Monday, May 4, 2009

More 787 movement


When it rains, it pours...I've been using that comment more often in the last few weeks for many reasons. The reason today in this posting is because Dreamliner 2 (ZA002) has left building 40-26 yesterday and made its way to the same paint hangar that Dreamliner 1 had until recently had occupied.

It's getting its paint job though I'm not sure what paint scheme it'll be painted in. There is also no word on where it will go after the paint job...it could go to the flight line, building 40-24 (767 line) or even back to 40-26. It will have to go through the same set of gauntlet tests that Dreamliner 1 is going through.

This also opens up a spot on the 787 (assuming it doesn't go back to 40-26) for Dreamliner 7 (ZA100). It's not known if Dreamliner 4 through 6 have move down one spot on the line or not though I do think that the last two sections for ZA100 should be in soon.
Charles Concklin is gracious enough to allow me to link to his pictures of Dreamliner 2 being rolled to the paint hangar.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Uresh,
Has A0002 completed its factory gauntlet tests yet...was it painted and moved as a step towards the flightline ?...seems hard to believe....or was it moved to create more space and will be tesated elsewhere?

Could you clarify what is occuring with Plane A0002

Uresh said...

Has not done factory gauntlet yet, went into the paint hagar yesterday to getit's first paint job so no it is not painted yet. Don't know where it's going after the paint job is done. It will still have to go through the same tests as ZA001 is going through.

Anonymous said...

It will be painted in the ANA livery. The rudder already has the customer's livery on it.

Uresh said...

Is that a certainty? The rudder was painted well before Boeing listed the test airplanes as unallocated and they may not want to paint the airplane in the color scheme of an airline that it will not go to. Boeing has publically said they're undecided as to what paint scheme will be applied to ZA002 to ZA006. Do you have any confirmation that ZA002 will be painted in ANA colors?

Anonymous said...

Will the factory gauntlet tests for the Z0002 take as long as they did for A0001 ?

Is there any shortening of the process since some , if not all, of the systems have been cleared/remediated with A2001.

For example, will the landing gear test be as incomplete or will have been improved.

Thanks for any clarity

Uresh said...

Hopefully they'll be able to shorten but part of the testing is to replicate the results that were obtained on the testing of ZA001 so that they have increased confidence in the testing. They'll probably shorten the testing after that.

Anonymous said...

At the very least, the vertical fin will be painted to match the rudder, it's possible Boeing could go with the standard Boeing blue livery like ZA001 or all white to cut costs and save weight.