My Blog List

Wednesday, August 19, 2015

London Heathrow 787 Fire Understood

How serious is everything on an airplane? Everything is serious when it flies. Often we settle into a seat with an impending flight, thinking about the future of a destination, without knowing a fear of missing a little electrical insulation or a battery instability could change the future forever. That is exactly what the inspectors on the Ethiopian Airlines crown fire have surmised with the Heathrow event. Bare wire wires were crossed while missing electrical insulation and the Li-ion battery caught fire. When the battery spent its energy from fire the combustion spread to the crown of the 787 itself. It would of have been very difficult to extinguished during flight or on the ground at the onset of heat detected.

Runaway locomotives are near impossible to stop. My life example of a runaway locomotive was in Montana when living near a high mountain pass. A train came to a stop at the crown of the pass while the crew adjusted the motive power for the descent into Helena, Montana. The train started to roll forward without the crew at the controls. It got away from them because during extreme cold conditions!

Photo Helena Independent Record
Image result for Montana Runaway Train 1989
Below is "The Story which should be read to your children"

"It was about 4:30 a.m. Feb. 2, 1989. The temperature had plummeted to minus 27 degrees Fahrenheit — with an estimated wind chill of minus 70.
A crash and two explosions ripped through the night, and the violent tremor shook people from their sleep.
The city went dark, except for a towering yellow flame shooting into the sky.
Some thought it was a nuclear bomb.
Others, an earthquake.
Many thought the extreme cold caused an electric substation to blow up.
Few thought runaway train.
It would go down as one of the worst disasters in Helena’s history and one of the worst train wrecks in Montana’s."
For Mike McNellis, it was the night he almost lost his life. He jumped out of the path of the 49-car runaway train as it charged down the tracks from Mullan Pass and piled into the helper train he’d been sitting in just moments before.
For the slumbering Carroll College students, it was likely the biggest wake-up call of their lives.
For the fire department, it was their biggest day in modern history.
Some 3,500 people were evacuated, the electricity and heat went out in much of the city, and more than $10 million in damages were reported.
Yet — people would marvel at how lucky they were that no one was killed or seriously injured.
Windows exploded across the Carroll College campus and throughout the downtown.
Hundreds or perhaps thousands of wickedly sharp shrapnel pieces shot across the campus, tearing through building roofs and windows and bombarding the Physical Education Building.
All the north windows in Guadalupe Hall shattered.
A train axel sailed over St. Charles Hall and tore through the roof of a house on what was then Ralph Street. It landed in the living room — just barely missing 79-year old Catherine DeBree, asleep in her bedroom.
Photos published in the Independent Record showed a campus that looked like a war zone.
“The wreck is something I’ll never forget,” said McNellis, who was a switchman at the time.
He and the engineer came on duty at 3:15 a.m. and were waiting in their helper train near Benton Avenue crossing to head up to Blossburg, but mechanical problems from the extreme cold delayed their departure.
McNellis had just left the train and was walking down the tracks to throw a switch by hand when he heard the boom of the runaway box cars crashing into the helper locomotives.
The locomotives buckled and “a locomotive shot toward me; I just jumped off the track … the handrail brushed my coveralls. I was running toward Batch Fields, and the cars are derailing behind me.
“The train was doing 35 to 45 miles per hour when it hit,” he said.
Fifteen cars derailed.
Suddenly, “it was pitch black,” McNellis said. “It was cold — it was 72 below with the wind chill.”
He and the engineer waited for a crew van from the railroad station to come pick them up. Just as it arrived, a tank car 200 feet away from him blew up, throwing him in the air.
“I landed in the middle of Benton Avenue,” he said. The second explosion, which he thinks was a nearby transformer station, blew him further, and he rolled into the Benton Avenue ditch.
“I could hear chunks of that tank car just going boom, boom,” as he hoped none of it would hit him, he said.
The first explosion mushroomed out blue and white and orange, he recalled. “My ears were ringing — I couldn’t hardly hear. I could smell a sulfuric acid type of smell. It smelled like rotten eggs.
