Forum: General F-35 Forum

One of the things the union negotiated the last time they walked was to move the contract end date away from the Thanksgiving/Christmas time frame. Walking during the Christmas shopping season added to the pressure to set terms with management (it also made it tougher for the union leadership to keep them on the picket line while they were at the malls).

Now, the contract ends during the nice weather of spring. LM should negotiate for a July/August date and see how many survive a summer like we had last year. Lots of folks are looking for work and the work isn't that hard.
fisk
(I worked acid etch area one strike season when I was salaried.)

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Ztex wrote:

A couple of shots of the LM plant "picket lines"...just a handful of folks at every gate on Wednesday... BUT...it looks like LockMart is keeping an eye on them...notice the guard shacks on stilts? Those are new, there is one at ever gate and more....each with 3-4 people in them with binoculars and cameras. History taught them something?

The handful could be the whole union membership! When the A-12 program crashed, there were ~10,000 union members at the plant. The downsizing that followed resulted in 11,000 total workforce in the 90's. With the level of automation building the -35, green buttons are at the lowest amount ever at the plant.
fisk

Fisk,

You're showing your age by describing hourly workers as "green buttons". They switched from buttons to badges more than forty years ago.

Another factor in reducing the number of hourly workers is the out-sourcing of much of the parts fabrication. The "bomber plant" is now an assembly plant, not a manufacturing plant.

Following the F-111 program, total employment dropped from 30,000 to 6,500 before the F-16 came along.

johnwill wrote:

Fisk,

You're showing your age by describing hourly workers as "green buttons". They switched from buttons to badges more than forty years ago.

Another factor in reducing the number of hourly workers is the out-sourcing of much of the parts fabrication. The "bomber plant" is now an assembly plant, not a manufacturing plant.

Following the F-111 program, total employment dropped from 30,000 to 6,500 before the F-16 came along.

Oops! haha Maybe I was just hanging out with an older crowd and picked up some bad slang? Smile

Yeah, sadly, we quit bending sheet metal a couple of decades ago. I always get tickled when folks post about the F-16 assembly line, 5 planes isn't much of a line and now they are assembled wingtip to wingtip instead of nose to tail.

During the B-36 days, all 3rd shift did was move airplanes down the line, one space at a time.
fisk

Forum: General F-35 Forum

LM union votes to strike, could affect F-35 production