Import-substituted aircraft SJ-100 should perform about 200 test flights in 2025 to complete the certification programme and enter serial production, the Ministry of Industry and Trade expects permission to perform the first flight with PD-8 engines and conduct flight tests. About it in an interview to the TV channel Russia-24. Anton Alikhanov, head of the Ministry of Industry and Trade, said.
‘Ground tests of this engine are coming to an end, some of them have already been completed. We are actually waiting for authorisation to conduct flight tests. We will have two machines flying. We need to do about 200 flights next year to get certification and start production,’ the minister said.
Answering the question about the start of flight tests of SJ-100 with PD-8 engine, Anton Alikhanov expressed hope that it will happen at the beginning or in the first half of 2025.
In December 2023, United Aircraft Corporation CEO Yury Slyusar said in an interview with Rossiya 24 TV channel that the first flight of the new SJ-100 with PD-8 engines could take place in early 2024, UAC is awaiting permission from the United Engine Corporation to start flights.
‘We are waiting for permission from our colleagues at the United Engine Corporation for the first flight. The engines have already been installed on our prototype aircraft. As soon as we receive this permission, I think that this year, in the remaining days we will conduct ground testing, and early next year we will count on the first flight,’ he said.
Yuri Slyusar added then that 20 SJ-100 aircraft are planned to be handed over to airlines in 2024.
On 29 August 1012 in Komsomolsk-on-Amur, a prototype of the SJ-100 aircraft b/n 97021 in a partially import-substituted guise (with SaM146 engines) made its maiden flight. On 26-27 April 2024, upon completion of the factory development test programme, the aircraft accompanied by another Superjet (b/n 97005) flew to the Gromov LII airfield in Zhukovsky, where it took off for the first time after the flight on 10 June.
Earlier it was reported that Flight 97021 performed four flights during the first month of flights in the Moscow region. In total, as of 1 August 2024, the SJ-100 had performed about 30 flights out of 200 planned as part of the factory and certification test programme.
In Komsomolsk-on-Amur, the second prototype aircraft, 97012, which is also not a full version of the SJ-100, is being prepared for flight tests; it received Russian PD-8 engines instead of SaM146 engines, but some of its systems were left from foreign suppliers. The PD-8 engine was first launched as part of this aircraft in early October 2023.
Thus, three prototype aircraft are planned to be involved in the certification of the import-substituted version of the Superjet:
- 97021 (s/n 97001) – SaM146 engines, partially imported equipment replaced by Russian;
- 97012 (s/n 95157) – PD-8 engines, partial replacement of imported components;
- s/n 97003 – PD-8 engines, complete replacement of imported components.
