VLADIMIR PUTIN
ARCHIVE OF THE OFFICIAL SITE
OF THE 2008-2012 PRIME MINISTER
OF THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION
VLADIMIR PUTIN
ARCHIVE OF THE OFFICIAL SITE
OF THE 2008-2012 PRIME MINISTER
OF THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION
VLADIMIR PUTIN
NPO Saturn production facilities and research and development centres design and build engines for aircraft and marine transport, stationary gas turbines and autonomous power plants with a capacity of between 2.5 and 110 megawatts. NPO Saturn has a production area of one million square metres and a workforce of 23,000, including 4,600 design personnel. More than 12,000 pieces of equipment are used in production.
Since 2008, the company Oboronprom has held a controlling stake in the company. It currently holds 88% of the shareholders' equity of NPO Saturn.
NPO Saturn is part of the United Engine-Building Corporation (a subsidiary of Oboronprom), and is under the latter's management.
The NPO Saturn production facility produces the following items commercially:
- D-30KU/KP aircraft engines for military transport and civilian aircraft;
- Engines for unmanned aircraft;
- Natural gas generators with capacities of 4, 6.3 and 10 megawatts;
- Gas turbine thermal power plants with capacities of 2.5 megawatts;
- Gas turbine units with capacities of 6 and 8 megawatts for thermal power plants;
- Gas turbine engines with capacities of 110 megawatts for national-level thermal power plants.
NPO Saturn also carries out major repairs of commercially produced units and research and design work on commission.
There are currently several items under development and being prepared for commercial production. These include:
- A family of modern engines for military aviation.
- The SaM146 engine for the Russian regional passenger jet (RRJ). The SaM146 programme is being carried out on the basis of an equal partnership between the Russian company NPO Saturn and the French Snecma Safran Group to develop, produce and market the new SaM146 power unit for use on the next generation of regional and long-distance aircraft. The SaM146 engine successfully completed certification testing in May, and within a week the engine will receive the first international type certificate meeting EASA standards in the history of Russian aircraft engineering. Commercial production of the SaM146 for the Sukhoi Superjet 100 will begin this summer.
- Progressive modernisation of the AL-31F family of engines, as well as development of generation 4+ engines (unit 114C) and fifth-generation engines for PAKFA.
- The D-30KP-Burlak aircraft engine for civilian and military transport aircraft;
- The AL-55 aircraft engine for military training planes;
- 7,000 and 14,000 horsepower gas turbine engines for maritime transport.
The new NPO Saturn training centre, which opened in March of this year, unites the NPO Saturn Training Centre and the NPO Saturn Aviation Training Centre, which previously provided instruction for general production facility personnel and personnel working on the SaM145 engine, respectively. This new training centre will have a maximum capacity of about 8,000.
The new NPO Saturn training centre is accredited in 34 engineering disciplines, and brings together key experts in the most sought-after areas of professional development. Equipped with modern manufacturing equipment, measuring instruments, tools and software, the new NPO Saturn training centre is equipped to train highly skilled professionals to meet the needs of the company itself, other United Engine-Building Corporation industrial enterprises and other engineering companies implementing modernisation programmes. This sort of training has become the centre's core philosophy.
The construction of the new training centre has been prompted by the company's involvement in the SaM146 programme. The centre is part of the efforts by the United Engine-Building Corporation to provide after-sale support for the products it manufactures, and is intended to train engineering and technical personnel in airlines, maintenance organisations and at NPO Saturn itself to service and repair the SaM1346 engine. This is the first time in the country an aircraft training centre has been established on the premises of an engine producer rather than an aircraft producer.
New Instrumental Solutions (NIR) was established in late 2008 by NPO Saturn at the company's premises in Rybinsk, Yaroslavl Region, and the industrial enterprise officially opened its doors on April 26, 2010. It is a collaborative project between the state-owned corporation RusNano, NPO Saturn and Gazprombank.
NIR will manufacture monolithic, carbide tools with nanostructured coating that improves performance significantly. The industrial enterprise has been created to provide hi-tech sectors of the Russian economy (aerospace engineering, instrumentation manufacturing, etc.) with modern, Russian-made and Russian-designed tools.
The Kremen units for applying nanostructured coating to metal-cutting equipment were designed jointly by the Kurchatov Institute (a Russian research institute) NPO Saturn and the Solovyov State Aviation Technology Academy in Rybinsk. The project was overseen by Federal Agency for Science and Innovation and received support through the Federal Targeted Programme Research and Development in Priority Areas of Russian Science and Technology for 2007-2012.
In early 2010 NIR began testing tools produced by VNIIInstrument and the NPO Saturn Training Centre. The tools showed better performance and mechanical characteristics than Western analogues. Thanks to advanced geometrical solutions and the nanostructured coatings, they are 10% to 20% stronger than products from well-known manufacturers such as Sandvik, Iscar etc.
When it reaches its design capacity in 2014, NIR will produce more than 150,000 metal-cutting tools with nanocoatings and resharpen more than 250,000 tools. It is expected to employ 232 workers.
Saturn Gas Turbines is a subsidiary of NPO Saturn that builds and markets high-capacity stationary generating equipment for energy suppliers, utilities companies, energy-intensive industrial enterprises and oil and gas companies. The company provides gas turbines with capacities between 2.5 and 25 megawatts, with plans to build units with capacities of up to 60 megawatts in the short term. This includes gas turbine design, manufacture, installation and commissioning, as well as the construction of turnkey generating stations and the provision after-sales service. This allows the company to build gas turbine thermal plants with capacities of up to 150 megawatts and gas pumping units with capacities ranging from 4 to 25 megawatts. Saturn Gas Turbines also produces equipment for the nuclear and chemical industries.
At present the company has enough production area to build between 50 and 60 gas turbines a year. It employs a workforce of 2,350.
