GKN Aerospace and Pratt & Whitney target 2028 certification for L-DED-w F135 engine casings

GKN Aerospace and Pratt & Whitney have signed a technology-development agreement to evaluate full-size F135 engine casings produced with GKN’s laser directed-energy-deposition wire process. The work will be carried out at GKN Aerospace’s Kongsberg facility in Norway. The partners plan to produce a demonstrator in 2027 and target certification by the end of 2028. The programme moves wire-fed laser DED from component-scale development toward a safety-critical, full-size military-engine structure.

For GKN Aerospace, the agreement places its L-DED-w capability inside a propulsion application where process repeatability, dimensional control, repairability and inspection evidence matter as much as deposition speed. Engine casings are structurally consequential parts, so the development path will need to demonstrate that wire feedstock, thermal history and post-processing can produce a controlled, certifiable result at full scale. That is a distinctly different commercial test from printing a demonstrator or using DED for non-critical refurbishment. Pratt & Whitney’s participation gives the programme an application owner with a direct interest in how the manufacturing route performs against F135 requirements, rather than treating the machine process as a standalone technology exercise.

The 2027 demonstrator is therefore the first meaningful execution gate; certification at the end of 2028 remains dependent on the evidence generated across build, finishing, inspection and qualification. If successful, the value lies in an approved production and support route for a specific engine architecture, not simply in proving that a large casing can be deposited by wire-fed laser DED.