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Show Cut Plane Output 95 in Man Hours i Factories Reduce Time for Building Tuo Models. j SAN FEANCISCO. A 95 per cent cut in the production time ol mak- : ing a typical fighter plane, was reported re-ported here by. the West Coast Aircraft Air-craft War Production Council, Inc. A tremendous reduction was reported report-ed for a four-engine bomber also. Neither plane was identified. The council, members of which are the Boeing Aircraft corporation of Seattle and the Consolidated Vul-tee, Vul-tee, Douglas, Lockheed, Northrop, North American, Ryan and Vega companies, stated that the first plane to come from the production line. , ''Model A" of the fighter craft, took ' 157,000 man hours to build. I "The tenth, plane of that model re- ' quired 59,000 man hours, V a spokesman spokes-man said. "By that time the engineers engi-neers were beginning to discover wayi and means to. Improve the ship, so the 13th plane was a slightly revised model, Model 'B,' which still took 59,000 man hours to build." 1 The 100th plane, in spite of design de-sign and model changes and changes in specifications, took only 26,500 man hours and the 1.000th, only 7,800 man hours. "In the case of this typical fighter plane, there was. 12 per cent decrease de-crease in man. hours required each time production was doubled," tht council stated. As to the bomber, in question, tht first one off the assembly., .line, required re-quired 200,000 man hours to build, according to the. council. . The tenth took 187,500 man hours, the 20th 137,500 man hours, the 100th 87,500 man hours, the 300th 50,500 man hours, the 1,000th, 22,500 man hours, and the 2,000th, only 13,000 man hours. The figures were offered, it was explained, to. show, that although aircraft air-craft plants on this coast were expected ex-pected to build 50 per cent more, planes,, in terms, of weight,., than in 1943,. It, would be possible .to do. so with "relatively small" increases In ; manpower, needs. |