The long wait...

Two days, two announcements, two delays: yesterday Bombardier told the aviation public that the CSeries will not fly in July for the first time, but in „the coming weeks“.

Today Mitsubishi Aircraft announced that the MRJ will not fly this year, but until the end of 2014  - a full one year delay (again). This is of course disappointing. According to the article Mitsubishi still has problems how to document the design and the production of the parts to be compliant with certification rules (this is my interpretation, based on what was the reason for the last delay). At least, it seems, there seems nothing wrong with the design of the aircraft itself.

The same can be said for the CSeries – hopefully! It seems that the integration of the software takes more time than planned. The question is why until now the Bombardier executives always build up pressure by announcing exactly when first flight will happen. Airbus with the A350 was smarter by only saying first flight would happen in the second half of 2013 and the surprising the aviation world by beating that target by two weeks. At least Bombardier has learned now by being vague. On the other side that does not build up confidence, especially because fixed dates were given three times before (end of 2012, end of June 2013, in July 2013). So everyone who waits for this first all-new narrowbody since the A320 first flew in 26 years ago in 1987 should hope that “in the coming weeks” does mean in the “next low single digit number of weeks”.

Airbus raises order target

OK, John Leahy is a little bit late to acknowledge there are more orders to come this year (at least later than me) and he now expects more than 1000 orders, instead of more than 800 and the initial goal of more than 700. And as we know how John Leahy ticks, he never wants to under-deliver and we can be pretty sure that he already has the customers in mind which will make him reach that target.
At the end of June there were 758 orders. Then Easyjet got the OK from their shareholders to order 35 A320ceo and 100 A320neo. Then there is the MoU from Hong Kong Aviation for 60 A320neo and the MoU from Doric for 20 A380. Also there is an commitment for 2 more A380 from Lufthansa. The order from SAS for 8 A350-900 and 4 A330-300 needs to be firmed up also, as well as the order from Kuwait Airways for 25 aircraft. Here we are: 1012!
Then there are new orders still to be decided: Monarch, Vueling, Lufthansa (widebodies), flydubai, Air Canada and probably some others also.
Still room to lift the target once or twice...

Paris Air Show 2013 Recap

The Paris Air Show 2013 is history – and it wrote (at least a little bit) of aviation history:

Embraer

On the opening day it was Embraer to launch it’s highly anticipated EJet E2 family. Not surprisingly, the E195-E2 will be a stretch of the current E195. Also no surprise that the E170 will not be continued and that the E190-E2 will stay where it is, sizewise. The E175-E2 will be a little bit larger in capacity, stretching it’s fuselage by 0.62m or 24.4inches. The effect is that two more seats can be fitted and in a 1-class 31” layout there are now 88 seats compared to 86 seats in the current E175. This is exactly the figure that Mitsubishi gives for the MRJ90 – any questions? With the same engine as the MRJ will get, the same cabin capacity and a new wing (even larger now than the MRJ wing) the fuel efficiency of the two aircraft should be very close to each other. The MTOW of the E175-E2 is a little bit higher (44.33 t vs. 42.8t), but the Embraer has more range, too (1920nm vs. 1780nm).