General Electric is building up for the start of the most frenetic test period in the development and certification of the GEnx engine for the Boeing 787 following the start of flight tests of the GEnx-1B64 on 22 February.
The test programme, which has already amassed more than 1,000h, is about to involve engine 003, which GE says will undertake vibration endurance test work at its Peebles outdoor test site in
This month the 150h block test is due to start - a certification requirement that involves cyclic operations at maximum (red line temperature) conditions - using engine 004. And late March will see the dramatic fan-blade-out test using engine 001, which was the first GEnx to run, in March last year.
Flight testing of engine 005 on GE's 747 flying testbed from
Source: Flight International