Aviadvigatel’s Story

Starting from 1939 to 1953, the company that was led by Arkady Shvetsov, well-known soviet designer of aero engines, creator of the first national M-11 aviation engine, created a family of high-power air-cooled star-shaped piston engines named M-63, ASh-82, ASh-82FN, ASh-73TK, ASh-82T, ASh-82V powering Polikarpov, Tupolev, Lavochkin, Sukhoi, Ilyushin, Antonov aircrafts and Mil, Jakovlev helicopters and had an important role to play in the victory over fascism and during the postwar period.

In early 1950-s, the company team headed by Pavel Soloviev, a Shvetsov’s successor, proceeded to create new gas turbine machinery. Each of aero engines made over that period features as “the first” and “the best”. These engines have been powering the most reliable in aviation history Tu-134 (D-30) and the most fuel-efficient Tu-154M (D-30KU-154) aircrafts.

Perm School has made a generally acknowledged contribution into a theory and practice of the worldwide engine construction. Classical examples of engineering included into textbooks on aero engines design are Perm developed Ash-62IR piston “long-liver engine” (designed in 1938 and still flying on board of An-2), D-20P (powers Tu-124), first bypass engine; D-25V (Mi-6, Mi-10, Mi-10K), first helicopter free-turbine engine; first electronic engine control system, high-pressure compressor and high-temperature turbines.

In 1993, PS-90A, the last engine created during the lifetime of Pavel Soloviev, entered a service. For more than 25 years the PS-90A has remained the only engine in Russia for long-haul aircrafts. Over a period of 20 years its PS-90A-76, PS-90A1, PS-90A2, PS-90A3 versions were developed and certified. Now PS-90A family engines are operating on Russian passenger, cargo and transport aircrafts, as well as powering airliners of the President and the Prime-Minister of the Russian Federation.

A distinctive feature of the Perm Design School is that it has a high percentage of developments introduced and manufactured by batch production factories. Over a period of 82 years more than 70 engine types have been developed, 41 (60%) of which were produced in series. At different times engine plants in Perm (UEC-Perm Engines) and in Rybinsk (NPO Saturn) delivered 66,400 piston aero engines and more than 19,500 gas turbine aero engines developed by Perm Design Bureau.

In early 90-s, due to the aviation structural crisis UEC-Aviadvigatel used all the experience gained in engineering to develop gas turbine equipment for Russian gas-production enterprises and fuel and energy sector. Over the last 25 years two families of gas turbine sets for gas-pumping units and power plants rated at 2.5 to 6 and 10 to 25 MW have been developed and commercially exploited (UEC-Perm Engines). By order of the largest gas and energy companies, Gasprom, LUKOIL, Bashkirenergo, Surgutneftegaz and others, more than 1100 industrial engines have been produced and are successfully operating.

Since 2008, UEC-Aviadvigatel continued works on creation of advanced engine family rated at 9-18 tons (19,800-39,700-lb.)-thrust, intended for short- and medium-haul MS-21 type aircraft and industrial gas turbine sets. In 2018, the base engine of the PD-14 family was certified by the Aviation Registry of the Russian Federation. In December 2020, the first flight of the MS–21-310 aircraft equipped with new Russian PD-14 engines took place at the airfield of the Irkutsk Aviation Plant - a branch of PJSC Irkut Corporation.

Currently, UEC-Aviadvigatel implements the program "Creation of a family of high-thrust engines based on the PD-35 gas generator", develops gas turbine sets for gas transportation on the basis of the PD-14 engine, as well as low-emission combustion chambers for industrial gas turbine engines.