Given the immaturity of the PD-14 engine, the first operators of the MC-21 airliner developed by the Russian company Yakovlev are expected to face significant challenges.
On November 28, Evgeny Yelin, chairman of the S7 Group, Russia's largest private airline, revealed at an industrial forum in St. Petersburg that the PD-14 engine was certified in 2018By 2026, it will have an interval between overhauls (TBOs) of just 3,600 hours. He said this means airlines will have to overhaul the PD-14 every year, and the engine won't meet the target of 12,500 hours between overhauls until 2030.
In fact, the interval between overhauls of mainstream commercial aircraft engines in the West is usually more than 20,000 hours. This means that the PD-14 is overhauled at only one-fifth the interval between repairs and needs to be returned to the factory frequently for overhaul in the future. This can cause huge problems for airlines. One is that maintenance costs money and costs a lot;Second, if the aircraft is repaired, the airline will have no aircraft to use, and the capacity will be affected.
UEC, the manufacturer of the PD-14 engine, declined to disclose the interval between overhauls of the aircraft, but promised that the figure would reach 12,500 hours by the time the engine was delivered.
Launch customer Aeroflot expects to take delivery of its first six MC-21s in 2024。The airline has 18 MC-21s on firm order and retains options for 192 aircraft. Between now and 2030, almost 80% of MC-21 aircraft will be delivered to Aeroflot.
Since the beginning of 2022, when the West imposed sanctions against Russia, the MC-21 has been being revised, and its foreign components have been replaced. The MC-21-310RUS prototype features a new Russian-made subsystem, and its first flight is scheduled to be postponed from the previously announced end of 2023 to 2024.
The PD-14 has been undergoing durability bench tests and flight tests on the MC-21 prototype with the aim of improving engine reliability and improving operational constraints, the UEC said. According to the plan, UEC will produce 578 PD-14 engines from 2024 to 2030 to support the MC-21 aircraft program.
In addition to Aeroflot, Yakovlev received an order for 10 MC-21s from Aurora Airlines, which will be delivered in 2027-2030.
Yellin complained that the S7 could not order the MC-21 because Aeroflot took up almost all the delivery slots. Instead, the S7 plans to continue maintaining its fleet of 102 Western-made aircraft through reverse engineering.