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¤ Performing more work on airplanes at their
assigned positions.
¤ Dedicating multiple days for our 737 teams to
focus on and implement quality improvements.
¤ Launching an independent assessment to bolster
the quality management system at Boeing Commercial
Airplanes by a highly experienced safety expert.
In addition, Boeing will open its factory to 737
customers to conduct their own additional reviews.
That’s not the only quality issue Boeing is dealing
with.
Recently, Boeing supplier Spirit AeroSystems, which
makes the fuselages of the 737 Max jets, notified
the plane maker that two holes on 50 undelivered
airplanes may not have been drilled exactly to Boeing’s
requirements.
The news comes one month after a catastrophic
failure occurred when a door plug blew off a new Alaska
Airlines Boeing 737 Max 9 at 16,000 feet, imperiling
171 passengers and 6 crew members.
The explosive accident caused the Federal Aviation
Administration to increase oversight of Boeing and audit
production of the 737 Max 9 jetliner. The agency also
said it’s reconsidering its longstanding practice of relying
on aircraft manufacturer employees to perform some
safety analysis of planes.
Boeing has dealt with misdrilled holes before.
In August 2023, Boeing found fastener holes on
some 737s in the aft pressure bulkhead — the heavy
metal dome capping the back end of the passenger
cabin that is essential to maintaining cabin pressure —
had been improperly drilled by fuselage manufacturer
Spirit Aerosystems.
Called “snowmen” due to their elongated shape of
two overlapping holes of differing size, these holes were
filled with fasteners and passed quality inspections at
Spirit before being shipped by rail to Boeing.
Fastenal Fastener Sales Slide Steepens
Fastenal Co. reported fastener sales declined for
a fourth straight month in January, falling 6% to $99.6
million (31.2% of overall sales). A year earlier, first-month
fasteners sales increased 11.6%.
Consolidated January sales gained 6.4% to $639.9
million. Daily sales improved 1.6% to $29.1 million.
Sales in the U.S. grew 11.2% to $531.7 million, while
sales in Canada and Mexico increased 17.3% to $87
million.
By end market, sales to heavy manufacturing
customers rose 3.3%, with sales to non-residential
construction customers falling 8.6% during January.
Fastenal’s full time workforce increased 2.7%
during the month to 23,380 employees. Distribution/
transportation personnel grew 3.7% to 3,072, while
manufacturing personnel increased 1.9% to 710 workers.
In the final quarter of 2023, Fastenal sales declined
2.3% to $546.9 million (31.1% of of total sales). The
results included a 1.9% drop in December, with pricing
for fasteners decelerating at a faster pace than nonfastener
products. Web: www.fastenal.com.
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