Boeing to move headquarters to Arlington,VA.

[Devil's Advocate]

United dropped their “all-Boeing” fleet strategy in 1931 with the introduction of the Ford Tri-Motor. At no point in the jet era has United ever had an all-Boeing fleet.

Seems like it was a US only fleet history that was broken at a time when United was Boeing’s biggest customer.
https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1992-07-09-fi-2575-story.html

 

[Dakota 400]

Yeah, I flew in one once.

I have flown in a few McDonnell Douglas aircraft: DC-8, DC-10, MD-88's in various configurations. No complaints from me about any of these planes.

I have sympathy for those in Chicago and Illinois who provided tax incentives to encourage a business to locate there and finally see, after the gravy train has ended, for the business to go elsewhere for another taxpayer subsidy with the "promise" of "oh, how so many jobs" will be created that may or may not actually happen.

 

[neroden]

Frankly, Boeing still appears to be floundering, unable to actually fix the root cause of many things that undermine it. Looks like now they have decided to see if being close to Washington can help to sweep the malady under the carpet by political manipulations, or at least that would be the cynical interpretation which jibes with their public statements on the matter.

The root problem was the "reverse takeover" by McDonnell Douglas. Many, many people have said this.

Boeing was a company run by engineers for engineers, and made good products they could be proud of.

McDonnell Douglas was a company run by military-industrial-complex pigs at the trough, whose focus was on extracting excess profit from the government while providing shoddy products. This is a bad business model for a company like Boeing which was selling in a genuine competitive market like the commercial airplane market.

The McDonnell Douglas management took over, and wrecked Boeing. It cannot recover because it's a corporate culture problem. They decided to double down on the pigs at the trough business model. Commercial airlines will continue to try to buy quality planes. Airbus is slowly becoming less of a ward of the government, so it gets the business. There's actually an opening for a competently managed company, but I don't think Embraer can scale up. COMAC might take over the market in the long run.

 

[MARC Rider]

McDonnell Douglas was a company run by military-industrial-complex pigs at the trough, whose focus was on extracting excess profit from the government while providing shoddy products.

That has some disturbing implications for those of us whose national security is based, in part, on military aircraft produced under that business model. We can only hope that the industries supplying our rivals (Russia and China, in particular) have similar (or worse) management problems to Boeing (as taken over by McDonnell-Douglas).

 

[WashingtonFlyer]

Not sure why anyone is surprised by this. Boeing's chief U.S. competitors are almost all headquartered in the DC area: Intelsat, Iridium, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, and General Dynamics. Some of Boeing's main overseas suppliers and competitors are also headquartered in the area: Rolls Royce and Airbus.

Boeing has a 300,000 square foot office for fewer than 500 HQ employees. Thats a massive, massive waste of space post COVID. Nobody needs that much room.

 

[neroden]

That has some disturbing implications for those of us whose national security is based, in part, on military aircraft produced under that business model. We can only hope that the industries supplying our rivals (Russia and China, in particular) have similar (or worse) management problems to Boeing (as taken over by McDonnell-Douglas).

Well, yeah. It is MUCH worse in Russia, and we now have proof of that. China, I don't know.

The good news (?) is that manned aircraft are militarily obsolete, with the exception of cargo planes, which have a fair amount of slack for bad design. We could always buy the massive cargo plane Ukraine is planning to rebuild, since they're our ally.

There seems to be nothing wrong with Aerovironment (maker of Switchblade and other drones). And Honeywell still makes consumer products and thinks like a consumer products company, and it's also one of the military drone suppliers. General Atomics, another military drone supplier, is pure MIC and arguably makes things too expensive, but is run by technologists with a focus on quality technology.

So there's one advantage of free-market capitalism: the military can send the contract to a new company which has a better attitude, and it *has* been happening recently. Not all military contracts are bribe-driven in the US, thank goodness.

The more old-line Military-Industrial-Complex US drone manufacturers are also making OK but overpriced drones. Turkey is making a much better drone which everyone is buying now (the Bayraktar), and they're our ally, so we could probably buy those if we needed to.

 

[jis]

Looks like while Boeing is busily rearranging its deck chairs while being unable to deliver any new aircraft in a timely fashion it is about to lose its long time customer in a big way for its entire wide body fleet renewal program. Looks like Tata owned rejuvenated Air India is going whole hog with Airbus.

https://www.business-standard.com/a...deal-for-50-a350-aircraft-122061501262_1.html

 

[JWM]

Boeing has several units. Most well-known are the Boeing Commercial Airplane and military units. I have to reveal that I have two grandsons, both mechanical engineers, at Boeing in the Seattle area. I have also met a Vice-President of Airbus a few years ago. Boeing's problems started when they moved the Executive Offices out of Seattle to Chicago. Then they compounded the problem by building an assembly plant in an area with zero technical background (South Carolina for the 787 assembly). Next came the outsourcing of the MCAS programing to $9 an hour "engineers" and the Max fiasco. They could move the Executive Offices to hell, and it still would not solve the problems. Airbus builds planes in Mobile, AL and a lot of other places with few issues. How do they do it? Boeing had better find out Both companies use GE/Safran engines some of which are made in Evendale, OH.. so that is no issue either.

