In preflight

This signifies the end of remedial production work on the aircraft and the commencement of a range of tests necessary for first flight, expected by the end of June.

These tests included build verification and structures and systems integration tests, landing gear ‘swings’ (retracting and extending the undercarriage) and the factory ‘gauntlet’ test. The factory gauntlet test was a full simulation of the first flight, with chief pilot Mike Carriker at the controls, with all flight controls, hardware and software tested, including manual and automatic landings, followed by extensive ground tests.

“These results give us confidence in our ability to move into further gauntlet testing using either ground power or the airplane’s engines or auxiliary power unit. This is a significant milestone on the path to first flight,” Scott Fancher, VP and general manager of the 787 program, said of the factory gauntlet test.

On April 27 ZA001 emerged from the final assembly halls, and was moved across the tarmac at Boeing’s Everett facility to one of three aircraft paint hangars. There, not only was ZA001’s Boeing house colours paint scheme touched up, but further flight test instrumentation was installed and the 787’s fuel system was given an aqueous wash to flush out contaminants.

Then on May 2 ZA001 rolled out of the paintshop onto the flightline to the ‘fuel farm’ (pictured above), firstly for fuelling tests to calibrate its Goodrich supplied fuel quantity indication system, which began on May 7/8. After fuelling, the aircraft’s APU and Rolls-Royce Trent 1000 engines were due to be started for the first time.

Boeing has also confirmed that all structural tests necessary for first flight have also been completed. The final test on the 787 static airframe required before first flight – where the wing and trailing edges were subjected to their limit load – took place on April 21.

“We continue to analyse the data, but the initial results are positive,” Fancher said.

ZA001’s last major test before flight will then be the eight day ‘gauntlet’ test of all the aircraft’s systems using both ground power or the aircraft’s engines or APU, with systems redundancy tested by simulating single and multiple failures.

After a successful gauntlet test, the 787 will begin high and low speed taxi tests to test flight control and braking performance, the last steps before first flight.

Despite recent progress Boeing still won’t put a more specific timeframe on first flight other than “on schedule for later this quarter”, but does say the second 787 to fly, ZA002, should take to the air only three weeks after ZA001.

After completing ground vibration tests ZA002 too was towed out of the assembly halls to enter the paintshop for painting in the colours of 787 launch customer ANA, even though ANA will now not take delivery and operate this aircraft. (Earlier in the year Boeing confirmed that all of the first six 787s used as test aircraft were no longer currently allocated to particular customers. ) ZA001’s milestone first flight will take off from Everett and last somewhere between three and five hours (depending on factors such as weather, performance of the telemetry equipment), before landing at Boeing Field, to the south of downtown Seattle, from where Boeing conducts most of its flight test operations.

That flight will begin a 3100 flight hour, eight-and-a-half month, six aircraft test and certification program scheduled to see US FAA certification for the 787 awarded in the first quarter of 2010, allowing first delivery to ANA soon after.

The condensed timeframe for flight testing has its critics. Typically a flight test program for an all-new airliner would take 11-12 months, but Boeing says the shorter timeframe can be achieved through a more efficient flight test schedule and better use of the 24 hour clock.

Boeing’s flight test operations director Frank Rasor briefed media on the planned 787 flight test program in late April, explaining the time allocated for flight testing and ‘discovery layups’, or rectifying faults discovered in flight test, will be the sameas for comparable previous programs. But, “Where we do have an ability to change is how much time we take for planned layups and when we do ground tests,” Rasor said.

“We have specifically taken action to reduce that amount of (planned) layup time,” Rasor said, for example through using prefabricated ice shapes for icing testing, and prefabricating the pressure belt system for surveying flight loads, cutting installation time from 30 days to about seven.

Then to cut time in ground testing, “We are going to move more ground test to (a) second shift, so when you hear words like 24-7 flight testing, it’s 24-7 between airborne test, ground test, and maintenance and reconfiguration of the airplane. It will be a 24-7 operation (but) we typically fly daylight hours. ” In the earlier stages of flight test that will mean the aircraft will fly during an eight hour block between 7am and 3pm, then there is a nine hour block for aircraft maintenance and possibly ground testing, during which time flight test data is analysed concurrently, while the third shift or block runs from midnight to 7am when the aircraft is prepared for that day’s flying.

Of the six flight test aircraft four will be powered by Rolls-Royce Trent 1000s, and the last two by General Electric’s GEnx.

Once in the air ZA001’s focus will be on testing for flutter and validating stability and control before doing icing tests with ice shapes. Key roles for ZA002 include fuel and electrical system testing, stability and control testing, autopilot testing and runway work. ZA003 will focus on testing the passenger cabin including interior noise and smoke penetration.

ZA004 will be used to validate the 787/ Trent 1000 combination’s fuel efficiency baseline and will be instrumented to validate modelling assumptions on flight loads and pressures on the airframe. Later in the program ZA004 will be used to flight test the improved ‘Package B’ version of the Trent engine, which will be delivered on all but the earliest Trent powered 787s.

ZA005, the fifth test 787, will be the first powered by the GEnx and will be fully instrumented for test and certification of the GE engine. GE powered ZA006 will also be used to support testing of the GEnx but will be minimally instrumented. It will also be used for some lightning strike testing.

Later in the flight test program five of the six aircraft will be involved in ETOPS and functional and reliability testing, which should see the 787 make its first international visits to early customer airlines.

To some degree Boeing will also be able to reallocate different aircraft to different tests if an assigned aircraft is not available due to an unserviceability or an unplanned layup. “One of the changes we’ve made is to go to a fleet management process, so that we’re looking at, do we have the right 787 airplanes flying on a daily basis and so if one airplane is down and we have critical and important data (to collect) we would put that test on another airplane if it had the right instrumentation system and the right configuration to do that,” Rasor explained.

There will also be some follow-on testing on the seventh and eighth 787s, which will incorporate structural and electrical changes which will require certification testing.

The seventh 787 (the production standard ZA100) will be the first delivered to an airline, with handover to ANA sometime in the first quarter next year, assuming flight testing runs to plan. Then under current planning Qantas subsidiary Jetstar should not be too far behind in taking delivery of its first of 15 787-8s. Jetstar says it is due to take delivery of its first aircraft in May 2010 for service entry in the second half of the year – assuming the order is not cancelled, which Qantas CEO Alan Joyce flagged as a possibility when announcing capacity, job and aircraft fleet cuts (see p20).

Meanwhile, Boeing’s 787 weight reduction efforts continue. A recent paper by Bernstein Research quoted by ATW Daily News claims the 787 is as much as eight per cent over weight, which translates into range performance “near 6900nm, well below the promised 7700-8200nm range. ” “We have acknowledged that early airplanes are heavy and are working hard on implementing weight improvements,” Boeing told ATW Daily News in response.

“Bernstein’s conclusion on range is inaccurate, the airplane’s range is closer to 8000nm than 7000nm. ”