Model Airplanes

After several years of reaching higher and higher 737 production rates, Boeing’s ramp-up in Renton is showing signs of severe strain.

More than 40 unfinished 737 jets are stacked around Boeing’s Renton final assembly plant and along the edges of the Renton Municipal Airport, many missing their engines and others awaiting installation of a variety of parts.

The pile-up of planes comes just two months after Boeing raised the hectic pace of production one more notch from 47 jets per month to an unprecedented 52 per month.

The 737 is Boeing’s cash cow jet. It brings in about half its commercial airplane revenue and provides the funds for its development of new airplanes. Boeing has successfully

Article source: https://www.seattletimes.com/business/boeing-aerospace/boeings-737-ramp-up-slows-as-unfinished-planes-pile-up-in-renton/

Don’t call them old men and don’t call their hobby little kid stuff.

They are proud veterans of various military service and proud to pursue an ageless passion called plastic modeling.

Every Friday evening, they dive into kits that contain plastic scale models of aircraft, cars, armored tanks, ships, movie monsters and more.

Currently, the half-dozen friends are working on a group collection to submit to an upcoming show and contest. Each are constructing an American tank, M41 Walker Bulldog, that’s now used by many national armies.

“This tank was exported all over the world,” says Roy Schlicht, who served in the Navy from 1987 to 2007.

He checks out three small-scale armored tanks, each created with a unique look. They represent Austria, Germany and New Zealand.

Ray Scott points to his handiwork, painted in brown camouflage.

“It’s New Zealand military,” he says. “That took me about two weeks. I even drew a little kiwi on the back.”

The guys inspect the tiny tank without picking it up because it’s not completely dry.

“You make us all look like a bunch of amateurs, Ray,” proclaims Fred Benninghoff.

The hobby is time consuming and it can become obsessive, some say.

But it’s also relaxing, educational, keeps them out of trouble and keeps their spouses happy.

“My wife always said ‘I’d rather have you sniffing glue than out drinking at the bars,’” jokes Shawn Gehling, who served in the Navy from 1978 to 2002.

Sitting at tables in the cool confines of Benninghoff’s Man Cave, otherwise known as a pimped-out garage, they pass the time

Article source: http://www.whidbeynewstimes.com/crosswind/model-vets-pursue-miniature-hobby/

Information is still unstable, but the scene of its instability has shifted. Through loss, noise, entropy, and error, an informational predilection toward instability organized command and control theories in the postwar. In its earlier cybernetic manifestations, informational instability referred to linguistic and technical frailties imminent to communication and its electronic, radiophonic, telephonic, or digital translations and embodiments. In recent alignments of homes, cities, and data, the stresses, failures, and infelicities of information are linked to social behavior and economic signs as much as they are to signal interruption and degradation. The informational administration of cities is governed by a conception of urban space perpetually threatened by destabilizing disruptions.

The most recent incarnation—or involution—of mechanisms of control and informational instability are found within a military imaginary that returns technologies of remote sensing and remote control to the command center of the military base and its field operations. The 2015 Cisco white paper “Smart and Connected Bases” narrates the day of Master Sergeant Jones and Captain Williams—two US airmen stationed at an informationally enhanced airbase.1 The paper begins with the conventional smart technology trope of improved efficiency. We learn that Jones and Williams are able to bypass time-consuming physical security checks by swiping onto the base electronically, and that integrated digital tracking allows for a more rapid ordering of replacement airplane parts. But we also learn of family strife, domestic disputes, missing children, AMBER Alerts, and how automated license plate tracking now helps manage such threats on the base. Building toward

Article source: https://www.e-flux.com/architecture/structural-instability/208702/unstable-control/

After several years of reaching higher and higher 737 production rates, Boeing’s ramp-up in Renton is showing signs of severe strain.

More than 40 unfinished 737 jets are stacked around Boeing’s Renton final assembly plant and along the edges of the Renton Municipal Airport, many missing their engines and others awaiting installation of a variety of parts.

The pile-up of planes comes just two months after Boeing raised the hectic pace of production one more notch from 47 jets per month to an unprecedented 52 per month.

The 737 is Boeing’s cash cow jet. It brings in about half its commercial airplane revenue and provides the funds for its development of new airplanes. Boeing has successfully

Article source: https://www.seattletimes.com/business/boeing-aerospace/boeings-737-ramp-up-slows-as-unfinished-planes-pile-up-in-renton/