TR Propulsion Systems

[AzeriTank]

If you don't mind, may I ask you a question?
I heard that the prototype of TF-6000 exists at the Korea Forum yesterday, is it true? I remember only looking at the Mock-up, can someone tell me?

First prototype should be ready end of this year from earlier interviews. But it will be on test next 4 years

 

[Rodeo]

First prototype should be ready end of this year from earlier interviews. But it will be on test next 4 years

It won't be ready by the end of this year. The CEO had said the first prototype was going to be fired in Q1 2023 but since we had trouble acquiring the necessary accessory gearbox, we won't see it running in the first half of 2023. About the testing campaign, I think it will be tested on the bench for two years and then one or two years on a flying platform. This is only speculation, ofc.

 

[zio]

We could not wait 5 years for TF 6000,RR succeed in 18 months.Someone will say it is RR but the motor is also more challenged one.I am not engineer but as far as I understand time is needed for tests,is there a reason not to test two or tree motors at the same time for different tests at the same time.

 

[Rodeo]

is there a reason not to test two or tree motors at the same time for different tests at the same time.

Ask if before why.

They're being tested in parallel.

 

[Yasar_TR]

Explanations on the TF6000 engine from Mahmut Faruk Akşit

TF10000AB afterburner turbofan engine will be developed
For ATAK 2, the turboshaft engine will be developed over the TF6000 core.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1596446917050916871

There is a slight misunderstanding in the way it is translated I think. According to the article in Turkish, Dr Aksit is saying that the TF6000 can lend itself to various end uses; Such as if we made a turboshaft version, it could fly Atak-2 and if we turned it in to a marine turbine engine, it could power fast attack boats.
There are no concrete agreements about a turbo shaft engine as far as this article goes. But that is a possibility if needed.
Yes TF6000 as a turbofan is being developed. It is in final assembly stage. There should also be a TF10000 version with an after burner section. Due to excessive stresses applied to the engine by the AB section, this engine will be a different engine altogether. A bit like F124 and F125 engines of Honeywell.

Mahmut Faruk Akşit’ten TF6000 motoru üzerine açıklamalar

TEI Genel Müdürü Prof. Dr. Mahmut Faruk Akşit, TF6000 turbofan motoru üzerine açıklamalarda bulundu. TF6000'in çekirdeğinin birçok farklı alanda kullanılabileceğine

www.defenceturk.net

 

[Merzifonlu]

Problem with integration of Korean power pack? The Greeks claim that the process has stalled and is not progressing.

 

[Agha Sher]

Problem with integration of Korean power pack? The Greeks claim that the process has stalled and is not progressing.

Why even listen to Greek claims?

 

[Zafer]

There is no place to trying to find weakness in the Altay tank program. The BATU engine is already up to the task and the transmission should be no different. The whole powerpack should be ready for 2024. I would skip the Korean power pack and go national right away anyway.

 

[TheInsider]

If you don't mind, may I ask you a question?
I heard that the prototype of TF-6000 exists at the Korea Forum yesterday, is it true? I remember only looking at the Mock-up, can someone tell me?

It is being produced/assembled right now. The first ignition will be done next year. If everything goes as expected we might see one of them on an unmanned system as early as 2025. TFX engine will be a scaled-up and modified version of TF-6000. Modifications will include RCS-optimized nozzles and a special cooling system to suppress IR signature. My personal sources quote 2026 for the first ignition and 2029-30 for availability.

I don't think there will be an Altay with a Korean powerpack as the schedule is no better than the national powerpack development. Do you spend a big effort and money to get Altay 1 year earlier? 1000hp powerpack is right around the corner and land forces might launch a SABRA-like modernization project for some of the M-60A3 tanks. Together with M-60TM TIYK and Leo2A4 TIYK, there will be enough modern tanks to wait for the national powerpack. Altay, M-60TM TIYK, and Leo2A4 TIYK don't have a lot of difference/generational leaps in performance.