“It’s like it happened last week,” he said of his brush with death. “It changed my life. It’s affected my hearing,” which was permanently damaged. He’s been told it will get worse as he gets older.
First responders
Roy Swanby, who is now a battalion chief with the Helena Fire Department, was rocked out of bed by the explosion, he said.
“I live down close to Custer Avenue on Villard, and it was enough to rock the house and wake me up.”
He struggled to get his car started and headed to the fire station: “The town was pitch black. There were no street lights, no traffic lights, no business lights. It was pretty ominous as I drove up… I could see fire … by that time, there were open flames.”
At the downtown fire station in the Civic Center, electricity and the back-up generator had been knocked out.
Firemen had to wrestle open the station door manually by pulling on a chain to raise it.
“The weird thing about the whole thing — the delay — it kept us from being at ground zero when it blew up,” he said. “Otherwise, we would have been at that crossing.”
At the scene, it was dark except for towering yellow flames leaping 20 to 30 feet in the air, he recalled.
They didn’t know what cargo was on the train — if it was toxic chemicals and if more explosions would follow.
“We weren’t truly trained up to the level we are today,” he said. They knew little about handling hazardous materials at the time. “There were a lot of odors we weren’t familiar with. We didn’t have a clue … for eight to 10 hours, of what exactly was on that train.
“We had a tank of pure hydrogen peroxide that ruptured. We were looking at it leaking onto the railroad,” forming a creek running down the tracks. As it touched the railroad ties, it ignited them.
“There was some really pungent alcohol smell,” he recalled.
The hazardous material proved to be three tank cars containing hydrogen peroxide, isopropyl alcohol and acetone.
The extreme cold proved a blessing.
“We had a big guardian angel watching over,” he said. “If the temperature had been above freezing, it would have been a much larger kaboom. The potential was there for something greater to happen. It could have been 100 times worse.”
It was also the day Swanby and a buddy almost became living ice sculptures.
As they were hosing down the cars, a mist of water coated them. “We were pretty much frozen in place,” he said. “The wet clothes became like a suit of armor.” Other firefighters “had to chip the ice away from our feet. They laid us in the back of the pickup truck and drove us to the fire station to thaw.
“It was the busiest day in the fire department’s history,” he said. There were structure fires all over town, evacuations and emergency shelters to set up. The department hadn’t dealt with anything like it since the 1935 earthquake.
“It was a long three days,” he said of how long it took to put out the fire and transfer the chemicals. “The whole time, it was bitterly cold.”
Carroll College
The subzero cold proved a blessing on the campus.
“It’s amazing no one was hurt,” said Ed Noonan, who was who was resident director of St. Charles and Borromeo halls and living on the third floor of St. Charles Hall.
Because of the early morning hour, students were in bed instead of on campus heading to classes. And it was too early for rush hour traffic and school buses on Benton Avenue.
Because temperatures had plummeted in 24 hours from about 45 degrees Fahrenheit to minus 27 degrees, the girls in Guadalupe Hall dormitory had pushed their beds away from the windows, said Noonan.
They’d also tucked in their curtains to keep out the cold, and these caught the exploding glass shards — preventing serious injuries.
But when the blast hit and the windows shattered, the dark was filled with screams as terrified residents tried to figure out what was happening.
Noonan, who was shaken from his bed in the dark, immediately thought it was an earthquake. “I had one leg in my pants, and I was looking out the east window facing the old transformer (switching) station of Montana Power, and it exploded.
“Right away there were emergency personnel on campus,” he recalled. “They were concerned about toxic fumes. There was really heavy black smoke” towering above the crash site.
Students and staff were directed to O’Connell Hall, where buses picked them up, taking them to emergency shelters — primarily the National Guard Armory, which happened to have its own generators for heat.
Most grabbed their heaviest winter coats. A few took their six packs. One proudly told a news reporter of saving a case of beer and his package of Hostess Ding Dongs.
