GKN Aerospace is shifting to increase its additive manufacturing footprint throughout a number of engine applications and part varieties, constructing on manufacturing expertise gained from its fan case mount ring (FCMR) — the structural half it produces for Pratt & Whitney geared turbofan engines.
Since qualifying the primary additively produced FCMR in 2023, the corporate claims to have delivered over 600 models, with full-rate manufacturing achieved in 2025.
Chief know-how officer Russ Dunn was reported by FlightGlobal as telling journalists in London just lately that GKN had an “extremely lengthy, complicated roadmap of various merchandise” it goals to convey to market, starting from parts much like the FCMR to “even barely extra complicated buildings”.
Internal and outer ring buildings are “very a lot in progress of being licensed”, he mentioned, alongside break up engine circumstances the place “we’ve a product there being licensed as we converse”.
Engine OEM partnerships and large-scale growth
GKN’s 2025 annual report recognized the geared turbofan FCMR because the “first of many deliberate know-how insertions being developed with Pratt & Whitney, GE Aerospace and Rolls-Royce”.
Work with GE Aerospace consists of additive fabrication actions for the GEnx, which powers the Boeing 787, and the in-development GE9X for the 777X program. GKN additionally produced what it described because the largest-ever all-additive half — a titanium engine case slightly below 2 meters in diameter — for the CFM Worldwide RISE open-fan know-how demonstrator.
Manufacturing is primarily by laser steel deposition by wire (LMD-W), although a powder mattress course of can be being developed, with turbine struts for the LM2500 industrial fuel engine serving as an preliminary certification pathway.
“By certifying that, we then construct up a physique of proof that permits us to construct the boldness of the shopper and airworthiness authorities, and we then transition that to the flying engine equal,” Dunn mentioned.
Certification timelines compress as information matures
The unique FCMR took roughly seven years to achieve service entry. Dunn mentioned that the timeline is anticipated to shorten significantly.
“We are actually speaking about possibly a few years moderately than seven,” he mentioned, citing the buildup of course of consistency information throughout GKN’s amenities in Sweden, the US and the UK.
Again-to-back testing of the identical part throughout these three websites produced materials properties that “got here out to inside 1% [with] a extremely, actually low stage of variation.” GKN can be pursuing additive manufacturing for part restore, with the goal of decreasing scrap charges and easing provide chain stress.
