Full afterburner: the pace of development of the PD-8 is shifting to the left
PD-8 under the wing of the Il-76LL flying laboratory. Source: Rostec
8 tons of thrust from Perm
The mobilization of the domestic industry has touched the aircraft industry, probably in the first place. The West decided to close the skies in Russia not only for its own Boeing and Airbus, but also for domestic equipment. Critical imported components, which were previously difficult to obtain, are now completely prohibited from exporting to our country. Fortunately, Russia is not Iran, forced to buy second-hand aircraft through third parties, just to replenish stocks of scarce spare parts.
PD-8 on display in Novosibirsk. Source: gorsite.ru
The domestic aviation industry operates in full afterburner mode. This concerns, first of all, the development of aircraft engines - the most complex, critical and high-tech products. According to the Comprehensive Program for the Development of the Aviation Industry, adopted last summer, by 2030 it is necessary to build at least 5 aircraft engines for various purposes. The turning point should be 2024, in which about 600 serial engines should appear. One should only rejoice at such a pace - never before have such ambitious plans been set in the domestic industry.
Everyone knows the PD-14, which will become the base for a whole series of civil and military aircraft. The rush inevitably leads to some compromises. For example, due to lack of resources and time, the construction of serial PD-35, ultra-high thrust aircraft engines is being shifted. These engines with thrust up to 52 tons will appear several years later than planned. In many ways, this is a fair decision - given the chronic lack of testing and production facilities, it is not entirely rational to force the development of an engine for which only one Il-96-400 aircraft is provided. There is another user - the Russian-Chinese CR929, but the implementation of this project in metal is still a big question.
The gas generator for the PD-8 was built from PD-14, which greatly accelerated the development time. Source: Rostec
Now in the industry, according to Alexander Inozemtsev, Deputy General Director of UAC for the management of NPK Perm Motors, there is an acute shortage of middle-level specialists - technologists, workers, controllers. If the issue with engineers and designers is more or less resolved due to the close cooperation of production with the Perm Polytechnic University, then it is still tight with the rest of the specialists. This imposes special restrictions on the pace of product development, you have to choose the highest priority. For example, to focus primarily on projects for which aircraft are already ready.
On such as PD-8 - the youngest aircraft engine in the Permian family. This unit is waiting for at least three cars - the passenger SSJ-100 New, the dual-purpose amphibian Be-200 and the heavy Mi-26 helicopter. For the latter, they planned to adapt the PD-12 engine in version "B", but last year it was decided to remotorize the entire fleet of helicopters with PD-8V products. A logical decision, given that the PD-12 was not even built in a prototype version, although it was developed on the basis of the PD-14 gas generator. The Be-200 Altair is, of course, a piece product and will not even partially justify the cost of the PD-8 engine, but it turned out to be a good export product. We are talking about the Algerian contract, signed in 2021. The first amphibian with Arabic script on the fuselage in December 2022 left the hangars of the Taganrog Aviation Scientific and Technical Complex named after. Beriev. In total, it is planned to send four Be-200ChS aircraft to Africa. This is an impressive order, given that only 18 serial amphibians have been produced in Taganrog before. Only now the engines on the planes are Ukrainian D-436TP from the Zaporozhye office "Motor Sich", apparently from old stocks. According to media reports, the last motors came to Russia in a roundabout way back in 2018. The Russian-French SaM146 (the one created for the SSJ-100) can become an analogue, but its marine version has not yet been certified. And it won't be anymore.
As for the passenger SSJ-100, the situation distinctly smelled of disaster. By the beginning of 2023, 230 aircraft had been produced, most of which remained in Russia. Naturally, all boards have imported SaM146 engines, albeit with Russian equipment, and one day they will die. Well, if not in the air. For this fleet, a domestic engine was vital back in February 2022. By the way, ten new "Superjets" took off last year.
The importance of PD-8 for the country is evidenced by the fact that NPO Energomash JSC is involved in the production of the combustion chamber. By the way, this enterprise belongs to Roskosmos. Last year, rocket scientists from Proton-Perm Motors also joined the PD-8 program - they are building a test bench for the new engine, and are also involved in the development of control systems.
Dynamics of PD-8
The long-awaited Perm "eight" is a classic bypass turbojet engine that develops thrust up to 8 tons in afterburner. Under normal conditions - 7,5 tons. As already mentioned, the only analogue in the entire post-Soviet space was the D-436 from Motor Sich, but now there are big doubts that this product will be produced at all, not to mention export to Russia. The PD-8 can be called a hybrid created from the "cold" part of the SaM146 and the "hot" deformed gas generator from the PD-14. It was the French SaM146 gas generator that was considered the most problematic part of the Superjets. Now it is being replaced by a native Russian unit. In many ways, this is what makes it possible to speed up all the necessary procedures for testing and certification of an aircraft engine - most of the solutions have either already been tested in practice or are undergoing final tests. The donor of the PD-14 gas generator has already managed to ride Denis Manturov in the air on the pre-production MS-21-301.
The first operational PD-8 was also in the air, however, not under the wing of the SSJ-100-NEW, but as part of the Il-76LL flying laboratory. The first flight took place at the very end of last year, and, according to Rostec, during the tests
“The main operational data are recorded - rotational speed, pressure, temperature, as well as additional parameters necessary to confirm the design decisions made and ensure the safety of the operation of the power plant.”
Bench tests of the motor were completed back in May 2022, when the final understanding of the scale of international restrictions in aviation sphere. The PD-8 is a complete analogue of its predecessor, the Russian "Frenchman" SaM146, but in almost everything is a little better. The specific consumption has been reduced from 0,63 kg/kgf•h to 0,61 kg/kgf•h, while the thrust has been increased by 20-180 kgf, depending on the modification. The Russian engine fits into the engine nacelles of serial Superjets with virtually no modifications.
PD-8 under the wing of the Il-76LL flying laboratory. Source: Rostec
About twelve to fifteen months ahead of schedule, in the first decade of 2023, a pair of flight prototypes will depart from Perm for Komsomolsk-on-Amur to be mounted under the wings of the NEW series Superjets. The certificate of conformity is expected by the summer, and the final approval for flights is expected in December 2023. Considering that work on the PD-8 began in 2019, this is a surprisingly fast time even by global standards. We can only hope that the planned shift of the timing to the left will not remain on paper. Given the resources spent on speeding up the program, the chances of the PD-8 appearing under the wings of domestic regional aviation as early as next year are very high. At least twenty SSJ-100 NEW in serial execution should take to the skies in 2024. The situation with the adaptation of the motor to the needs of the Be-200 marine amphibian is more complicated. Here we need new materials that are resistant to aggressive salt water, as well as modification for new operating modes. Competences in this area remained in Zaporozhye, so domestic engineers will have to go through this path on their own. And it doesn't seem like an overwhelming task.
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