limits to growth..
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/n...ectid=11841946
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limits to growth..
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/n...ectid=11841946
Those pay rates don't look very good compared to what senior AIR pilots are earning. Then there's living in Dubai...
Emirates got their own growth limiting factors too http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/n...ectid=11841478
Happy holder, well managed, low PE, high fully imputed dividend yield...what's not to like.
I always think this 3D printing is blown out of proportion. Realistically how many parts can be made on a 3D printer that meet the strength and quality standards required for an airplane?
The term '3D Printer' is really oblique, even confusing using the reference to a 'printer' that most will typically associate with 2D paper printing.
Actually 3D printing is a fabrication technology, a device that can create, or build objects with extremely precise parameters from a variety of input materials, potentially at the scale required for manufacturing.
Also one has to look into the array of materials that can be used in fabricating '3D' objects. Some materials for example enable direct metal laser sintering, that can quite realistically be used in fabricating or manufacturing components for aircraft engineering, for example titanium, or even ceramics, and may already be being used.
It's an amazing world. Even my teenage kids have 3D printers at school, they design objects on the computer and hey presto, it's 'printed' out into a real life fabrication that they bring home and proudly display to their parents who wonder at the marvels of modern science but have no knowledge or technology required to do it themselves.
Additive printing (or colloquially, 3D Printing) has certainly advanced rapidly over the last decade, and has certainly garnered huge amounts of press, but the reality is that at this juncture it's primarily suited to prototyping, and the production of non-structural components. Even as material strength has improved, regulatory issues now loom over it's use in various industries, especially the risk-adverse aviation industry.
The ability to print a spare part on demand for an aircraft will certainly revolutionise the industry. It's coming, but I think we are still quite a few years away from that point.
Just saw this a couple of days ago Meextr; its hard to keep up with the pace of change.And i heard an interview re robots taking over all the mundane jobs and many others too, soon including automated taxis and trucks and cars!. Even heard of a sports result article on a game of baseball (i think) written by a bot and a musical score for a show at westend that was written by a bot; hell they can be creative too:eek2:
3-D printed titanium to shave millions in Boeing Dreamliner costs
http://s4.reutersmedia.net/resources...=LYNXMPED391AX
Visitors take pictures of a model of Boeing's 787 Dreamliner during Japan Aerospace 2016 air show in Tokyo, Japan, October 12, 2016.REUTERS/Kim Kyung-Hoon
By Alwyn Scott | SEATTLE
Boeing Co hired Norsk Titanium AS to print the first structural titanium parts for its 787 Dreamliner, the Norwegian 3-D printing company said on Monday, paving the way to cost savings of $2 million to $3 million for each plane.
The contract is a major step in Boeing's effort to cut the cost of its barely profitable 787 and a sign of growing industrial acceptance of the durability of 3-D printed metal parts, allowing them to replace pieces made with more expensive traditional manufacturing in demanding aerospace applications.
Strong, lightweight titanium alloy is seven times more costly than aluminum, and accounts for about $17 million of the cost of a $265 million Dreamliner, industry sources say.
Boeing has been trying to reduce titanium costs on the 787, which requires more of the metal than other models because of its carbon-fiber composite fuselage and wings. Titanium also is used extensively on Airbus Group SE's rival A350 jet.
"This means $2 million to $3 million in savings for each Dreamliner, at least," starting in 2018 when many more parts are being printed, Chip Yates, Norsk Titanium's vice president of marketing, said in a telephone interview.
Boeing declined to comment on the estimate but said Norsk's technology would help reduce costs.
The aircraft maker in February said it had hired privately held Oxford Performance Materials to print plastic parts for its Starliner spacecraft.
Norsk worked with Boeing for more than a year to design four 787 parts and obtain Federal Aviation Administration certification for them, Yates said.
Norsk expects the U.S. regulatory agency will approve the material properties and production process for the parts later this year, which would "open up the floodgates" and allow Norsk to print thousands of different parts for each Dreamliner, without each part requiring separate FAA approval, Yates said.
"You're talking about tons, literally," on the 787 that would be printed instead of made with traditional, expensive forging and machining, he said.
General Electric Co is already printing metal fuel nozzles for a line of new aircraft engines. But Norsk and Boeing said the titanium parts are the first printed structural components designed to bear the stress of an airframe in flight.
Norsk said that initially it will print in Norway, but is building up a 67,000-square-foot (6,220-square-meter) facility in Plattsburgh in upstate New York, where it aims to have nine printers running by year-end.
Thanks for that insight guys. I just imagined 3D printers manufacturing out of plastics.
Hi QOH, is your user name from the old "Q" code used in the Morse code days?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Q_code
Nice find.
Boeing have been working on this for several years and it's good to see this finally coming to fruition.
The gas turbine nozzles mentioned in the article that GE produce are a relatively complicated shape, thin, required to withstand high temperatures and are consequently difficult to machine conventionally. The parts outlined above - which still have yet to be formally publicly identified - represent quite a step change. The devil of course will be in the detail of Boeing's definition of structural and load bearing, which at this point is likely to be very minor.
Looks like Air NZ is the number one business in Aussie...
http://www.afr.com/business/media-an...0170424-gvr550
2.50 wall gone just like that....