engines,” says Mandato. “Similarly, our network includes 17 facilities offering MRO services for our PT6A and turboshaft engines. These facilities are located throughout the world consistent with the fleet geographical distribution.”
The Challenges of Turboprop Support We have already seen how the unique nature of turboprops requires OEMs/ MROs to install equipment specifically tailored to this engine’s needs. This is why entering the turboprop market is not a casual decision. It takes substantial investment in technology, facilities and personnel to do the job right. Fortunately, MRO technology has
advanced in the turboprop sector. In fact, “We have seen big improvements in technology that applies to maintenance activities,” says Bevans. Advances include everything from stereo borescopes and ground-based trending algorithms to on-line access to maintenance programs and “our 24/7 tech contact center connectivity with engineering and service support,” he tells Aviation Maintenance. Honeywell has also advanced the state- of-the-art for turboprop maintenance by applying digital engine control (DEEC) technology to the task; supplemented by on-board trending and fault detection on engines in service. Ironically, the success of turboprops
in the Asia Pacific region, India, South America, and the Middle East is stressing MROs’ ability to serve all of these aircraft. At P&WC, “one of our
challenges will be to continue to develop our MRO network to serve these growing markets,” says Mandato. The company has already taken steps to deal with this issue. “Our Singapore MRO facility is already well established to serve our PW100 operators in the Asia-Pacific region. Last year we also expanded our MRO capability in Brazil.” As new turboprop service centers pop
up globally, qualified technicians have to be found to staff them. Given pay scales in the industry and the aging of its skills base, finding good help can be a real problem. “We understand some
service centers have had challenges in areas with high costs of living, which means techs have to commute considerable distances from surrounding areas,” Bevans says. “And overall there is a significant demographic shift as a large number of long-time techs begin to retire out of the industry.”
A Bright Future In general, the challenges facing the turboprop MRO industry are borne out of this engine platform’s proven success and global popularity. This is why Honeywell Aerospace and P&WC are generally happy to be dealing with the challenges they have at hand. It is certainly preferable to trying to cope with slow sales and insufficient demand. “We are seeing a return to historical
norms of flight hours, spares orders and training academy enrollments,” says Mike Bevans. This bodes well for the turboprop OEM and MRO sectors. This said, “We have seen some challenges in the industry with supply chain issues as the commercial and general aviation fleets as some suppliers who scaled back in the recession have struggled to ramp up to meet production demand,” she notes. For its part, Pratt & Whitney Canada
is bullish about the future—and making tangible investments to capitalize on the opportunities the company foresees. “We see a number of opportunities
in expanding our service offering in emerging markets such as Asia-Pacific, China, India, Middle East and South
48 Aviation Maintenance |
avmain-mag.com | October / November 2011
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