COMAC C929 Widebody Airliner
- Thread starter Iron Man
- Start date
that is the picture? right
post the link of this video.
well its not a big deal. Russia have had agreement with China to build composite wing. so Russia just fulfill the agreement.
China also working on their own wing as well. CR929 will have three different variants in near future. so COMAC just can't stick on one design. its good to have options.
It is fine if China makes their own wing. I just hope they also have replacements for the Western components in the pipeline. Because those have way more chance of getting sanctioned. Boeing loathes competition and they basically own the US government. FAA approval of the 737 MAX is one example, and the tanker scandal is another. They already tried to bury Bombardier and they barely competed with them.
Russia recently made a news report where they managed to make their own robot to build the wing in the MC-21, replacing imports, so I doubt there will be any problems delivering the wing on their part.
Russia recently made a news report where they managed to make their own robot to build the wing in the MC-21, replacing imports, so I doubt there will be any problems delivering the wing on their part.
Think C929 started off with much more ambitious localization goals than C919. That was half the point of partnering with Russia really.
Did they not make the wings of C919 themselves?
AFAIK C919 does not use composites on the wing. COMAC used aluminium alloys.
they do. but C919 doesn't use composite wing instead using aluminium alloys. initial plan was composite wings but due to difficulties COMAC scrapped and go with traditional design.
but in 2019 The North Research Center of COMAC has done the full-scale box section test and verification of the T800-level composite wing. According to COMAC, the completion of this project at the end of 2019 means that COMAC basically has the design, manufacturing and verification capabilities of the main structure of the composite wing of a large passenger aircraft.
if everything goes well then C919 mass production units will use composite wings.
That's fine, but normally there requires more testing before something as significant as a composite wing get put on c919. New wing is a really big deal. 777x basically just had a new wing and it required new certification.
IIRC, that's also part of the reason the fuel economy is a bit worse too but as @sunnymaxi stated it leads to a mature design and probably makes the initial certification easier. They can always apply composite wings as a running change to be certified for future models but still get some planes built in the meantime.