Global Fastener News

1/10/2010

“Widespread shortages of specially designed bolts, rivets and nut-plates needed to fasten the 787’s all-composite fuselage ranked among the two chief problems that Boeing blamed for the initial delay in September 2007,” Stephen Trimble wrote in Flight International.

The 787 fastener shortage was severe and unexpected. Fasteners total only 3% of the airframe’s value but became high priority. Boeing then determined the shortage was due to “unusual market and organizational forces within the supply chain.”

Boeing has responded by changing its monitoring and contracts.
However a University of Michigan case study suggests goals to change fastener supply chain business relationships “remain unresolved, fuelling concerns that a fastener shortage could return.”

“I think they have a window to get it done,” says UM professor Ravi Anupindi told aerospace writer Trimble. “It’s a do-able,” he added.

Boeing turned to Anupindi’s graduate students as consultants. Their study traced how the 787 fastener shortage began with consolidation in the fastener industry after 9/11, leaving only three companies. Aerospace sales began increasing in 2004, but the fastener industry resisted boosting capacity, Anupindi said.

The case study blames fastener manufacturers for failing to keep up with the pace and distributors for speculating by holding inventories to increase prices.

Increased demand in Asia for raw materials lengthened lead times for fasteners from one to two years.

By mid-2007, Boeing realized that major changes were needed in the fastener supply chain.

Boeing began monitoring fasteners “almost by part numbers” – including supplier capacity, and lead time re-order points.

A drop in aerospace fastener orders in 2008 helped Boeing.

Boeing is looking at single contracts with fastener suppliers based on 787 demand to achieve more supply chain efficiency.

But Anupindi told Flight Information he questions changes because fasteners are such a small part of the 787’s cost that disrupting the supply chain could cause more problems than any efficiency Boeing gains.
©2010 GlobalFastenerNews.com