Pratt says the F100 meets the performance required by the F-15EX and already has margin for growth in the system.
KIELCE, Poland—Pratt & Whitney is promising to enhance military engine maintenance, repair and overhaul (MRO) activities in Poland in a bid to secure the engine order should Warsaw opt to buy Boeing F-15EXs in an ongoing fighter competition.
Poland, as part of its massive weapons acquisition spree, is expected to follow up its purchase of F-35 Joint Strike Fighters with the acquisition of twin-engine combat aircraft, with the F-15EX and the Eurofighter Typhoon in the running. The F-15 is powered either by the Pratt F100 or the General Electric F110.
Should Poland opt for the F-15, the country could run a separate competition for the powerplant. The Eurofighter is exclusively powered by a joint venture involving Rolls-Royce and MTU, among others.
Pratt already has a sizeable footprint in Poland, where it placed F100 engine work when the country acquired Lockheed Martin F-16s more than two decades ago. But Josh Goodman, the company’s senior F100 program director, said at the MSPO defense show here in Kielce that the scope of work would increase meaningfully with an F-15EX deal.
The work now placed in Poland, he said, represented packages of lower scope, but the company would expand that to effectively cover the totality of the engine. “This would truly give the Polish Air Force sovereign sustainment capabilities,” he said.
The company also is looking at some performance-based logistics arrangements to help drive long-term work.
Although the F-15 comes with two engine options, the EX is so far powered only by GE. Goodman said the F100 meets the performance required by the aircraft and already has margin for growth in the system.
He acknowledged that some work would have to be completed to certify use of the F100s on the EX, but he characterized those activities as “limited and low” focused on the certification. Nothing would need to change with the engine architecture, he said, though the aircraft-to-engine interface has to be adapted to reflect the introduction of a fly-by-wire system on the latest version of the fighter.
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