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Boeing overcharged the U.S. Air Force 8,000% above market for soap dispensers

(www.reuters.com)
152 points lr0 | 4 comments | 21 Nov 24 04:19 UTC | HN request time: 0.764s | source
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cjensen ◴[21 Nov 24 06:40 UTC] No.42201750[source]▶
The US has 222 C-17 Aircraft. A single C-17 costs over $300 million.

If you ask Boeing for soap dispenser parts for these, what should they cost? Boeing charged $149,072 for the dispensers. That's $671 per plane. Is that too much?

If you had to make these dispensers, make sure they conform to rules for aircraft parts and Air Force parts, provide formal responses to bids, etc., how much could you make them for?

It seems high to me. The article says 8000%, which is less than $10 per plane. So while it seems high, it's definitely not 8000% high.

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bagels ◴[21 Nov 24 07:03 UTC] No.42201842[source]▶
Can you imagine even being a one-man shop making 222 bespoke soap dispensers to some absurd spec AND jumping through all the documentation hoops that are required for only $150k? I wouldn't take that job. Sounds awful.
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1. JohnBooty ◴[21 Nov 24 07:31 UTC] No.42201973[source]▶
Yeah. People who haven't done manufacturing may laugh, but depending on how many custom parts there are you could easily spend most or all of that $150K just on the molds/tooling.

Now, like you said... the root cause here is probably some absurd spec that prevents them from using some existing commercial soap dispenser whose costs have already been amortized.

Then again, maybe the spec isn't absurd. The C-17 may need to fly in contested airspace. Maybe damage control is a concern. Maybe they can't use commercial soap dispensers because they're plastic and they don't want the plane to fill up with toxic fumes from burning plastic. That is a random guess. I have no idea.

I couldn't find pictures of the soap dispenser, but here's apparently a urinal from some version of the Globemaster. I get the feeling these parts are kinda custom... https://www.flickr.com/photos/morganone/122375474/in/photost...

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2. bagels ◴[21 Nov 24 08:16 UTC] No.42202189[source]▶
You probably also really don't want slippery floors at a critical (or any) time.
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3. lazide ◴[21 Nov 24 08:16 UTC] No.42202192[source]▶
Also, every material that goes into them needs to be tracked (with paperwork) since it was mined/smelted.
4. XorNot ◴[21 Nov 24 08:39 UTC] No.42202301[source]▶
You also can't just drill a couple of holes wherever to mount it and you don't want it turning to a missile if the plane has to do any aggressive maneuvering.