News photos and footage show the students tucked in blankets, sitting on floors along the shelter wall laughing and singing.
Since this was in the days before cellphones, students stood in a long line to call home, reassuring frantic parents that all was well.
Soon community members showed up at the shelters and took students home with them.
“By noon, all the students were gone,” said Noonan. “It’s one of those bits of knowledge of what kind of community Helena is.
“Instead of a tragedy, it became an adventure,” he said.
And, it appears, from comments in the campus newspaper, The Prospector, that students were delighted to have classes canceled, and not expected to resume before Feb. 12, 1989.
The cause
Following an extensive investigation, the National Transportation Safety Board released a report Feb. 12, 1990. It noted a combination of factors including the extreme weather, equipment failures and human error.
In the early morning hours, Montana Rail Link Train 121 had stopped on a mountain grade at Austin near Mullan Pass to switch around helper engines because the lead unit had lost heat.
To make the switch, the crew uncoupled the locomotives from the freight cars, leaving them parked unattended on a 2.2 percent mountain grade.
The temperature in Austin at the time, according to the National Weather Service, was 36 degrees below zero, and 10 inches of snow was on the ground.
The probable cause of the accident, said NTSB, was the failure of the crew of Train 121 “to properly secure their train by placing the train brakes in emergency and applying hand brakes when it was left standing unattended on a mountain grade.”
A contributing factor was the failure of MRL management to adequately assess the qualifications and training of employees placed in train service.
Earlier in the day, train crews had noted leakage from the airbrakes because of the extreme cold, which was not corrected before leaving Helena and heading for the pass.
A few of the other topics addressed were faulty cab heaters, a crew that was improperly dressed to handle a 72 degree drop in temperature within 48 hours, and “inaccurate waybills” about the actual shipment in the box cars and tanker cars.
Also faulted was the Helena Police Department dispatcher for failing to send personnel to the Benton Avenue crossing after receiving two phone calls that a “small accident” had happened there.
Immediate aftermath
Some of the immediate aftermath of the crash and three days of Arctic weather that followed were that water pipes burst all over town, particularly at Carroll College. Plumbers had long waiting lists, according to news reports.
Aquariums across campus froze solid.
Russ Ritter, who was mayor at the time and vice president for Carroll College Relations, said they couldn’t find enough plywood in town to cover all the broken windows across campus and in the city.
To him, the key of what worked was communication.
As soon as he knew what was happening, he was issuing news releases and going on the radio, he said. He also set up a call station to field phone calls from across the country and world — particularly from distressed parents.
Paul Spengler, the Lewis and Clark County coordinator of disaster and emergency services, said the train crash changed its emergency operations.
After it, the county instituted an Incident Command System — so that everyone knew their roles and responsibilities and to whom they reported.
They also fixed radio communication problems. At the time of the crash and fire, Spengler didn’t have any radio communication with first responders at the crash site.
“It’s the biggest disaster I’ve been involved in — in the 34 years on the job,” he said. “It was the biggest disaster since the 1935 earthquake.”
25 years later
As to Montana Rail Link, it made changes, according to an email from its president, Thomas J. Walsh.
It has purchased “state-of-the-art locomotives” and also positioned locomotive power at not only the front of the train but also the rear.
“Information on trains with hazardous material is instantly available to dispatchers and field personnel,” he wrote. And MRL provides “comprehensive training programs” to its staff both in the classroom and on the job regarding operating policies and safe operations in accordance with Federal Railroad Administration regulations, he wrote.
But for many in Helena, like Ed Noonan and a number of the first responders, that day remains as a reason to count one’s blessings.
 Image result for Montana Runaway Train 1989
That was 1989 in Montana's own crown fire (Mullen pass runaway). Runaway battery fire is an evil on airplanes. Broken window seals are also an evil on high flying airplanes. 

