How Long Can a Jet Engine Last — And Why Is It So Expensive to Keep One Flying?
A car with 200,000 kilometers on the odometer is considered old. A 20-year-old Mercedes-AMG or BMW M can still run beautifully at that mileage. Maintain it well, replace worn parts and repair what breaks, and the car may keep going for years. A commercial jet engine takes that idea much further. It can remain in service for decades. But aviation does not mainly ask how many kilometers an engine has traveled. It asks different questions. A jet engine has more than one clock Two numbers matter enormously: Flight hours — how long the engine has operated. Flight cycles — how many flights it has experienced. Consider two aircraft. One takes off and flies for 10 hours. Another makes five two-hour flights. Both engines accumulate roughly 10 flight hours. But one has completed one cycle, while the other has completed five. That matters because an engine does not experience the same conditions throughout a flight. Takeoff, climb, cruise, descent and landing create different te...