Is Boeing similar to some car manufacturing companies where quality has slipped?

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amiga500

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#249036 21-Apr-2019 20:44

If you watch Scotty Kilmer's car repair channel he talks about car companies whose quality has slipped for various reasons. He talks about this a lot. He also talks about parts suppliers that can change from making excellent parts to shoddy parts and vice-versa. In the case of car companies he attributes some of the quality problems being caused by a company being sold and being bought by another company with existing dodgy quality processes and culture. He even mentions that Toyota are not as good as they used to be!

Could it be that Boeing has slipped in a similar way to Toyota? (I am not suggesting that Boeing has become like BMW, Nissan, Chrysler, or Fiat.)

Here are three articles well worth a read. The Aljazeera one is similar in content to the B787 video documentary but is particularly concerning in that former long serving Boeing engineers are adamant that schedule has become too dominant over safety and quality.

The other two links are about the US Air Force refusing to take delivery of new tanker aircraft due to tools and debris being left in the aircraft prior to delivery.

https://edition.cnn.com/2019/03/14/politics/air-force-boeing-refueling-plane/index.html

https://www.aljazeera.com/investigations/boeing787/2014/09/boeing-battle-between-quality-schedule-201491114110291678.html

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#2221852 21-Apr-2019 20:44

Allow me to introduce you folks to our new travel community: TravelTalk NZ.

We hope to see you there!

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tehgerbil

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#2221885 21-Apr-2019 22:01

Every single person alive needs to look at GM's response to their cars turning off and killing people. 124 people died. Not a single person went to prison for this.

So yes, absolutely deaths are a cost of making more money. It just comes to how much bad press the deaths cost the business.

People wonder why I am such a cynic about companies ethics. You look in to the General motors event and you will be to.

amiga500

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#2222226 22-Apr-2019 15:56

'I never plan to fly on it': US Boeing workers blow whistle on 787 plant

This is the headline on a Stuff story today. Among other things it mentions metal shavings being found on top of flight control wires. Boeing says it is old news, but it seems very similar to the story about the US Air Force refusing to take delivery of their tanker aircraft. Boeing have a huge reputational issue to fix and it is 100% their fault for allowing it to happen.

amiga500

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#2222227 22-Apr-2019 16:00

tehgerbil:

Every single person alive needs to look at GM's response to their cars turning off and killing people. 124 people died. Not a single person went to prison for this.

So yes, absolutely deaths are a cost of making more money. It just comes to how much bad press the deaths cost the business.

People wonder why I am such a cynic about companies ethics. You look in to the General motors event and you will be to.

Shameful response by GM, makes Boeing look like Angels.

Aredwood

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#2222479 23-Apr-2019 01:52

tehgerbil:
Every single person alive needs to look at GM's response to their cars turning off and killing people. 124 people died. Not a single person went to prison for this.

So yes, absolutely deaths are a cost of making more money. It just comes to how much bad press the deaths cost the business.

People wonder why I am such a cynic about companies ethics. You look in to the General motors event and you will be to.

Another factor. On some cars, you cant restart the engine from the Acc or Run position. Unless you first turn the key completely off first. (Don't know if GM is like that though).

My Mercedes Vito is like that. Which is an incredibly stupid system. As turning off the ignition locks the steering wheel and switches off power to the airbags.

And on Automatic cars, you often can't turn off the key completely unless you put the gearbox into Park. Meaning that you might not be able to restart the car, unless you come to a complete stop first.

I modified the ignition switch on my Vito, so that you can turn it to start without needing to turn it off first. Except that the ECU still doesn't let you restart the engine, unless you power cycle the ECU first. But at least I can now do that without having to lock the steering. Interestingly, the Vito airbag system gets its power from the Acc switch feed (meaning it loses power while the starter motor is being cranked). Unless the Airbag system is able to also get power from the airbag warning light wire. Or it has been designed with enough storage capacitors, to maintain operation for a minute or two.

dafman

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#2222632 23-Apr-2019 11:05

amiga500:He even mentions that Toyota are not as good as they used to be.

I had a look at the new base model Corolla last month and was surprised at how cheap it felt. A lot of the interior fittings were flimsy plastic which felt like they would break easily. The driver's seat lacked support and the seat covering felt loose and cheap. Pretty disappointing from a car maker that used to set the quality benchmark across Japanese car makers.

FineWine

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#2222652 23-Apr-2019 11:35

Watched the USA 60 minutes show last night (recorded) and they had an article concerning the Amtrak accidents and how these could be prevented if the rails company spent billions on an automated safety system called PSC "Positive Train Control" which congress had legislated on 10 years ago but the rail companies have managed to get delays on.

60 min's - How safe are America's railroads?

America Could Stop More Than a Third of Train Crashes. Here’s Why It Doesn’t.

So what all this boils down to is MONEY and then MONEY. If these rail accidents were equated to aircraft planes would be grounded and manufactures and airlines would have no option but to comply to legislation. Same for to a large extend the automotive industry as well.

Whilst the difficult we can do immediately, the impossible takes a bit longer. However, miracles you will have to wait for.

