By Edward James/Singapore

SINGAPORE (February 24, 2000) - Pratt and Whitney and General Electric forgot their differences long enough yesterday to tout their joint venture GP7200 engine for the proposed A3XX and 747 stretch aircraft.

The core of the engine is now ready for testing and Lloyd Thompson, newly appointed president says final engine design is set for May 2001.

He said that the companies were evaluating a number of new technologies that may be incorporated. In service date is targeted for 2005. Key issues for the engine were noise, fuel burn and performance retention.

Performance retention has been a significant problem for airlines such as Singapore Airlines in the past with the critical Singapore-London route in all weather.

The airline's heavy discounting for performance retention figures from Pratt and Whitney, based on its experience on the P&W 747, caused the airline to cancel the MD-11 in 1991, after excessive fuel burn, promised destroyed the aircraft's range guarantees.

An aggressive program by Douglas actually recovered all of the shortfall but Douglas lost a critical order.

GE and Pratt say that the GP7200 would give a $4.40 million fuel saving over the 747-400, over 20,000hr.