Bottom line is that you save nothing and bring on disasters when you leave an area where you had an incredibly talented and loyal assembly, design and executive base (Seattle area). There are many muti-generation employees at Boeing. They know how to build planes, but many are in a union. Did it really save Boeing anything by trying for non-union assembly people in S.C. when there was zero educational and experience background in aircraft assembly? This member of this forum thinks not. The problem is dimwit executives and myopic accountants. God help them and us.

 

[doncrozier]

The MBAs took over from the engineers and there are no signs that anything will change, sadly. Every company has to keep an eye on the bottom line, but the 737Max tragedy is a clear example of that culture going too far.

 

[Dakota 400]

Did it really save Boeing anything by trying for non-union assembly people in S.C. when there was zero educational and experience background in aircraft assembly? This member of this forum thinks not. The problem is dimwit executives and myopic accountants. God help them and us.

As a Boeing shareholder and flies on both Boeing and Airbus planes, I completely agree with your post. Have not flown on all models of either company's planes, but I prefer some of the Airbus planes when compared to a similar model of a Boeing plane.

The MBAs took over from the engineers and there are no signs that anything will change, sadly. Every company has to keep an eye on the bottom line, but the 737Max tragedy is a clear example of that culture going too far.

I still have some hope that there may be some positive changes. There has been within the last two years some new Board members elected. The "new blood" may help to re-direct the Company. But, the move of Headquarters to a politically important area doesn't help the engineering issues that the Company has.

 

[west point]

Do notknock Boeing too much. Even with MCAS crashes airbus computers have run more airplanes into ground. Fortunately were not revenue flight except air France (Chance(

 

[jis]

Do notknock Boeing too much. Even with MCAS crashes airbus computers have run more airplanes into ground. Fortunately were not revenue flight except air France (Chance(

At least since 2000, Boeing has been running far ahead of Airbus in that department :

https://www.1001crash.com/transport...eing-plane-accident-aeronautical-history.html
https://www.1001crash.com/transport...rbus-plane-accident-aeronautical-history.html

 

[Devil's Advocate]

Nothing put the relative strength of Airbus and Boeing into starker relief than the Qatar Airways paint dispute.

 

[Dakota 400]

Do notknock Boeing too much. Even with MCAS crashes airbus computers have run more airplanes into ground. Fortunately were not revenue flight except air France (Chance(

I think Airbus introduced the "fly by wire" technology as it was called at the time. Initially, there were some accidents that, I think, was attributed to both the technology and the learning of the technology by the pilots.

The Smithsonian Channel is running a series of programs titled Air Accidents that is very interesting for those who might be interested. It's surprising at the cause of some of them. In one case, a washer was missing in a piece of equipment; the failure of that item led to the accident.

 

[Trogdor]

Do notknock Boeing too much. Even with MCAS crashes airbus computers have run more airplanes into ground. Fortunately were not revenue flight except air France (Chance(

Far, far more planes have crashed because there wasn’t a computer to protect the pilots from themselves, than have crashed specifically because the computer did something it wasn’t supposed to do.

In fact, more planes have crashed because pilots didn’t understand what the computer was designed to do than have crashed because of the computer doing something it wasn’t intended to do.

 

[Trogdor]

I think Airbus introduced the "fly by wire" technology as it was called at the time. Initially, there were some accidents that, I think, was attributed to both the technology and the learning of the technology by the pilots.

Airbus was the first to make a fully fly-by-wire commercial plane. The technology had existed and was in use on some military applications long before then, and even had limited commercial applications before Airbus introduced it on the A320.

 

[JWM]

I will try to be objective here. I recently flew from MCO/IAH/EZE (Buenos Aires) and SCL (Santiago)/DFW/MCO. United kicked us out of our Polaris seats because our connector from Orlando was late. Didn't like "Premium Economy", but the plane was much quieter than American's 777 in Flagship Business coming back. However, American's cabin service and crew were far superior. My best flight? June 2019 on Lufthansa FRA-MIA A380 in Business on the Upper Level. The quiet was incredible as was the smooth flight and landing.

 

[Rover]

China's biggest airlines sealed a deal with Airbus to buy almost 300 aircraft worth $37 billion. It's China's biggest aircraft order since COVID-19 dealt a huge blow to the travel industry. But the deal is being called a big disappointment by U.S. manufacturer Boeing, who had received intentions from China to order 300 aircraft from them. Then the 737Max issues happened...

 

[Devil's Advocate]

Then the 737Max issues happened...

Boeing and Southwest Airlines courted disaster in pursuit of cheaper profits with predictable results. There are no surprises that a combination of screwing up, covering it up, and deflecting all blame before being caught has alarmed many potential customers. The main factor that is keeping McBoeing Douglas relevant outside of the US is that Airbus does not possess unlimited manufacturing capability. As a result some airlines will need mainline commercial aircraft long before Airbus can deliver them and Boeing will be the only major aircraft supplier available to take those orders.

 

[jis]

Several reports in industry rags seem to suggest that Boeing is also about to lose a $10 Billion Malaysian order for a number of wide bodies, to Airbus.

 

[jis]

At last some good news for Boeing... ANA finalizes order

https://www.anahd.co.jp/group/en/pr/202207/20220711.html

 

[jis]

Boeing finally had a good showing at the Farnborough Air Show. In summary it managed to bag the following orders:

100 x 737-10 for Delta
30 x 737-8200 for 777 Partners
25 x 737-10 for Qatar
5 x 787-9 for Aercap

Good showing with the MAX but rather light on the wide-body side.

However, this is not the final list.