 

[Rodeo]

Single crystal blades and thermal barrier coatings for starters. Technology that took Pratt and Whitney, and GE how many years to develop? Not talking about TS1400. Plus various other small tidbits, Mr. Mahmut Akşit himself said that they faced embargoes on fuel pumps, oil pumps, gearboxes, etc.. and that this has caused delays. I don't know which parts we can manufacture and cannot, but I'm just realistic enough to know that making an engine of that scale without outside help is not realistic.
What did it take for China to come up with WS-15? For India to come up with the failure that is Kaveri? What is the total budget for our TF-X project? Don't dodge this question now.

OK, I'll bite.

Turkey has successfully cast SCB(single crystal blades) in 2015 for the first time. And TÜBİTAK MAM has been developing the technology ever since. Recently, Mahmut Akşit said that they're using 3rd generation SCB for their turbines.

TÜBİTAK MAM has also developed TBC for TS1400 for the first time. @TheInsider has said that the institution is developing double-layer thermal barrier coatings for the TFX engine program. Watch the video below.

The other components you mentioned are trivial. They can be outsourced or subcontracted to a local company to develop and the would certainly not take a decade to

I think the confusion comes from the one to one comparison with the other countries like China or India who had no prior knowledge or experience in the field and took on a major task of developing large turbines and failed at it for decades. TEI is not in the same situation. Go visit the section of capabilities on TEI's website. We are already a significant part of the western turbine engine ecosystem. We're already very good at cold sections of the engine and with T700, TS1400 and TF6000 we gained significant know-how and know-why about hot-sections. We have reached the maturity to develop a big turbine(or will reach with TF6000). I'm not saying it will be a piece of cake but it's within our reach, imo.

These are the parts that are produced by TEI for GEnx engine.

And these are for the LEAP engine, again, manufactured by TEI

We're not starting from scratch like the Chinese or Indians were.


That said, there are people who are much more knowledgeable about the subject than I am. We should hear what they have to say. Their opinions would carry much more weight.

@Nilgiri @Yasar

Edit: Correction. First SCB was cast in 2016, not in 2015.

 

[Nilgiri]

What did it take for China to come up with WS-15? For India to come up with the failure that is Kaveri? What is the total budget for our TF-X project? Don't dodge this question now.

If you are satisfied with Russian level MTBO and reliability in the end, it just often more economical to import from Russia for vast majority of countries (that have technical experience but various geopolitical and strategic priorities and inheritances).

Replicating that base level with say added desire of a local supply chain (and its hope for the future catching up with the Western standard) then has to override that , but there is a disadvantage you bake in by doing so that is not entirely apparent and not something that can be simply explained as it involves a whole host of technical topics and analysis of what was the integrated man-hours spent on RnD over a stretch of decades that there is no shortcut around (without significant IP theft regarding crucial apex areas, which the Chinese have had mostly bad results on here given the nature of the RnD tech tree in this domain).

The Chinese actual Qual. standards and opaqueness regarding their powerplant speaks volumes given there is no 3rd party operation of said engine to compare with Russian (forget Western) over the timeframes needed to establish this more transparently in the complete picture of lifetime performance/cost ratio and what is the actual success/failure ratio of the approach relatively speaking.

The Indian system and approach is different one (suffice to say Russian and Western powerplants import availability/risk relative to what China has determined for its needs)....i.e the issue of raw commited funding and the pros/cons of prioritizing this strategic area over other ones currently. Kaveri being a "failure" is being overly harsh as it will see application in the Ghatak drone for example in the short term and longer term will form basis to develop into something more as India augments this program priority and RnD final tier work .....rather than India having to start from scratch (which would be the case if it was actually a failure write-off).

The Turkish situation is again a unique one w.r.t what it had and has access to, what it prioritised and prioritises w.r.t the western (NATO) ecosystem....and how it achieves more local ecosystem independence/autonomy here over time. It is very different to situations China and India had and have. There is no need to be either over optimistic or over pessimistic, simply we should try gather all the facts and analyse them well. There is lot of information pertaining to the Turkish case in the propulsion thread, which maybe you should explore later.

