Pictured is a Pratt & Whitney photo of its F135 engine for the F-35 fighter.
RTX‘s Pratt & Whitney said on Sept. 22 that it is developing a new 500 to 1,800 pounds of thrust class of engines to power munitions and U.S. Air Force Collaborative Combat Aircraft (CCA).
Jill Albertelli, president of Pratt & Whitney’s military engines business, said that the company’s GATORWORKS is developing the engine class and emphasizing “development speed and affordability.”
“The scalability of the architecture, the commonality across models, and the use of additive manufacturing will allow us to significantly reduce development and production timelines as we look at existing and future applications with customers,” she said in a statement.
The company said that is to run “a second series of tests” next year “to further validate key design features” and that the company will market the engines domestically and internationally.
The General Atomics YFQ-42A Gambit is competing against the Anduril Industries YFQ-44A Fury, which carries a Williams International FJ44 engine, for CCA Increment 1. General Atomics said in August that the YFQ-42A had its debut flight at Edwards AFB, Calif. The company has not disclosed which engine it is using for the YFQ-42A.
General Atomics and Anduril have said that they believe the use of commercial engines for CCA can lead to significant savings.
A version of this story originally appeared in affiliate publication Defense Daily.