Pratt & Whitney is confident it will meet the ramp-up demands for its geared-turbofan narrowbody engines, despite issues earlier this year that temporarily halted deliveries of the PW1100G to Airbus for the A320neo family.

Speaking at the Farnborough air show on 16 July, the US engine maker's president Bob Leduc said it was now "on schedule" with engine deliveries.

"We are all caught up," he says. "The problems we had over the last few years are behind us.

"We are on schedule and will ramp up on schedule."

Leduc's comments were echoed by Greg Hayes, chief executive of parent company United Technologies, who says it will achieve "rate 63" for Airbus "at some time next year".

With both airframers considering taking narrowbody production to 70 aircraft per month or higher, there are concerns as to whether the supply chain can support that increase.

Hayes says the issue for Pratt & Whitney is whether it can "make investments fast enough to satisfy [the airframers'] demands".

He stresses: "There's no technical reason that we can't do it; it's simply an issue of supply-chain constraints."

But Leduc believes the engine suppliers have not been given enough credit for achieving higher output in relatively little time.

"It took Airbus and Boeing 30 years to get to rate 60: the engines companies are going to do it in 30 months. No-one ever seems to want to talk about that piece."

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Source: Cirium Dashboard