Airbus’s A350-900 helped Rolls-Royce to cut its average unit losses on its large engine programmes last year, and contributed to the powerplant manufacturer’s achieving a record 510 Trent engine deliveries.
Average original equipment unit losses for its large engines fell by 14%, from £1.4 million to £1.2 million, last year as production of the A350-900 – powered by the Trent XWB-84 – continued to mature.
Rolls-Royce says the specific deficit on the XWB-84 was reduced by over 20% last year and it expects to deliver its first break-even XWB-84 by the end of this year.
Airbus’s ramp-up of A330neo output also assisted Rolls-Royce’s delivery figures, with the manufacturer handing over 106 Trent 7000 engines for the twinjet – with 80 flying – compared with just eight in the previous year. Rolls-Royce says the powerplant has achieved 99.9% dispatch reliability.
Total installed large Rolls-Royce engines passed the 5,000 mark during 2019 as a result of the higher deliveries. The company puts the installed base at 5,029 powerplants, of which 32% are Trent 700s for earlier models of the A330.
As of last year the A350 accounts for the second-largest number of Trent engines by volume.
Early Trent XWB-84 engines have reached the company’s original expectations for time-on-wing, says Rolls-Royce, with fleet-leading engines flying over 22,000h without a shop visit.
Rolls-Royce also produces the Trent 900 for the A380, the final example of which is nearing final assembly in Toulouse following the decision to terminate the programme.
While it had recorded an additional exceptional charge of £59 million in the first half of last year, following an updated impact assessment from the termination, this has been revised down to £48 million at year-end.
