EVERETT – No matter how cool, fuel-efficient or revolutionary the Boeing Co. says its new 787 jet is, the company still has to prove the Dreamliner can fly safely.
Boeing has been taking steps to show the 787 is ready to go even before its first Dreamliner comes together in Everett. The company conducts a battery of tests for its own information and for formal certification of the 787 from the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration. Boeing will combine new technology with experience to make the 787’s certification process the speediest in company history.
“Historically, it gets shorter with each new airplane,” said Lori Gunter, spokeswoman for Boeing.
But Boeing’s 787 isn’t like all the jets that have come before it. About half of the Dreamliner will be made out of carbon-fiber composite materials, not aluminum like past plane programs. That doesn’t have Gunter too concerned.
“The rules are somewhat transparent for material types,” she said.
Although the certification of each new airplane program is unique, Boeing partially paved the way for the Dreamliner with the 777.
The FAA develops special conditions to its established rules if the rules haven’t been updated to account for new technology. With the 777 program, the FAA developed special conditions for Boeing’s use of composite materials. Composites make up 12 percent of the 777.
Boeing and the FAA will apply some of the same special conditions initially created for the 777 to the 787 since the general rules have yet to change, Gunter said. To date, the FAA has applied seven special conditions to the 787 certification, she said.
The company has used the 777 to test 787 flight controls, giving Boeing a leg up on certification. Laboratory tests and other simulations also provide Boeing with data useful for certification.
“You can run a lot more scenarios in a lab than you can in flight,” Gunter said.
The certification process with the FAA involves reaching a number of agreements with the agency. The sooner the company and the FAA can come to terms on how Boeing goes about proving the 787’s air worthiness, the better for Boeing.
Aircraft manufacturers such as Boeing and Airbus tend to have several new planes built before the first one takes flight – long before the certification process concludes.
“If you learn something in flight test, you have to go back and fix the planes that are already built,” Gunter said.
Planemakers Boeing and Airbus tend to learn from their mistakes. Boeing’s Mike Bair, vice president of the 787 program, said last fall that he didn’t want to see Boeing get itself in the predicament over certification it went through with the Next Generation 737. Boeing officials and FAA representatives didn’t see eye-to-eye on a number of issues, thus prolonging certification.
“We are never going to get our selves in a situation like that,” Bair said.
Reporter Michelle Dunlop: 425-339-3454 or mdunlop@heraldnet.com.
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