A test version of Boeing's next-generation 787 Dreamliner passenger airliner will pay a visit to a paint shop today at Fort Worth's Meacham Airport, testing towing equipment and its fit inside the hangar.
It's a lead-up to the shop, run by Leading Edge Aviation Services, painting 787s for Boeing beginning next year. After the Fort Worth stop, the 787 will continue on to Boeing's other 787 factory, in Everett, Wash."It lands, it'll complete the tests at the Leading Edge facility and be back in the air in just a few hours," Candy Eslinger, a spokeswoman for Boeing South Carolina, said Friday.California-based Leading Edge, the world's largest aircraft painter, agreed this summer to lease space at Meacham to paint the 787 and other aircraft.Leading Edge expects to employ at least 150 people at the center, which includes a 69,490-square-foot hangar. The Fort Worth City Council approved the lease effective Aug. 1.Leading Edge will paint all the 787s that Boeing is building in South Carolina, Eslinger said.Boeing is ramping up production of the lightweight, fuel-efficient, international-range wide-body, made substantially of composite materials. The company has been behind schedule, recently delivering the first production aircraft to the Japanese carrier ANA.At full production, the Everett factory will produce seven Dreamliners per month and South Carolina three. The Everett center has its own paint shop. The South Carolina factory has only a small paint shop."We'll be coming up on full production with the program at the end of 2013," Eslinger said.The first South Carolina-built production aircraft is about 50 percent complete, she said."We anticipate our first delivery in the first half of 2012," Eslinger said. Leading Edge "will start painting in the first half of 2012."Scott Nishimura, 817-390-7808Have more to add? News tip? Tell us