Tuesday, August 18, 2015

Know Your Airplane Not The Old Fashioned Way

Passengers for years have boarded aircraft the modern way. Not looking at the serial number painted on the body and not caring about a particular airplane build. It's a mind numbing experience sitting in the seat and thinking, have I ever been on board this aircraft before? Well ANA has gone one step up by making a cruise ship type experience for its flag ships falling into line with the selected 767, 787-9, and 777 300-ER. They are personalizing the aircraft. ANA is painting themes for the livery. Now passengers can get excited through recognition of an prticular aircraft.

The instantaneous response,"we're going on R2-D2 again, or its BB-8 the new Star Wars character!" This is a lot more passenger-airplane connecting than using a serial number like 34485, This is ANA's oldest built 787-8. Who can remember a serial number except Aviation geeks, and they often have to do a look-up. Now geeks can use a camera without a zoom lenses hanging heavy.

B767-300_0730_25%
Courtesy ANA Photo 

Image having a ticket labeled by the aircraft theme name instead of just numbers. ANA is leaving the numbers for the professionals surrounding the aircraft during operations. However, the theme livery and naming convention is the ANA new expression. Many airlines have named its airships with prominence such Ethiopian's 787-8 "Queen Of Sheba".

ANA has taken it a step further by added a thematic livery matching the Ship's name. Only the vertical stabilizer remains ANA's flag, as a brilliant consideration for its corporate identification. In addition the livery scheme is set aside for its most prominent aircraft like the 777-300-ER type or the 787-9. 

As a passenger, bonding with an aircraft through recognition is an intrinsic relationship. ANA is going to great lengths for its passengers to bond with specific airplanes parked on the flight-line. Airplane spotters are also a sub-genre who often write about seeing special livery markings. ANA uses a  form of free advertising for a company wanting to spread the news of its arrival. Anytime an airline can obtain recognition, it is positive for the bottom line. Gaining  a customers bonding for a particular aircraft is establishing a subliminal relationship beyond its serial number stenciled-in on a panel. This becomes an edge in the market place for ANA. The deal with Disney is a brilliant strategy.



Monday, August 17, 2015

Exceeding the Older 777-200 Will Be The A-350-900

Yesterday's Blog was about going long with the 777-200 LR. Today the press came back with a reconfigured Singapore Airline A-350-900 from Singapore to New York for a 9,536 mile jaunt. This would make it about 1,000 miles longer than the Dubai to Panama run featured yesterday with the 777-200-LR. Boeing has not rolled out its 777X-8 yet, so observers can't actually confirm its capability until tested and built for any special long range configuration. 

Airbus or Singapore Air have convinced each other if you build less seats they will come the  15,355 KM. Airbus thinks it's a flying billboard for bragging points. Singapore is taking another shot at the longer range from its former failed attempt of lessons learned with an A-340 long range route, which became not feasible for the Airline. Both are talking up the new A-350-900 attempt, before its on paper scheme is shredded. 


Bloomberg Business “reveal”, is the link above:

Below are the clips and Quotes:

"Airbus Group SE’s airliner unit is working on a new variant of its A350-900 wide-body that would allow Singapore Airlines Ltd. to restore nonstop U.S. flights and regain the record for the world’s longest airline sector.

Airbus, which began deliveries of the twin-engine model last year, is working on changes to the cabin layout that would reduce the aircraft’s weight and let Singapore Airlines reach New York economically by 2018, said Kiran Rao, the planemaker’s executive vice president for strategy and marketing...

“I can’t go into details on the type of layouts they’re looking at but it would be a premium service,” he said. When Singapore Air last flew to the New York area directly it did so with just 100 business-only seats on a four-engine Airbus A340-500, an arrangement that ultimately proved non-viable."

The U.S. manufacturer could offer a development of its 787-9 Dreamliner for extended operations if it wants to compete in that area, according to Richard Aboulafia, an analyst at Teal Group in Fairfax, Virginia. “Its market potential is pretty small, but it’s prestigious,” he said...

Boeing’s older 777-200LR -- the longest-range jetliner available today -- could make the distance, according to the U.S. company, and will be used by Emirates to fly the 13,821 km between Dubai and Panama from February. That flight will become the longest single sector currently flown, beating Qantas Airways Ltd.’s Sydney-Dallas Fort Worth route by about 20 km.
The 777-200LR entered service in 2006 and the last delivery to an airline was more than a year ago in April 2014."


This is showmanship for Airbus, and elitism for Singapore, as it becomes a talking point for capability and not having a great business sense for the long haul and its profit margins, despite the claims by both maker and customer. It has become another lost leader for the enticement within the market place.

