Farnborough International Airshow news

787 touches down at Farnborough. Photo: Geoffrey Thomas

787 makes Farnborough debut

Boeing’s 787 Dreamliner made its international debut yesterday, touching down at Farnborough Airport in the UK just after 9 a.m. local time.

The 787, piloted by Capt. Mike Bryan, conducted a slow flyby before landing and the hundreds of bystanders were taken aback by the quietness of the Rolls-Royce Trent 1000 engines, particularly when power was applied for a climbout after the low-level pass. Bryan, a former carrier pilot, performed a short-field landing of which any pilot in a STOL aircraft would be proud.

On hand for the arrival were Boeing Chairman, President and CEO Jim McNerney and Executive VP and Commercial Airplanes President and CEO Jim Albaugh. A jubilant McNerney, responding to media about the delays in the program said, "For a long time we've been on the bleeding edge of technology and now it's nice to finally be on the leading edge."

Bryan told media that it “was a great flight over” and the crew conducted some “navigation and communications tests” en route. He said pilots love the 787 cockpit: “You can’t find a pilot who doesn’t like the cockpit with its beautiful big displays and flight control systems.”

He added, “I have flown the aircraft to 0.98 Mach and through to full stalls and the plane flies magnificently." Commenting on the precision landing, he credited the head-up display and carbon-fiber brakes. The 787, the third to fly, will be at Farnborough through Tuesday night before returning to Seattle.—By Geoffrey Thomas

Albaugh predicts a week of orders

Boeing Commercial Airplanes President and CEO Jim Albaugh yesterday forecast a busy week of order announcements at the Farnborough Airshow. Speaking with BBC News during the arrival of the 787 yesterday, he said, “We're going to hear a lot of orders being announced this week, both from Airbus and from Boeing.”

Last week, VP-Marketing Randy Tinseth sought to manage expectations of a big event for Boeing, writing in a blog post that the "so-called air show orders race" is not really a competition because "there's only one horse running." Airbus has a "different approach" in which it spotlights sales at air shows, he explained (ATW Daily News, July 15).

Albaugh added that the 787 is the first new commercial aircraft Boeing has shown at Farnborough since 1990. And while it is at the cutting edge of air transport technology, he conceded that competitors are on the manufacturer’s tail. “There are a lot of companies that have a lot of technology and ambition, but competition is good. Competition makes us better. Competition makes us more innovative," he said.

Airbus is expected to have a robust week of orders, although one of the first to be announced tomorrow is thought to be an Emirates order for 20 777s while Qatar Airways is rumored to be announcing an order for Bombardier’s CSeries as well as a 777 order.—By Geoffrey Thomas

LEAP-X going 'full speed ahead' for C919

Selection of the LEAP-X by COMAC to power the C919 puts CFM International on an aggressive path to certify the engine in 2014, or about two years earlier than planned when it was launched at the 2008 Farnborough Airshow.

"Initially we launched it as an engine that would be certified in 2016," Executive VP Chaker Chahrour said at a briefing in London yesterday, stating that the program is going "full speed ahead and nothing is holding us back right now." To insure that it achieves the earlier certification date, which is necessary to meet the C919's planned service entry in 2016 (ATW Daily News, Dec. 22, 2009), CFM has decided to limit the introduction of ceramic matrix composites. "We will have some in the shrouds; we decided not to put it in the nozzles," said Executive VP Olivier Savin.

"CMC is not ready for primetime," Chahrour said. As a result of this and other decisions driven by the development schedule, the new engine will enter service with a 15% improvement in specific fuel consumption rather than the 16% that would have been available in the later timeframe, he said. Bypass ratio will be 10:1.

The company has run its LEAP-X e-Core Demonstrator for 150 total hr. and is "thrilled with the results," Chahrour said. It also has tested the fan blade system, which has accumulated some 165 hr. on the MASCOT engine demonstrator with another 400 hr. or so planned.

The LEAP-X features composite fan blades using 3D woven resin transfer molding technology and a composite fan case. It will have 50% fewer blades than current CFM engines. The weight saving from the blades and fan case is 1,000 lb. per aircraft, Savin said. The blades already have passed 4-lb. and 6-lb. bird ingestion tests as well as a blade-out test, he added. The high pressure compressor will have a 22:1 compression ratio, the same as the GE90 and GEnx, compared to 11:1 to 14:1 for today's narrowbody engines.

Despite the accelerated development schedule, the company is confident it will deliver its engine on time. "CFM has never missed a certification date," Chahrour said.—By Perry Flint

GE Aviation and its engine joint ventures, CFM International with Snecma and Engine Alliance with Pratt & Whitney, expect to deliver about 2,000 commercial jet engines in 2010, an increase of 3.6% over the 1,930 delivered in 2009, GE said ahead of the Farnborough Airshow. Based on its current "record order book," it expects this to rise to 2,300 units in 2012. CFM will deliver more than 1,200 powerplants annually in 2010, 2011 and 2012. GE Aviation expects to deliver 700 GEnx engines powering the 787 and 747-8 to 28 customers by 2013. The Engine Alliance recently completed its 100 GP7200 for the A380. The company's installed base, including joint venture products, will number 23,000 engines by year end, approximately 40% of which have not received their first major overhaul, reaching 30,000 in 2015.

Esterline CMC Electronics said its CMA-1410 Class 2 PilotView Electronic Flight Bag was selected by Boeing for its 747-8 Onboard Network Access Terminal system. Boeing earlier chose the CMA-1410 for the 737NG and BBJ as a Class 2 EFB system on both production aircraft and for retrofit.

CMC was selected by Air France to install its multichannel SwiftBroadband-compliant CMA-2102SB satcom high-gain antenna system on future 777-300s.