Aircraft
Bombardier Readies C Series Fuselage Barrel for Testing
Bombardier next month plans to start more than a year of testing with the first aluminum-lithium test barrel for the C Series narrowbody that was delivered

Bombardier next month plans to start more than a year of testing with the first aluminum-lithium test barrel for the C Series narrowbody that was delivered from Chinese partner Shenyang Aircraft on Monday. Now located at Bombardier’s Ville Saint-Laurent, Quebec manufacturing plant, the test barrel represents the
main fuselage section of the airplane. Its production and testing will demonstrate manufacturing and engineering concepts before the aircraft’s final design phase begins next year, said Bombardier. The company expects the 110- to 135-seat airplane to enter service in 2013.

The test barrel, which measures some 23 feet long and about 12 feet in diameter, left Shenyang Aircraft’s plant in Dalian, China, on July 20, traveled across the Pacific and then 2,500 miles from California to Quebec.