Like the entire commercial aircraft sector, Rolls-Royce has been suffering from the post-9/11 blues.
But Charles Cuddington, MD airlines of the British engine company, says recovery "is now definitely upon us, driven by work on the Trent derivative powerplants for the Airbus A380 and the Boeing 787".
He says: "Activity is high and we have increased revenues in our commercial engines business by 50% from the start of 2001 to the end of 2004."
But it's R-R's aftermarket business that is showing the strongest signs of recovery.
Slowly
Says Cuddington: "Our Total Care business is growing fast and we now have more than 3,000 engines covered, including around 90% of the R-R-powered regional airliner fleet. We aim to expand our coverage of the Trent-powered fleet to 75% by the end of 2008 and all with all this activity, it's perhaps not surprising that after- market revenues now account for roughly half of Rolls-Royce's income stream."
But although things are definitely on the mend, the commercial market in the US is still struggling, according to Cuddington.
He explains: "Bits of the market in the US are recovering slowly, even the domestic business, but there's considerable overcapacity that needs to be sorted out before things really start to improve."
With Airbus announcing that the A380's entry to service will be delayed from mid-2006 until towards the end of the year, Cuddington says R-R still has to agree with Airbus precisely what the slippage means in terms of the overall programme. However, he's confident that the initial 17 test flights have gone really well, including from an airframe/engine integration perspective.
Electric
He says: "We now have more than 100 aircraft hours 'in the bank' and this of course means more than 400 engine hours, so it's good to be able to report that the already certificated Trent 900s have performed flawlessly, with fuel burn better than specification."
Turning to the R-R Trent 1000 for the Boeing 787, Cuddington says the design work is now complete and parts are arriving for assembly to begin in early November this year.
The engine is scheduled to run for the first time in February next year, around 11 months before the engine will fly for the first time, bolted on to Rolls-Royce's newly-acquired Boeing 747-200 flying test bed that will be based at Waco in Texas. Certification is scheduled for mid-2007 with the 'entry to service' still being quoted as 2008.
Although this will be the first 'all electric' engine that R-R has produced, Cuddington says that the innovation has not been a major issue. "We've obviously been talking to Boeing for some time about this technology," he explains, "and we're rig-testing the integration of the Hamilton Sundstrand generators/gearbox at our technology centre at Nottingham University."
A 'bleedless' engine requires a smaller core, weighs less, burns less fuel - especially in the descent phase of flight - and the technology really suits R-R's three-shaft architecture.
However, Airbus has decided to remain faithful to 'bleed technology' on the A350 and Cuddington says the structure will be suitably modified for this application.
Source: Flight Daily News