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Fred99

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#2222673 23-Apr-2019 13:01

If there was any trend for flying to be less safe due to manufacturing quality issues, then you'd think it would show up in stats:

So there you are, 5 year moving average, fatalities per trillion revenue passenger kilometers, you're at least 30 times safer being flown today than in 1970, about 5 times safer than at the start of the century.

amiga500

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#2225169 26-Apr-2019 07:36

Fred99:

If there was any trend for flying to be less safe due to manufacturing quality issues, then you'd think it would show up in stats:

So there you are, 5 year moving average, fatalities per trillion revenue passenger kilometers, you're at least 30 times safer being flown today than in 1970, about 5 times safer than at the start of the century.

Maybe thanks to individual workers trying to do a safe and good job, while being undermined by corporate scumbag management at every turn?

tehgerbil

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#2225195 26-Apr-2019 08:44

@Amiga500 - Yip. My brother signs off aircraft to be airworthy for a major airline and can confirm it keeps him awake at night.

He is not a fan of where things are headed in regards to cost cutting within airlines to get more shareholder profit and that's not withstanding he ultimately shoulders blame if any aircraft fails under his signature.

Not the accountants making the decisions to cut corners to save money..

Or the shareholders clamoring for more dividends

Or the managers getting pressure from higher ups to make more profit for the company...
Or the customer relationship managers under performance guidelines to ensure they meet their schedules...

His balls are in a very tight vice being squeezed from all areas. Very stressful.

olivernz

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#2225241 26-Apr-2019 09:12

Can't remember where I saw it (probably YouTube) a documentary on the 787 build and it was scary. The thing they said was basically boing lost its edge and handed control to the bean counters when they merged with McDonnell Douglas. It changed the whole company ethos. The 737 issues sound exactly like the thing that would happen.

tdgeek

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#2225248 26-Apr-2019 09:18

amiga500:

Maybe thanks to individual workers trying to do a safe and good job, while being undermined by corporate scumbag management at every turn?

Air travel is very new. Its only decades old. As design and manufacturing improves, that helps. Each crash causes an improvement to stop the same crash happening again. It has evolved to be very safe. How long has cost cutting been going on? Forever. Maybe more now, I don't know, I suspect so. As air travel is inherently very safe, and we dont have 400 crashes annually to see a trend, its difficult to see how much we have been lucky to get away with. The comments by some employees show that little has probably changed, but due to inherent safety we cannot see the effects of cutting corners. Maybe the safety boards need to find a way to collate employee concerns, so that the information is gathered and employees are kept anonymous. To date (I assume) they only collate employee concerns when investigating a crash or incident.

Humans and money are not compatible

frankv

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#2225329 26-Apr-2019 09:40

amiga500:

Could it be that Boeing has slipped in a similar way to Toyota? (I am not suggesting that Boeing has become like BMW, Nissan, Chrysler, or Fiat.)

Interesting that you should choose Toyota as your exemplar of failure, when a recent thread here found that it was considered the most reliable of all car makers. Do you have any stats to show that Toyota has indeed slipped?

frankv

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#2225369 26-Apr-2019 09:49

tdgeek:
amiga500:

Maybe thanks to individual workers trying to do a safe and good job, while being undermined by corporate scumbag management at every turn?

Or, equally, maybe thanks to corporate management trying to do a good and safe job, while being undermined by scumbag individual workers at every turn?

Really, if you're going to make speculative and accusatory statements like this, you should have something to back them up.

Each crash causes an improvement to stop the same crash happening again.

That is the theory. Regrettably, it's not always true.

I'm not at home ATM so can't give the reference, but I have a book written by an NTSB investigator, which states "There are no new accidents."

Obviously, the Lion Air crash didn't actually cause an improvement to stop the same crash happening again.

amiga500

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#2225586 26-Apr-2019 15:04

frankv:
tdgeek:

amiga500:

Maybe thanks to individual workers trying to do a safe and good job, while being undermined by corporate scumbag management at every turn?

Or, equally, maybe thanks to corporate management trying to do a good and safe job, while being undermined by scumbag individual workers at every turn? Really, if you're going to make speculative and accusatory statements like this, you should have something to back them up.
Each crash causes an improvement to stop the same crash happening again.
That is the theory. Regrettably, it's not always true. I'm not at home ATM so can't give the reference, but I have a book written by an NTSB investigator, which states "There are no new accidents." Obviously, the Lion Air crash didn't actually cause an improvement to stop the same crash happening again.

The New York Times and Aljazeera have covered this issue in the last few days. Although Boeing say it is old news, there is yet another Boeing ex safety inspector saying exactly the same things as found in the 2014 Aljazeera investigation. It's all schedule schedule & in his case movement to another part of the plant when he expressed concerns. What lends credence to the whistle blowers are facts such as Qatar airways saying that they would not accept 787s from the South Carolina plant and the US Air Force rejecting delivery of planes due to debris and tools left behind. And in my judgement the retired safety inspector comes across as a careful and concerned person, not some vindictive ex employee.

I made the comparison between Toyota and Boeing as it would have been unfair to compare Boeing's quality with 'basket case' manufacturers such as Chrysler, Fiat, BMW, and many Nissans made in the last 10 years!

Once they have the Max software sorted out look forward to seeing news footage of smiling Boeing executives boarding 737 Max planes with their wives and children, just to prove how safe and excellent the planes have been made. Good chance they will have some of the children saying how much they loved the flight in the new plane.

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