A380 = White Elephant

Boeing and their home run called the 787 will bury Airbus soon.

French Frogs in charge?

What a joke

Airbus Management reminds me at lot of FAA Management(hehe)


PARIS - Airbus unions in France on Friday ordered a one-day
strike for next week to protest planned job cuts and plant
disposals at the European aircraft maker.

Shares of the parent company of Airbus, meanwhile, sank as
much as 5.2 percent in the wake of the disclosure that work
has been halted on the slow-selling freighter version of the
A380 model.

HAMBURG, Germany -- In Airbus' sprawling production plant
here, one of modern industry's biggest meltdowns, and the
dawning effort to set things right, is a tale of two
airplane-production hangars and two countries, Germany and
France.

Nearly 600 people should be hard at work in the key
production hangar here, where Airbus planned to assemble the
giant sections of the world's largest passenger airplane,
the A380. Instead, the quiet is broken only by music playing
softly on a stereo speakers that an employee sneaked in.
Only a few dozen employees tinker on eight airplane
carcasses that clog a production line that cost some $15
billion to develop.

The workers essentially are hand-building some of the
company's first two dozen A380s. Airbus' superjumbo jet
program was launched before Chicago-based Boeing's big hit,
the 787 Dreamliner, but the A380 now is two years behind
schedule, and the production delay will cost Airbus' parent
company, European Aeronautic Defense and Space Co., $6.1
billion is operating profit over the next four years.

In Hangar 42 nearby, it is a different scene. Dozens of
aerospace engineers are in a mad dash to untangle the A380's
myriad of problems. They huddle in front of computer
terminals, set up on 15-foot-long folding tables, so they
can be in constant contact with workers in blue jumpsuits
who are investigating a hobbled A380. The workers,
confronted with bundles of wire that won't bend in the right
places and cables that come up short, explain the problems
to the engineers and urge them to design new ones. And quickly.

The design engineers are bogged down by computers that can't
talk to one another. One displays their work in
three-dimensional images, the other is strictly 2-D. The
breakdown fouls the effort to design a new part, get it
built and get the A380 back into full production.

The A380 line won't run full speed until 2010, if all goes
well. Biding their time until then, thousands of workers are
idle or on part-time shifts. Yet others labor furiously,
redesigning parts and installing them as they arrive, all in
the rush to get the A380 on track.

Workers in Hamburg and Airbus' other facilities have
worried, hurried and waited since the planemaker in October
announced that breakdowns on its A380 production line would
put deliveries of the new plane two years behind schedule.

On 2 Mrz., 15:29, BiffClinton wrote:
Boeing and their home run called the 787 will bury Airbus soon.

French Frogs in charge?

What a joke

Obviously you face a lot of problems with a company beeing controlled
by governments and political drivers.

Buit if I remember right, wasn't Boeing almost broke due to the huge
development costs of the 747 in the 1960s ?

What a mirical that would be, if Airbus would not face HUGE problems
with such a project.

Okay, I'll bite:
Airbus is both German and French, so please include "German Krauts" in your
nationalistic insults. Only saying "French Frogs" is not paying proper
respect to the system of national parity at Airbus. As a German, when it
comes to Airbus, I want my fair share of nationalistic slurs, and I find
not being insulted highly offending.

On a more serious note, I think that Competition Is Good (TM) and that both
passengers and airlines alike have profited from the rivalry between Boeing
and Airbus. It was this intense competition that sparked projects like the
A340 and B787. Not even the most pig-headed Boeing fanboy could seriously
wish for the demise of Airbus, and vice versa - it would make the single
remaining then-monopolist a worse company and seriously slow down
innovation.

Anno.

Don't they also make wings or something in the UK?

Anno v. Heimburg wrote:
Okay, I'll bite:
Airbus is both German and French, so please include "German Krauts" in your
nationalistic insults. Only saying "French Frogs" is not paying proper
respect to the system of national parity at Airbus. As a German, when it
comes to Airbus, I want my fair share of nationalistic slurs, and I find
not being insulted highly offending.

