Yes, the same Vishnu Som registered on this forum
The video (courtesy rakall)
http://rapidshare.de/files/27161911/TTS_Farnborough.wmv.html
Rest here,
http://www.bharat-rakshak.com/IAF/Images/main.php?g2_itemId=3360
All pics copyright Vishnu Som (NDTV) and Kevin Flynn (Boeing)
His impressions
Hi there guys … As much as I would like to share this footage with you … I cannot and it is strictly copyright protected. I would urge you guys to please respect that.
I am a disaster on email … Can one of the Webmasters please send me their gmail accounts so I can get back to my work and stop emailing a zillion people? I have quite a few pics of the ALH and the IJT .. which in my mind is the most gorgeous little jet in the world, hands down. The front profile with the twin nose wheel set-up is lovely … Unfortunately, the HAL pilots flew a singularly conservative flight profile but went to great lengths in explaining that the jet was still in a relatively early stage of development. The maximum they did were a couple of loops … I doubt they pulled more than 4 g. The controls are apparently still a bit stiff and need to be worked on.
The international reception to HAL as I mentioned in my story was quite encouraging. A couple of Apache pilots who had their helicopter next of the Dhruv at the Heliport went up to our guys and bowed before them saying that they were amazed with what they saw. The ALH display was world class.
As for the IJT … I have quite a few pics of the cockpit … Thales stuff … no large MFDs … just a bunch of smaller MFDs … They had a gorgeous red IJT for the air display and a less attractive orange one for the static display. The Dhruv on static display had the Israeli glass cockpit with a lot of test instrumentation lying around. They are still working through the stuff. I flew with them on the Dhruv … did a 75 degree bank near Farnborough … the helicopter does not even struggle … Its also SO very quiet compared to the Russkie stuff and even the Sea King which I have flown a LOT on.
So what then is my favourite helicopter … Well, its got to be the Chetak … with no doors … charging ten feet above the waves. Now THAT is a ride.
As far as the F-18 sortie was concerned .. it was fantastic and the test pilot I flew with was one of the best there are … anywhere. Lets just say I was hardly dormant in the back seat. Some things will remain close to my chest but in clear, simple terms, let me just say, that this was not a missed opportunity by any means and if the goal was to give me a feel for the jet .. .then that was more than achieved.
There is little here in technical terms which most of you don’t know about. I will tell you though … that the Hornet has a remarkably simple cockpit .. a few large MFDs … the rear seat I flew in had a small monitor where there would have been a HUD … and there was no HUD repeater … so I couldn’t see through the display … No big deal since visiility to the sides was outstanding. I will however say that visibility in the rear seat of the Sea Harrier trainer I flew recently off the deck of the Viraat was possibly as good .. .particularly forward vision.
We flew the Hornet to close to the edge … all the way to 7.2 g … with several hard turns and loops engaging burner on several occasions. We also transitioned from a slow speed flight to full burner for a feel of the acceleration of the fighter … Also managed to do a few piroutte maneuvers when the tail of the jet slides out … as close to thrust vectoring a non-thrust vector jet can do I suppose .. All in all, from what I could clearly gauge … the Hornet is outstanding in flying through severely disrupted airflow conditions … A lot of what we did would have pushed several other jets beyond the edge … There was this one loop where we were low on speed and the jet started rattling as we neared the apex … but the pilot said we could just keep on going … which is exactly what we did. Also did about negative 1.1 g … in an inverted profile … which was awesome … though less scary than the wildest roller costers I have been on … The jet becomes markedly slower and less agile with the wheels down … but the auto thrust feature coupled to an advanced stability system enables the pilot to literally make an almost completely hands-off landing .. he just points his jet on the deck … and it pretty much does the rest. We couldn’t really check out the air to air features of the radar because of restrictions in place. We did, however, paint Farnborough in the Air to Ground mode … I can now appreciate the value of pilots getting almost real time imagery of a ground target even though they are miles away from the target …
The Hornet flares very little on landing … it just lands with a bit of a thud … and that then, friends, was my Hornet sortie …
PS … we are NOT plugging Boeing … I have some other stuff in the works as well though there is only so much aviation a larger audience in genuinely interested in.
Cheers
Vishnu
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July 27, 2006 at 4:33 pm