CEO McNerney : Customers Pushing Us To All New Replacement
Most Favoured Solutions Balanced Between LEAP-X Engine & Clean Sheet Design
“We’re Ready To Go” Says CFM International
737RS Plans Dusted Off Once Again
No Room For GTF Engine
While the odds on favourite outcome for Boeing’s eventual year-end decision on the 737 update is likely to be a deferral, the economic and cost benefits of re-engining the airplane have become much more harder to justify as the jet maker looks to bring back its 737RS studies to the fore.
Discussions have continued to take place around re-engining, with CFM International stating just prior to the Farnborough Air Show with Chaker Chahrour, Executive VP at CFM that “we’re ready to go [with LEAP-X] on the 737 when Boeing wants to.”
“It [the LEAP-X1C] fits with no problem and without changes [to the current 737 family],” added LEAP-X program director, Francois Bastin when he spoke with me in detail on the subject.
CFM56-7 Engine Seen Aboard Departing FlyDubai Boeing 737-800
Image copyright/owned by FleetBuzz Editorial.com
But not everyone is convinced of the merits of going down the re-engine route, particularly if service entry is around 2016 with potential A320/737 replacements supposedly making their debut in 2025 – leaving less than a decade to recoup billions of dollars of investment that could be better spent on an all new design. Any effort to re-engine would not supplant the current propulsion units today – they would be a customer option – thus making the potential returns on a program lasting less than a decade even harder to justify.
“Re-engining the highly successful 737 family would alienate the majority of existing customers of the world’s best-selling commercial airliner ever. And re-engining with what? The shaky, unproven, 40-year-old-technology Pratt & Whitney GTF or the all-new CFM LEAP-X competitor? The smart money says neither — If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it, mister,” says Arran Aerospace Founder & MD, Doug McVitie.
If Boeing does go the re-engine route, it is clear that the LEAP-X engine is the preferred solution due to ease of installation. Boeing’s VP Marketing, Randy Tinseth told me that the rivals like the not-so-popular CSeries had struggled due to a number of risk factors – one of them namely being the engine and is part of the reason why Boeing prefers to stick with CFM International if they opt to re-engine the 737.
“Customers believe there’s risk. We’re evaluating that engine [the GTF] but there is technology risk behind that engine,” said Tinseth.
“We are looking at re-engining the airplane, as the CFM team has said and it is technically feasible with what they’ve proposed but at the same time we’re looking at the possibility of a new aircraft. Our objective is to make a decision based on what our customers want, but we have time to make that decision. If and when the technology [suite] and customer requirements line up [in the next several years], I think we’ll have the right mix for a new airplane and if that doesn’t work, we have the path of continuous improvement that we’ve always been on,” added Tinseth.
While Airbus is confident that if it elects to press ahead with an A320 re-engine effort, Boeing would follow suit but there is much more merit to Airbus following Boeing’s lead if the 737 were to be replaced – the business case for re-engining the A320 would be non-existent.
At this point, expediting the A30X trade studies to replace the A320 would take a greater degree of urgency despite Airbus stating that mid-next decade being is the preferred window in which to launch such a product. As Airbus works through the near term challenges on the A350XWB program, there is less chance of the 777 being radically overhauled or replaced – the 737 clearly is in play and from all the musings, it is crystallising into a decision that will come first for Boeing.
Can the new generation engines really leverage as much fuel burn advantage over their cost of installation vis a vis being installed on a clean sheet design?
As number crunchers look to identify the basis for either re-engining or replacing, the chorus from some suppliers and customers favour something all-new.
Doing nothing may not be an option, however, replacing the 737 altogether has suddenly become much more of an attractive value proposition – especially when in yesterdays second quarter earnings call, Boeing CEO Jim McNerney opined that customers had been “pushing us towards a new airplane.”
It is becoming evident that Boeing is stepping away from re-engining and looking towards an all new solution.
