Boeing 787 Dreamliner Nightmare financial disaster ?

Major design changes are to be made to the wing box in Boeing's stalled Dreamliner 787 . This is a major structural component section inside the fuselage where the two wings are joined and acts to hold the plane's wings in place so they don't fold up in flight (it also inorporates a fuel tank) . This is made made by Fuji Heavy Industries at a plant in Nagoya, Japan.

The center wing box was the first large part to be assembled, in June 2006 at the Fuji plant in Nagoya. It has a composite skin and is roughly 17.5 feet long (5.5 m) and 19 feet wide (7.0m).

As part of the assembly, the center wing box is attached to the main landing-gear as well, which is made in a nearby plant in Nagoya by Kawasaki. The completed assembly is then flown from Nagoya to Charleston, S.C., the fuselage assembly hub for the 787.

The Japanese structures, including a section of the forward fuselage made by Kawasaki, are integrated in Charleston with two center fuselage sections made by Alenia of Italy. The entire fuselage section is then flown to Boeing's Everett plant for final assembly.

After 2 delays already announced, no deliveries are being expected to customers in 2008 with some estimates of last quarter 2009 before customers take delivery. (last forecast was 109 planes in 2009)

The changes will also require retrofits to the first several 787s produced, so that Boeing will have to go back and rebuild parts of the planes already assembled.

As a result the certification timeline is still uncertain, as the first plane has yet to fly, and the large number of 787s sold at low prices, combined with rising recurring costs, are steadily eating away at program margins and long-term program profitability.

Steven Udvar-Hazy, chairman and founder of International Lease Financial Corp., (74 Dreamliners on order, 1st delivery already set back 9/ 12 months to late 2010 or early 2011,) said at JPMorgan's aviation and transportation conference in New York on Tuesday that these further delays will push out the aircraft's maiden flight to the fall, three months beyond Boeing's schedule. He added that after its first flight, it could take Boeing an additional year to have the Dreamliner certified.

Hazy also told the conference that the proposed 787-10, a stretched version of the plane that Boeing eventually plans to develop, will require a new center section, a redesigned wing and higher-thrust engines as well as stronger landing gear.

This points both to the concerns of the all up weight discussed in the December web conference and follow on concerns about the landing gear.

Singapore Airlines inaugurated their daily London / Singapore Airbus 380 route on Tuesday. All Singapore Airlines 19 Airbus 380 's are powered by Rolls Royce Trent 900 engines, is the largest and one of the most powerful engines produced by Rolls-Royce, it is the quietest and cleanest engine for the A380.

In Beijing the new hangar that can accommodate four Airbus A380s, or other widebodies, simultaneously has been opened by Ameco Beijing. The hangar, inaugurated on March 19, is 350 meters long and 110 meters wide, a total 70,000 square meters at Beijing Capital International Airport.



UPDATE 25th March 2008 Daily Telegraph reports that Virgin are in discussions with Boeing over the 787 - 9' s with extended range that they have ordered. Propects for the derivative -9 and - 10's are lookong increasingly further down the track.

Tour operator First Choice and British Airways, which has 24 787s on order, also face delivery delays