 

[blackjack]

But the TF-X engine, has to be built in the near future. Which is why we NEED that involvement. Because otherwise that shorter time window will be about at least 20 years

Where are you pulling 20 years? Pratt and Whitney received a contract in 1970 to make the engines for the F-15 and the F-15 flew like in 1972.

 

[Pilatino]

OK, I'll bite.

Turkey has successfully cast SCB(single crystal blades) in 2015 for the first time. And TÜBİTAK MAM has been developing the technology ever since. Recently, Mahmut Akşit said that they're using 3rd generation SCB for their turbine blades.

TÜBİTAK MAM has also developed TBC for TS1400 for the first time. @TheInsider has said that the institution is developing double-layer thermal barrier coatings for the TFX engine program. Watch the video below.

The other components you mentioned are trivial. They can be outsourced or subcontracted to a local company to develop and the would certainly not take a decade to

I think the confusion comes from the one to one comparison with the other countries like China or India who had no prior knowledge or experience in the field and took on a major task of developing large turbines and failed at it for decades. TEI is not in the same situation. Go visit the section of capabilities on TEI's website. We are already a significant part of the western turbine engine ecosystem. We're already very good at cold sections of the engine and with T700, TS1400 and TF6000 we gained significant know-how and know-why about hot-sections. We have reached the maturity to develop a big turbine(or will reach with TF6000). I'm not saying it will be a piece of cake but it's within our reach, imo.

These are the parts that are produced by TEI for GEnx engine.

And these are for the LEAP engine, again, manufactured by TEI

We're not starting from scratch like the Chinese or Indians were.


That said, there are people who are much more knowledgeable about the subject than I am. We should hear what they have to say. Their opinions would carry much more weight.

@Nilgiri @Yasar

I agree, somehow I'm totally positive about the great outcomes in this topic. I think we can do it thx to our experiences.

 

[Rodeo]

I agree, somehow I'm totally positive about the great outcomes in this topic. I think we can do it thx to our experiences.

I'm not claiming that it's going to be a smooth run. There's always a chance of failure. And since I'm not in the industry, I cannot truly appreciate the difficulty of developing a large turbine engine. But we are not naive. We've been developing the necessary technologies and have been building the infrastructure. We have reasons to be optimistic.

We should have a more clear picture next year. TS1400 should fly GÖKBEY and TF6000 should be on the test bench. Our evaluations regarding our capabilities would be more accurate then.

 

[Nilgiri]

OK, I'll bite.

Turkey has successfully cast SCB(single crystal blades) in 2015 for the first time. And TÜBİTAK MAM has been developing the technology ever since. Recently, Mahmut Akşit said that they're using 3rd generation SCB for their turbine blades.

TÜBİTAK MAM has also developed TBC for TS1400 for the first time. @TheInsider has said that the institution is developing double-layer thermal barrier coatings for the TFX engine program. Watch the video below.

The other components you mentioned are trivial. They can be outsourced or subcontracted to a local company to develop and the would certainly not take a decade to

I think the confusion comes from the one to one comparison with the other countries like China or India who had no prior knowledge or experience in the field and took on a major task of developing large turbines and failed at it for decades. TEI is not in the same situation. Go visit the section of capabilities on TEI's website. We are already a significant part of the western turbine engine ecosystem. We're already very good at cold sections of the engine and with T700, TS1400 and TF6000 we gained significant know-how and know-why about hot-sections. We have reached the maturity to develop a big turbine(or will reach with TF6000). I'm not saying it will be a piece of cake but it's within our reach, imo.

These are the parts that are produced by TEI for GEnx engine.

And these are for the LEAP engine, again, manufactured by TEI

We're not starting from scratch like the Chinese or Indians were.


That said, there are people who are much more knowledgeable about the subject than I am. We should hear what they have to say. Their opinions would carry much more weight.

@Nilgiri @Yasar

Yes TEI and GE collab is discussed in quite some detail in the propulsion thread at various places. Folks should really search and read things in there.