Sunday, August 16, 2015

1,055 Minutes-Emirates, Dubai-Panama

It's up to Winging It to find a movie list for the "Trip". You may be riding from Dubai to Panama for 13,831 km, for those living south of USA’s North Border, it's about 8,594 miles for the Emirates 777-200-LR. This requires using a thumb drive feature for plugging into any portable or fixed screen device in a seat near you. Allow time for taking “amenity breaks” on the flight, a person should consider one movie every two hours while setting aside time for your own special 10 minute breaks between movies. The length of a thumb drive movie should only be consume about 110 minutes out of 120 minutes. The number of movies will be be constrained to a total 1,000 minutes before arriving in Panama from Dubai.

Recommendation: Before a trip build a movie library. Do a thumb drive download of your movies (buy a thumb drive containing a least a terabyte of data room). Ready to plug and play?

Franchise Movies are best for doing thumb-drive downloads, it saves time searching for individual movies when making multiple choices if searching for multiple actors or genre is too time consuming. Keeping it thematic is efficient method for long flights, while it entertains over the long haul it provides having story continuity with your favorite stars following through a grand story to its completion:

Franchise Actors I like Best: see below


Matt Damon - Bourne Identity                                                     Total Minutes


Tom Cruise   - Mission Impossible (potpourri)

Wiki Lists:

Mission: Impossible (1996)[edit]

Released in 1996. Ethan Hunt is framed for the murder of his fellow IMF agents during a Prague Embassy mission gone wrong and wrongly accused of selling government secrets to a mysterious international criminal known only as "Max". The action spy film was directed by Brian De Palma, and was produced by and starred Tom Cruise. Work on the script had begun early with filmmaker Sydney Pollack on board, before De Palma, Steven ZaillianDavid Koepp, and Robert Towne were brought in. Mission: Impossible went into pre-production without a shooting script. De Palma came up with some action sequences, but Koepp and Towne were dissatisfied with the story that led up to those events. U2 band members Larry Mullen, Jr. and Adam Clayton produced an electronic dance version of the original theme song. The song went into top ten of music charts around the world and was nominated for the Grammy Award for Best Pop Instrumental Performance. The film was the third-highest-grossing of the year and received positive reviews from film critics.

Mission: Impossible II (2000)[edit]

Main article: Mission: Impossible II
Released in 2000. Ethan Hunt sends Nyah Nordoff-Hall undercover to stop an ex-IMF agent's mad scheme to steal a deadly virus and sell the antidote to the highest bidder. The film was directed by John Woo and starredTom Cruise, who also served as the film's producer. Cruise reprises his role as agent Ethan Hunt of the IMF, a top-secret espionage and clandestine operation agency. The movie has strong thematic similarities with Alfred Hitchcock's 1946 spy thriller Notorious.[2]

Mission: Impossible III (2006)[edit]

Main article: Mission: Impossible III
Released in 2006. Ethan Hunt, retired from being an IMF team leader and engaged to be married, assembles a team to face a ruthless arms and information broker intending to sell a mysterious dangerous object known as "The Rabbit's Foot".

Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol (2011)[edit]

Released in 2011. Ethan Hunt and the entire IMF are placed with the blame of the bombing of the Kremlin. He and three others must stop a man bent on starting a global nuclear war.

Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation (2015)[edit]

The IMF agency comes under threat from the Syndicate, that they are a near-mythical organization of assassins and rogue operatives who kill to order. Faced with the IMF's disbandment, Ethan Hunt assembles his team for their most difficult mission yet —to prove the Syndicate's true existence and bring the organization down by any means necessary.

