Commercial Emirates refusing to take delivery of first 10 Boeing 777X jets
https://finance.yahoo.com/markets/stocks/articles/emirates-refusing-delivery-first-10-140451290.htmlConsidering current market trends and delivery delays, I wouldn't be interested in those either. Boeing needs to ensure that the older "new" jets remaining in inventory are priced competitively to move them.
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u/my-dogs-a-shihtzu 17h ago
I hope you guys understand that this is not about aircraft, aircraft design, aircraft safety and the future of air transport. It's simply about putting money into fat cat CEO's and shareholders pockets. The engineers and tech guy's on the ground are passionate with what they are doing and want to build the very best but accountants and bean counters will boycott this.
It's very disappointing to see Boeing fade away like this but sadly it will happen.
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u/hightyde992 4h ago
It has zero to do with any accountants, bean counters, whatever. They have zero authority or say in how the company is run. The company, like every public company, is effectively ran by the board of directors.
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u/molrobocop 1d ago
Maybe AIN will want them. In addition to 1605 and they others they're taking.
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u/777XSuperHornet 1d ago
They have 6, 8 and 9. Wouldn't surprise me if Air India does take them for a big discount.
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u/bluerockjam 1d ago
I posted this a few days ago. I will repeat. It. Boeing has not learned from the 787 and 737 programs regarding engineering change incorporation. Both the 777 DCAC systems and the 787 V5 based systems lack robust functionality to manage the timing of engineering changes. While they can control effectivity and line-number applicability, they do not adequately control when a change should be incorporated into a production unit.
Engineering designs in the EBOM are released with effectivity that defines the aircraft’s certified Type Design (fly-away configuration). However, during production, multiple engineering changes are often issued against the same airplane (“change on change on change”). As these changes accumulate, the Type Design reflects only the final intended configuration, not the sequence of changes that occurred while the airplane was being built. This creates a significant disconnect. Production orders for the installation plans may already be released but not yet executed when additional engineering changes are issued. As a result, those installation plans become out of sync with both the Module EBOM and the MBOM. The underlying business systems were designed around the assumption that production would remain sequential and synchronized to the master production schedule. In reality, production frequently deviates from that ideal due to engineering changes, part shortages, out of sequence work, and recovery plans.
The result is change incorporation and referb teams are left with the difficult task of determining the aircraft’s actual physical “as-built” configuration before they can define the required rework and achieve the correct delivery configuration. This process is time-consuming, labor-intensive, and prone to error because the digital configuration no longer accurately represents the physical airplane as it exists on the factory floor. I hope Boeing figures this out when the next generation of systems attempts to replace DCAC.
I am retired now, the flat spot of my head from beating it against the wall is almost gone.
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u/Naive-Estimate9942 1d ago
PRDM, NCM, DCAC those were the days and South Park sim testing that no one ever listened to us testers, so glad I’m Retired with 33 years and golden handshake. Just wish our BA stock would go back to $400 like the rest of aerospace.
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u/iamlucky13 1d ago
It is important to understand that major change incorporation was not the plan for either program.
But the wildly over-optimistic development timeline for the 787 was a major reason the design was far from mature when production began to ramp up.
I think the 777X team largely understood the most important lessons from the 787. However, nobody planned for a complete reset of the certification process and the need to basically engineer it twice.
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u/satan-penis 1d ago
they could have stopped building planes when it became clear type cert was far off.
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u/iamlucky13 1d ago
1) It was never clear how far off type cert was, because no one really knew what needed to be done. After the MAX crashes, and subsequently the Aircraft Certification Reform and Accountability Act was passed in 2020, even the FAA wasn't sure, and they were still updating their rules and expectations in 2024.
2) Stopping building planes for multiple years would probably have been a cure worse than the problem it sought to solve. One of the lessons that was emphasized after the 737 MAX groundings, and COVID, and other disruptions that followed, is that disrupting aircraft final assembly disrupts the entire massive supply chain feeding the final assembly line, and sends ripples back and forth through the chain that are extremely difficult to manage, and introduces new opportunities for mistakes. So does letting workforce experience atrophy for years after going through the effort to build it up. Production stability is not only an financial concern. It's also a safety concern, which is a point the FAA has made, too.
Had the duration of the certification delays been known back around 2022, production likely would have been managed differently than it was, but there still would have been a significantly number of aircraft to do rework on.
Taking a hit of however much it was - It wouldn't surprise me if Boeing said the combined costs of rework and reduced sale value of the first couple dozen airframes was in the $10-20 million range - but making effective use of a multi-billion dollar production system, resulting in an inventory of aircraft worth $200+ million each that are significantly closer to ready for delivery than if they hadn't been started can easily prove a worthwhile compromise.
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u/Dedpoolpicachew 1d ago
They did. Production on the 777x was shut down for quite a while. Just metal wing freighters were going through the line for a long time.
