The Boeing 787 Dreamliner is a mid-sized, wide-body, twin-engine jet airlinerBoeing Commercial Airplanes. Its maximum seating capacity in a 1-class seating is between 290 to 330 passengers depending on variant. Boeing stated that it will be more fuel-efficient than earlier Boeing airliners and will be the first major airliner to use composite materials for most of its construction.[3] currently under development by Boeing's development of the 787 is also innovative and large scale collaborative management approach with suppliers.
On January 28, 2005, the aircraft's development designation 7E7 was changed to the 787.[4] Early released concept images depicted a radical design with highly curved surfaces. On April 26, 2005, a year after the launch of the program, the final and more conventional external 787 design was set.
Boeing featured its first 787 in a roll-out ceremony on July 8, 2007, at its Everett assembly factory, by which time it had become the fastest-selling wide-body airliner in history with nearly 600 orders.[5] A total of 850 Boeing 787s have been ordered by 56 customers as of June 2009.[6] Originally scheduled to enter service in May 2008, production has been delayed multiple times and as of May 2009 was planned to enter into service in 2010.[7][8][9] The aircraft's maiden flight, originally planned for September 2007, has been delayed a number of times.[10]
Background
In the late 1990s, Boeing began considering a replacement for the 767 when sales weakened due to the competing Airbus A330-200. As sales of the Boeing 747-400Sonic Cruiser747X. The Sonic Cruiser would have achieved higher speeds (approximately Mach 0.98) while burning fuel at the same rate as the existing 767. The 747X, competing with the Airbus A380, would have lengthened the 747-400 and improved efficiency by using a composite supercritical wing. also slowed, the company proposed two new aircraft, which were the and the
Market interest for the 747X was tepid, but the Sonic Cruiser had brighter prospects. Several major airlines in the United States, including Continental Airlines, initially showed enthusiasm for the Sonic Cruiser concept, although they also expressed concerns about the operating cost.[11] However, by decreasing travel time they would be able to increase customer satisfaction and aircraft utilization.
The September 11, 2001 attacks upended the global airline market. Airlines could not justify large capital expenditures, and increased petroleum prices made them more interested in efficiency than speed. The worst-affected airlines, those in the United States, were considered the most likely customers of the Sonic Cruiser. Boeing offered airlines the option of using the airframe for either higher speed or increased efficiency, but the high projected airframe costs caused demand to slacken further. Then the company officially canceled the Sonic Cruiser on December 20, 2002 and switched tracks by announcing an alternative product, the 7E7, on January 29, 2003, naming the executives to run the new jetliner program.[3][12]
Design phase
The replacement for the Sonic Cruiser project was dubbed the "7E7"[13] (with a development code name of "Y2"). The "E" was said to stand for various things, depending upon the audience. To some, it stood for "efficiency", to others it stood for "environmentally friendly". In the end, Boeing claimed it merely stood for "Eight", after the aircraft was eventually rechristened "787".[3] A public naming competition was also held, for which out of 500,000 votes cast online the winning title was Dreamliner.[14]
On April 26, 2004, the Japanese airline All Nippon Airways (ANA) became the launch customer for the 787, then still known as the 7E7, by announcing a firm order for 50 aircraft to be delivered at the end of 2008. ANA's order included 30 787-3, 290–330 seat, one-class domestic aircraft, and 20 787-8, long-haul, 210–250 seat, two-class aircraft for regional international routes such as Tokyo Narita–Beijing. The aircraft will allow ANA to open new routes to mid-sized cities not previously served, such as Denver, Montreal, and Boston.
Early concept images of the 787 included rakish cockpit windows, a dropped nose and a distinctive "shark-fin" vertical stabilizer. The final styling of the aircraft was more conservative, the fin appearing visually similar to those of aircraft currently in service. The nose and cockpit windows were also changed to a more conventional form.
