Boeing 787 enters its final assembly

Boeing 787 enters its final assembly

EVERETT — The 787 Dreamliner, The Boeing Co.’s first all-new jetliner in more than a dozen years, has entered final assembly at the company’s factory here. But it will be a challenge to get the plane ready for its first flight by late August.Some electrical wiring and systems won’t be installed until after that first plane is officially unveiled to the world July 8, said Scott Strode, vice president of airplane definition and production for the 787 program.

“A high level of systems still have to be installed,” Strode told reporters Monday at a factory ceremony to mark the start of final assembly.

“It is our objective that it will fly when it’s ready, when it’s safe to fly,” he said when asked about meeting the late August target date for first flight.

“It is always hard to gauge how long that takes,” he said.

Despite the challenges ahead, Strode said he does not see any problems that would delay the official rollout in July.

But that maiden flight will be a much better barometer of how well things are going on the program than getting the plane ready for its public coming-out party.

The first flight starts a critical test program that will lead to the jet’s certification to carry passengers. Boeing is supposed to deliver the first Dreamliner — the seventh production plane after six test planes — to All Nippon Airways of Japan next May.

The industry is watching closely to see if Boeing can do what Airbus did not — deliver an all-new plane on time. Wiring problems have delayed the giant A380’s entry into service by nearly two years.

“If all the systems testing and power-on work goes well, we will get close to that,” Strode said of having the first flight by late August.

“If we get into issues we have to solve … it could take longer. But we will do (the first flight) when we are ready.”

Boeing had always figured that in order to get the wings and fuselage sections of the first plane delivered to Everett this month so final assembly could begin, there would be a lot of “travel work.”

The large composite structures for the first plane are missing much of the electrical wiring and hydraulic systems, for example. This work will eventually be done by Boeing’s partners before the structures are delivered to Everett for final assembly. But for the first few planes, Boeing workers must install much of the wiring.

“We had planned to do that for months,” Strode said of the late start on wiring and systems installation.

But he acknowledged, as the Seattle P-I reported last week, that the structures for the first 787 arrived with thousands of temporary fasteners, which help hold a plane together.

“The fasteners are a bigger challenge than we anticipated,” Strode said. Not only is the fastener supply chain stretched tightly, but the 787 requires many unique fasteners.

“They are being ordered into an industry that is already running at a high level of capacity,” Strode said. “It’s challenging. … We were surprised at how much detailed management we have had to do on all those little fasteners to get them here. But we are getting them here.”

There are also workmanship problems with some of the large structures, including the horizontal stabilizer, manufactured by Boeing’s partners, he acknowledged.

But Strode also said that Boeing is very happy with the quality of the all-important wire bundles that will be used in the first plane.

The last of those wire bundles will be delivered this week Strode said.

“In terms of the quality, we are pleased with where we are,” he said. But even though some of the wiring in the wings and cockpit was completed before those sections arrived in Everett, the bulk of the wiring installation remains.

Parts are already starting to arrive in Everett for the second 787, Strode said, which will be used for static ground tests. That means it will not have to be stuffed with the systems needed for the flight-test jets.

Boeing will use three shifts of workers to get the first 787 finished. It has brought in workers from its other airplane programs, such as the 777, to help with the 787. He said Boeing has tried to be careful so it does not disrupt production of its other jets.

But the majority of the 787 workers are new hires, Strode said.

Boeing won’t talk specifics about 787 employment, saying only that final assembly eventually will require 700 to 1,200 workers.

The 787 program represents a new way of building commercial jetliners. The plane will be assembled from six large composite structures that are carried to Everett on a modified 747 known as the large cargo freighter or Dreamlifter. Those structures are the forward, center and aft fuselage sections, the wings, the horizontal stabilizer and the vertical fin.

All six sections are joined in the first of three stations on the factory floor. Lasers in the rafters of the factory provide a guide for the sections to be in the exact spot for assembly.

Gone is the large fixed tooling and overhead cranes used for assembly of Boeing’s other planes. The 787 tooling is all movable.

Workers have nicknamed that first workstation where all the large structures come together the “big bang,” said Brennan Dunlap, one of the 787 tooling engineers.

The biggest tool used for that work is called the MOATT, which is short for “mother of all tools tower.” It acts like a giant clamshell to grab, lift and attach the rear fuselage sections, horizontal stabilizer and vertical fin to the rest of the plane.

The engines and landing gear are attached at station two, and power is turned on to the plane and systems are tested. Systems installation is supposed to be complete by station three, along with the testing.

Boeing will add a fourth station for future production growth.

Eventually, Boeing hopes to deliver a finished Dreamliner after only three days in final assembly. It should be able to reduce the flow time to six days in final assembly by the 100th plane, said to Steve Westby, vice president of manufacturing and quality for the 787 program.

But for now, Boeing is focused on meeting those early deadlines — rollout and first flight.

Asked what keeps him up at night, Strode had a one-word answer: “Time.” Then he added, “There are a lot of things left to do in a short amount of time.”