Aircraft

Sukhoi Civil Aircraft president Victor Subbotin says that the airframer, engine manufacturer PowerJet and the Gromov Flight Test and Research Institute have agreed a new schedule for flight tests of the Superjet 100's SaM146 powerplant.

The first flight of an Ilyushin Il-76TD testbed fitted with a SaM146 in place of one of its standard Saturn D-30KPs has been postponed from early September to "three weeks from now", says Subbotin. The decision was taken to enable the testbed to be fitted with additional test equipment before before first flight. The original plan called for two flights of the test bed carrying the SaM146 in "auto-rotate" mode.

Subbotin says a total of 40 engine test flights are planned by the end of November, in order to gain Russian civil aviation authority approval for the maiden flight of the Superjet 100 prototype around mid-December.

Superjet has already delivered three SaM146s to Sukhoi's Komsomolsk plant, two of which will be installed on the Superjet 100 prototype.