Power systems giant Rolls-Royce has opened a £50m London Heathrow Service Centre to provide 24-hour maintenance for aero engines and potentially creating 20 new jobs.
The 95,000 square feet facility, which is larger than Wembley football pitch, includes an engine workshop that is four times larger than the previous Rolls-Royce service centre at Hatton Cross, Heathrow.
Engineers will be able to work on up to 13 of the latest generation Rolls-Royce Trent engines at any one time, double the capacity of the previous facility. When fully operational it will employ up to 60 people, with 40 transferring from the existing Rolls-Royce Heathrow facility, with potential to employ up to 20 further people in the longer term.
The centre can also store up to 30 large gas turbines for maintenance and deployment to operators worldwide.
Eric Schulz, president of Civil Large Engines at Rolls-Royce, opened the centre. He said: “We are very proud to open our new state-of-the-art London Heathrow Service Centre which joins our global network of service centres. As our order book and customer demand for our TotalCare support services continue to grow, we are committed to ensuring we deliver excellent support, on time, every time.”
More than 90% of Trent engine orders include TotalCare services support, a maintenance, repair & overhaul (MRO) model designed to maximise engine availability, by helping operators to improve operational performance and reliability. Services such as maintenance accounted for more than 50% of Rolls-Royce civil aerospace revenue in 2012.
The Heathrow centre has been awarded an “excellent” rating by the Building Research Establishment, which assesses environmental attributes of building design, construction and operation.
