by Görkem Kiriş Gümüşel, Country Director of Rolls-Royce & Scott Holland, Vice President of Marketing at Rolls-Royce
Continuous improvement is second nature to Rolls-Royce; the business is always looking to enhance each engine through its service life, delivering more for those who operate and own it.
In 2023, the business announced a £1bn investment programme to upgrade all of its in-service Trent engines, including a Durability Enhancement package for the Trent 1000 TEN and the Trent 7000, which share a common core engine bill of material.
Görkem Kiriş Gümüşel, Country Director of Rolls-Royce, comments about the latest upgrades for both engines:
“Since entry into service in 2011 as the launch engine for the Boeing 787 Dreamliner, we have been continuously improving both the fuel efficiency and the capability of the Trent 1000. Our latest upgrades for the Trent 1000 TEN are aimed at improving the durability of the engine.
The first phase of our Durability Enhancement package is near certification. Recently we got to see the Boeing 787 Dreamliner used for flight testing begins the certification flight test programme.
The great benefit of this package will be that it more than doubles the engine time on wing whilst also reducing emissions. We anticipate certification and availability of the package in Q1 2025. A key element of this Durability Enhancement package is a re-engineered high-pressure turbine blade (HPTB). We’ve applied our latest coatings and cooling design to enable the blade to survive longer in the high turbine temperatures needed to deliver the fuel efficiency that airline operators demand.”
One Million Engine Flight Hours Exceeded in Two Years
“This same Durability Enhancement package is already in service on the Trent 7000 and performing flawlessly. After first entering service almost two years ago, we’ve now surpassed one million engine flying hours, the fleet leaders have already more than doubled engine time on wing and it’s still going strong. This “real life” service demonstration on the Trent 7000 provides the ultimate confidence that our expectation of more than doubling the time on wing for the Trent 1000 TEN is already assured before it even enters service.”
Customers buying a Trent 1000 now are benefitting from over a decade of improvements and billions of pounds of investment. Plus the trust that Rolls-Royce will provide the maintenance needed to keep its customers flying.
Scott Holland, Vice President of Marketing at Rolls-Royce says they will continue to invest in the Trent 1000 and related service infrastructure to provide customers with the best engine and experience.
“This package will be incorporated into all our customer’s Trent 1000 TEN engines as part of their TotalCare service package, and once installed, will transform their Trent 1000 TEN management and operational experience by halving the number of engine removals and dramatically reducing the maintenance and management they currently perform.
Having this package available for the Trent 1000 TEN opens an exciting new chapter for the Trent 1000 and we are really looking forward to seeing it deployed in service with our customers and delivering the benefits we know it will bring.
And we are not stopping there, a second package of hot-section enhancements is already in development and will deliver a further improvement in time on wing of up to 30%. This is set to be available in 2026.”
The Best Engine & Experience for Current and Future 787 Customers
“This investment in improving durability of the Trent 1000 is only half the story. What’s equally important for our customers is the service and support provided through TotalCare to ensure the engines are available and delivering as expected within their operation. That’s why we are putting equal focus on investing in our global CareNetwork to ensure sufficient shop visit capacity is in place to meet the growing long-term demand for the Trent family of engines.
We are absolutely committed to continued investment in the Trent 1000 and the associated service infrastructure to deliver the best engine and experience for our current and future 787 customers.”