The 787-3 and 787-8 were to be the initial variants, with the 787-9 entering service in 2010. Boeing initially priced the 787-8 variant at US$120 million, a low figure that surprised the industry. Boeing has since increased the price twice. As of 2007, the list price was $146–151.5 million for the 787-3, $157–167 million for the 787-8 and $189–200 million for the 787-9.[15] Customer-announced orders and commitments for the 787 reached 237 aircraft during the first year of sales, with firm orders numbering 677 by the 787's premiere on July 8, 2007, and well before entry into service.[16] This makes the 787 the fastest-selling wide-body airliner ever before entry into service.[5][17]
The 787 uses the same technology proposed for the Sonic Cruiser in a more conventional configuration (see Features). Boeing claims the 787 will be near to 20% more fuel-efficient than the 767.[18] One third of the efficiency gain will come from the engines, another third from aerodynamic improvements and the increased use of lighter weight composite materials, and the final third from advanced systems. The most notable contribution to efficiency is the new electrical architecture which replaces bleed air and hydraulic power sources with electrically powered compressors and pumps, as well as completely eliminates pneumatics and hydraulics from some subsystems (e.g., engine starters or brakes).[19] Technology from the Sonic Cruiser and 787 will be used as part of Boeing's project to replace its entire airliner product line, an endeavor called the Yellowstone Project (of which the 787 is the first stage).[20]
Boeing selected two engine types, the General Electric GEnx and Rolls-Royce Trent 1000, to power the 787, both placed in pods. Significantly, this leaves Pratt & Whitney, which normally has an entrant in the market, unable to offer one of its engines to 787 customers. According to United Technologies Corporation CEO George David, Pratt & Whitney "couldn't make the business case work for that engine."[21] For the first time in commercial aviation, both engine types will have a standard interface with the aircraft, allowing any 787 to be fitted with either a GE or Rolls-Royce engine at any time. Engine interchangeability makes the 787 a more flexible asset to airlines, allowing them to change easily from one manufacturer's engine to the other's if required.[3] The engine market for the 787 is estimated at US$40 billion over the next 25 years. The launch engine for all three current 787 variants is the Rolls-Royce Trent 1000. Airbus has offered the competing A350Rolls Royce Trent turbofan, the Trent XWB. powered by a development of the
The launch of a new airliner can draw criticism from competitors. The 787 is no exception, as Airbus's John Leahy attempted to refute all of Boeing's claims. Leahy openly criticized the large-scale use of composites in the 787's fuselage as being "rushed and ridiculous". Despite this criticism, Boeing built and tested the first composite section while examining the Sonic Cruiser concept nearly five years before,[22] making the 787 a significantly refined product.[23]
The 787 underwent extensive wind tunnel testing at Boeing's Transonic Wind Tunnel, QinetiQ's five-meter wind tunnel at Farnborough, UK, and NASA Ames Research Center's wind tunnel, as well as at the French aerodynamics research agency, ONERA.
Production
See also: Production of the Boeing 787
After stiff competition, Boeing announced on December 16, 2003, that the 787 would be assembled in Everett, Washington.[3] 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.[24] 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.[25][26][27] In order to speed delivery of the 787's major components, Boeing has modified three 747sDreamlifters, these widened airplanes can house the wings and fuselage of the 787 as well as other smaller parts. purchased from Chinese and Taiwanese airlines. Called
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.[citation needed]Japanese companies in Nagoya such as Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, which also makes the central wing box.[28] The horizontal stabilizers are manufactured by Alenia Aeronautica in Italy; and the fuselage sections by Global Aeronautica and Boeing Charleston[29] in Charleston, South Carolina (USA), Kawasaki Heavy Industries in Japan and Spirit AeroSystems, in Wichita, Kansas (USA).[30] The subcontractors are all designing with CATIA V5.[31] For economic reasons, the wings are manufactured by
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.[32] 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.[3] 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.[33][34]
Messier-Dowty (France) builds the landing gear, which includes titanium forged in Russia, and brake parts from Italy,[35] and Thales supplies the integrated standby flight display and electrical power conversion system.[3] 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.[3] 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.[36] On December 6, 2006, Boeing conducted a "virtual rollout" of the 787 in which a simulation of the 787's manufacturing process was shown publicly. Performed using the project's Catia design tool, the simulation was intended to discover production issues prior to assembly of the first airframe, when they are cheaper to fix.[37]
