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Design challenges ahead for Boeing’s New Midsize Airplane
Boeing announced at last year’s Paris Air Show that it planned to launch a New Midsize Airplane (NMA). Read More » Since then, the emerging diverse design requirements of its North American and Asia-Pacific customers have added to the challenges the Seattle manufacturer faces in developing the aircraft.
At press time, the NMA, sometimes called the B797, was still a paper airplane. Boeing’s commercial aircraft arm had yet to receive board approval for the project, which will have 225 to 275 seats and ranges of up 5,000 nautical miles (9,250 kilometres) and 4,500 nm, respectively.
It is estimated the NMA will cost from US$10 million to US$15 million to develop. Its maiden flight is planned for 2024. An engine decision also has to be made sooner rather than later with one contender, GE, saying it must have a go-ahead for the aircraft by year end.
Such uncertainties have not deterred the enthusiasm for the airline at Atlanta-headquartered Delta Air Lines. In February, the airline’s CEO, Ed Bastian, declared: “You’re going to see us participate in Boeing’s middle-of-the-market campaign. I hope we are going to be a launch customer on that program as well.”
And that was both good and bad news for Boeing. U.S. carriers have very different configuration plans for the new aircraft compared with customers elsewhere in the world, including Asia-Pacific airlines.
Boeing’s senior vice-president sales Asia-Pacific and India, Dinesh Keskar, said recently it is likely to be a twin aisle plane intended to fill the gap between the narrow body B737 MAX and the wide body B787, which have ranges as long as 3,800nm and more than 8,000nm, respectively.
Importantly, the NMA would have a greater range than the A321neo, but Airbus also has a long range variant available to the market, the A321LR.Additionally, Airbus is expected to make incremental improvements to the A321 family to compete with the new Boeing plane. In the meantime, analysts have put their heads together and don’t dispute Boeing’s forecast that the NMA has the potential to sell 4,000 units.
Another factor at play for Boeing in establishing the NMA business case is the “cargo conundrum”, said Avolon’s Domhnal Slattery recently. Commentators have said the big three U.S. carriers, Delta, United and American differ with their Asia-Pacific peers about the volume of baggage and freight the new jet should haul. Asian airlines want greater below deck capacity because their fleets carry more than a third of global cargo.
Boeing has been working with more than 50 customers globally on the new jet, including many airlines in Asia. The U.S. network carriers have said belly cargo is not a high priority for them, which has meant Boeing is leaning towards an “ovoid” air frame that will have a roomier passenger cabin and a smaller cargo hold.
Historically, Slattery said, Boeing launched planes such as the NMA with a major U.S. carrier. This time, he forecast, the manufacturer had to be “super careful” that it built an aircraft that is fit for purpose in Asia because that is where the action is. “This is the big issue. Typically in the States, it’s bags plus five tons of cargo. The Asians want bags plus 10 tons for this aircraft. So, for whom do you build?” Slattery asked.
Several Asia-Pacific airlines are interested in the NMA. Indian low-cost carrier, SpiceJet, said the proposed jet would relieve airport congestion and open routes out of South Asia. “We have 1.3 billion people in our country. They need to travel to different parts of the world and they don’t necessarily need to travel through hubs that have been created by several airlines on both sides of our country,” said Spicejet CEO, Ajay Singh.
Boeing wants to build an aircraft that more efficiently serves airlines on heavily congested short-range services in China and wider Asia as well as longer flights on routes such as the U.S. Midwest to Europe. The Seattle manufacturer believes the aircraft will open up hundreds of direct routes much like the B787 is doing. The B787’s fuel efficiency and long range has launched 170 new city pairs, Boeing Commercial Airplane vice president marketing, Randy Tinseth, has said.
Slattery said 600 of the 1,350 unique new city pairs launched last year were in Asia, of which 400 were in Mainland China. By contrast, in the domestic market served by U.S. carriers, 61 new city routes were created.
Boeing’s vice president of airplane development, Mike Delaney, has said the wings and fuselage of the NMA will be made primarily from carbon fiber composite material like the larger B787 and that would require Boeing to expand its carbon fiber composite manufacturing. Composite fuselage sections of the B787 are manufactured in North Charleston and Wichita in the U.S. and Nagoya in Japan. Boeing recently opened a new factory in Everett, Washington to bake the epoxy-infused carbon fiber wings of the B777X. The NMA’s composite fuselage also may require a new factory, analysts have said.
Boeing has not specifically explained why it refers to the NMA fuselage as composite with a “hybrid cross-section”, but it has been reported Delaney used the term to describe a fuselage with elements of a narrow body and a wide body that would use composite and metallic materials.
NMA designers are understood to be examining a geared turbofan (GTF) prototype engine for the aircraft. Pratt & Whitney and Rolls-Royce have put forward engines for the manufacturer’s consideration, with Pratt weighing up the merits of an upgrade of its existing GTF, the PW1000G. Rolls-Royce is advocating the UltraFan, a GTF it has in development.
CFM International, a joint venture between GE Aviation and Safran Aircraft Engines, is considered likely to build a new engine if it has sufficient time to develop it. It does not favour a geared fan. The engine OEMS have said they need a launch decision this year to meet first flight and delivery dates in 2024-2025.
Not surprisingly, trans-Atlantic bickering is already underway between Seattle and Toulouse about demand for the new jet. Airbus said it has jets that can serve all the markets the NMA will targeting. Delaney has retorted that one airline has estimated the new plane could cut flying costs by as much as 45% compared with the A330neo.
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