Widerøe omtales nå i US` AIN

Embraer plans to deliver the first E190-E2 to launch customer Widerøe of Norway next April, the Brazilian airframer announced Wednesday in Athens during the European Regional Airline Association’s annual general meeting. Widerøe, the largest regional airline in Scandinavia, expects to begin revenue service with the 114-seat narrowbody shortly afterwards.

“Since the program was launched, the first half of 2018 has been our target, and now we are making good on this commitment,” said Embraer Commercial Aviation CEO John Slattery. “This was only possible thanks to the excellence of our engineering process due to our unique experience in certifying 12 new aircraft in the last 17 years.”

Widerøe in January placed a firm order for three E190-E2s—the first member of the new generation of E-Jets—and took purchase rights for another 12 E2s. Embraer places the value of the contract at $873 million.

In a recent interview with AIN, Embraer vice president of corporate strategy and innovation Luis Carlos Affonso reported that the E190-E2 program had accumulated 1,600 flight hours out of an expected total of 2,000, and that the company had performed all of the most challenging aspects of flight and ground testing with minimal need for configuration changes. Program teams recently completed tests associated with aeroelastic characteristics and natural icing, while cabin evacuation drills met certification requirements by what Affonso called a very good margin over the 90-second limit.

Embraer has completed all structural testing on the static test airframe and begun fatigue trials on an airframe dedicated to that task. It also has successfully finished all of the testing that typically carries a high risk for revealing redesign requirements, such as tire burst tests.

“I would say the amount of rework is significantly lower than we had in previous programs,” said Affonso. “But it’s always expected that you have to do something.”Affonso explained that engineers found “nothing big” in terms of a need for changes to the airplane’s aerodynamic configuration, but rather minor adjustments to slat and flap positions and modifications involving the mechanisms associated with those devices to reduce drag. 

Next, schedules called for the start of function and reliability testing, which Affonso said the company would perform with one of two E195-E2 flying prototypes. Having flown the first E195-E2 on March 29, Embraer plans to fly the second some time in early November. “Because the E195-E2 will benefit from many of the tests done on the 190, we are really using the 195s to help and support the 190 campaign,” explained Affonso.

Although the actual flight testing deviated little from the original plan, Embraer did need to “optimize” testing sequences to accommodate problems Pratt & Whitney encountered with the PW1000G family of geared turbofans destined to power all three E2 variants.

Affonso expressed satisfaction with Pratt & Whitney’s response to Embraer’s concerns and confidence that the issues would not affect the E2’s production schedules. “As we had planned, not being the first application is paying off,” he noted. “Because a lot of the issues will be corrected in our engines, or the solutions have already been identified. We are monitoring this very closely but we believe the engine will not be a show-stopper for us.”

Meanwhile, Pratt said it has found a solution to earlier problems involving excessive rotor bowing, forcing extended engine re-start intervals. “When we enter into service, [the rotor-bow condition] will have already been fixed,” insisted Affonso. “Our customers will not see that problem, even though we have seen it during the flight test campaign…We have tested different Fadec software that will cope with this issue in our application so at EISthis problem will not be there.”