A new set of drilling and riveting machines recently transferred to Boeing’s massive plant in Everett, Washington, from a high-bay space the company rented in nearby Anacortes marked the latest milestone in its continuing effort to automate 777 production. Called the FAUB (fuselage automated upright build), the machinery employs automated guided robots designed by KUKA Robotics. It drills and fills some 60,000 fasteners that attach the panels that comprise the 777’s forward and aft body sections. Today, Boeing mechanics positioned on both sides of the fuselage perform the task by hand, a repetitive and tiring job that places a lot of stress on their shoulders and hands.
The new process will use automated guided vehicles (AGVs) to move the components of FAUB into position, including work stands, fuselages and the robotic arms that will drill and insert fasteners. The robots, positioned inside and outside the fuselage, not only drill the holes, but also act as a bucking bar and perform dynamic riveting.
A 325,000-square-foot factory extension in Everett houses the FAUB. Boeing expects to start using the system by the end of the year.
The FAUB serves as something of a centerpiece for Boeing’s continuing evolution toward automotive-industry style automation. For example, it will allow the company to remove all of the body-structures tools in favor of a process using cradles and AGVs that “pulse” throughout the production system. At the same time, the company plans to remove all the tooling associated with the wing-to-body join, also in favor of a cradle-AGV-based production system.
“We will really be transforming the production system in the next two- to three years to a monument-free environment,” said 777 program vice president and general manager Elizabeth Lund. “That means it’s flexible; it’s easy to reconfigure; you can take advantage of design changes.”
Correspondingly, as Boeing designs the new 777X–due to enter service around the turn of the decade–it does so with automation in mind, resulting in a transformation of the way it delivers parts and develops production standards for the airplane, added Lund.
Once the 777X enters production, its composite wing will travel through the same main final assembly line as the metal wing now used on the current generation airplanes, thanks largely to the flexibility the new monument-free system affords. Boeing expects to continue building metal wings for the 777 freighter for roughly another 10 years, said Lund, or until the company decides to develop a 777X cargo variant with a composite wing.
“We’re also looking at where you put the technology, that it isn’t just putting automation in for automation’s sake,” added Boeing Commercial Airplanes vice president of 777 manufacturing Jason Clark. “We’re putting the automation in areas where there is high-volume, repetitive type work–drilling, filling, sealant application–those type of applications that are hard on the human body, that we tend to have a lot of quality constraints on.”
While the FAUB underwent testing over the last year in Anacortes, in Everett the company built a new facility to run in parallel with the current production line, allowing for a slow transition from today’s processes to the new technology. To ensure that it works as expected, Boeing has also implemented a fatigue program for which it built a test barrel with the automation. Situated on the north side of the Everett campus, the barrel neared completion late last month, in time for the planned conclusion of testing in August. “[It] allows us to start onboarding later this year the new technology and the parallel production I was mentioning,” said Clark.
For the empennage, Boeing has established yet another automated assembly process, using many of the same technologies introduced with the FAUB. The new system will perform roughly 80 percent of the drilling and light fastening, eliminating roughly 58,000 manual drills.
Now building 777s at a rate of 8.3 airplanes per month, Boeing continues to express confidence that it will manage a smooth production transition to the 777X as long as it collects orders for between 50 and 60 current-generation airplanes a month through 2018. Continuous product improvement, said 777 integration leader Doug Ackerman, will ensure a steady flow of orders for the current airplane, plans for which call for capacity addition of some 14 extra seats along with engine, cabin and aerodynamic changes designed to improve fuel efficiency per seat by 5 percent.
Changes include a reduction in empty weight of some 1,200 pounds, elevator trim bias modifications, window drag reduction, flap fairing “optimization” and the removal of the tailskid device through improvements in the software that controls tail strike correction.
Boeing expects to gain the 14 extra seats by shrinking the exterior dimensions of the lavatories and switching from a canted seat track pattern in the rear of the cabin to a straight, staggered configuration, allowing for better use of now wasted space where the fuselage narrows in the rear of the airplane. So far, two customers have agreed to take the option and Boeing expects to begin delivering that modification in the first half of 2016.
Other improvements coming in the second quarter of 2016 include engine mods by GE expected to result in a half-percent improvement in fuel burn. Other fuel burn enhancements come from a software modification that will allow for a so-called flaps 25 autoland setting, resulting in more efficient approach speeds.