On a more serious note, I think that Competition Is Good (TM) and that both
passengers and airlines alike have profited from the rivalry between Boeing
and Airbus. It was this intense competition that sparked projects like the
A340 and B787. Not even the most pig-headed Boeing fanboy could seriously
wish for the demise of Airbus, and vice versa - it would make the single
remaining then-monopolist a worse company and seriously slow down
innovation.

Anno.

"Anno v. Heimburg" wrote in message
...
Okay, I'll bite:
Airbus is both German and French, so please include "German Krauts" in
your
nationalistic insults. Only saying "French Frogs" is not paying proper
respect to the system of national parity at Airbus. As a German, when it
comes to Airbus, I want my fair share of nationalistic slurs, and I find
not being insulted highly offending.

Okay...insert your favorite here [ ]

On a more serious note, I think that Competition Is Good (TM) and that
both
passengers and airlines alike have profited from the rivalry between
Boeing
and Airbus. It was this intense competition that sparked projects like the
A340 and B787. Not even the most pig-headed Boeing fanboy could seriously
wish for the demise of Airbus, and vice versa - it would make the single
remaining then-monopolist a worse company and seriously slow down
innovation.

Sure we could.

The result would be the formation of an entirely NEW company that would not
have the bureaucratic boneheadedness of either company. Think Wal-Mart in
the 1960's when Kresske's, Sears, MonkeyWards and a dozen others were run
over by that redneck upstart, Sam Walton.

Thomas Lifson at www.americanthinker.com has been writing a very good series
of articles folowing the soap opera of the Airbus A380. Things looks pretty
desperate for Airbus and all parties within Airbus seem to only be able to
exaggerate those problems. The CEOs, especially the one that lasted a few
days before leaving, recognize the existential threat Airbus faces. The
unions and politicians, with a death grip on the throat of Airbus are saying
they understand Airbus must change or die, but they are practicing the same
tactics which are driving Airbus to the Brink. The French and German
governments aren't willing to let their people get less than all they
deserve, especially the French.

The sensible thing would be to consolidate manufacturing, perhaps into only
2 locations. But the Germans see that the French are setting them up for
bait and switch. If Airbus moves all narrow body production to Germany, it
will only benefit the Germans until Airbus gets narrow body production up
and running in China. Every plane made in China, and the Chinese are
insisting they not just buy aircraft but be allowed to make aircraft makes
the German facilities redundant.

About the time the A380 was announced there was a half-serious idea floating
around that Boeing had tricked Airbus into committing to the A380 by
"accidentally" exposing Boeing's plans for a super-747. The idea being if
Airbus knew Boeing saw the world market as demanding ever larger jets,
Airbus would commit to the A380. In reality, Boeing had determined the
world market was demanding 777 and 787 type aircraft. If Boeing could trick
Airbus into taking the bait and building A380s the burden would doom Airbus.
That's probably a better story than real explanation. But the lack of
oversight, political meddling, and divisions within Airbus that became
obvious with the A380 do look the be serious enough to doom Airbus.

The good news is that Airbus can survive. The bad news is that survival
probably depends on the politicians and the governments reacting like
seasoned private enterprise.

You can read the Thomas Lifson articles about Airbus at the link below.

http://tinyurl.com/2gxebd
--

Scott

Drain the swamp. Deport Islam. Until Muslims observe and protect
human/religious rights of others they should not be allowed to remain in the
West. Islam, as practiced, is incompatible with Western freedom.
"Anno v. Heimburg" wrote in message
...
Okay, I'll bite:
Airbus is both German and French, so please include "German Krauts" in
your
nationalistic insults. Only saying "French Frogs" is not paying proper
respect to the system of national parity at Airbus. As a German, when it
comes to Airbus, I want my fair share of nationalistic slurs, and I find
not being insulted highly offending.

On a more serious note, I think that Competition Is Good (TM) and that
both
passengers and airlines alike have profited from the rivalry between
Boeing
and Airbus. It was this intense competition that sparked projects like the
A340 and B787. Not even the most pig-headed Boeing fanboy could seriously
wish for the demise of Airbus, and vice versa - it would make the single
remaining then-monopolist a worse company and seriously slow down
innovation.

Anno.