The Protocol Programme: the Fuel & Inserting Research for Systems Technologies (FIRST)

Airbus engineers are building and upgrading giant test rigs to simulate fuel systems under flight conditions at their Filton site and other UK facilities. This project, called FIRST, takes technologies identified in earlier research and scales them up to the integrated wing level for the next all-new Airbus aircraft. The immediate problem is that novel wing technologies—such as advanced fuel management systems—need to be proven under realistic, large-scale conditions before they can be certified for production. Without this testing, promising designs remain theoretical. If successful, FIRST will deliver a validated set of wing-level technologies ready for the UK’s ‘Wing of the Future’ programme, scheduled to begin in 2014. The impact is largely industrial: it secures UK testing capability and manufacturing know-how for future aircraft wings, which in turn supports jobs and supply chains at Airbus Filton and other British aerospace sites. Passengers will not notice the difference directly, but the aircraft they fly on a decade later will be more efficient and reliable because these systems were tested properly first.