CHARLESTON, S.C. – In layman’s terms, this is where much of the Dreamliner will be built.
This is where Vought Aircraft Industries will cast the rear fuselage sections and begin installing the wiring and hydraulic lines inside.
This is where a new company, Global Aeronautica, will take in the sections built in Italy and Japan – and across the street at Vought. Workers at Global – a joint venture between Vought and Italian partner Alenia Aeronautica – will snap the sections together and continue the installation work that the other suppliers have started.
They’ll even apply the preliminary coats of paint, said Scott Strode, the Boeing Co.’s vice president for 787 production.
“The time in Everett will not be spent on priming and doing the basic under work,” he said.
Sections will be essentially complete when they leave Charleston, except for custom items such as floors, seating, galleys and overhead bins, said Charles “Newt” Newton, Global Aeronautica’s top executive. “Everything’s standard that we produce,” he said. “The unique items are done in Everett.”
“It’ll be a fully integrated piece of structure,” said Mark Dickey, the general manager at Vought.
All this will take place on a site that until recently was a snake-filled morass, and be done by a work force that doesn’t have generations of tradition behind it.
The Wright Brothers took their first flight in North Carolina, but South Carolina doesn’t have that history, Dickey said. “Historically, you think about South Carolina as textiles, agriculture, recently automotive.”
Vought and Global are in South Carolina largely because of Boeing’s search for a home to build what was then called the 7E7.
According to Site Selection magazine, South Carolina made a favorable impression on Boeing’s search teams in 2003.
The Charleston site had a deep-water port and a suitable airport for bringing in parts from abroad. The state has a pro-business reputation and officials could offer financial incentives. Wages are lower there than around Puget Sound – the average worker in South Carolina takes home about $30,000 a year, compared with an average closer to $45,000 in Snohomish County. Yet thanks to a fledgling automotive industry, some workers already have advanced manufacturing skills.
BMW has been building cars in the area for 15 years, using the same three-dimensional CATIA design software that Boeing uses to design and build airplanes, Newton said. “We’re finding people who have good technical skills.”
When Vought was named a 787 partner, none of the company’s existing facilities had room, and it was clear it would need a new factory, Dickey said.
So Vought began reviewing the sites Boeing had considered.
Charleston had a lot of pluses, and state officials offered an attractive package that included job training and a range of incentives, said Newton, who was part of the Vought team that picked the South Carolina site.
He wouldn’t give details about the package, but according to Site Selection magazine, it’s worth at least $115 million, and could climb to $165 million if Vought and Global hit job creation targets. The two companies are investing about $565 million, the magazine said.
While Vought had targeted South Carolina, Alenia was looking at sites closer to Boeing’s Everett plant for its new plant, said David Brigante, Alenia’s director for commercial airplane programs.
But then Vought and Alenia, which already enjoyed a close working relationship, decided to form Global Aeronautica. The new partners decided to put Global in Charleston to capitalize on shared strengths, said Vincenzo Caiazzo, the chief executive of Alenia’s North American operations.
It only made sense, he said. Neither Vought nor Alenia has ever been asked to do this level of assembly work, or to manage their own supply chains on this scale. With the 787, they’re sharing capabilities and capital to do work that used to be done only by Boeing and Airbus.
“Global Aeronautica was formed to be for this,” Caiazzo said. “It’s more of a necessity than a strategic alignment.”
Now, Vought and Global are a team, the executives said. “We’re into each others’ business every day,” Newton said.
Dickey agreed. “Newt and I talk more often than we talk with our wives,” he said.
The site the companies picked sits atop old phosphate mines that were inhabited by “spiders and snakes, and a few alligators,” Newton said.
It required a tremendous amount of excavation and fill, with roughly 110,000 truckloads of dirt moving on and off. “I had one of the busiest sandboxes in the world here for a while,” Newton quipped.
But only 14 months after breaking ground, Vought moved into its building and began installing equipment. Global expects to move into its factory in the fall.
That’s amazing, Dickey said. “I can’t quite honestly get over the fact that the factory itself was built in a shade over a year.”
In mid-June, workers were installing new tools in the Vought factory, and preparing to start tests to prove they would work as projected.
Machines will cut the holes for the windows, and drill and rivet pieces together, Dickey said. Only a fraction of that work will be done by hand.
There are likely to be bumps in the road, Newton said. “The first couple airplanes,” he said, “I fully expect to receive things from other partners that they couldn’t put on because of the crush of time.”
Newton said he’s worked in aerospace all his adult life, but the 787 is different.
In other projects, the company built jet parts and sent them off.
But the 787 “is great,” he said. “You get to build something and see the fruits of your labor.”
Dickey agreed.
“I’ve loved airplanes since I was a kid,” Dickey said. “To be involved on the ground floor of a project of this magnitude …”
He paused. “We’re involved from day one and it doesn’t get any better than that.”
Reporter Bryan Corliss: 425-339-3454 or corliss@heraldnet.com.
Herald writer Bryan Corliss has literally traveled the world to examine how the Boeing Co. plans to build the 787 Dreamliner, its first jet that will be mostly made of a hardened plastic.
The result is a four-part series on the building of the 21st century jet, how it differs dramatically from its predecessors, what people at home and abroad think about it and how it will affect Everett’s work force.
Sunday: The worldwide assembly line: How it will work and what it means.
Monday: Japan will play a major role.
Tuesday: How Italy is involved.
Today: South Carolina will be a key assembly point.
For a photo gallery taken at the worldwide factories and to read earlier installments, go to www.heraldnet.com/boeing.
Home to the 787 factories of Vought Aircraft Industries and Global Aeronautica, a joint venture formed by Dallas-based Vought and Alenia Aeronautica of Italy.
Vought Aircraft Industries will fabricate the two aft fuselage sections.
Global Aeronautica will join together fuselage sections from other suppliers, begin the process of “stuffing” them with wiring and other components, and apply the first layers of paint.
Workflow: Vought will fabricate its sections in what it calls the world’s largest autoclave (by volume), then deliver them across the street to Global. Global will take fuselage sections from Vought, Italy and Japan; join the aft sections into one piece and the center sections into another; “stuff” the sections with wiring, floor grids and hydraulic lines; and apply base layers of paint before sending the largely completed sections to Everett.
Work force: Vought will have 100 by year’s end, and expects about 375 at peak production around 2010. Global expects to have 100 employees by year’s end, and up to 400 at peak production.
Facilities: Vought’s new building is 342,000 square feet; Global’s is 252,000 square feet. The companies also are building a ramp to connect the factories to Charleston International Airport.
Notable: Vought and Alenia are investing $560 million into the new campus, and receiving a state and local incentive package worth between $116 million and $160 million, depending on how many long-term jobs they create.
Quotable: “The 787 represents innovation in our industry. The 787 represents a breakthrough in the market. The 787 has also allowed us to build innovative relationships in the supply chain that have never been made in the past.” – Vincenzo Caiazzo, chief executive of Alenia North America.
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