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CTS Engines has invested $15 million in this new 216,000-ft.2 facility in Coral Springs, Florida.
Sometimes bigger is not better, but in the case of CTS Engines’ new MRO facility, it is. The new 216,000-ft.2 site doubles the company’s space and its number of engine bays—and, equally important, drastically changes the production workflow. “It’s about capacity and operational effectiveness,” CEO Bill Kircher says.
This should translate eventually to supporting 200 legacy commercial and military aircraft instead of about 60, as it did in 2024. The MRO’s goal is “in the 90s” this year, Kircher says.
Comparing CTS Engines’ former Fort Lauderdale, Florida, headquarters to the new one 30 mi. north in Coral Springs is similar to comparing an older home with multiple bolt-on additions and lots of small rooms to a modern one with an open floor plan.
“The flow of production is [now] world-class versus suboptimized,” Kircher says. “From a cost productivity perspective, we’re aiming to save over $1 million per year.”
The Fort Lauderdale facility consisted of a 55,000-ft.2 repair shop with 12 engine bays and three other support buildings for repairs, warehousing and administration that added up to 100,000 ft.2
The Coral Springs facility is one big rectangle that houses the engine bays in the middle flanked by component repair and backshops. Warehouses for commercial and military parts bookend one side. The 55,000-ft.2 Fort Lauderdale MRO operations building “would fit four times in the new building,” says Jared Butson, vice president of sales and marketing.
CTS plans to finish moving to Coral Springs from Fort Lauderdale by the end of June.
Investments
CTS Engines’ strategic investments are focused on items to increase efficiency, add capabilities for larger engines and reduce turnaround times.
The Coral Springs facility includes new cranes and hoists to transport engines through production. It also houses new equipment, including clean tanks that are four times their predecessors’ size, which will increase MRO throughput. The cleaning system also is more environmentally friendly than the one in Fort Lauderdale.
A Danobat vertical grinder handles two key GE CF6-80C2 modules: the high-pressure compressor cases, including vanes, and the high-pressure turbine nozzle guide vane assemblies, including rotors and shrouds.
A balance machine for the Engine Alliance GP7200, which powers the Airbus A380, has also come online at the new facility. CTS completed work on its first GP7200 in June 2024 at the new facility through a temporary certificate of occupancy and finished the test-cell correlation for the engine in January. The old facility was not tall enough to accommodate the powerplant, so the work had to be performed in Coral Springs.
A new Turbulence Control Structure (TCS), which looks like a giant silver golf ball, increases the use of CTS’ 155,000-lb.-thrust test cell by altering the air flow into engines to reduce variations that could be caused by wind speed and direction. The TCS is “an economical way to add capacity to test because we don’t have to wait for the perfect winds and perfect humidity,” Kircher says.
CTS added the test cell in 2022, allowing it to trial 100 engines annually, which matched its throughput. Adding the TCS boosted the capability to 150 engines annually. “The new building can get us up to 200 engines per year,” Butson says. When it gets to that quantity on the MRO side, he adds, “we will definitely need another test cell.”
A second pad at CTS Engines’ site in Jupiter, Florida, 62 mi. north of Coral Springs, could accommodate a second test cell when the time is right. The control centers, fuel tanks, mechanical room and zoning were all set up for two.
New Engines, Production Planning
CTS strives to add a new engine line every year. “We started with the CF6-50 (2010), then added -80C2 (2011), -80A (2013), -80E1 (2023), Pratt & Whitney PW2000 (2022) and GP7200 (2024),” Kircher says.
This year the company inducted its first Pratt-powered Lockheed Martin F117, which also is the engine for the Boeing C-17. CTS is maintaining these engines through a sustainment contract with Pratt.
What is the next engine addition going to be? “The PW4000-94” in 2026, Kircher says. The new building is designed to support the volume and tooling for additional engines.
Having the GP7200 only in Coral Springs since last year allowed CTS to study the space and undergo multiple iterations of production planning. The company put tape on the ground to visualize how much room the grinder would need and where tooling should go. “We could really see how things were going to fit,” Kircher says.
He thinks the clean line of sight in the building will improve quality and teamwork as well. CTS plans to grow its staff to 400 from 250 over a two-year journey, which it is halfway through.
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