This is great news...my entire family (except for me, the black sheep) works for Boeing.

The potentially disconcerting news from my Sister is that they plan on outsourcing the 7E7 wing to Japan, which is their core competency. (Boeing has always built the wing at home). Because of this she says "Watch for Mitsubishi Heavy Aircraft in about 10 years"... :(

I can't remember what the numbers are but I think 30-40% of the 7E7 will be built by non-US companies. That's one way to get those participating nations airlines' a "reason" to purchase it. Not that ANA isn't looking to the future by purchasing the 7E7, but I'm sure having some Japanese companies involved in it's development didn't hurt in it's decision.

Foreign companies have a major role in the 777 too and the 767 as well, but the 7E7 will have the largest foreign percentage of work to date, which truly makes it a global aircraft (which is one of the reasons it SHOULD have been dubbed the Global Cruiser instead of the Dreamliner - but I digress :p )

7E7 Outsourcing
 

While it is true that Mitsubishi Heavy Industries will be building the wings and some of the fuselage, they already build most of the fuselage of the 777. The difference is the 7E7 will be pre-built before arrival at Everett for final assembly, rather then being shipped as panels that are then assembled on-site, as with the 777.

All that being said, I do not expect Japan to launch a large commercial aircraft program, ala Boeing and EADS. The market just really isn't there. Japan is much better off providing components and sub-assembles. I don't even think they will enter into the Regional Jet market, as Embraer and Bombardier are the "Boeing and EADS" of that market.

Those interested in seeing who will build what on the 7E7 can read this Seattle Times article.

Composites issue
 

Some airline executives (I think VS's?) have been reported to have raised concerns over this. The 7E7's skin and structure will feature, as you mentioned, significant composite content. While metal can handle small dings from ground handling equipment (baggage trolleys, fuel & catering trucks, etc.), or at least be easilty repaired, the execs were concerned a 7E7 would be grounded by similar damage, and whether such damage could be easily discerned.

The last thing Boeing needs is a 7E7 coming apart midflight because of undetected damage to the composite structure.

Whenever there's a new technology involved, there's always - and should be - concern. For example, the fly-by-wire system that Airbus pioneered. I'm sure things have been sorted out, or will get sorted out, for the 7E7.

The only major accident that is somewhat related to the use of composite material I can think of is the AA A300 crash in New York soon after 9/11. If I remember correctly, it has to do with some repairs or fasteners that attach the vertical stabilizer (which is made of composite material) to the fuselage.

FBW was actually used in military a/c, General Dymanics F-16 and way before that, the Canadian Avro Arrow. At any rate, I think a catastrophic FBW incident will eventually happen, much like an incident of both engines on a twin engine a/c having overlapping failures for independent reasons.

That's the only incident that I can think of too. The analogy I was thinking of the deHavilland Comet and the mysterious high altitude crashes in its early service life. What came about was stress cracks from window corners (hence why you never see square windows in pressurized a/c hulls) due to pressurization cycles (they put a hull in water to run it through pressure cycles in the accident investigations and found that). deHavilland and the Comet programme never recovered from that.

Remember that the interiors depend on and are specified by the airline buying the planes not Boeing. So interior layout, amenities, IFE etc. will vary from carrier to carrier.

Significance of the "dash"
 

As I suspected (I can't view the 7E7 site), the -X designating the number has all to do with range and not size. The -3 or -8 is the rounded down range in (nautical?) miles. he -3 can do up to 3,500 n.m. while the -8 can do up to 8,500 n.m. The yet-to-be-launched -9 can do up presumably 9,000+ n.m.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/busine...899_air28.html

How Boeing is planning to achieve 7E7 efficiencies
 

Some more details as to how Boeing is planning to get the 20% efficiency gains out of the 7E7. Briefly,

1. Fewer hydraulic & pneumatic controls - landing gear and brakes, and more control surfaces to be powered by electrical motors

2. No engine bleed - lots of bleed air ducting and controls removed - also improves engine efficiency at the expense of bolting on electrical generators (which will also double as engine start motors)

3. Less electrical wiring

The major changes to passenger cabin comfort will be that cabin air will no longer come from the engine bleeds but will be directly taken in from outside (so no hot dry air that has to be cooled first).

Brave new technology (said to be not technologically feasible just a few years ago). If Boeing can carry it off, it'll make all the other a/c obsolete. And no, Airbus can't respond by just bolting 7E7 engines onto an A330 (not without significant & major reengineering anyway). Looks like the 747Advance project will incorporate this 7E7 technology if it goes ahead.

You don't remember correctly. There was concern about the stabilizer tab (which had a defect detected in manufacture and fixed by adding additional plys) but so far the investigation has indicated that it failed at almost 50% above the limit load -- so it worked better than expected in the design. The problem is why there were loadings on the fin far above the design point (lots of speculation as to the reason, not involving material failure, but the NTSB investigation is still underway and final finding is expected late 2004 or almost 3 years after the accident, so pointless to speculate here). It does seem that composite material usage is not implicated in any way in that A300-600 crash. The composites Boeing is proposing for the 7E7 are significantly advanced (not surprising given 2+ decades of development since then A300).