India's Mass Order of F404-IN20 Engines for Tejas Mk1A Surprised GE, Leaving It Scrambling to Catch Up & Delays

India's unexpected mass order of Tejas Mk1A in 2021 may be the reason behind GE's inability to meet engine delivery timelines. This unexpected demand necessitated the delivery of almost 99 more F404-IN20 engines, a variant specifically designed for the Tejas Mk1 program, leaving GE scrambling to adjust its production capabilities.

GE officials, speaking anonymously, revealed that the company had not anticipated such a large order after the initial procurement of 40 Tejas Mk1 jets. By 2013, India's focus had shifted to the more advanced Tejas Mk2, powered by the F414 engine, further diminishing GE's expectations for additional F404 orders. Consequently, GE scaled back its supply chain for the specialized engine, assuming limited future demand.

The 2021 order for 83 Tejas Mk1A jets, bringing the total to 123, significantly disrupted GE's plans. The company faced a daunting supply chain challenge, needing to ramp up production for an engine it had virtually phased out. The COVID-19 pandemic further complicated matters, disrupting global supply chains and forcing GE to identify new partners to restart production.

Adding to the complexity, the F404-IN20 engine is a highly customized variant specific to India. While other countries utilize the F404 engine, their versions differ in thrust output and production arrangements, limiting GE's ability to leverage existing resources to meet India's sudden demand.

With India now planning to procure an additional 97 Tejas Mk1A jets, GE is accelerating its production efforts. The company aims to deliver 20 engines per year starting in 2026, with potential for further increases. This commitment is crucial to support the expanding Tejas Mk1A fleet and ensure its operational readiness.

Despite the challenges, GE remains dedicated to fulfilling India's orders and supporting the Tejas Mk1A program. The F404-IN20 engine will continue to play a vital role in India's light combat aircraft fleet until the Tejas Mk2 enters full production.

 

[Sudha]

GE is failed & exposed, second GE have signed Agreement to deliver the 99 Engines now no Excuse , its shows how professional are they no need to hide incompetency of GE which already had well developed Eco-system & it was IOC & FOC engines order & not Tejas MK1A order, Nothing to do with kaveri Engine replacement have Bharat inform about it to stop production of GE-404 (kaveri as a replacement) it was GE fault knowing a fighter jet requires 3.5 Engine in entire life time & lastly they are ramping up production upto 20 instead of 24 to 30 to make-up the loss for 3 years its Just PR for hiding / face saving from GE for its Incompetence Nothing else , second Boeing was begging for orders as its production line was going to idle this is called double standard

One you do not anything about efficiency in reducing the cost. Secondly even if GE has well developed eco system no commercial company will keep open the supply lines when no further order materialises. And FYI GE will look after its commercial interests & not Bharat's. If 3.5 engines were required it is not fault of GE but HAL because they did not order those engines inspite of being aware of it. Loss of three years? They were required to start supplying from 2023, now how that becomes three years🤔? BTW why do you not see the incompetence of HAL for not ordering 3.5 engines?

 

[Rajesh Patil]

There is only one solution to this problem:
Indigenous R&D of engines for 20 years with Public-Private partnership. Right down to the material science. We have material science B.Tech course in IIT Bombay. What is it there for?

 

[sanket]

One you do not anything about efficiency in reducing the cost. Secondly even if GE has well developed eco system no commercial company will keep open the supply lines when no further order materialises. And FYI GE will look after its commercial interests & not Bharat's. If 3.5 engines were required it is not fault of GE but HAL because they did not order those engines inspite of being aware of it. Loss of three years? They were required to start supplying from 2023, now how that becomes three years🤔? BTW why do you not see the incompetence of HAL for not ordering 3.5 engines?

What a Funny Logic , Thoughts Does 36 Rafale deal was bought with 36X4 Engines .................144 ??? can u Give example in which Fighter jet deal Engines are Bought Once a recent xample even after having war with Ukraine Su-30 MKI was never Grounded & have struck a deal for 240 Engines & some components will come from Russia have they expected that Bharat will place orders or go for AL-41 ...................??? dont cooked childish stories Just for Fun

 

[sanket]

Yeah... no. Supply chain issues are a thing, and the two wars going on haven't helped in the slightest. Need I point to HAL's delays in Su-30MKI production to give you an example?

Secondly, this 99 engine order was for the 83 aircraft order, and not for preceding orders. Engines for those were delivered long back.

GE doesn't work based on instructions from Bharat. They did not foresee us ordering more Tejas Mk 1As, and so they switched over an idle production line (manufacturing the specialised engine variant) back to normal production. They knew full well we, as customers, would not stock the additional engines here (almost no one does), and so would have planned for diverting a production line again for manufacturing of the IN-20 variant at a later date when the 40 Tejas Mk 1/1As came up for engine replacement.

