Another project by SriLankan Engineering

SriLankan Engineering has begun another project to change the landing gear on the widebody Airbus A330 fleet of SriLankan Airlines.

The complex program is saving the country and the airline foreign exchange, totalling more than Rs. 50 million, as opposed to carrying out the project at an overseas facility.

This is the first time that this sophisticated operation has been carried out in-house at SriLankan Engineering on widebody aircraft. Work was completed on the first two of SriLankan’s four A330 aircraft in September, with the third scheduled for December and the last one in March next year.

Aircraft Maintenance Manager Priyantha Rose said: “This further strengthens the position of SriLankan Engineering as a Maintenance, Repair, Overhaul (MRO) organization of choice in the region, and we intend to market our new capability in landing gear changes to other airlines, especially as we now have the necessary tools as well as the experience.”

The program is a mandatory requirement specified by the manufacturer, Airbus Industries, which needs to be performed upon completion of ten years’ service of an aircraft. Over a decade, the impact of thousands of landings by the 180-tonne aircraft on runways around the world at a touchdown speed of 150 miles per hour, wears down the structure of the complex, moveable parts of the landing gear.

Procurement and Logistics (Aircraft) Manager Rehan Fernando said: “The program enhanced the level of exposure of our aircraft engineers and technicians, which will be a significant advantage when we begin landing gear changes on SriLankan’s four-engined A340 fleet starting next April.”

The project required the acquisition of specialized tools to handle the landing gear. An A330 has two sets of main landing gear each of which weigh three tonnes, and one nose landing gear which weighs one tonne.

SriLankan’s A330’s serve on long-haul routes such as Paris, Frankfurt, Rome, Beijing and Hong Kong, and medium range sectors such as Dubai, Kuwait, New Delhi, Bangkok and Singapore.

SriLankan Engineering is receiving growing recognition from airlines in the region for its maintenance, repair and overhaul capabilities.