Boeing retools Renton plant with automation for 737’s big ramp-up

Originally published April 18, 2015 at 8:00 pm Updated May 21, 2015 at 9:57 am

 
1 of 10

Systems installation at Boeing’s Renton plant now takes place on six 737 fuselages at the same time. That will grow to nine fuselages later this year as production ramps up. These fuselage sections move on a rail... (Mike Siegel / The Seattle Times) More Six shiny, green 737 fuselage shells, freshly delivered by train from Wichita, Kan., sit snugly cradled in a steel superstructure like giant eggs in a carton at Boeing’s Renton factory.

Underneath, swarming mechanics install the guts of each airplane — wads of insulation blankets, snaking bundles of electrical wiring, intricately intertwined metal hydraulic tubes and pumps.

But despite appearances, those fuselages aren’t trapped in steel.

After finishing systems installation, a Boeing 737 is prepared for wing... (Mike Siegel / The Seattle Times) More 

Soon, the steel walkways encasing the jets will lift away like drawbridges, freeing the fuselages to slide 150 feet forward during the night into the next position in Boeing’s newest moving assembly line.

The factory, already a showcase of efficiency with its two final-assembly lines churning out 42 of the single-aisle jets monthly, is gearing up by 2018 to build them at a prodigious pace of 52 a month — and later perhaps even more.

A key step is extending the use of moving assembly lines to the back-end shops where mechanics build the wings and stuff those fuselage shells.

The new machinery is being installed even as Boeing choreographs the addition of a third final-assembly line at the plant. This year, that line will begin building the new 737 MAX, the next version of the best-selling single-aisle jet, which already has a backlog of more than 2,700 orders.

Director of factory operations Marty Chamberlin likens it to “changing the wheels on the car as we head down the freeway at 60 miles per hour.”