Originally Posted by
maggot
So lots of practice in building the first 600 or so
Same went for the dugong
Sorry for the thread drift - but this pattern is quite consistent for new airliners.
Initial aircraft are over initial spec weight - sometimes badly. Air framer launches a big weight loss program - with various incentives to encourage the engineers/designers to shave weight. Program is successful and later aircraft are significantly lighter - often below the spec weight.
Later on, the weight will start going up again as they discover various bits that fail because they made them a bit too light, along with a push to reduce recurring costs by using cheaper processes and/or materials which invariable weigh a bit more.
I've been on four major aircraft programs and they all followed that trend...