Air Transport and Cargo » Air Transport and Cargo Engines

With its Trent 1000 engines finally in commercial service on the delayed Boeing 787 platform, Rolls-Royce is stepping up efforts to advance further applications of the powerplant. It has started development of the Trent 1000C1 engine, also known as Pac C, that will be able to manage higher loads necessitated by the [787]-9 aircraft’s changed wing and thrust profiles. “It delivers 74,000 pounds of thrust at economic performance levels,” reported Trent 1000 project manager Simon Carlisle in a pre-show briefing.

GE Aviation is to expand its manufacturing and R&D capacity in the U.S. with three new facilities to open by 2013, the company announced Tuesday. It expects its production rates to grow from 3,000 commercial and military engine deliveries in 2011 to 3,400 deliveries in 2012 and 3,800 deliveries in 2013, requiring $580 million in plant, equipment and tooling during the 2011-2012 time frame across its network of 55 U.S. operations.

In late 2012 CFM International plans to run the third development core, known as “eCore 3,” for the Leap engine it is developing for the Airbus A320neo, Boeing 737 MAX and Comac C919 airliners. On Tuesday, the General Electric-Snecma join venture also announced it is ramping up production, after having delivered 1,354 CFM56s last year.

Rolls-Royce and Airbus are just about to start flight-testing the 84,000-pound-thrust Trent XWB engine for the A350XWB. Airbus’s A380 flying testbed (MSN 001) has already been fitted with the test engine and requisite instrumentation and is only waiting “for the weather in Europe to warm up a bit,” according to Rolls-Royce chief operating officer Mike Terrett.