Boeing Finds Faulty Jet Fasteners By MICHAEL J. MARTINEZ, AP Business Writer

SEATTLE (AP) -- Twenty Boeing jets currently in service have been found to have faulty fasteners on their engine casings that could eventually corrode and crack, The Boeing Co. said Tuesday.

In addition, an unknown number of aircraft still on the assembly line will be delayed as the company searches for and replaces every defective fastener, which are used to fasten the plane's metal skin to the fuselage.

Many Boeing jets have already been delayed due to a strike by Boeing's engineers and technical workers.

The fasteners, mistakenly made of an aluminum alloy that is prone to cracking, were installed on wings, engine housings and parts of the main fuselage in planes that have been on Boeing's Seattle-area production lines since December, Boeing spokeswoman Yvonne Leach said.

The fasteners on the 20 planes in service -- all 737s, 757s and 777s -- have been tracked down and are all located in the planes' engine housings.

Boeing officials would not identify the airlines involved.

The fasteners are small circular collars that hold pins in place, which in turn secure the airplane's outer skin. The problem with the fasterners was first reported in Tuesday's Wall Street Journal.

No fastener failures have been reported. Boeing met Monday with the Federal Aviation Administration, which determined the problem would not pose a safety threat, Leach said.

''There would have to be at least four different things that would have to go wrong to even have a slight failure,'' Leach said.

More than 330,000 of the fasteners were delivered to Boeing in November and December by a unit of Cordant Technologies Inc. of Salt Lake City.

Cordant spokeswoman Lauren Sides said the company received the wrong alloy from one of its suppliers. The defects were found through heat testing after Boeing alerted Cordant to the problem.

Sides said Cordant also sent defective fasteners to other manufacturing customers, but she would not identify them.

Boeing deliveries already had been curtailed by the absence of about 17,000 union engineers and technical workers, who walked off the job Feb. 9.

Talks broke down Feb. 27 in the dispute over wages and benefits. Boeing declared an impasse last week and imposed terms of its latest offer Monday, but few of the strikers returned to work.

Shares of Boeing were down 62{ cents to $34.50 as many blue-chip stocks on the New York Stock Exchange declined Tuesday. Shares of Cordant Technologies were down $1.12{ to $30.18}, also on the NYSE.

http://www.newsday.com/ap/business/ap865.htm

-- Martin Thompson (mthom1927@aol.com), March 07, 2000