Rolls-Royce and the United States Air Force (USAF) have completed the final element of testing for the Series 3.5 enhancement for the T5...
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Rolls-Royce and the United States Air Force (USAF) have completed the final element of testing for the Series 3.5 enhancement for the T56 engine, leading to military qualification and FAA certification later this year.
Accelerated Mission Testing (AMT) was successfully completed ahead of schedule last month and proved the durability of the new blades, vanes and other parts of the T56 turboprop engine over a period of 400 hours and 1,000 cycles. The enhanced engine is undergoing inspection by a Rolls-Royce and USAF technical team.
The engine enhancements would result in fuel savings of 9.7 percent, plus performance and reliability improvements.
Interest from US and international C-130 operators continues to grow and we look forward to US Air Force qualification and FAA certification by the end of the year.
Flight test results exceeded expectations for reduced fuel consumption and reliability improvements.
Using an installed Series 3.5 engine on a C-130, significant savings were made in fuel consumption as well as a significant reduction in turbine operating temperatures, which will translate into more than 22 per cent improvement in reliability.
The engine improvements can be installed as part of a conventional engine overhaul, and do not require any aircraft or engine control system modifications. Each C-130 aircraft has four Rolls-Royce T56 engines, with approximately 220 USAF C-130H models eligible for updating, as well as the fleet of international operators.
The Series 3.5 engine enhancement will enable the USAF to continue to operate its C-130H fleet until 2040 and a USAF analysis estimated its long-term savings from the program could exceed $2 billion.
The T56 is a single shaft, modular design, turboprop engine with a 14-stage axial flow compressor driven by a four-stage turbine unit. The gearbox has two stages of gear reduction, features a propeller brake and is connected to the power section by a torquemeter assembly. Other engine modules are the can-annular type combustor and the accessory drive housing.
The T56 military turboprop and its commercial version, the 501-D are the leading large turboprop engines in the world on the basis of the number of units sold and more than 200 million operating hours.
Since the engine entered production in 1954 over 18,000 T56/501-D turboprops have been installed on a wide variety of propeller-driven aircraft, including Lockheed Martin's ubiquitous C-130 Hercules and L-100 transports, Northrop Grumman's E-2 Hawkeye early warning aircraft and Lockheed's P-3 Orion anti-submarine warfare aircraft.
