After several delays the No2 Dreamliner in the 787 flight test fleet has been doing taxying tests at Everett.
On the same day as this perplexing item appeared on Daily Finance, an on-line business news service.
What makes it perplexing is the equivocal response from Boeing as quoted in the story.
Surely it could state that the 787 is capable of being pressurised, OK, even pressurized?
If it can’t be done the program is dead. It is a ‘Yes/No’ situation, and it would be appalling and astonishing if that part of the report is correct.
Boeing has been asked for an unequivocal response to that claim, and also to the reported issue with electrical systems.
21 August Boeing responds:
We told Cohen that someone was feeding him bad information. The 787’s systems are working, including the environmental control system that pressurises the airplane. We are continuing to improve and mature the systems, as is normal for a development program.
We have a problem giving any credence to a story that clearly identified the source as one person who the writer has spoken two once and e-mailed with no other substantiation. Both Boeing and Hamilton Sundstrand said there was no basis in fact for the claim.
The response has been added to the 787 statement log. It is also very welcome, as is the mention of credence in any context.
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Two more years to develop the Boeing 787 Dreamliner would mean a devastating blow to both Boeing and the airlines. But it’s no wonder in the current state of affairs, with the wing breaking, the skin wrinkling, the electrical system kaput, and the “unique no-bleed” air system a failure.
If Boeing was straight and honest, and announced it needed a further 2 years to develop the 787, then airlines would be cancelling orders in droves. But Boeing instead issues announcements of many smaller incremental slippages, which for some reason keeps the airlines tagging along for the ride.
It was bizarre that Qantas CEO Alan Joyce yesterday announced he believes the 787 will fly on time. Incredibly, he must take Boeing’s word at face value. What, is he living in Dreamland?
Well, if the airlines can have ” rolling technical delays” of 15 minutes or more at a time, so that their customer, the paying passengers have to wait and wait, why can’t BOEING pull the same ” rolling technical delay ” stunt on their customers?
Must admit, that this saga of the B787 certainly has dragged BOEING’s credibility way down.
I recall reading that Qantas has received substantial penalty payments from Boeing due to delays to the 787. Given that Qantas doesn’t really need the aircraft until the world economy picks up, it probably thinks that it’s onto a winner by being paid to not have planes it doesn’t want.
Pressurising an all composite fuselage of the size of the B787 was always going to be a design challenge, as was the case with the much smaller Lear Fan, that from memory due to the additional movement of composite material compared with metal under differential air pressure, had significant problems with effective door sealing.
Interesting to hear Boeing’s absolute categorical denial of any problem with the 787’s Environmental Control System (ECS). Also, other media are reporting that Qantas CEO Alan Joyce was assured by Boeing only days ago that the first 787 flight will be this year. When the first flight eventually happens, we should ask if it was pressurised!
Now that its hurting their pocketbook the execs are fighting back….cutting air travel is a real sign of genius. But it appears to me they are also pushing harder in the direction they took in engineering. That is, do cheap crude engineering analysis with foreign sweatshops, new grads and nonengineers. For example, stress analysis used to be a challenging job for someone with an engineering degree, talent, and many years of good experience. Not anymore at Boeing and Airbus. Engineers will deny this (but they know its true) but the analysis on the 787 is largely just crude computer models with the results run through simplistic programs and spreadsheets. The corps like this because anyone can do it. You don’t need a degree or experience. The downsides are the accuracy (affecting weight, durability, [part performance, and even safety), lack of insight and intelligence, and cost of redoing the cumbersome process when changes occur. The lack of experienced intelligent eyes on the analysis caused the center wing delay (a basic model error), the stringer runout failure (gee, we saw a hotspot in the model but never addressed it…) and will cause many many more problems later when weight saving is attempted and the planes are in service. Imagine a sustaining engineer when he sees the stress reports…HAH!
Boeing’s reply: “We have a problem giving any credence to a story that clearly identified the source as one person…”.
How can Boeing talk about “credence”? The public, and Boeing’s shareholders, can give little credence to any official statements coming from Boeing. Boeing’s own statements, such as at the last Paris Air Show, when it said the 787 would fly in a matter of days, was misleading (maybe outright deceitful). The most accurate information has been from blogs such as FlightBlogger, and if Boeing was truthful and trustworthy we wouldn’t have to rely on leaks to find out what’s going on.
“who the writer has spoken two once”
Now that’s something that I might have typed
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