Mission: Impossible VI[edit]

On July 24, 2015, a report surfaced saying Paramount Pictures is already developing Mission: Impossible VI. At this time, no cast members are officially set to return for the sequel, but Cruise will again be producing along with David Ellison and Dana Goldberg at Skydance Productions and J.J. Abrams at Bad Robot.[3]
On July 28, 2015, Tom Cruise confirmed on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart that a sixth Mission: Impossible film was being developed, and will hopefully begin production in 2016.[4]

Nicolas Cage  - National Treasure 1,2,3 (Optional)

This is a guy list naturally. Sorry Ladies, call this a demonstration on building a list using movie themes on a flight lasting for 17 hrs and 35 minutes going to Panama. The beauty of it all, pick a movie that will put you asleep during the trip. A Disney Movie (Polly Anna) works best for for me. A Cary Grant film fest is enjoyable, as he is a mainstay for everybody. K.I.S.S. for the 1,000 minute ride gives self indulgent entertainment.




Friday, August 14, 2015

Headlines Keep Marking The Boeing Bullseye

Constantly, are the headlines today about the Boeing $489 Billion Order Backlog, 1740 Airplanes needed for the Indian Market over the next twenty years. Especially noteworthy is the first 737 Max fuselage winding through the Wichita factory, lining up for next year’s first flight. A sense of urgency meets an opportunity is in process. The Bulls eye for Boeing is the next ten years of change management pacing with market need.
All three articles suggest the tiger has a tail for which Boeing is grabbing onto during the next five years. The twenty year expansion for India starts now as early orders will mark which airplane an Indian aviation companies will latch onto for the full ride. The airplane for which Boeing will provide, is the 737 Max. Even though the twin aisle superstars gain the largest headlines, the Max will figure prominently in early orders taken by Indian centered aviation operations.  These first orders will line up for follow-on orders when India region stretches for its 1,740 units needed within the Boeing forecast, which it had recently offered for public consumption.

That backlog word keeps reappearing with these journals as if it is a troublesome word for despair, or a bragging word of Industrial might. It depends on which Boeing VP you talk to concerning how backlog affects their area of responsibility. Backlog could mean a solid financial future for CFO's, or it could mean a sales impediment for a Marketing VP. Both will agree backlog is a necessary evil component for planning, and portraying the popularity of a type as a talking point. Either way backlog is a two edge sward slicing the inner functions of Boeing's progress. A short backlog chokes cash flows and gives marketing a high ground of anytime, anywhere and any price appeal. The extremely large backlog suggest a shrinkage of liability and healthy cash flows from production optimization. However, marketing is telling customers that 2022 is a good year for a 787 delivery.

Which brings me to another point:

Thursday, August 13, 2015

Boeing's Short Term Market Is Active

Short Term Plans and Long Term projections are two different worlds in any business. The short term period is executed with high confidence as it brings resources together with an immediacy of implementation. The long term period is predicated on the success of the short term execution and the stability of any long term projections going forward as planned. However, the confidence level in the long term is subject to more risk factors than the short term.

It sounds like Mumble Jumbo. It does have a sense that planning as a mover and shaker is pretty crazy stuff. Boeing's CFO and planner has this to say about the airline industry.

Aviation Today: [Avionics Today 08-13-2015]

“Despite a lot of movement going on in the global marketplace — and we’re watching it — we’re not seeing a slowdown in demand,” said Greg Smith, chief financial officer and executive vice president of business development and strategy at Boeing, speaking at the Jefferies Industrials Conference in New York yesterday. “There’s a lot of volatility in the market … but, despite that, there’s pretty robust demand in the market around products and services.”

The trickledown effect on airlines become a hit and miss order barrage from Smith's statement. Indicating a robust market remains if selected by an active airline, while executing its own plans regardless of current world market conditions. An active airline is one who has reached its pinnacle within its five year plan and places the order out of the same sure momentum from planning and execution.

There may be less players in this mode than last year, but the orders are significant for those who are ready to place an order. It may be the last rush before the market takes a pause before the next surge. A twelve month pause would be the expectation. The year 2016 may go sub 800 for Boeing in total. It is acclimated for over 1,000 orders each year for some time. An order dip is coming for all makers in 2016. In the year 2018, the market should become normalized again with plus 1,000 orders a year. I am just saying this for the reasons quoted above from Greg Smith. He has let it slip, the market change is coming.

Don't panic, this is inside of Boeing's 20 year forecast for market demand. In spite of Boeing's outlook for aircraft numbers of abundance. Nothing has changed, if a market dip is experienced. Its how a manufacturer uses a "market dip" as an opportunity. 