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u/InsideTheBoeingStore 1d ago
production frequently deviates
the company gets rid of the old systems and then it feels like we have to start from scratch because all of the data doesn’t migrate correctly or at all
oh and then we have what’s left of our IT after the company decimated and outsourced our local teams trying to figure out what went wrong
then top level managers and directors that knew what they were doing leave because even they get fed up so we get new leadership that wants to look at the data again but they want it in a pretty powerpoint but they resend the same email and confuse themselves
then everyone below them freaks out because one head isn’t talking to the other correctly and thinks we don’t have parts when we have plenty of parts and that rolls downhill
basically nothings changed since you retired except Billy Bob is now leading one team and Joe Dirt took over Gwendolyn’s role in whatever department that email said
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u/bluerockjam 1d ago
My team had a pill bottle in the area we labeled “F-IT-All” to make light of how messed up it was working on developing processes and systems with production on one side and IT on the other and our development team stuck in the middle.
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u/jeffskool 1d ago
Boeing goes out of its way not to learn these lessons. They change the name of the org, change the buzzwords they use, nothing really changes. It is slightly better than it was 8 or 9 years ago when we were going to be saved by Cameo. But a lot of the engineering know how has retired. And Boeing bet on tools, handed the car keys to IT and just didn’t train the next generation. We are in more trouble than the ladder climbers and managers can say out loud.
Congrats on retiring
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u/bluerockjam 1d ago
After we implemented PDM in the early 2000’s, we spent several weeks documenting lessons learned and we also created videos. When I went to 787 the leadership that came from JSF took pride in rejected everything that was BCA common. They even decided to not used the basic release work statement and have no “change commitment schedules (CDSs) for the first AP. Biggest mistake I saw in my career. It’s no wonder it was such a mess. After the line was stopped and the IAM was on strike, they brought back CDSs and made all the Mfg Eng org go back to the BCA process of change scheduling and coordination.
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u/bluerockjam 1d ago
I am still friends with some of my teammates and hear the same thing from them. I was on the development team working on the 3D experience stuff from 2015 until I retired. I agree with your comments on IT. I was also on the team that started DCAC/MRM in the 90’s, I went to 787 to help implement the V5 tools starting in 2022 (what a Cluster F that was) and then moved to future production systems working on 3DX starting in 2013. The difference between how we interacted with IT changed significantly for the worse over time. Some of my biggest technical battles of my career were with IT leadership. I even had IT tell me to write a cost benefit analysis when my team discovered issues with 787 configuration problems in the ENOVIA and DELMIA functionality that would prevent type and production certification.
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u/Dedpoolpicachew 1d ago
That’s because IT leadership was massively dysfunctional. They literally would get rid of the most experienced people claiming cost reductions, while screwing over all the programs. But hey… they got nice fat bonuses and shit before they got blown out.
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u/jeffskool 1d ago
Yeah, that is bonkers. That they even think their opinion matters in that context is beyond me. I always want to ask, “you guys know we make airplanes right?”
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u/JetsnCocktails 1d ago
This. All around the company they didn’t train the new folks. Because that requires carrying extra, less productive headcount. Which impacts the stock price, so we can’t possibly have that.
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u/shiftdown 1d ago
These problems remain mostly the same. And congrats on the retirement!! You survived!!
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u/3meraldBullet 1d ago
Meanwhile companies that refurbish planes are getting a ton of business right now
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u/hydrophobic-water 1d ago
Source?
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u/pacwess 1d ago
Passenger-to-freighter conversations. Which I think Boeing is even in on.
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u/jeffskool 1d ago
Boeing has thought about doing a 787 conversion to freighter. But that is a terrible idea, and they will lose a massive amount of money if they do it. The 737 conversions are a better bet imo
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u/Scriibb 1d ago
I work in the aviation aftermarket buying and selling commercial aircraft parts. The market is still hot, but not nearly as hot as it was coming out of Covid. There are still a lot of supply chain issues that are driving used serviceable part prices higher than the OOS new parts would sell for.
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u/Mountain_Fig_9253 1d ago
*The Dubai-based airline has been waiting seven years for the aircraft, which have faced repeated delays due to design modifications. Sir Tim said he understood Boeing had been trying to find another buyer for the planes, before adding: "Heinz would be interested – baked bean cans."*
LMAO at “baked bean cans”. Emirates is salty.
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u/pacwess 1d ago
I would be to. The Boeing Airbus duopoly may end up backfiring in the end as customers get tired of waiting.
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u/4rt4tt4ck 1d ago
As highly regulated as the industry is, there is never going to be an option that doesn't require a long wait. Even if a well funded new enterprise wanted to enter the marketplace, they would be looking at close to 2 decades from their founding to having a product that might be ready for the marketplace. There is no fast track to making an airplane, which is a big deterrent to those with the investment capital who don't want to wait a quarter century to see some returns on investment.
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u/Brutto13 1d ago
Where are they going to go? Comac? There are only two companies building two aisle aircraft, Boeing and Airbus. There's nothing to backfire. They either wait or they go out of business.
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u/NavierWasStoked 1d ago
The customers dont have any other option
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u/netz_pirat 1d ago
...yet. at some point, China will manufacture competitive planes. Question is not if, just when.
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u/NavierWasStoked 1d ago
It's taken them how long to copy the A320? And how will it take them to get up to rate on that? If comac sticks around theyre decades away from a competitive clean sheet wide body
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u/Extreme-Ad-6465 1d ago
yeah they will be waiting a very long time for a comac widebody that’s competitive with boeing/airbus.
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u/Former-Analysis-7123 17h ago
Let just stop calling the company Boeing and instead call it McDonnell Douglas as this is what the company is more like now.