.

This production slow down will allow Boeing to catch up with the rest of the supply chain as well as allow the tier one suppliers to ensure that all their respective work packages are appropraitely stuffed when shipped to Everett. However it will probably allow them to deliver only the 25 787 as they've indicated unless there is a significant improvement in the production rate (which would be necessitated by a steep learning curve on the 787 line). Once Boeing's 787 manufacturing technicians are fully up to speed on working on the 787 final assembly line as Boeing has intended (without any travelled work or any other engineering issues) then production can be ramped up to the 10/month or more.

787 Back on Track?

While it is way too soon to say that the 787 program is back on track, recent milestones seem to indicate that Boeing is getting the 787 house (and assembly line) back in order. In the conference call on April 9th, Pat Shanahan had outlined goals or milestones for the 787 program for the remainder of the 2nd quarter of 2008. These include:

* Static airplane will move out of the factory at the end of April to make room for the third flying airplane. Parts for airplane 3 will arrive in Everett by the end of April
* Power on date moved to June 2008* Fatigue airplane will move to its test stand in June shortly followed by parts for airplane #4 to enter final assembly in June* By June 30th will have static and fatigue frames out at their test sites, final assembly begun on airplanes 3 and 4 in Everett, completing systems hardware airworthiness qualifications, finishing safety of flight testing for system hardware and software integration, and receiving flight test systems hardware.

From recent flight made by the LCF and the recent movement of the static test airframe from building 40-26 to 40-23 for the start of static tests, it looks like Boeing is on its way to accomplishing the first goal listed. Parts for Airplane 3 are in Everett and the static frame has been moved out of the 787 final assembly hall. Additionally the fatigue air frame has moved to the third assembly position and LN 2 has moved to the 2nd assembly position thus clearing the way for LN 3 to start final assembly.

While there is some assembly yet to be done on the static airplane, that will be done concurrently with the setup for the static tests. Those tests are expected to start this summer.

Boeing now has two months to get airplane 1 ready for power on and ground testing as well as start assembly of airplane 4 and all the while there are still lingering doubts about the program and if Boeing has been conservative enough with its schedule. As many analysts (and Boeing itself) have said, once they’ve powered on airplane 1 then a significant amount of risk would have been retired and the path should be clear (assuming no major issues that are uncovered during ground testing) to first flight. This is the key metric to watch for in the short term.

One thing that is working in Boeing’s favor (a lesson learned from the A380 delays) is that they and their risk sharing partners took advantage of the delays to wring out the systems in the test labs in Seattle, reduce the travel work sent by the suppliers, and maturing the systems hardware and software (mainly the flight control software). This will go a long way in having a mature airplane at first flight as well as make progress on non-flight testing certification tests and deliverables for the FAA/EASA certification.

Now one month does not a trend make and the real indication of the health of the program will be realized on June 30th. If Boeing provides customers, analysts and shareholders with short term goals for the quarter and it achieves those goals then Boeing management will have come a long way to repairing their image and reputation.

Now I think Boeing was a little too conservative in their time line and they could perhaps achieve first flight earlier. I do think that power on will be achieved by June 30th and that power on testing as well as ground testing and taxi test could take two months. That takes you to August 30th. Boeing can then have first flight in early September...late in the third quarter. Now assuming a 10 month flight testing program and certification brings the time to early July 2009…2nd quarter of 2009 for first delivery and EIS as opposed to 3rd quarter 2009. Is this achievable? Sure but at the same time Boeing has to mature the systems with aggressive testing and carefully manage the production ramp up.

Boeing needs to give Wall Street, customers, and shareholders detailed quarterly goals and milestones that they need to meet in order for the confidence to be rebuilt in the company and in the program. These goals and milestones shouldn’t be for just Boeing itself but also for the partners and suppliers. Already there are reports that Vought will be starting to ship fully stuffed rear fuselages (section 47/48) sometime between June and September (more likely September and with that section will be from Dreamliner #6). Certainly with Boeing buying out Vought’s share of Global Aeronautica, it’ll have more control over what happens there but will allow Boeing to continuously look over Vought’s shoulder.