On January 12, 2007, first major assemblies, forward fuselage, center wing, and center wheel well built by FHI and KHI were shipped on Dreamlifters from Nagoya, Japan. They were delivered to Global Aeronautica in Charleston, South Carolina, on January 15.[38] On March 14, 2007, the first production vertical tail fin was rolled out at Boeing's Composite Manufacturing Center in Frederickson, Washington.[39] On April 16, the first production all-composite nose-and-cockpit section (Section 41) was rolled out at Spirit Aerosystem's plant in Wichita, Kansas.[40] Comprising the cockpit area, nose landing gear well, and the forward-most section of the passenger area, this oval-shaped section is 21 feet (6.4 m) in height, 19 feet (5.74 m) in width and 42 feet (12.8 m) in length. A Dreamlifter delivered the first horizontal stabilizer manufactured by Alenia Aeronautica at its facility in Grottaglie, Italy to Everett on April 24.[41] On May 8, 2007, Vought rolled out completed rear Sections 47 and 48 from its factory in Charleston, SC.[42] The sections were flown via the Dreamlifter to Everett, arriving on May 11 along with the all-composite forward section (section 41) manufactured by Spirit AeroSystems.[43]
The Dreamlifter was also used to ship the first 787 carbon-fiber wings from Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd.'s factory in Nagoya to Everett on May 15, 2007.[44][45][46] Rolls-Royce shipped the first pair of Trent 1000 engines from their Derby, UK facilities on schedule on June 7,[47] and on June 26, 2007 LN1/ZA001 had finished major assembly and was towed to the paint hangar in the early morning.[48] The final major assembly, the integrated midbody fuselage, followed the next day, allowing 787 final assembly to began on May 21.
An important milestone in the launch of the 787 was the on-time certification of the Rolls-Royce Trent 1000 engine on August 7, 2007 by European and US regulators.[49] The alternative GE GEnx-1B engine achieved certification on March 31, 2008.[50] On August 20, 2007, Hamilton Sundstrand stated that it had delivered its first two cabin air conditioning packs to Boeing for the initial flight-test of the 787 Dreamliner.[51] On June 20, 2008, the 787 team achieved "Power On" of the first aircraft, powering and testing the aircraft's electrical supply and distribution systems.[20]
In addition to the flight test aircraft, Boeing has also constructed a non-flight 787 airframe which has been built without engines or horizontal stabilizers and will be used for static testing. The composite wing may not be broken during the tests, as this would require an expensive cleanup afterwards.[52] On September 27, 2008, over a period of nearly two hours, the fuselage was successfully tested at 14.9 psi (102.7 kPa), this being 150 percent of the maximum pressure expected in commercial service (i.e., when the plane is at maximum cruising altitude).[53] In December 2008 FAA passed the maintenance program for the 787.[54]
On May 3, 2009, the first test 787 was moved to the flight line following extensive factory testing. The tests included landing gear swings, systems integration verification, and a total run through of the first flight. Before first flight, the test aircraft must be put through additional power and systems tests, including engine run-ups. Following these and high-speed taxi tests, the maiden flight will occur.[55] Boeing spent most of May 2009 conducting tests on the first 787 prototype in preparation for the first flight. The aircraft's engines were started for the first time on May 21, 2009.
Although the flight test schedule has not been announced, the original program called for a 9-month flight test campaign. In September 2007, after announcing delays, Mike Bair said that Boeing would keep the Certification Date using six flight-test 787s at a rate of 120 FT hours per month, higher than the 70-80 FT hours per month used in previous planes.[56] Boeing's previous major aircraft, the 777, took 11 months with nine aircraft flying 7000 FT Hours, partly to demonstrate 180-min ETOPS, one of its main features.[57]
Boeing decided to change its basic assembly approach beginning with the 787. Rather than receive individual parts and assemble them in Everett, Washington, Boeing assigned its subcontractors to do more assembly themselves and deliver completed subsystems to Boeing. Boeing would then perform final assembly. While the major benefits of this approach are a leaner and simpler assembly line and lower inventory, its success depends on the degree to which suppliers can perform the extra work. Some subcontractors have had difficulty completing the extra work, because they could not procure the needed parts, perform the subassembly on schedule, or both. The remaining assembly work is left for Boeing to complete and is referred to as "traveled work".[58][59][60]
Boeing premiered the first 787 at a rollout ceremony on July 8, 2007, which matches the aircraft's designation in the US-style month-day-year format (7/08/07).[61][62] Boeing had originally planned for a first flight by the end of September 2007,[63] but on September 5 announced a three-month delay, blaming a shortage of fasteners as well as incomplete software.[64] However, some of the aircraft's major systems had not been installed at that time, and many parts were attached with temporary non-aerospace fasteners requiring their later replacement with flight fasteners.