Boeing has long since become a proponent of increased production capacity no matter the backlog issue. However, even though it adjust the 747 production downward, it is feathering its capacity for the next big orders for that type. It also, is successfully switching 767 capacity to the military function. Boeing also has another 50 Fedex 767 on the backlog. Its waning production stance on these models will not affect Boeing's over-all productivity efficiency. Boeing has at least five years of robust 787 production and not yet started producing the Max. It also has just begun plant expansion in Everett for the 777X wing plant. An order dip gives Boeing pause for optimization for backlog reduction and plant expansion at the same time. The world will need those aircraft in the next 20 years, no doubt.

Boeing is already taking the opportunity to step up its efforts for maximizing the "order pause". The post order pause period is already on the presentation boards in meetings. Boeing would hope to shape the order backlog by giving Boeing more flexibility in the innovation scope. A reduced backlog will give Boeing's market immediacy to the market place.

As discussed before, a customer will look at delivery time before ordering aircraft. The optimal leverage point in a sale is a customer's timing opportunity. Airlines have its five year plans too. Ordering an A-350 or a 787 is based on when it can have finances in order, and when the opportune arrives for inserting new aircraft. The manufacturer that can meet the production slot with a customer’s optimal opportunity for new aircraft wins the sale. Boeing wants that high ground. The former 787 backlog was too big to meet a customer's buying constraints on time.

A market pause shapes a manufacturer's backlog portfolio with optimization in the market place. Actually Boeing needs an order pause for the purpose of aligning it Max effort for balancing Both Market Inputs (MI) and Production Outputs (PO).

The MI have long outpaced the PO, where Boeing cannot keep up production balancing with sales. This is a complex balance. Production is more efficient with greater output. Boeing won't expand production capacity unless Marketing bring home the orders. Production can't become more efficient unless it has the backlog in place to make production enhancement decisions. Market can't sell units if the backlog is too far out and so forth. The Dog chases its tail until exhaustion.

The solution is an MI pause balancing the backlog. No "right minded" Market guru can refuse any viable sale. If some airline today offered Boeing an order for 1,000 Max over the next three years, Boeing would say yes, sign here and here. 

The PO people would have to go just dump in the portable latrine in Renton Wa. Then on another day, the PO people are told to slow down production to 25 units a months on the 737 Max. Back they go to the portable latrine to pay homage to the work slowdown.

The only control for Boeing is found in the flexibility of market demand and fall, which forces all airplane makers to build flexible production facilities where work numbers can be accommodated and machinery can move in out under a facility reconfiguration work order.

The 767 line is the new MI model as it wrestles with its new found market for its type (s). The 777X is also employing a plant change-over in Everett, Wa. The 737 Renton Plant is going to build 52, 737 NG and Max at the same time in several years. Boeing has opted its 787 for a two plant model in both Everett and Charleston, SC. It hints at expanding the SC plant with more production options as the Market place flexes. Therefore the rule goes as follows:

MI * Backlog (f) - PO= optimal Efficiency (OE) for both the customer and manufacturer. Boeing's goal is to move its backlog at an optimal five year buffer. Any longer of a backlog, it losses sales opportunity. Any shorter than three years, Marketing has adjust prices lower to move product. Optimal Backlog time is about 42 months. 

The real variable is Plant flexibility affecting production efficiency.



Wednesday, August 12, 2015

Finally, American Industrial Might is Ready To Crow About F-35 Stuff

It has been a long while since people have heard a positive story on military aircraft in the works. Below is a link, and an encapsulation of the F-35 program. The F-22 project gave the pentagon such heart burn it stopped it at 187 copies; after its extreme price per copy amounts, and testing short comings for re-work stalled the Inventory. The real big show was the F-35 Joint Fight program.

It will be $135 million a copy or thereabouts in that amount. In short, its the same war Fighter for the Air Force, Navy, and Marines. The one size fits all services is rapidly reaching a development climax, and will become operational in the next months. Lockheed will build on the US Treasury for its defense.

