Turkish Aerospace Industries T925 helicopter mock-up at the Paris Air Show 2023. (Janes/Nigel Torp-Petersen)
Turkish Aerospace Industries (TAI) debuted the T925 medium-heavy helicopter programme at Le Bourget and featured a full-scale mock-up among its static exhibits and models of militarised variants of the helicopter.
During a media briefing on the second day of the Paris Air Show 2023, TAI CEO Temel Kotil discussed the company's current programmes. Kotil said that TAI had received input into the development of the T925 from the Turkish Armed Forces. He also said that TAI had received orders for the helicopter from the navy and the army, although he added that the launch customer was a commercial organisation. He said that development was significantly progressed on the T925 and a prototype would fly in 2024.
Powered by twin turboshafts, the T925 will have a maximum take-off weight of around 11,000 kg and accommodation for three crew and 20 passengers. Kotil has earlier said that the helicopter would be equipped with a domestically produced turboshaft engine with around 2,500 shp output and that the same engine would power the T929 ATAK 2 heavy-attack helicopter. He described the two helicopters as “brothers” because of the 70% commonality between the two airframes. He said that TAI is also working on a navalised variant of the T925 with a folding tail section and principal rotors.
During development, prototypes of both the T925 and the T929 ATAK 2 will share interim TV3-117VMA-SBM1V Series 1 turboshaft engines produced by Ukranian Motor Sich, as there is no domestically produced engine with output at the 2,500 shp level currently available. TAI ordered 14 of these engines in mid-2021. Kotil confirmed to Janes
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