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Boeing 787 wing flaw extends inside plane

Old 07-30-2009, 05:28 PM
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Default Boeing 787 wing flaw extends inside plane

The wing damage that grounded Boeing's new composite 787 Dreamliner occurred under less stress than previously reported — and is more extensive.
An engineer familiar with the details said the damage happened when the stress on the wings was well below the load the wings must bear to be federally certified to carry passengers.
In addition, information obtained independently and confirmed by a second engineer familiar with the problem shows the damage occurred on both sides of the wing-body join — that is, on the outer wing as well as inside the fuselage.




Boeing news | Boeing 787 wing flaw extends inside plane | Seattle Times Newspaper



Folks....I say this Airplane is TOAST....It will never fly and sad to say may cost many their jobs.


Boeing laughed at the delays for the A-380....Karma....got to watch for it.
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Old 07-30-2009, 05:52 PM
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Doh! YouTube - Airbus A350 vs Boeing 787 - Boeing tongue-in-cheek
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Old 07-30-2009, 06:20 PM
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Gentlemen, lets all wait until the 787 testing is completed and design changes have been implemented. At least Boeing is testing their aircraft designs to the point, and well beyond, that structural damage "will" occur. Airbus on the other hand has a "tail attach" point problem, apparently.

Now, if Airbus had fully tested their tails design, well beyond the point of the pilot being able to tear it off with their feet pushing the rudder pedal, maybe a few hundred people, New York 2001/Atlantic Ocean 2009, would still be alive today. Speculation on my part but something seems fishy about the 2009 Air France crash.

Boeing has been building and designing commercial aircraft since 1916.......DO NOT GIVE UP HOPE! How long has Airbus been around?

Sorry, but I am a believer in the Boeing family of jets. Sure they have had problems with this next generation of "composite" aircraft but it is the first one to be built. I know they will figure it out and make it safe.......

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Old 07-30-2009, 06:28 PM
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I think you're spot on, Boeing has a deep well of engineering talent and despite the 787 program setbacks it will be successful. It was a little humbling to have Joe "Father of the 747" Sutter on my flight yesterday (although great to get the Boeing swag). In a brief chat with him I was reminded of the depth of design and testing that goes on in a new airframe launch.
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Old 07-30-2009, 06:48 PM
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Originally Posted by Boeing717Driver View Post
Boeing has been building and designing commercial aircraft since 1916.......DO NOT GIVE UP HOPE!
This is true. The problem is that a majority of this aircraft was neither designed nor built by Boeing.

Boeing 787 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

After stiff competition, Boeing announced on December 16, 2003, that the 787 would be assembled in Everett, Washington. Instead of building the complete aircraft from the ground up in the traditional manner, final assembly employs just 800 to 1,200 people to join completed sub-assemblies and integrate systems. This is a technique that Boeing has previously used on the 737 program, which involves shipping fuselage barrel sections by rail from Spirit AeroSystems' Wichita, Kansas, facility to Boeing's narrowbody final assembly plant in Renton, Washington. As the major components have many components pre-installed before delivery to Everett, final assembly time is reduced to only three days. This is less than a quarter of the time traditionally needed for Boeing's final assembly process. In order to speed delivery of the 787's major components, Boeing has modified three 747s purchased from Chinese and Taiwanese airlines. Called Dreamlifters, these widened airplanes can house the wings and fuselage of the 787 as well as other smaller parts.


Boeing's Everett Facility, selected as the site of 787 final assembly.Boeing manufactures the 787's tail fin at its plant in Frederickson, Washington, the ailerons and flaps at Boeing Australia, and fairings at Boeing Canada Technology. This was a new and daring step for Boeing, which has historically guarded its techniques for designing and mass producing commercial jetliner wings. For economic reasons, the wings are manufactured by Japanese companies in Nagoya such as Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, which also makes the central wing box. The horizontal stabilizers are manufactured by Alenia Aeronautica in Italy; and the fuselage sections by Global Aeronautica and Vought in Charleston, South Carolina (USA), Kawasaki Heavy Industries in Japan and Spirit AeroSystems, in Wichita, Kansas (USA). The subcontractors are all designing with CATIA V5.

