Il-96 history

[C_J]

I just noticed that this beautiful plane has a strange history:

Striking facts (source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ilyushin_Il-96):

- Only 20 built airframes.
- Aeroflot had ordered tens before Soviet desintegration.
- Russian airlines lost confidence after a breaking incident with Poetin's Il-96.
- Could be powered by P&W engines, but program was cancelled.
- Il-96-300 still needs flight engineer.
- Il-96-400 is Il-96M/T with Russian engines and instruments.
- The article mentions a Syrianair order for 4 aircraft (true? delivery date?).

I found these facts (unknown to me) worth posting
Simon

[Dorfmeister]

Hello,

Some explanations;

- SU had ordered 100 IL-96 before soviet desintegration. The IL-96's was to be used as a replacement for IL-86 whose NK-86s powerplants consumption prevent the airplane of being a real long haul airplane.

- Russian airliners lost confidence, but orders already placed hasn't been withdrawned. Some comments about this "incident" are quite strange as it seems that it was part of some lobbying action by russian groups to show how "unreliable" the soviet planes are and so the russian operators must be allowed to buy western airplanes.

- IL-96M/T was a nice project which could have been successful. However, the EXIM bank (financing the powerplants and avionics) withdrawn in 1998-1999 officialy due to the russian bank crisis and less officially because Boeing doesn't want to see a competitor emerging in the "still untapped" russian market.

- The flight engineer in the IL-96-300 is a soviet remnant... in Soviet times, planes were overstaffed to prevent pilots to escape in the West. As the IL-96 was designed in Soviet times, it has a 3rd member in the deck.

- The IL-96-400 is the longer IL-96M/T variant with russian avionics and Aviadvigatel PS90A (or upgraded PS90A2) engines.

- True but very unclear for Syrianair. The planes were partly financed by IFC (Ilyushin Finance Corporation), if I'm not mistaken.

Regards,

Dorf'

P.S: Sorry for the mistakes, my english is a bit rusty

[chornedsnorkack]

Hello,

Some explanations;

- The flight engineer in the IL-96-300 is a soviet remnant... in Soviet times, planes were overstaffed to prevent pilots to escape in the West. As the IL-96 was designed in Soviet times, it has a 3rd member in the deck.

Wrong reason, this one.

There are plenty of Western planes with flight engineers. Every Boeing 747-300 needs a flight engineer - the first one flew in, what, 1982 or so.

Airbus 300 has flight engineer. Some Boeing 767s have flight engineers. Some Boeing 737-s have flight engineers, too.

Given that Boeing still thought that B747-300 absolutely needed a flight engineer, even though 767-200 could do without and 757 did not even have option for flight engineer, it is no wonder that Ilyushin needed flight engineer on 96-300.

[regi]

did I not just read an article some weeks ago that the money was found at last to start up full production again ?
I think +20 bodies for russian carriers.