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Aviation History
1990
1990 - 1803.PDF
HEADLINES MDC plans $700 m cut BY JOHN BAILEY IN LOS ANGELES M CDONNELL Douglas is facing thousands of job losses and swingeing spending cuts across the company, in re sponse to cost over-runs on three military development pro grammes and the continued poor performance of the Douglas Air craft transport division. Chairman John McDonnell last week sent a letter to all employees demanding cutbacks which will save at least $700 million in annual spending, al though he stopped short of threatening the sale of any assets. Headlined The Hard Reality, the letter says MDC "must begin immediately to take further strong actions to save our costs". McDonnell has already an nounced 4,000 job losses at Douglas in Long Beach, but says there will be further "substantial layoffs across the corporation". The chairman expects a cost- cutting plan to be in place by early August. Among the areas affected will be overtime, travel, new employ ment, consultants, advertising and "support activities". McDonnell Douglas, the na tion's largest military contractor, is involved in five fixed-price aircraft development pro grammes, three of which (A-12, C-17 and T-45) are running well behind schedule. The others, the YF-23 proto type Advanced Tactical Fighter (ATF) which rolled out last week, and the Army's Light Heli copter (LH), .are competitive demonstration/validation pro jects into which each contracting team has sunk hundreds of mil lions of dollars. In his letter, McDonnell refers to the three late-running development programmes, and to the high investment, costs associated with certificating the new MD-11 trijet, adding that MD-80 delivery rates and costs are not yet satisfactory. Although the "Total Quality Management System" (TQMS) management shake-up at Doug las last year is "having an impact, we are a long way from realising its full potential", he says. TQMS was introduced at Douglas in an attempt to reverse mounting losses and late deliv eries of both MD-80s and MD- 11s, but the Long Beach division lost $84 million in the first quar ter of this year, and is still run ning late on both programmes. Douglas has borrowed heavily to build up the MD-11 and C-17 production lines, and has been counting on quick deliveries of the MD-11 by the end of this year in an attempt to turn the com pany's fortunes around (Flight, 30 May-5 June, pl6). Despite this, Douglas 's snu at least a year behind schedule on the Air Force's C-17 airlifter, which is now scheduled to fly in June next year. Defence secretary Richard Cheney plans to cut the C-17 order from 210 to 120 aircraft in his FY1991 budget, which would further reduce the chances of Douglas showing a reasonable profit on the programme. Last week, an official from the Congressional General Account ing Office (GAO) told a Senate subcommittee that C-17 money should be halted entirely during FY1991, to give Douglas time to solve its production problems. The company is due to build six C-17s during FY1991, although Cheney's cuts would reduce this to two aircraft. Other McDonnell divisions have been equally hard-hit by defence cutbacks, including the helicopter company in Mesa (end of AH-64 production), and McDonnell Aircraft (McAir) in St Louis • (F-15 and F-18 cuts). McAir is also running a year late on development with General Dynamics of the A-12 Advanced Tactical Aircraft (Flight, 20-26 June), a delay which will send costs soaring. McDonnell says workers laid off over the next few months will not be offered voluntary retire ment, severance programmes, or other incentives, because "prospective layoffs are driven by ongoing unsatisfactory business results, rather than by productiv ity improvements". MDC made a corporate profit of $2 million in the first quarter of this year, mainly due to tax credits and one-off asset sales. • YF-23 is longer than this impression and internal stowage points for four missiles, below and behind the cockpit. Overall finish is a dark grey, with radar- absorbing finish similar to that on the B-2 YF-23 roll out marks ATF debut T he US Air Force last week revealed the first of two competing designs for its Ad vanced Tactical Fighter (ATF) programme, rolling out the Nor throp/McDonnell Douglas YF-23 prototype at Edwards Air Force Base, California. The YF-23 is described as a fourth-generation stealth air craft. It features a high degree of wing-fuselage blending and sharply canted all-flying tail sur faces similar to those on the third-generation F-117A. The twin trapezoidal engine inlets are located beneath the highly ta pered clipped, trapezoidal wing, with the engines buried in humps in the upper rear fuselage inboard of the inlets. The S- shaped inlet ducts have inlet doors as on the MiG-29. There are two separate engine diffuser ducts. The YF-23 is 21.33m (69ft llin) long, 4.29m high and has a span of 13.11m, slightly larger overall than the F-15. It is claimed by Northrop president KenttKresa to be the first aircraft capable of reaching supersonic cruise without using afterburner. The wing has leading-edge slats, a small outboar-d aileron and a larger inboard flap. There are no visible sensors apart from three air-data probes. Each of the competing teams will fly prototypes powered by Pratt & Whitney and General Electric engines, with the first YF-23 powered by P&W Fl*l'9s, and the second by GE F120s.v: Lockheed, which will fly the engines in the opposite order, apparently considered replacing its two F120s with P&W engines early last month because of prob lems with the two-dimensional thrust-vectoring nozzles. The company says the F120 nozzle problem has now been fixed. Following the first flights, the aircraft will enter the final stage of the demonstration/validation (Dem/Val) phase, a year-long competitive fly-off ending with the award of a full-scale develop ment contract to the winning contractor in June next year. Dem/Val includes a study of a version known as NATF (Naval Advanced Tactical Fighter). The Air Force originally planned to buy 750 ATFs to replace the F-15 Eagle as its next air-superiority fighter. However, the Pentagon is currently "reviewing its force structure", and may cut procurement. The Air Force has already spent $2.8 billion in development funding, and the planned purchase of 750 aircraft would extend the pro gramme cost to $63.5 billion, in 1990 dollars. The target flyaway cost for ATF is $43.5 million (in 1985 dollars). • NEWS IN BRIEF JSTARS SETTLEMENT Grumman and Boeing have announced an agreement to "amicably settle" claims made against each other over the Joint STARS battle field management system for the US Army and Air Force. Grumman says, "The settlement eliminates sub stantial claims by both par ties concerning responsibility for the costs of completion of the first two Joint STARS aircraft." FLIGHT INTERNATIONAL 27 June-3 July 1990
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