Now, as for how much the production line is being ramped up. If you bother to read the article, it says they will ramp production up to 20 by 2026 and further beyond that. Once the 97 aircraft order for the Tejas Mk 1A is formally given, GE will increase production to even 30-40 engine a year. They need concrete orders to make that kind of investment. Not every company in the world is going to work like a DPSU in India does. Unlike in India, global companies do not have a captive market, and so cannot afford to work based on speculation.

Finally, about your Boeing point: Do you have a basic idea about how production lines work? Boeing manufactures aircraft, while GE manufactures engines. You can't build one on a production line of the other. Hence, this last point from you is utterly wrong.

keep your childish comment with You , GE should have Avoided signing the contrat if there supply Chain was not ready to deliver simple Even after Xtra 13 Months cant deliver single Engine shame on GE Very professional Aero-Giant , GE must b knowing there own preparedness thats why they sign the deal

 

[Anant]

What a Funny Logic , Thoughts Does 36 Rafale deal was bought with 36X4 Engines .................144 ??? can u Give example in which Fighter jet deal Engines are Bought Once a recent xample even after having war with Ukraine Su-30 MKI was never Grounded & have struck a deal for 240 Engines & some components will come from Russia have they expected that Bharat will place orders or go for AL-41 ...................??? dont cooked childish stories Just for Fun

Your stance about the AL-31 is incorrect, since Russia still produces the AL-31 for their own use. The engines we get can come off the same production line. That does not hold true for the F404.

Finally, if you have a source for India ordering more than 90-100 M88 engines back in 2016 (72 to be used on the Rafales plus spares), please share that.

 

[Anant]

keep your childish comment with You , GE should have Avoided signing the contrat if there supply Chain was not ready to deliver simple Even after Xtra 13 Months cant deliver single Engine shame on GE Very professional Aero-Giant , GE must b knowing there own preparedness thats why they sign the deal

Um, nope. GE signed the contract with the full understanding of delivering the engines. They couldn't have foreseen Russia's invasion of Ukraine or Hamas' attack on Israel, and therefore couldn't have foreseen the supply chain disruptions resulting from those.

In any contract, you have factors that are beyond the scope of the contract. External wars in a third country very much fall into that category.

 

[Sandeep]

It shouldn’t matter if they were even caught off guard with more orders placed because all they have to do is continue the same variant and its production for a longer period of time. This benefits GE anyway so there should be no complaints from them. However I’m sure that India would have entered the optional clause of placing more orders in their contracts as optional and if it’s ever needed. So this shouldn’t be seen as a reason for the delays in manufacturing the engines for Tejas MK1A or delay production of the Tejas MK1A and trainers.

 

[Naveen Bijoy]

HAL should have worked for another engine, other that 404 ,

 

[Sandeep]

Sometimes I feel all this special variant is problem we should have gone with basic variant which gives 50/78 KN Thrust. We could hve brought few engines from S.Korea or Sweden Volvo for emergency. If thrust is not satisfactory go with Eurojet with provides 60/90KN. Many claim service life of F404 is 8000 hrs which is same as fighter jet 8000hr so no problem is replacing engines in-between.

The problem comes with integrating a new engine whereas previous engines had already been integrated with the jet. To change the engine now would require major structural changes, technology changes, engineering chances, electrical and piping to the jet etc. This would delay production of the jet as it will have to get certified again which takes years.

 

[kurtwallis wallis]

NO! GE is helping LM to get MRFA tender final order by denying engines to HAL now.....

 

[sanket]

Your stance about the AL-31 is incorrect, since Russia still produces the AL-31 for their own use. The engines we get can come off the same production line. That does not hold true for the F404.

Finally, if you have a source for India ordering more than 90-100 M88 engines back in 2016 (72 to be used on the Rafales plus spares), please share that.

Joke of the day i am asking in which deal Engines are ordered at Once for Life Time of Fighter jet , dont Reply hurryly First read others comments care fully then reply. Infact i am asking sorce for which deal 3.5 Engines are bought

 

[kurtwallis wallis]

HAL should have worked for another engine, other that 404 ,

EJ200 option was there in the 90's but successive Govt's rejected due to higher costs involved something like 1.5 times costs for GE F404... ONLY other engine is useless Russian RD93MA ones...

 

[Suddhasattwa Bandyopadhyay]

MOD/IAF made a similar kind of blunder with the delayed order of 6 additional C 17 Globemaster III aircraft knowing Boeing's assembly line was shutting down.