Going Forward

While in the short term Boeing has made some strides to recovery, there are risks that remain as well as questions about the 787.

Flight Testing and Certification – After power on is accomplished Boeing needs to hope for a relatively smooth flight tests of the airplane if they are to keep to schedule. What will also be critical is Boeing’s change incorporation program. When issues crop up during testing the changes and fixes must be incorporated back from the planes that were built all the way back through the supply chain to the planes that are just starting the production process. How Boeing and the supply base handle all that is going to remain critical to getting production moving. For that reason Boeing won’t be producing 787s in any great numbers until almost all the test flights and certification paperwork is done. Rumors were going around that the FAA is going to force Boeing to do more certification work then previously agreed and that it would mean that EIS wouldn’t occur until 2010. The German magazine that reported this said that Boeing would announce a fourth delay due to the extra certification work in mid May. Both the FAA and Boeing denied the story and there hasn’t been any further news on that. Still issues could come up during flight testing that might force the FAA to ask Boeing to do further modifications and tests to give them satisfaction. At least worries of cold soak tests are put to rest.

Production – With 25 planned deliveries in 2009 Boeing’s big worry after flight testing is ramping up production and catching up with deliveries. Pre-delay, Boeing was planning to deliver 112 787s between May 2008 and December 2009. Now they’re planning on only 25. Assuming that they stay on that schedule they will be behind by 87 airplanes. That’s roughly 4 airplanes per month. Boeing needs to find someway of making up those 87 deliveries. Boeing is starting to plan out a gradual production increase to approximately 10/month by 2012 but how that will resolve the backlog is unclear. Production is also key for future orders as Boeing’s salespeople need to give a time frame to potential (and current customers) about when they can expect their airplanes given these delays. That’s going to be a factor of planned production rates as well as what the suppliers can reasonably be expected to produce.

Weight – Before the delays took the stage as the main issue, the 787s 2% weight gain (about 5000 lbs.). We have not had an update on this issue though previously Boeing said that they expect that the 787 will meet its weight goals by airplane #7. Whether that is still going to be achieved is unclear and good represent risk on only to the -8 but also to the other variants. Already there have been reports that the -9 variant is also overweight and that the fix to the center wing box added some (though negligible) weight gain. Through static, fatigue and flight testing Boeing can identify over engineered structural parts and target them for weight savings. What remains to be seen is how fast those changes can be incorporated into all the produced airplanes if at all. The delay may make it hard for Boeing to achieve the target weight for airplane # 7.

Future Variants – Boeing has pushed back the service entry for the larger -9 variant to 2012, a two year delay and pushed the -3 to an undetermined sate beyond that. Clearly Boeing is looking to make up time to most customers by delivering as many of the -8 as possible (to date they have 646 -8 orders, 207 -9 orders and 43 -3 orders). Also to be determined is the specs and EIS date for the -10. Boeing has put this off for several reasons: 1) They want to know what they’re competing with in terms of the A350-900 and 2) They need to get flight test data in order to see to help design the -10. When they offer the -10 Boeing can be well poised for the A340/777-200ER replacement market. In my opinion an EIS for the -10 cannot be reasonably expected before 2014 at the earliest.

On April 9th Boeing execs gave us details of the delay as well as milestones that they have set of themselves and the program. One thing that was noticeably different was the greater detail this time around. They gave goals that they intend to accomplish between April 9th and June 30th and it would be expected that around early July they will probably give goals that they intend to accomplish for the 3rd quarter of 2008 as well as an overview of what they did and did not accomplish in the 2nd quarter. This transparency goes a long way starting the rebuild confidence in the program and management. It’s not their yet but the fact that they have already accomplished some of the goals that they laid out in the April 9th conference call gives them a foundation to work on.