Pontifications: Looking ahead to 2016

Jan. 4, 2016, © Leeham Co. Let’s take a walk through our outlook for 2016.

Boeing is 100

The Boeing Co. is 100 years old this year. July 15, to be precise. This is the last day of the industrial portion of the Farnborough Air Show.

There will no doubt be all kinds of celebrations at the Air Show. To the extent possible, I would imagine Boeing will try to have a whole lot of orders to announce there. There will be all kinds of run-up to the 100th anniversary. Few throw a party as well as Boeing. (Just don’t sing “Happy Birthday;” I never have liked this song.)

It’s a great achievement and we should all celebrate with Boeing for the next seven months.

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Mitsubishi delays MRJ90 EIS one year, IDs “issues”

  • HOLIDAY SCHEDULE: Unless there is major, breaking news, Leeham News and Comment is taking the Christmas-New Year’s holidays off. We resume our normal publishing scheduled Jan. 4, 2016.

Update, Dec. 25: The Seattle Times reports the MRJ90 doesn’t meet the 150% certification requirement.

Update, Dec. 24: Mitsubishi’s biggest customer for the MRJ90 weighed in on the latest news of a delay and structural issues. From today’s Wall Street Journal:

SkyWest Inc., the largest U.S. regional airline operator by revenue, has as many as 200 of the Mitsubishi jets on order. In advance of Mitsubishi’s news conference Thursday, a SkyWest spokeswoman said the company was sticking with its order, but said it was “dependent on flying contracts, scope and aircraft availability.”

There are enough caveats in that statement to be cause for worry about the solidity of the order. Trans States Airlines of the USA, the second largest customer, could not be reached (it was after hours) by the WSJ for comment. Launch customer and launch operator ANA stood behind the company, the WSJ reported.

Original post:

Dec. 23, 21015: Mitsubishi issued a press release at 4pm Tokyo time Dec. 24 (11pm Seattle Time Dec. 23), announcing a delay of entry into service by about a year from 2Q2017. The press release said “issues” arose during flight testing, but the PR did not identify what these are.

The press conference is going on as this is posted. The press release is below. The short PPT/PDF presentation is here: 20151224_Update on MRJ Development Status

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Pontifications: Potential MRJ safety issue, delay impacts customers

Hamilton KING5_2

By Scott Hamilton

Dec. 21, 2015, © Leeham Co.: Mitsubishi Aircraft announced last week that its MRJ90 program was undergoing a review following three test flights. A new schedule could be announced as early as this week, but by the end of the month is also possible.

The company didn’t indicate what prompted the review, but the 7news service reported that “safety” issues were involved.

A delay in delivery to the first customer, ANA, slated for 2Q2017, is almost a certainty. This isn’t good news for the program, which is already more than two years late.

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Bjorn’s Corner: MRJ90 first flight

By Bjorn Fehrm

By Bjorn Fehrm

13 November 2015, ©. Leeham Co: Mitsubishi flew their MRJ for the first time this week. I could have added “finally” because it is two years late compared to the original time plan. But who cares when the aircraft is finally ready to fly and everything goes well? (Well, the customers do, actually.)

It was a big moment for Japan, a nation with a sizable aeronautical industry. Japan has been a major partner to Boeing in their larger airplane programs over the 757/767 to the 777 and 787. For the Dreamliner, they even designed and made the hottest item, the high-tech Carbon Fibre Reinforced Plastic (CFRP) wing.

Despite having such a capable aeronautical industry, Japan has not built an own civil aircraft since it closed the production line for the YS-11 twin engined turboprop in 1973. Since then it has acted as sub-supplier and has worked on certain military programs like the Mitsubishi F-2 fighter, based on the Lockheed Martin F16.MRJ first flightThe Mitsubishi corporation flew the MRJ90 for the first time Wednesday from the Nagoya Airport in Japan (screenshot from video from Mitsubishi). Most of the flight testing will be done in Moses Lake (WA), USA, where four test airplanes will be based.

Moses Lake is blessed with open skies, little air traffic, a long runway and good weather. It has a long history of flight testing, serving as a test-base for Japan Air Lines 747 pilot training for decades. Boeing also uses Moses Lake for flight testing.

We analyzed the MRJ90 and its main competitor the Embraer E175 in a subscriber article the 25th of January. We will revisit the main characteristics and then comment on what could be seen from the first flight. Read more

Embraer’s fundamental advantages

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 Introduction

With the first Embraer E-Jet E2 under assembly, we take a look at the E1 and E2 programs in the run-up to roll-out of the E-190 E2 next year and projected Entry Into Service (EIS) in 2018.

Summary

  • Broad customer base gives Embraer a major advantage against new competitors.
  • More than 2,300 ERJs, E-Jets in service.
  • More than 1,100 E-Jets in service.
  • Broad product support a key advantage.

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Embraer faces new challenge from MRJ90

Part 2

Paulo Cesar, president and CEO of Embraer’s commercial aviation unit. Photo via Google images.

Sept. 10, 2015, © Leeham Co. Embraer is the dominant producer of commercial aircraft in the 70-125 seat sector, having overtaken Bombardier in the last decade following the development and 2004 introduction of the E-Jet. Bombardier’s CRJ family struggles, hampered by a sales force that neglected it and the Q400 turbo-prop as attention focused on the new CSeries.

