Russian-Chinese project CR929 is coming to the stage of selecting system suppliers
The project of the CR929 wide-body long-haul passenger aircraft, developed jointly by UAC and the Chinese civil aviation corporation COMAC, in 2018 passed an important stage in coordinating the general appearance of the airliner. At the same time, the amount of work that developers would like to give to suppliers was determined. Now comes the important stage of choosing these suppliers.
On the whole, a half dozen directions were identified in which the CR929 developers first issued a request for information and then a request for proposals for potential suppliers. Now there is an analysis of the proposals received and the selection of the best of them. The final “freeze” of the list of suppliers for the liner is planned in the first quarter of 2020, when the CR929 project must pass through the Gate 3 stage. According to the previous project management system, this roughly corresponds to the protection of the draft design.
Alexey Kubasov, Head of the Sukhoi Civil Aircraft Systems System Engineering Department, tells about the peculiarities of the selection process for suppliers of main systems and equipment in the framework of the stage to Gate 3 according to the CR929 program.
An ordinary unusual project
- Alexey Viktorovich, with what can the CR929 project in the field of international cooperation be compared? Probably, with the first development of the Airbus A300, when the aviation industry of France and Germany participated in the project, not yet integrated into a single whole?
- From the point of view of the organization of the project, the world experience knows enough examples when different companies united to realize something together. Our previous Superjet 100 project was also revealing. With its implementation was also the broadest international cooperation. Features are in the project CR929. Interaction with Chinese partners, of course, has its own specifics, first of all, organizational. Issues related to the organization should be resolved now, so that the project can move on to understandable to all sides of the path.
- There are differences in aviation schools in Russia and China?
- From the point of view of my area of responsibility, everything is quite simple. In this sense, CR929 is a regular project. What difference would it make if “Sukhoi” together with “Tupolev” would start designing a plane together? When the Superjet 100 project began, the team for its implementation included representatives from very many enterprises. Although the company was named Sukhoi Civil Aircraft, in the design block from the Sukhoi Design Bureau there were no more than 25-30% of specialists. The rest were from Ilyushin, Tupolev, MiG. But everyone got together, found a common language and made a plane: in 2004 the project was launched, in 2010 they were certified. There was a desire and a common goal.
The difference between the Superjet 100 and CR929 is that people speak different languages. But now this is no longer a problem. The basic regulatory documents and requirements of all companies and countries producing civil aviation technology are the same. These are ICAO requirements, aviation regulations, many applicable standards, etc. and here are the procedures for how to apply it, in each company. And our task now for the project is to adopt uniform procedures.
The Chinese, in their old tradition, strive to involve the very best in their projects, and learn from it themselves. Those colleagues who work with us, they all participate in the project C919, and some even stood at the origins of the project ARJ21. They all have experience working with western partners. Moreover, with the same ones who are now offering their systems for wide-body aircraft. Most of them have already participated in international cooperation, they know the global rules of the game. They know what to develop systems on their own, and how to develop systems with the involvement of suppliers. Therefore, there are no big differences, and questions about the development of most systems today are not worth it. We have a very good relationship, there is an understanding of how we move forward.
- How do you divide the amount of work in part of the systems among themselves?
- Now there is no separation. The development of all systems is formally a single Russian-Chinese team. A set of documents and background information are known. We divide the next “piece” in half, and from it they make their part, we - ours. Then we meet on “jets”, check our positions where necessary - we rule and agree, and a single document comes out of us. All by agreement and respecting parity on loading.
More than 12 thousand pages to study
- At what stage is the CR929 project now?
- Now we are preparing for Gate 3. From the point of view of system development, it is characterized by the choice of suppliers. In 2018, we completed the RFP release (Request For Proposal - Request for Proposal - Ed.) For all systems. In April - early May of this year they received technical and commercial offers from those suppliers who wanted to participate in the project. It turned out quite a big list. For each direction of the systems, and there are 15 of them in my area of responsibility, there were at least four candidates. 15 directions on 4 suppliers on 200 pages - more than 12 thousand pages for studying turn out. And there are calculations that need to be analyzed, to identify strengths and weaknesses. This amount of work we divide in half with Chinese partners.
- 15 is the number of major systems?
- There was a flexible approach. We considered that for some systems it is better to order the turnkey integration development. We have divided some systems into component parts. Because at the previous stage, RFI (Request For Information - Request Information - Ed.) 2-3 years ago, we received from potential suppliers either not entirely satisfactory offers, or it was obvious that some are strong in one, and others in another. To get the best option for the CR929 project, it was decided to divide some systems into subsystems. The hydraulic system is being developed according to a single HLR, and we divided the air conditioning system into five different subsystems and released five HLRs.
- What are the criteria for choosing the best suppliers?
- RFP is a document in many areas, and not only in technology. Therefore, the final choice of the supplier is not only for designers. Our design block analyzes those documents and information related to the technical part of the proposal. We assess the technical response of suppliers to the RFP in terms of two documents: a technical task (TR, Technical Requirements - Ed.) And a statement of work sharing (SOW, Statement of Work - Ed.), Which clearly states for how much global development the supplier is responsible. and for which - CRAIC (joint venture of UAC and SOMAS - Ed.) as an aircraft integrator.
We use weights to analyze the responses received. We have already agreed on them with Chinese partners mainly in all areas: which groups of answers in which areas will have some weight. This work began in Shanghai in March 2018. Then we discussed the criteria for evaluating the proposals of suppliers for 10 days. On technology then we practically managed to come to a consensus. Now, using these criteria, after analyzing the received materials, we will try to translate all this into digital format so that we can get the quantified value of the evaluation of proposals.