The Rolls-Royce Tay 611-8 engine, which entered service in 1987, recently reached the milestone of 10 million flying hours — achieved in nearly five million missions.

The engine powers a range of Gulfstream’s large-cabin business aircraft, such as the GIV, GIV-SP, G300 and G400; it has established a reputation for dependability, efficiency and low noise generation.

It enabled the Gulfstream GIV to ‘revolutionise’ the business aviation market with its high cruising speed and its intercontinental range of around 4,300nm.

Over the past three decades, the Tay 611-8 has achieved numerous records for speed and range, and these have been complemented by its successor, the Tay 611-8C, powering the G350 and G450.

There are over 1,700 Tay 611-8 and -8C engines currently in service.

The background to the first Tay order is part of aviation history.

In December 1982, the basic details — engine price, quantity, payment terms — were written on a napkin in less than 10mins by Sir Ralph Robins, Rolls Royce’s managing director, and Gulfstream‘s founder Allen Paulson.

The deal was formally settled in March 1983.

Dirk Geisinger, Rolls-Royce’s director of business aviation (www.rolls-royce.com), said: “Reaching 10 million flying hours is an impressive milestone, and we are very proud of this achievement.

“With its legendary reliability, the Tay 611-8 became the benchmark for ultra-reliable long distance business aircraft and perfectly illustrates why Rolls-Royce is the leading engine manufacturer in business aviation.”