Pratt & Whitney Canada is emphasising its commitment to providing a powerplant for next generation regional turboprops, after ATR revealed it is in detailed talks with both General Electric and P&W on powering a potential new large-sized turboprop.
"We are currently defining the specific product attributes for future regional turboprop aircraft. While we have not publicly released any specifics on the product, we are working closely with our aircraft OEM customers to ensure our engine will deliver industry-leading efficiency, maintenance costs and reliability. All of this backed by our worldwide customer service network," says a Pratt & Whitney Canada spokesman.
He adds: "We have the shared R&D resources of Pratt & Whitney US and Pratt & Whitney Canada with the development of the Next Generation Product Family including the PurePower family of [geared turbofan] engines. We will leverage the technology developed for the next generation product family as we move forward with defining our next regional turboprop engine offering."
Pratt & Whitney Canada has a long history in the regional turboprop segment. The PW100 engine for the regional market has more than 119 million flying hours.
"With 13 engine models ranging from 1,800 to over 5,000 shaft horsepower, there have been more than 6,600 PW100 engines produced. We intend to leverage our experience, technology and customer service track-record with regional airlines as we develop the next generation turboprop engine," says the spokesman.
Speaking this week at the Regional Airline Association (RAA) convention in Milwaukee, ATR's head of marketing Mario Formica said the EADS-Alenia joint venture expects to decide in 2011 whether to continue its studies on a 90-seat turboprop. This timeframe is fundamental since ATR "would like to enter into the market at around 2016", he said.
Bombardier, meanwhile, continues to study a stretch of its Q400, dubbed the Q400X.
Source: Air Transport Intelligence news
