The fundamental problem was that Airbus upgraded the A320 family with new, larger, more efficient engines. Boeing had to react but, unlike the Airbus’s, the 737 undercarriage did not allow sufficient space under the wings for the big engines. Boeing thought that they had solved the problem by altering the nacelle of the engine, moving it forward and up. But had the effect of moving the aircraft’s center of gravity and nothing that has been done since seems to have cured the problem to the satisfaction of the World’s safety authorities.
It now seems likely that the 737MAX will not fly again until well into next year and, when it does, may be a ‘never going to fly in that’ dead duck from the public’s perspective. This is the result of finance and marketing having the final say over safety decisions rather than engineering. Boeing poured its profits into share buybacks, financial engineering, rather than real engineering R&D on a new plane and are now backed into a corner.
There now appears to be another issue with the existing 737NG. During the deep stripping of the existing airframes on conversion to cargo cracks were found in major supports struts for the wings. It has turned out to have been caused by very, very slightly oversized holes for the fixing bolts. This is not safety critical at the moment but hundreds of aircraft are going to have to be checked and repaired. Fortunately for Boeing, due to their warranty contracts, the main costs of this seem to be going to have to be met by their customers.
