Sunday, August 8, 2010

Flightblogger details immediate 787 flight tests

Flightblogger posted an article detailing the immediate flight test agenda for the 787 test flight fleet in the next month or so of flight testing. Thus far, the 787 test flight fleet has racked up just under 1,440 flight test hours but the pace has slowed considerably in the last few days. Still Boeing seems to be on pace to achieve certification by the end of November but they will certainly have to fly the 787s a least 10 hours a day in order to achieve delivery in December. It is still a very tight schedule.

ZA001 should by flying to Edwards AFB, according to Flightblogger, to validate the take off and landing performance of the 787 which will include the VMu (minimum unstick velocity) testing in which the 787 will drag it's tail along the surface of the runway and takeoff at the lowest possible speed. After this testing in California it's on to New Mexico for brake testing which will include rejected take off braking at maximum take off weight.

Flightblogger: Arduous phase of flight-test effort awaits Dreamliner

Flightblogger also confirmed what I had reported earlier, that ZA006's first flight may slip into early September. The date I have is September 7th. ZA006 should be out on the Boeing flightline by August 9th but we'll see. The parts for ZA231 (LN 26) have been arriving and that aircraft should start final assembly sometime tomorrow or Tuesday. Hopefully I should have more information on movements of the 787s in production soon. Stay tuned!

Lastly, ZA003 performed a short flyby at the Seattle Seafair this afternoon which was followed up by the Blue Angels performing before the Seafair crowd. Hope to see pics of that soon.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hi uresh

Thanks for the interesting reading on the B787. I was at everett on july 15th and am trying to figure out which aircraft I saw. There were 2 B787's painted all white? Are these Line 10 and 16 for Lan Chile? Also there were 3 B747-8 parked outside next to each other. 1 with a cathay Pacific Rudder. 1 all white and 1 in full cargolux cls. Do you know the Line numbers for these? Inside the hanger at that time was 1 with a cathay Pacific Rudder parked nearest the door, 1 behind it with no markings and 1 behind that with 1st B747-8 for Volga Dnepr. Thanks for any help.
Best reagrds
Mark

Uresh said...

MArk,
You're correct on the LAN bird (LN 10 and LN 16 are not painted). As far the Line number s for the 747-8s I don't have that information as of yet.