 

[shekhar]

That's why it is necessary to tell the companies for your complete requirements present and future, then you are free from your side, otherwise blame game has no advantage

 

[Ray]

1. They weren't dreaming about anything. I have said it before as well, but as the F404IN-20 is a specialised variant, you need a separate line to manufacture those.

2. The 83 Tejas Mk 1A order was not given a lot of warning for. For a comparison, the second order for 97 aircraft was hinted at back in late 2022, and the order is not expected to be signed before the end of this financial year.

3. Each fighter jet needs 3 or 3.5 engines over it's lifetime, sure. However, you missed two things. Firstly, there has always been some talk of replacing the F404 with the Kaveri at some point. Secondly, if only 40 Mk 1/1As were delivered, then these wouldn't require spare engines for a long time. This meant GE could use the IN-20 production line to manufacture other F404s, and eventually build more IN-20 variants when the time to replace engines came around.

4. You cannot expect a company to keep a production line going on an expectation of orders. Had the 83 aircraft deal even been firmly announced, GE may have decided to keep the line going.

See, there is certainly a geopolitical aspect to this. The US is, to an extent, delaying the engines slightly. However, the main factor here is simple economics and how supply chains work.

HAL is infamous for delay, that's true. But don't be blind in hate of HAL you people are trying to justify delay by GE.
yes Indian variant of f-404 is different than others but it won't be much different. There will be some parts which are different from others but not the whole engine.
GE doesn't need to make some super efforts for Indian variant. They're one of the biggest engine maker and can't manage a small thing, is completely nonsense.
It's American arms twisting nothing else. US Democrat govt is behind all this and you guys are doing mud slinging on each other. US wants to pressure Indian govt to buy f-16.
I don't know why but you are a big US fanboy. And ready to malign India and Indians too to save American wrong doing.

 

[NSR]

I wrote many times here that GE is not responsible for the delay in deliveries of GE F-404IN20.
GE delivered 75 F-404s and some were used in Tejas Mk 1 and some in trainers.
That still leaves many more left to be used in Tejas Mk IAs.
So the delivery delay of Tejas Mk IAs were not due to GE but due to inefficient and bottomless pit mismanagement by none other than HAL.

Since India wishes to build 200+ Tejas IAs, it is high time to get a license from GE to build F-404IN20 locally with 80% TOTs.
India needs at least 400+ F-404s conservatively over the lives of Tejas IAs.

Go for it and improve skills though build both F-404s and F-414s and apply those skill sets to Indian GTRE Kaveri derivatives.
Order same machines, tools, and testing reequipments for Kaveri derivatives too.

This way India can realize its fighter engine dream very quickly.

 

[A K Tiwari]

It was HALs responsibilities to keep their suppliers in the loop. When GE disbanded the 404 production line our government should have raised an alarm and given them and inkling of the things to come.

 

[Arz786]

keep your childish comment with You , GE should have Avoided signing the contrat if there supply Chain was not ready to deliver simple Even after Xtra 13 Months cant deliver single Engine shame on GE Very professional Aero-Giant , GE must b knowing there own preparedness thats why they sign the deal

Frankly, GE and many other US defence contractors consider India a risky place to do business. They are not so impressed by our market as we think they are. It is too uncertain, volatile and binary for them. I will not be surprised if GE had taken a decision to keep India on low priority. I mean look at the GE Defence business presence in India - no senior manager running that business, while their civil aero-engine business has multiple senior officials managing that civil aero-engine business.

 

[Daniel Raj]

Or maybe the US govt is blackmailing India for something we don't yet know now. So they could have asked GE to play hard to get.

 

[PKPRS]

Nice Joke From GE , it means GE-404 Supply chain were dreaming about Chai Samosa. IAF have ordered 20 IOC & 20 FOC , & Based on Modification Further orders were going to b placed second What mean by IOC & FOC .............??? GE dont fool others its your incompetence u were busy in having Chai samosa Third Every Fighter jet in its life span requires 3.5 Engines apart from 40 (IOC+FOC) several Tech Demonstrator were Flying, then what about IOC& FOC According to GE it should b Grounded after Integrating Engines for Once Any way Nice PR From GE , as expected western are Masters in propaganda form hiding there own mistake Lastly spareparts & components needs to replace at certain sortie GE is not new in this Field it have tonnes of experience even then exposed to fullfill its order for taking extra 13 months

Whole world has supply chain issues, for an example some new cars are delivered by dealers to customers with just one remote instead of two, customers are asked to wait a couple of months to get the second remote, GE doesn’t make engine for only India, they also have suppliers internationally, IAF is the main culprit here just sleeping all the years and asking for 90 mini jets all of a sudden especially during COVID, who expected IAF to order Tejas MK1A when everybody thought they would order Tejas MK2. Even GE wiuldn’t have expected an order for some engine that they are going to stop producing.