Turkey to select foreign engine for local fighter

Turkey has requested bids from global motor companies GE, Rolls-Royce and Pratt & Whitney to present bids to power Turkey’s future fighter jet. The defense authorities, who mull to complete the program by 2023, see the engines as the first step for the ambitious program Turkey’s aerospace industry and procurement authorities have decided to first choose a foreign-made engine for the indigenous fighter jet that the country’s local industry will develop, and then finalize its design.

A senior aide of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said Turkish scientists had decided that choosing the engine and then proceeding with the program would be the best way. 

“So we’ll first choose the engine that will power the TF-X [the proposed Turkish fighter] and develop the aircraft based on that engine,” the official said. 

Earlier this year, Turkey’s defense procurement agency, the Undersecretary for Defense Industry (SSM) wrote to three engine makers — GE, Pratt & Whitney and Rolls-Royce — asking them to propose a suitable engine for the TF-X.

An SSM official said Ankara would most likely select an engine before the end of the year. “That decision will be followed by the launch of the first phase of the development stage,” he said. 

Earlier in June, Pratt & Whitney, at a high profile ceremony, inaugurated its Turkish partnership with local aviation company Kale to produce critical engine parts for the F-35.

Kale Pratt & Whitney, the joint venture, will manufacture the parts of the F-135 and the engine for the F-35, at the plant in İzmir on Turkey’s Aegean coast.

Pratt & Whitney has a 51 percent...