On October 10, 2007, a second three-month delay to the first flight and a six-month delay to first deliveries was announced. Boeing cited problems with its foreign and domestic supply chain for the delay, especially the ongoing fastener shortage, the lack of documentation from overseas suppliers, and continuing delays with the flight guidance software.[65][66][67] Less than a week later, the 787 program manager was replaced, although the delivery delays were not cited as a reason for the change.[68]
On January 16, 2008, Boeing announced a third three-month delay to the first flight of the 787, with deliveries to launch customer All Nippon Airways postponed until early 2009. The company said that insufficient progress had been made on the factory floor to complete work that was originally planned to be carried out by suppliers.[69]
On March 28, 2008, Boeing announced that it plans to buy Vought Aircraft Industries' interest in Global Aeronautica, owner of the South Carolina plant that manufacturers major portions of the 787's fuselage. The purchase will make the assembly plant a 50-50 joint venture between Boeing and Italy’s Alenia Aeronautica.[70]
On April 9, 2008, Boeing officially announced a fourth delay, shifting the maiden flight to the fourth quarter of 2008, and delaying initial deliveries by around 15 months to the third quarter of 2009. The 787-9 variant was postponed to 2012 and the 787-3 variant will follow but has no firm delivery date.[71] The new schedule included extra time in the testing phase to accommodate unforeseen delays.[72][73][74][75] Information subsequent to the announcement indicated that the production ramp-up would also be slower than previously expected, with only 25 aircraft delivered by the end of 2009 compared to the 120 originally planned.[76] Later deliveries were expected to be delayed by up to 30 months.[77] While the April 2008 announcement did not directly address delivery schedules, the production rates had previously been planned to increase to 10 per month by 2010, and possibly as high as 16 per month thereafter.
The program was further delayed by a Boeing machinists strike during September and October 2008. On November 4, 2008, the company announced another delay, this time caused by the incorrect installation of some of the structurally important fasteners, stating that the first test flight would not be accomplished in the fourth quarter of 2008.[78] Boeing continued to emphasize that the new delay could be attributed directly to the strike.[79] After assessing the 787 program schedule with its suppliers,[80] Boeing confirmed on 11 December 2008 that the first flight would be delayed until the second quarter of 2009.[81]
On May 4, 2009, a press report indicated that customers will face additional delivery delays of up to six months, because Boeing is not expected to reach its target production rate of 10 aircraft per month until mid-2013.[82] The first 787 to enter commercial service is due to be delivered to All Nippon Airways in February 2010.[83]
On June 15, 2009, during the Paris Air Show, Boeing said that the Boeing 787 would make its first flight within two weeks. However, on June 23, 2009, Boeing issued a press release stating that the first flight is postponed "due to a need to reinforce an area within the side-of-body section of the aircraft".[84] Boeing confirmed that no new dates for the first flight or deliveries will be forthcoming for several weeks.[85] On July 30, 2009, Seattle Times reported that the structural problem of the wing was worse than stated in the company's June 23 press release.[86]
In an effort to gain more control over the supply chain, Boeing, in July 2009, agreed to purchase Vought's facility in North Charleston, S.C. that makes 787 fuselage sections, for a total cost of $1 billion.[87] Low speed taxi tests were completed on July 7, 2009.[88]
On August 14, 2009, it was reported Boeing had halted work on two fuselage sections of the 787 on June 23, 2009 after tiny wrinkles were discovered in the composite fuselage sections made by Italian aerospace company Alenia Aeronautica. The affected two sections make up the middle portion of the fuselage and involve 23 aircraft beginning with the seventh 787. Boeing states that the problem is minor and that patches will be installed to increase strength. The repairs will have little effect of production and will not affect 2009 deliveries. The Boeing said a new 787 schedule will be provided by the end of September 2009.[89]
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