GUY NORRIS / LOS ANGELES
Order books look healthy and optimism stays high despite industry nervousness following terror attacks
General Electric's newly launched strategy aimed at securing up to $2.5 billion worth of upgrades to installed GE and CFM engines has received a boost from Air France. The carrier has awarded GE a contract worth up to $100 million for the retrofit of up to 106 CF6-50 engines for the airline's fleet of Boeing 747-200/300s.
The launch of the -50 hot section upgrade, which GE predicts will give up to 25% improvement in time on wing and better exhaust gas temperature (EGT) margin retention, is viewed as a significant milestone in its efforts to develop the upgrade business.
The company took orders for $183 million worth of upgrades in 2000 and has attracted $288 million in orders for 2001 to date. "Who knows what will happen with the fourth quarter, but we have already beaten the order target we'd set ourselves," says general manager of upgrade sales, Bob Barton. The current target remains around $500 million for next year despite the onset of recession. The total GE/CFM upgrade market is viewed at around $2.5 billion "if everything comes true", says Barton.
With the exception of the CF6-80C2 engine, GE has developed upgrade packages for all the major "platforms" making up the combined GE/CFM installed base which now numbers almost 16,000 powerplants, and which is conservatively expected to be 25,000 by 2010.
The CF6-50 package chosen by Air France is due to be certificated this month with first kit shipsets due for delivery to the airline in the first week in November. A "core upgrade" kit developed for the Boeing 737 Classic CFM56-3 engine is due to be certificated in July 2002. Launch customer for the -3 kit was Southwest Airlines which ordered the upgrade for up to 300 engines in May 2001.
"Since 11 September a lot of airline evaluations have gone on the back burner, but once they get through the rationalisations we expect interest to revive," says Barton, who expects the -3 kit market to be among the most active. "It is a pretty safe bet that the -3 upgrade will continue to be in demand as a lot of older 737-200s, DC-9s and 727s are accelerated into retirement and the Classic fleet takes on more flying."
Work on filling the CF6-80C2 "gap" is under way says Barton, who hopes to finalise the upgrade plan within the next six months, and to be able to offer it in the last quarter of 2002. "We have a good handle on what that will be," he adds. With the addition of the-80C2, the company will have upgrade kits in place or in planning for the CF6-6, -50, -80A, CFM56-2/3, -5C, CF34-3, CT7-9 and GE90. The CFM56-5C kit is an additional upgrade to the performance enhancement kit now on offer to Airbus A340 operators, and will be dubbed the CFM56-5C/P.
The CF6-50 hot section upgrade kit improves high pressure turbine (HPT) durability, and boosts exhaust gas temperature and performance retention by around 9%. The kit includes new stage one HPT blades, nozzles, shrouds and new repair processes to reduce maintenance costs. The stage one nozzles and blades are made of N5 material (in place of X40 for the nozzle and R80 for the blade).
Source: Flight International
