GTRE may go with Snecma to help develop the Kaveri engine

Bangalore: Unconfirmed reports suggest that India's aerospace research laboratory, the Gas Turbine Research Establishment (GTRE), may have finally zeroed in on a foreign partner to take its struggling Kaveri jet engine project past the qualifying mark. According to reports, the GTRE will partner French engine maker Snecma SA to build engines for the Tejas, the country's indigenously developed Light Combat Aircraft.

According to the report, Snecma could not immediately confirm the development.

Snecma, a division of the Safran Group, will take at least four years to build and certify the engine, reports said. The technology would eventually be transferred to India for local manufacture. ''We don't have the time now for the Kaveri to fully mature. In the co-development with Snecma, our R&D (work) also goes in,'' said T Mohana Rao, director, GTRE was quoted as saying.

''It would have taken another five to six years or more (for Kaveri) to achieve (the full performance),'' said Rao. ''We firmed the partner, so IAF need not wait longer.''

Work on the Kaveri engine began in 1989. According to reports, the Kaveri is unable to provide the ''slam effect'' that engines in its class are required to give. Still overweight, the engine's core is unable to provide sufficient thrust required to power the fighter.

The core, with a compressor, combustor and high-pressure turbine, is the heart of any jet engine. Air is compressed and mixed with fuel to drive turbines and create thrust.

Currently the LCA Tejas flies with a General Electric engine. Tejas is a single-engine supersonic fighter with delta wings and no tail, and uses fly-by-wire technology.

Reports also suggest that the Aeronautical Development Agency, the DRDO design lab tasked with developing the LCA Tejas, has invited General Electric and Eurojet Turbo GmbH, a European engine consortium, to bid for the supply of higher-powered engines that would be modified for the Indian fighter.