The capital machinery + process control for example that Turkiye has in the eskisehir facility is a big leg up to how completely non-NATO "newer entrant" ecosystems had to go about developing them or making do.

PRC got a number of fairly significant injections/absorptions on this from the western ecosystem (before tianenmen happened) during the 1980s relative detente/cooperation era of Deng (with western + Chinese cooperation to bring down the USSR).

But since then it has been very ITAR regulated (as relations have become more tense/fearful/mistrust with China's rise while it retains very non-liberal political structure that West dislikes) and the trend is tightening even more.

When I went to Chengdu for example to bring certain QC online at the pratt (JV) facility there (and this was before the Xi Jinping era when relations were far better than now), there are all kind of protocols made to stymie easy IP transfer/theft that west wants to hold closer to its chest. Its similar to the whole lithograph EUV + CHIPS act stuff playing out right now w.r.t semiconductors.

If you look at IP receipt transfers, you get larger (actual 3rd party transparent) basis for overall state of tech level differential.

China only recently broke into 10+ billion USD range (what it earns from its IP abroad)....and this is mostly based on 5G telecoms gear (i.e arguably long topic as to what was genuine RnD versus stolen/copied and in between).

For long time prior to 2016 (5G explosion), China earned about 1 billion per year in IP use abroad.

Compare to Turkiye for example where it earns 100 - 300 million dollar range here and Turkiye comes out very favourably in per capita basis (since PRC is like 17 times larger by population)

Whereas US for example earns consistently in the 100 - 125 billion USD range for the last 10 years or so.
Japan in the 25 - 50 billion USD range.
UK in 15 - 25 billion USD range.
Germany in the 15 - 60 billion USD range.
France in the 10 - 15 billion USD range.
Even Canada earns about 10 billion USD per year now.

(Figures all taken from world bank)

etc etc. and they earn them across a diverse range of technology compared to China....and with noticeably smaller population sizes.

In US, UK, Germany, France, Canada.... some relative large portion of this comes from gas turbine field and propulsion in general.

There are larger multiplier effects in economy from these too (longer topic to get into). But these are what are vetted by cross border market reality in the end (compared to say govt GDP estimates and so on with whatever inflation inside it).

But what I mean to say in end is its clear where leg up in technological ecosystem resides in the end still and how TR leveraged and leverages this (by EU trade+investment deals/access, NATO/western ecosystem, the higher technical education cooperation over longer timeframe of years I mentioned before)....that also has its clear effect in say an apex niche area like gas turbines and jet engines. It is very different to countries that were never part of NATO or in close proximity to large rich EU market basically...and have (especially relative to their population size and potential) opened up to free market economics fairly recently and still somewhat nominally still.

 

[Yasar_TR]

Turkey will produce the so called 5th generation turbofan engine for the TFX sooner or later. Hopefully sooner rather than later.
Being able to produce Single Crystal Turbine blades for a small diameter engine like TS1400 does not automatically mean that TEI will be able to produce Single Crystal blades for a large 35000lbf class engine. But we are now being told/given the hint that Tubitak Sage and TEI are now in a position and confident to produce these difficult hot parts in house. And TEI‘s MD has outright declared that they are in a position to be able to produce an engine comparable to F119.
Being able to produce both low pressure and high pressure compressor sections of a large engine with blisk fans and with 3D additive manufacturing techniques is a big feat of achievement in it’s own right. The engines that GE has been developing using these techniques lend themselves to being fuel efficient and having longer operational lives as well as having lower turbine inlet temperatures. Hence not being very demanding on hot parts. TEI utilising the same manufacturing methods is in a position to attain same with their engines.
One thing that needs to be remembered though, is the fact that due to patent laws, TEI has to design and develop these engines from scratch. It can’t just copy a current GE engine. It has to go through the vigorous tests like all major engine manufacturers would. And this takes time. Time is a commodity that we don’t have. Any mishaps, embargoes or unforeseen delays would add years to the planned integration of an engine to TFX. There has got to be a “B” plan for engines.
That is where RR/Kale comes in. That is where Typhoon planes should come in too.

