First, my apologies for going dark for such a long time.  My day job became suddenly very busy and required my full attention.

And now to take note that the 787 has been delivered to ANA and it is winging its way to Japan as I write this.  It’s a good moment for the 787 and Boeing and I’m glad to see this delivery take place.  It’s long overdue and all parties suffered a great deal of pain getting to this point. 

But even though it is a moment of celebration, I think it’s important to remember a few things going forward.

First, this is the first delivery and a better indicator of the state of the program will be how many more are delivered by the end of the year.  If this turns out to be a small handful, I think we’re looking at a program with production problems still.  (The latest indicator about this was Boeing’s last production halt to allow work to catch up just a few months ago.)  If Boeing manages to deliver more aircraft than expectations and I would have to say that this would need to be 12 or more deliveries, we might be able to relax and feel more confident that Boeing has the production issues well managed.

Second, this is a great aircraft but the one many more airlines want is the 787-9 and quite a few want to see what a 787-10 will look like.  The 787-9 isn’t due for another 2 years and it is dependent upon Boeing having its production ramped up completely.  My fear on the 787-10 is that Boeing will compromise the design into a derivative that is unsatisfying for customers.  My prime concern is that they’ll accept a range that doesn’t completely allow customers to use it in 777-200LR missions and I think airlines want that capability.  There will be more McBoeing cracks if the -10 ends up being that kind of disappointment.

Finally, there is the question of “what’s next?” for 787 technologies.  Boeing has spent a massive amount of money developing this aircraft and it not only has amazing promise, it’s already realized amazing gains.   Now they own a tremendous body of knowledge and . . . there is no other program to apply these to.   There is no replacement for the 737 being worked on and that is deferred for probably 10 years or more at this point.  There is no announced program for enhancing or replacing the 777 and there likely won’t be for some time to come. 

If you don’t use such knowledge, it creeps away from you.  At this point, there could be a 5 or 8 year gap between applying these technologies and given how technology rapidly evolves today, I think that’s a shame.  I continue to believe that the argument for a 737 re engine was justified by low capital costs alone and didn’t adequately consider just how devestating a full new aircraft would be to Airbus.   To not want to do that aircraft because you had not fully figured out how to scale production to 60 aircraft a month is . . . suspcicious.  I want to throw the McBoeing label out there when I consider this.

I know one thing . . . a 737 re-engine would have never gained traction with Alan Mullaly at the helm.

Filed under: Aircraft Development by ajax