Falcon Fixes Bottleneck
Aviation Week & Space Technology
The market downturn has delivered an unexpected benefit to Dassault Falcon Jet, according to President/CEO John Rosanvallon. It is helping the company reduce a bottleneck in deliveries at its completion facility in Little Rock, Ark. The jam, which has particularly affected the 7X, was due mostly to the FAA's imposition of new data validation criteria that require many more burn tests on various combinations of materials. But engineering and production ramp-up issues have also been factors. The company is reducing the number of options, offering only two crew rest configurations instead of five.
The bottleneck is expected to be gradually absorbed by early next year, which will cause deliveries to rise to 80-90 aircraft in 2009, up from 72 in 2008. Dassault has a backlog of more than 200 7Xs; only 34 have been handed over so far.
Photo credit: Dassault Aviation
