MC-21 – January 2025 Digest

Photo by © UAC

In late February 2024, Sergei Chemezov, head of Rostec, indicated that the start of deliveries of the MC-21-310 aircraft would most likely be pushed back to 2026. In January 2025, he reiterated his statement from a year prior: series production of the MC-21-310 is scheduled to commence in 2026. Rostec hopes to complete the certification flight test programme this year.

“For both the MC-21 and the Superjet 100 in its import-substituted configuration, we are entering the most critical phase – flight trials. Series deliveries of the aircraft can only begin once the airliners, their systems and components have fully undergone testing, confirmed their reliability and safety, and received the necessary approvals. There are no shortcuts to be taken here. These processes all have objective timeframes; if you add them up, you arrive at 2026,” he stated.

This statement from Sergei Chemezov is further evidence that the plans revised in the spring of 2024 within the Integrated Programme for the Development of the Russian Aviation Industry are divorced from reality and cannot be fulfilled within the required timeframe and to the full extent. According to the programme, the Irkutsk Aviation Plant (IAZ) is expected to manufacture nine MC-21-310 aircraft in 2025 and 31 in 2026. Chemezov’s comments imply that no aircraft will be handed over to customers this year.

On 25th January, Oleg Korobchenko, Deputy Prime Minister of the Government of Tatarstan, also stated that it would be impossible to fulfil the programme in relation to the Tu-214 aircraft.

The delays are primarily attributable to the lack of readiness of Russian-produced aircraft systems and on-board equipment, and their certification in flight trials. This is why flight testing of the MC-21 and SJ-100 prototypes with import-substituted components has not commenced.

“The import-substituted versions of the aircraft are at the stage of preparing the units for flight trials. Upon completion of the full cycle of certification testing and receipt of the approval document, deliveries of series-production aircraft to airline and leasing companies will begin,” the Ministry of Industry and Trade (Minpromtorg) reported on the current status of MC-21 and SJ-100 production.

Currently, at least 20 aircraft are at various stages of completion at IAZ. This is a backlog awaiting deliveries of Russian components, and it is from these that the batch of aircraft that will begin to be handed over to customers next year will be formed.

In Irkutsk, prototype aircraft 73055 was already ready in mid-January to begin manufacturer’s refinement trials. However, authorisation to conduct the first flight has not been granted by representatives of the production cooperation companies whose systems and components are installed on the aircraft. The responsibility for them is very high, and until there is complete confidence that everything will operate as intended, they will not give the “go-ahead” for the start of flights.

* * *

The Russian Government has amended the rules for granting subsidies to Rostec for the implementation of civil aviation projects. The funds will be transferred to UAC (United Aircraft Corporation) as a property contribution for the development of design documentation for the outline and technical project of a shortened version of the MC-21-210. The amount of the subsidy is not specified, but last year the Ministry prepared a Government decree according to which the budgetary costs for the development of the MC-21-210 outline project were estimated at 1.94 billion roubles in 2024-2025.

On 24th January, Minpromtorg noted that the work would be carried out within the framework of the already allocated funding and would not require additional expenditure from the federal budget.

Rostec must submit design documentation confirming the technical feasibility of the MC-21-210 project no later than 31st December 2025. Previously, in 2024, it was repeatedly reported that PJSC Yakovlev was already working on the project for a shortened version of the MC-21.

In September 2024, in an interview with the newspaper Vedomosti, First Deputy Prime Minister Denis Manturov stated that the creation of Russian analogues of systems and avionics requires adaptation of both the systems and the design of the MC-21 aircraft.

“A good option would be to additionally create a version of the aircraft with a fuselage shortened by one section. This will allow airlines to operate the aircraft more efficiently, taking into account the resulting weight characteristics, while maintaining the original parameters for flight range when loading 140-150 people,” the Deputy Prime Minister responded to a question about resolving the problems with import substitution of components.

Some Russian media outlets interpreted this statement by Manturov as an acknowledgement of the overweight condition of the MC-21-310 aircraft. Following them, the Russian segment of the web has been overrun with the firm conviction that import substitution has led to an excessively increased weight of the aircraft, which in turn has negatively affected its flight range. This has necessitated the creation of a lighter aircraft, which will be the MC-21-210.

The general feeling on this issue can be summarised as follows: “given that the MC-21-310 has turned out to be significantly heavier and does not meet the technical specification and the stated functionality, then, as Manturov said, a short version needs to be developed to meet the characteristics.”

Aviation industry specialists, engineers and designers at PJSC Yakovlev and Irkutsk Aviation Plant understand and see how primitive and simplistic such a judgement is. The fully import-substituted aircraft (73057) is not even ready for flight yet, and the “experts” already know everything about its weight and compliance with the technical specification. However, they do not take into account the existence of two key facts regarding the MC-21-210.

First. The shortened version was originally the baseline version when the MC-21 was created in the mid-2000s. Later, UAC decided to develop the larger MC-21-300 aircraft, and to return to the MC-21-200 version later, when the work on the larger aircraft was generally completed.

Second. The line-up of passenger aircraft of domestic aviation, in order of increasing passenger capacity and taking into account prospective models, looks approximately like this: LMS-901 “Baikal” – LMS-192 “Osvey” – TVRS-44 “Ladoga” – Il-114-300 – SJ-100 – MC-21-310/Tu-214 – Il-96-400.

There is no model with a passenger capacity of 130-150 passengers between the SJ-100 and the medium-haul MC-21-310 and Tu-214. It is this niche that the MC-21-210 should fill. At the same time, whether the MC-21-310 will be heavier or not is irrelevant here. It is the efficient operation, taking into account the flight range and weight characteristics of the shortened version, that should be taken into account.

* * *

In January 2025, two flights were performed by aircraft 73054 in Zhukovsky, in which the assessment of anti-icing procedures at various stages of flight was carried out. On 28th January, the aircraft was airborne for 3 hours and 10 minutes: take-off was at 07:32, landing was at 10:42. The second flight, lasting 4 hours and 59 minutes, took place on 30th January. The aircraft took off at 07:34 and landed at 12:33.

The weather in the Moscow region in late January 2025 was conducive to carrying out such flight tasks. The assessment was carried out in conditions of solid cloud cover at altitudes from 4,000 to 7,000 m and at air temperatures in the clouds conducive to the formation of icing.

Other MC-21 prototypes, both in Irkutsk and Zhukovsky, did not perform any flights. In Zhukovsky, specialists from Yakovlev Flight Test Centre (LIiDK) in conjunction with Gromov Flight Research Institute (LII) are conducting ground tests on the MC-21 for lightning protection. Aircraft 73051 is being used for this purpose.

On 30th January, the second Il-114-300 prototype, with tail number 54115, also performed another certification flight in Lukhovitsy.

1 Star2 Stars3 Stars4 Stars5 Stars (3 votes, average: 3.33 out of 5)
Loading...