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Of course they have the skills and equipment to make airplane brakes. But think it through a bit. First the airline has to see that they need brakes. Then they
by HeyLaughingBoy 3y ago
Of course they have the skills and equipment to make airplane brakes. But think it through a bit. First the airline has to see that they need brakes. Then they have to find a potential supplier, likely an outfit that's already making brakes for Russian airplanes. Now that supplier has to reverse engineer the brakes on the Boeing/Airbus airplanes since they need to be compatible with everything that interfaces to them. That in itself is a substantial task. Now they have to find suitable materials, assuming there aren't proprietary metallurgies or materials in the American brakes.
After that engineering is done, they have to set up a supply chain, a manufacturing line, a quality control system, installation instructions (if they're copying something this may not be needed), and an ordering system. By this point, we'd be well into the millions of dollars if this was done in the US.
And all of this has to be financially worthwhile over some time horizon, unless the airline is also going to foot the upfront cost of all this. And bear in mind that resources dedicated to this may have to be taken away from parts they're already building and making money on.
So with all that, how likely is it to happen? I don't know but it's an interesting question.
- tivert 3y agoYou seem to be assuming they will manufacture new brakes from scratch, but what about remanufacturing them (e.g. take a worn out part, replace only the specific components that are worn, then put it back into service)?
- HeyLaughingBoy 3y agoI'm sure they would do it using the most efficient methods available. That will reduce the overall cost, but not the concept I laid out. You'll still need all those steps at a minimum. The bottom line is that it's not a trivial "why don't they just..."
- tivert 3y agoOh, I agree it's not trivial, though with Russia it at least seems doable. They already have an established advanced aerospace industry, so they're already most of the way there. It's not like they're going to have to start from scratch. One other thing: >>> And all of this has to be financially worthwhile over some time horizon, unless the airline is also going to foot the upfront cost of all this. And bear in mind that resources dedicated to this may have to be taken away from parts they're already building and making money on. I think you're neglecting politics. My understanding is Putin is trying to maintain as much of a "business as usual" atmosphere in Russia as possible, and that probably means Russian airlines (which I believe are state-owned) will have a strong incentive to do what they can to keep flying (on top of the pressures of the existential business risk of being unable to continue operations). The main complicating factor that I see isn't a financial calculation, but competition with military production priorities. Also, I found an article (https://www.businessinsider.com/russian-airline-aeroflot-sends-plane-iran-repairs-sanctions-2023-4 https://www.businessinsider.com/russian-airline-aeroflot-sen...) that says Russia is starting to send Western planes to Iran for maintenance, since Iran has been manufacturing its own parts for the planes, due to its own sanctions.
- The_Colonel 3y agoThe general problem is that Russia has a lot of these issues + war going on + missing workforce due to conscription and emigration. They can fix any of these problems, but not all of them. The war effort will likely get a priority.