With all the clamor over the F-35 a,b,c type stumbling forward, it appeared as a less than an adequate result for defending our nation. 

However, not so fast my friends. The F-35 is making a big comeback in a big way. Even the F-22 has become such a valued military commodity that it is sparingly used in everyday conflicts and saved just for all-out war theaters  of strategic importance. 

The F-35's are the equivalent of various Special Forces units, for Boots in the Air, missions. The F-35: "if you can't find it, you can't hit it." It doesn't need Mach 3+, only 1,200 nmph. Its longbow approach will stifle adversary encroachment beyond a 100 mile arc of control for the mission. Its flights, mainly would engage "off-shore dog fighting scheme" (shooting down an adversary from 100 nm out) However, in actual close encounters, if it happens, the air superiority emerges, since an adversary can't turn away fast enough (F-35 pulls 9 g's I hear). 

The only thing shooting it down is the $135 million cost per unit. However, if Lockheed builds boatloads of F-35 for the services mentioned, that cost would naturally come down to sub $100 million levels per flying copy. Mass production could make the F-35 arrive at a 10 units per $Billion clip. It has a fifty year shelf life with future follow-on enhancements would extend it beyond a usual fighter life cycle. The F-35 family of war machines should be good to go until 2050+, or long after my own end of service.

 Lockheed Feature:


Today There Are 787 unfilled 787 Orders

1095, 787 ordered and 308, 787 delivered, leaving 787, 787 to be delivered. China would be proud of these numbered sequences. Only an aviation mind-head with little to do would come up with this numbering sequence.  However in all dynamic situations the program skillet moves numbers around when the market is hot like drops of water.

Consider this a mathematical screen grab only a nitwit could report. The illustration does represent the Boeing 787 is a solid performer after so much ill attention given for its teething glitches. The three hundred and eight, 787 delivered, supersedes other programs that have come and gone in aviation's history.

DC-10, 20 year build = 446 including for both freight and passenger.  
L-1011, 16 year build= 250
B-787, 4 year build=308

While working on several other several other scribbles, the research never stops on the 787 and this is a prime example. The 787, benching at 308 units delivered, is no particular mark, but it was time to note how far the program has gone since first delivery in the fall of 2011. 

In a tribute to the 787 Having Fire and Hail
For your enjoyment, James Taylor, in one of my favorites.



Tuesday, August 11, 2015

The All You Can Eat Buffet

Aerospace has a billionaire's tentacles reach into the Aircraft Workings. Both Boeing and Airbus must now shake hands with Warren Buffet's investment inceptions inside his manufacturing investment grabs.


"Precision Castparts is not a household name, but its products can be in aircraft, power plants, and various other industrial components. The Boeing 787 and the Airbus 350 are considered integral to its success. Buffett notes, "For good reasons, it is the supplier of choice for the world's aerospace industry, one of the largest sources of American exports."

In the biggest deal of his career -- no small thing when you consider his five decades of investing -- Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE: BRK-A) (NYSE: BRK-B) is acquiring metal parts manufacturer Precision Castparts (NYSE: PCP) for $37.2 billion cash.
The deal further enmeshes the conglomerate in the industrial segment of the economy and follows his purchase of Iscar Metalworking in 2006 and chemical maker Lubrizol in 2011.

The Buffet has moved his sizable fortunes into areas where two sizable players, AKA World's largest names, which are bantered back and forth in discussions, and are the real subservient customers for Buffet's musings.

Both Boeing and Airbus need Buffet's directed manufacturing of cast parts in order to fly all its airplanes. Not only are they now handled by Buffet parts, GE goes to the same Buffet Bin of parts for its engine parts when making cast parts for engines on the same aircraft. GE goes along with the military contracts as well.

Buying Precision Castparts is actually a Boeing and Airbus endorsement, through this third party Buffet Checking and Savings accounts, referenced above in his $37.2 Billion cash on the counter purchase. The last time I checked my wallet I had a five, two ones and some loose change. Buffet reached in his wallet and paid cash for the deal. Or he had a team of his staff reach into its brief cases and pull out the cash transaction.