Aircraft

Embraer has launched a seven-year programme to upgrade the radar and standardise the avionics of 53 Alenia/Embraer AMX/A-1 fighters for the Brazilian air force.

The long-awaited mid-life update of the AMX fleet had been on hold since the air force awarded a contract to Embraer in 2003, but then withheld funds for the roughly $400 million programme.

Embraer has now received the first of three prototype AMX aircraft to be modified in 2007 and 2008, says Luis Hernan, Embraer's contract director for the defence market. Flight testing is scheduled to commence in 2009 and will be followed by first delivery in 2010, although the air force is discussing an alternative plan to accelerate production, he adds. The final delivery is currently scheduled in 2014.

The first prototype upgraded aircraft will receive structural and only some electronic modifications to carry and launch guided weapons and a new air to air missile - Mectron's MAA-1 Piranha - Hernan says. The remaining two prototypes, to be inducted next year, will be modified to carry the new radar and an Elbit Systems-supplied avionics suite, with the latter to become the standard cockpit layout across Brazil's tactical air fleet of AMXs, Northrop F-5BRs and Embraer EMB-314 Super Tucanos.

The upgrade programme's most significant change for the AMX fleet is the integration of the multi-mode, Galileo Avionica/Mectron SCP-01 Scipio fire-control radar. The system is already in production, Hernan says. The purpose of the upgrade is to equip the AMX fleet to remain in frontline service for the next two decades, he adds.

Embraer is, meanwhile, refocusing on US defence market expansion after a nearly two-year hiatus caused by the termination of the original Aerial Common Sensor (ACS) contract, which featured its ERJ-145 as the host platform.

The US Army is due next year to define the requirements for the follow-on ACS programme, says Luiz Carlos Aguiar, executive vice-president, defence and government market. "Most likely, they are going to be asking for a consortium with a system plus an aircraft," he says. "We are waiting for the specifications of their requirement and then we will decide."

Meanwhile, the US Air Force is expected to release a request for proposals on behalf of the Iraqi air force later this month for a "light combat aircraft," for which the EMB-314 is a candidate. Aguiar confirms that Embraer is prepared to open a Super Tucano final assembly line in the USA if the company wins the contract.