French aircraft manufacturer Airbus has said that it has finally restored engine balance to the A320neo deliveries on order by Indian carriers like Indigo and GoAir, that were affected due to troubles in the Pratt & Whitney engines that power them earlier this year.
In May, the aircraft manufacturer delivered 22, A320neos – equally fitted with Pratt & Whitney and CFM engines. While Indigo and GoAir have opted for the former, Air India and Vistara have opted for the later engine. “Initially, time went in making available engines to the grounded aircraft in India and providing engines to new deliveries was held up. We are now back on track,” Justin Dubon, Head, Global News Communications said.
Airbus said that it had successfully restored ‘power-plant’ parity to A320neo-family deliveries, handing over 22 aircraft in total during May,” an official overlooking the A320neo deliveries said. As Pratt & Whitney encountered issues with the PW1100G engine, and retrofitting fixes started it affected new deliveries. “We have a few aircraft ready for delivery to Indigo and GoAir along with Air India,” officials said.
Aviation regulator, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation had in March this year grounded 11 A320neos operated by Indigo (8) and GoAir (3) citing safety to aircraft. These aircraft were later fitted with new engines and are now back to flying.
For Airbus, deliveries in May involved 41 airplanes from the A320 family (including the 22 in the NEO configuration), along with seven A350-900s and three A330-200s/A330-300s. With May’s orders and deliveries taken into account, net orders logged by Airbus during the first five months of 2018 totalled 111 jetliners. As of May 31, Airbus’ overall backlog of jetliners remaining to be delivered stood at 7,153 aircraft, representing approximately nine years of production at current rates.
The A320neo despite past hick-ups is 15 % more fuel efficient than today’s comparable models. It also shows better figures in terms of noise reduction. The 85 decibel maximum noise-level contour of a starting A320neo is around 50% lower than that of the current A320.