CFM to begin testing LEAP-X core, awaits movement on 737/A320 successor

CFM International today will move the first LEAP-X engine core to GE Aviation's testbed at its Evendale, Ohio, facility to begin testing within three weeks as the GE/Snecma joint venture aggressively develops the new-generation powerplant it is marketing to Boeing and Airbus for the eventual successor to the 737 and A320 families.

CFM this week showed reporters both the core and a "MASCOT" test engine comprising composite three-dimensional modeling-designed LEAP-X fan blades currently undergoing crosswind tests at GE's Peebles, Ohio, facility. CFM said a baseline LEAP-X can be ready for certification by 2016 for a possible EIS in 2018 and insisted that it will be far enough along in development and testing by 2011-12 for the aircraft manufacturers to make a decision (ATWOnline, July 14).

"What is very important now is to conduct the development, to demonstrate all these technologies," CFM President and CEO Eric Bachelet told ATWOnline. "We are pushing the envelope on the core." He added that CFM is in "constant dialog" with Boeing and Airbus.

CFM officials described LEAP-X as a scaled-down widebody engine that can bring the kind of efficiencies generated by the GE90 and GEnx to the narrowbody segment, offering 16% lower fuel consumption than the CFM56-7 powering the 737NG. It is the result "of all the learning we've done over the last 15 years with widebodies," CFM Executive VP Chaker Chahrour said. It will have a 10:1 bypass ratio, twice that of the CFM56 and on par with a GE90 or GEnx.

The challenge, he added, is to achieve a similar reliability with a "workhorse" narrowbody flying multiple times daily to a GE90 powering a 777 flying one or two long-haul routes daily. He said the LEAP-X will "maintain today's [CFM-56] maintenance costs."

Chahrour explained that the core going into the testbed will undergo a series of carefully monitored tests over the next two years (more than 2,000 sensors will be attached to it) and the next demonstration core will be built by mid-2011 with a third coming 6-8 months later. The MASCOT simultaneously will test the 71-in.-diameter fan blades shaped with "woven resin transfer modeling" materials that are 1/3 the density of CFM56 blades.

Beyond 2012, "going forward is really going to be a function of what the airplane guys do," he said. "Six months ago, I would have said Airbus and Boeing would introduce a new [narrowbody] by 2018. I don't know that I can say that today. . .If the airplane companies haven't decided what to do [by 2012], we may have to sit back and wait."

Bachelet added, "A lot of it will depend on the evolution of fuel prices." Chahrour noted that even if Airbus and Boeing push off a decision, the LEAP-X is "applicable to the regional jet market. . .It's actually pretty easy to scale down the core."