Embraer in recent years faced new competition. However, the early entries—AVIC’s ARJ21 and the Sukhoi Superjet SJ100, both in the 70-90 seat sector, proved little to worry about. The ARJ21, now eight years late, proved to be a technological and industrial dud, a project that was more about learning how to design and build an airplane than producing a commercially viable one.

The SSJ100, while winning favorable reviews, was and continues to be plagued by a poor production system and in recent years the political overhang of Russia’s annexation of Crimea and its war in Ukraine.

Shortly, though, the E-190 faces a new challenger: the Mitsubishi MRJ90. It’s two years late, now forecasting an entry-into-service of 2017—just one year ahead of the redesigned E-190, the E-190 E2. The MRJ90, a 90-seat clean-sheet design, is Japan’s first commercial airliner since the NAMC YS-11 turbo-prop of the 1960s. The MRJ90’s first flight is scheduled for the second half of next month. Full flight testing moves to Washington State in the first quarter next year.

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PW chief credited MRJ with ripple effect leading to CSeries, A320neo, 737 MAX and E-Jet E2

David Hess, former president of Pratt & Whitney, credits Mitsubishi with the ripple effect that led to new developments at Bombardier, Airbus, Boeing and Embraer. Photo via Google images.

Aug. 20, 2015, © Leeham Co.: Conventional wisdom credits Bombardier’s CSeries with being the disruptor that prompted Airbus to launch the A320neo, which in turn caused Boeing to launch the 737 MAX and Embraer to launch its E-Jet E2.

But an academic paper by John Slattery, chief commercial officer for Embraer, reveals that David Hess, the former president of Pratt & Whitney, credits Mitsubishi rather than Bombardier as the catalyst for the dramatic changes that followed.

In a paper entitled Resources & Rivalry, A Case Study of The Single-Aisle Commercial Jet Manufacturing Industry, Slattery interview present and former executives of the Big Four airframe manufactures, the former CEO of ILFC and officials of P&W.

The paper provides a chronicle of thinking leading to decisions to move ahead with new airplane projects, including re-engining the A320 and 737 rather than proceeding with new, clean-sheet designs.

The interviews debunk some of the conventional wisdom surrounding the variety of programs. We’ll periodically report the findings of Slattery’s paper, starting with PW and Mitsubishi.

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Boeing start applying “Standard Rules” to its and competitors’ aircraft.

By Bjorn Fehrm

Introduction 

04 Aug 2015, © Leeham Co.: Boeing has for the last 20 years used an internal set of rules called Integrated Airplane Configuration ruleset, or IAC for short, for how it describes its own and competitors’ aircraft. These configuration rules, while comprehensive and consistently applied, have some problems, the most obvious is that they are 20 years old.

The IAC rules have filled an important role for Boeing: they have been the yard-stick how its different aircraft stack up but also how to value competitor’s aircraft. All aircraft in Boeing Commercial Airplanes (BCA) have been configured and scrutinized with IAC.

The world of civil airliners have moved on since the creation of IAC in the early 1990s and there was time for an overhaul. This has now been done, after several years of internal work the new configuration rules are ready for prime time under the name of “Boeing Standard Rules”.

The most externally visual effect is that officially published seat information and performance data for Boeing’s aircraft change. The configuration ruleset dictates how everything is measured against a standardized set of parameters for each aircraft type and use.

We talked with Boeing’s Director for Product Marketing, Jim Haas, how to decipher the changes and how aircraft stack up before and after being “Standardized”. Read more

Mitsubishi Regional Jet, MRJ, compared with second generation regional jets, Part 2.

By Bjorn Fehrm

Subscription required.

Introduction

04 Aug 2015, © Leeham Co.: Yesterday we started our deeper look at Mitsubishi Aircraft Corporation’s new MRJ90 and compared it with one of the aircraft that it aspires to replace, Bombardier’s (BBD) CRJ900. We outlined similarities and differences in architecture, dimensions, weights and payload capabilities.

We will now finish the analysis with a study of the fuel consumption performance of the two aircraft on a typical regional route network. Finally, we will discuss at what net price a MRJ90 would be motivated against the incumbent regional aircraft CRJ900 from BBD.

Summary:

  • The MRJ’s more efficient engines and more modern wing gives it a lower fuel burn than CRJ900.
  • A lower fuel cost can be compensated with a lower purchase price. We check at what value the per seat mile operating cost of the aircraft would be the same.

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Mitsubishi opens Seattle Engineering Center ahead of MRJ90 first flight

MRJ90 Timeline

The MRJ90 testing and entry into service timeline. Source: Mitsubishi. Click on image to enlarge.

August 3, 2015, © Leeham Co.: Mitsubishi Aircraft Corp. today opened its Seattle Engineering Center jointly with local company AeroTEC in advance of the first flight of the MRJ90 in September or October. During the second quarter of next year, four of five MRJ Flight Test Vehicles will be domiciled in Moses Lake in Central Washington for the bulk of the flight testing over the following year. Entry into service is planned for 2Q2017 with launch customer All Nippon Airways.

The engineering center represents the first in Washington State for an aircraft OEM other than Boeing. Mitsubishi will assign 50 engineers from Japan to the new SEC, in South Seattle a short distance from Boeing Field. One hundred engineers will be hired locally.

AeroTEC and Mitsubishi began discussing working together only last January, said president Lee Human, who added that the seven months from January to the opening of the SEC today was remarkable for the speed in which negotiations, contracts, permits and hiring was achieved.

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