l****z
发帖数: 29846 | 1 Boeing to Build Stretched 787-10 in South Carolina
Jet to Be Built Exclusively at Its Nonunion Facility
By Jon Ostrower
Updated July 30, 2014 1:51 p.m. ET
Boeing Co. BA -0.19% plans to build a new version of its flagship 787
Dreamliner jet exclusively at its nonunion factory in South Carolina, a
senior executive said, marking a significant upgrade in the role of a
facility that has fueled tensions with the company's labor unions.
The 787-10, a longer version of the Dreamliner that is scheduled for
delivery in 2018, will be the first Boeing jetliner model to be built solely
in a nonunion factory. It will mean not only increased output but a more
sophisticated role for the plant, which Boeing broke ground on five years
ago after decades of assembling its jetliners in its unionized base in
Washington state and California.
Larry Loftis, Boeing vice president and general manager of the 787 program,
said in an interview that the decision on the 787-10 was dictated by the
stretched length of the jet's midfuselage, which contains the passenger
cabin. For the current Dreamliner, that midbody section is assembled in
South Carolina from pieces flown in from Italian and Japanese plants. Then
it is either flown to Everett, Wash., or rolled to the adjacent assembly
line in South Carolina to be mated with parts from around the world in
building the final jet.
On the 787-10, however, that midbody section is 114 feet long, or 10 feet
longer than the same section of the next largest Dreamliner, the 787-9,
meaning it won't fit into the fleet of modified 747 aircraft that Boeing
uses to fly its big jet parts from factory to factory, said Mr. Loftis.
"It makes shipment [by air] really not practical," he said.
Boeing has long had strained ties with organized labor. Its decision in 2009
to build the South Carolina factory, which sits in the city of North
Charleston, infuriated its main union, which claimed the move was
retaliation for past strikes. Last year, Boeing threatened to build another
new widebody jet, the 777X, outside its Washington base if unions didn't
agree to concessions in a new contract. The two sides reached a deal in 2009.
This month, Boeing Chief Executive Jim McNerney apologized for remarks that
angered workers, in which he said, in response to a question about his
potential retirement, that he planned to keep working and "the employees
will still be cowering."
Mr. Loftis said that the planned move for the 787-10 comes as the company is
expanding production of other models in its Washington facilities, meaning
both its unionized and nonunion workforces are getting more work.
Boeing's two biggest unions, the International Association of Machinists and
Aerospace Workers and the Society of Professional Engineering Employees in
Aerospace, didn't immediately respond to requests for comment.
The 787-10 is crucial to Boeing's plans to extend sales and enhance the
profitability of the Dreamliner, which has won more than 1,000 orders with
its greater fuel efficiency and other advanced features. That program also
incurred 3 1/2 years of delays and billions of dollars in cost overruns
during its development because of design and manufacturing issues.
At 224-feet long, the new version will be able to carry around 320
passengers, 15% more than the 787-9 and a third more than the original 787-8
, which began commercial flights in late 2011. The 787-10 also will have a
list price before discounts of $288.7 million, 36% more than the 787-8.
Since it started selling the 787-10 in June 2013, Boeing has accumulated 132
orders from four airlines and two lessors.
The plan for the 787-10 will be a challenge for the South Carolina plant.
The facility so far has assembled only jets that were already in production
in Washington. Production of a new jet model can bring unfamiliar changes
and new challenges.
Mr. Loftis said Boeing is counting on design and manufacturing similarities
between the 787-9 and longer 787-10 to smooth the jet's introduction to
South Carolina in 2017. The site has struggled to increase output and
deliver fully completed sections to the final assembly sites.
Mr. Loftis said Boeing will have built more than 500 Dreamliners by the time
the 787-10 is introduced.
Boeing now builds 10 787s a month: three in South Carolina and seven in
Washington. The total will grow to 12 a month in 2016, and later 14 a month
before the end of the decade. All of the increases will come in South
Carolina, which will build five and then seven Dreamliners monthly,
including the new 787-10, said Mr. Loftis. |
|