The passenger doors are made by Latécoère (France), and the cargo doors, access doors, and crew escape door are made by Saab (Sweden). Japanese industrial participation is very important to the project, with a 35% work share, and many of the subcontractors supported and funded by the Japanese government. On April 26, 2006, Japanese manufacturer Toray Industries and Boeing announced a production agreement involving $6 billion worth of carbon fiber. The deal is an extension of a contract signed in 2004 between the two companies and eases some concerns that Boeing might have difficulty maintaining its production goals for the 787. On February 6, 2008, TAL Manufacturing Solutions Limited, a subsidiary of the Tata Group (India) announced a deal to deliver floor beams for the 787 from their factory at Mihan, near Nagpur, India to assembly plants in Italy, Japan and the United States.

Messier-Dowty (France) builds the landing gear, which includes titanium forged in Russia, and brake parts from Italy, and Thales supplies the integrated standby flight display and electrical power conversion system. Honeywell and Rockwell-Collins provide flight control, guidance, and other avionics systems, including standard dual head up guidance systems. Future integration of forward-looking infrared is being considered by Flight Dynamics allowing improved visibility using thermal sensing as part of the HUD system, allowing pilots to "see" through the clouds. Connecticut (USA)-based Hamilton Sundstrand provides power distribution and management systems for the aircraft, including manufacture and production of Generator Control Units (GCUs) as well as integration of power transfer systems that can move power from the Auxiliary Power Unit (APU) and the main engines to the necessary parts and machinery of the aircraft. Cold weather test of the APU took place in Alaska.

The first composite fuselage section rolled out in January 2005, and final external design was set in April 2005. On June 30, 2006, Boeing celebrated the start of major assembly of the first 787 at Fuji Heavy Industries' new factory in Handa, Japan, near Nagoya.
The long-term cost of short-term gains made by outsourcing rears its head yet again...
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Old 07-30-2009, 06:53 PM
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"Gentlemen, lets all wait until the 787 testing is completed and design changes have been implemented. At least Boeing is testing their aircraft designs to the point, and well beyond, that structural damage "will" occur. Airbus on the other hand has a "tail attach" point problem, apparently."

Boeing 717, this machine`s problems happened way, way below the 150% that the FAA requires. Supposedly, if you can believe the Seattle newspaper, it happened at or near what could happen in normal service. This program is in deep trouble. I do agree about AirBus. Them Frenchies just can`t seem to make them tails stay on.
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Old 07-30-2009, 06:55 PM
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Point taken. However, Boeing knows "it" takes full responsibility for the final design and production of the competed 787 assembly. Hence they are beating the crap out of it to make sure nothing unforseen happens during the aircrafts normal life expectancy of what, 20/30 years?

Some Airbus components are made here in the US of A, if I am not mistaken, but not the tail sections.

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Old 07-30-2009, 07:13 PM
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Originally Posted by Boeing717Driver View Post
However, Boeing knows "it" takes full responsibility for the final design and production of the competed 787 assembly. Hence they are beating the crap out of it to make sure nothing unforseen happens during the aircrafts normal life expectancy of what, 20/30 years?
Yep, they are beating the crap out of it, just like the Federal Aviation Regulations require them to.

Boeing isn't testing the airplane out of the kindness of their heart - they have to.

My concern is that computational analysis is supposed to figure this out before the design is built. Why wasn't this figured out months/years ago?
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Old 07-30-2009, 08:54 PM
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Originally Posted by flyths1 View Post
Folks....I say this Airplane is TOAST....It will never fly and sad to say may cost many their jobs.


Boeing laughed at the delays for the A-380....Karma....got to watch for it.
Interesting. I disagree with you 100%.

The issue happened beyond that the airplane will see in normal service, but before the Ultimate load limit. The problem was with delamination.

"The delamination of the composite-plastic material isn't likely to lead to catastrophic failure of the airplane, but it would require constant monitoring and potentially costly repairs by the airlines."

They already have a fix for the issue.
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Old 07-30-2009, 08:58 PM
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Originally Posted by iaflyer View Post
My concern is that computational analysis is supposed to figure this out before the design is built. Why wasn't this figured out months/years ago?
Because composite is relatively new technology and their computer models for it might not be 100% accurate. Boeing took a big risk using composites for the majority of the plane.
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