Lufthansa on Wednesday took delivery of the first A320neo following a three-week delay involving engine-related documentation. The handover follows nearly two months of delivery preparation after the November 24 certification of the Pratt & Whitney PW11000G-powered narrowbody, now expected to enter service on Lufthansa's Frankfurt-Munich route on January 24. Lufthansa expects to take delivery of five A320neos by the end of the year.

Lufthansa Group has ordered 116 of the new family--including 45 A321neos--for its Lufthansa and Swiss operating units and Airbus has sold more than 4,400.

Lufthansa became the de-facto launch customer for the A320neo when Qatar Airways balked at an operating restriction related to its Pratt & Whitney engines. In fact, more than one hiccup involving the PW1100Gs during the course of the flight-test program forced Airbus to juggle certification work among its test articles to recoup time lost on the first aircraft, grounded in April by a defect in one of the engines and again in September by a separate problem the companies described as “minor.”

The original three-month pause in testing of the initial two A320neos, both GTF-powered, followed discovery of a manufacturing defect in a 10-inch-diameter retaining ring in the powerplant’s combustor section. Both aircraft had returned to testing by late July. Then, on September 30, Airbus confirmed it had to ground the first Pratt-powered example yet again, after finding a “minor problem” in one of its engines following hot-weather trials in Al Ain in the United Arab Emirates. At the time the company insisted that the incident would not affect plans to deliver the first airplane by the end of the year. Finally, on December 30, Airbus delayed delivery of the first A320neo by “a few weeks” to help Pratt & Whitney to address certain documentation items. 

Airbus continues flight trials of the CFM Leap-1A-powered version of the A320neo, scheduled for certification by the middle of the year.