 

[blackjack]

I am still unclear on the timeframes of when the F-119 was designed but we know when the F-22 1st flew.

 

[Huelague]

Turkey will produce the so called 5th generation turbofan engine for the TFX sooner or later. Hopefully sooner rather than later.
Being able to produce Single Crystal Turbine blades for a small diameter engine like TS1400 does not automatically mean that TEI will be able to produce Single Crystal blades for a large 35000lbf class engine. But we are now being told/given the hint that Tubitak Sage and TEI are now in a position and confident to produce these difficult hot parts in house. And TEI‘s MD has outright declared that they are in a position to be able to produce an engine comparable to F119.
Being able to produce both low pressure and high pressure compressor sections of a large engine with blisk fans and with 3D additive manufacturing techniques is a big feat of achievement in it’s own right. The engines that GE has been developing using these techniques lend themselves to being fuel efficient and having longer operational lives as well as having lower turbine inlet temperatures. Hence not being very demanding on hot parts. TEI utilising the same manufacturing methods is in a position to attain same with their engines.
One thing that needs to be remembered though, is the fact that due to patent laws, TEI has to design and develop these engines from scratch. It can’t just copy a current GE engine. It has to go through the vigorous tests like all major engine manufacturers would. And this takes time. Time is a commodity that we don’t have. Any mishaps, embargoes or unforeseen delays would add years to the planned integration of an engine to TFX. There has got to be a “B” plan for engines.
That is where RR/Kale comes in. That is where Typhoon planes should come in too.

We are able to produce an equivalent to F-119 engine (2D trust vectoring+ Supercruise) with 35.000 ibf (dry thrust) ?

 

[Hasanrize]

The Altay tank was a real serious project for us, since we couldn't procure any more tanks due to the embargoes. Yet, it was far less complex than a turbofan, yet since 2007 a single tank is yet to be produced. How much more money and time needs to be sunk before we get to replace our aging tank fleet? And the thing is well obsolete, before it has come out yet. Looking at this, the far more complex task of developing a turbofan wholly indigenously? ..Yeah. As for your previous post, you can only crush so much money until you're broke. As for our friends so called "support", it will end up same fate as the Altay. No thanks. I do pray that the cooperation does not fall apart because if it does, with that other thing going on which I will not mention, we'll have a real predicament in our hands.

There is this saying all the time "There is plenty of countries that can make aircraft, yet only a handful of them can produce engine because it is more difficult than the aircraft itself." So, if we use the same thinking, there is only one country on Earth that produces a 1500 hp diesel engine and transmission for it, this suggests that the engine of Altay is at least not simpler than a jet engine. South Korea is becoming the second country hopefully for that power pack.

 

[Windchime]

However, right now there is only one company with two stealth engine models that achieved upwards of 30k lbf

Two, since GE made a flight-worthy prototypes of both the ATF and JSF. In fact, F120 even had a greater thrust than the F119.

South Korea is becoming the second country hopefully for that power pack.

US had some very mature 1200~1500hp diesel engine designs in the 20th century. It's just that those designs were not selected in favor of the AGT1500. Nowadays those manufacturers which offered US diesel engines for M1 either merged or stopped operating but considering the diesel engine expertise that exist in the US, as shown by Caterpillar and co, it is hard to argue that they are not capable of developing and manufacturing a 1500hp powerpack today if they already did it decades ago. Japan also did it with their Type 90, albeit it was 2-stroke. Based on the information regarding 8VA4WTK engine and MT1200 transmission of Type 10, I'd say Japan is fully capable of designing and manufacturing a 4-stroke 1500hp powerpack if they needed it. Same could be said about France, Italy and the UK but they've got no issues with using Renk transmissions. Not to mention, Russia and China have their respective powerpacks with domestic design.

Anyways, if what you've meant was "1500hp powerpack offered on the international market", then it'll be correct to say that Korea is trying to become the second supplier after Germany.