Civil aircraft construction in Russia learns to rely only on its own strength

Photo by © Aviation of Russia

The Russian civil aviation industry has become one of the main targets of the West – at the end of February Europe and the US stopped supplying, leasing, servicing and insuring aircraft, hostile countries banned Russian airlines from flying in their airspace. The only possible and reasonable response from Russia is to increase the production of its own civil aircraft within a very strict timeframe.

MC-21
The import substitution of the composite materials for the MC-21 wings has been completed. Irkut Corporation, AeroComposite and TsAGI completed all the stages of static tests of the composite wing of the aircraft made of Russian PKM. This event marked the complete replacement of foreign materials, the supply of which was stopped due to U.S. trade restrictions back in 2018. At the end of 2022 Rosaviation issued the Approval of the main change to the standard design of the MC-21 in terms of the composite wing made of Russian materials.

According to Vasily Sevastyanov, a test pilot of the Yakovlev Design Bureau, a training program for pilots to operate the MC-21 has already been drawn up, and organizational issues of pilot training are being discussed. “We plan to train 12 pilots. According to the program, they should perform 12 flights for each, respectively, 144 flights will be performed,” said Vasily Sevastyanov in a special report by correspondent Maria Kudryavtseva on the TV channel Russia 24.

Superjet 100
This regional aircraft has always had an aggressively critical attitude to the “well-wishers” and patriots who stand up for everything Russian. The blame was put on a large number of imported components, aircraft systems and assemblies, the number of which amounted to about 70 percent in value terms.

Now about 150 aircraft of this type fly in Russia, the average flight time per flight is 9 hours, which is comparable with the flight time of foreign-made aircraft. Import substitution on the Superjet began in 2018. A fully Russian version of the SSJ100 with a Russian PD-8 engine – the SSJ-New – will appear at the end of 2023.

The replacement requires 27 systems of imported origin, as well as the SaM146 engine, which will be replaced by the Russian PD-8. A total of 38 systems and components will be replaced in the SSJ-New version of the aircraft.

For the passengers of the new Superjet will not differ from the existing car, they will not see the difference. The first flight of the SSJ-New will be conducted in the first half of 2023.

Tu-204/214
The airplane is being built in Kazan in the quantity of 2-3 boards per year by the order of the state structures. According to Denis Manturov, by 2025 it is planned to produce ten planes per year with a gradual increase in production volumes.

Increase of Tu-214 production volume requires “progressive promotion of cooperation” and expansion of production at Kazan aircraft plant. Production of Tu-214 is needed to back up the MC-21 aircraft.

There is a common opinion that Russian airlines have given up operating Tu-204/214 planes due to their less attractive operational efficiency compared to A and B, which is important in an open market and fierce competition. But under the emerging conditions, in which the civil aviation industry has to operate nowadays, the higher fuel consumption (by about 25%) recedes into the background. Aircraft are needed to fulfill the main task – to provide transport accessibility in the vast country.

Ilushin IL-96, IL-86
UAC is mainly focused on the Tu-214 aircraft, the production growth for this aircraft will be more than 3 times – more than 70 aircraft by 2030. But as far as the Ilushin 96 wide-body aircraft program is concerned the growth is expected to be much more modest as this airliner is not so mass-produced.

Construction of the first IL-96-400M was completed in Voronezh. In April the airplane was handed over to the Flight Testing Station for the preparation for the first flight. The S7 Airlines has expressed its interest in the airliner.

As the head of the Ministry of Transport of the Russian Federation Vitaly Savelyev said on March 22, 2022 during the meeting of the Federation Council Committee on Economic Policy, the airline will receive five machines of Soviet production: two cargo aircraft IL-96 and three IL-86. “Will complete them … and we will fly,” said the head of the Ministry of Transport.

UAC plans to produce two IL-96s a year. In addition, the corporation has a task to build 72 MC-21 planes annually. The aviation industry has to assimilate such variety of domestic machines (MC-21-310, SSJ-New, IL-114-300, IL-96-400M and Tu-214) in the nearest years. But the replacement of the foreign made planes is not a quick process, it will require tremendous efforts and money.

It would be naive to expect the collective West to lift its sanctions at the end of a special military operation in Ukraine. “I propose to assume that there will be no previous interaction with former partners in the near future,” Vladimir Putin said on March 31 at a meeting on the development of air transport and aircraft building.