PitPit: that was really well answered. I agree with you there, its not as easy as it sounds . cheers and best of luck with those Flankers.
About the future, what do you think will be Venezuela’s next buy? what do you think SHOULD be Venezuela’s next buy?
What should follow?, a miracle, and some LIFT (Yak-130)…did you know that the situation of pilot training was so bad that until recently cadets from the Military Aviation School, didn’t received ANY flight school before graduation?…or that we didn’t have any fighter flying school (after whitdrawal of T-2D Buckeye from GAET 13, 1997 and a limited period of LIFT activities by some VF-5D froM GAC 12) since years?…
Our pilots are now going straight from AT-27 Tucano training (after 5 years of academy) towards fast flying combat jets (VF-5, Mirage-50, F-16 if he rocks)…
This has started to change (thanks to god) and some new elementary training aircraft will be bought, and in local magazines have been reported that Yak-130 have been chosen for LIFT so that would be a next step…
After that… (basic training, LIFT…our AT-27 can still hang it on some time), I think we need some good SIGINT platform, we have some (pretty few) Falcon-20DC “Prometeo” ELINT aircraft, modified by Israel’s industry in late 90s and a Fairchild C-26B Metro EW in GAIVRE-85 Electronic Warfare Air Group…but those are limited in numbers and capabilities, before any jump towards AEW&C I’m sure we need first some SIGINT (specially COMINT) intel capabilities…in a longed ranged aircraft…later on we can think on AEW&C.
For the fighter groups, for our local needs in two years when GAC 13 could reach full IOC with Su-30MK2, the situation would be stabilized something, but the situation of the GAC 16’s Fighting Falcon will at the end of the day, enforce another aircraft buy…I don’t think our aircrafts could hang it up for more than 5 years if situation doesn’t changes.
OV-10A/E and VF-5A/D situation is catastrophic (GAOE 15 and GAC 12), both are nearly in the end of their structural life…if somebody in our high command uses his head, a Yak-133 (single seat derived radar equiped Yak-130) could be used for replacing the “Grifos” (local name for CF-5A/D, NF-5A/B and RF-5A)…OV-10A/E replacement is much more difficult, because its natural replacement (Super Tucano) was not allowed due to political pressure from the US…I would not be surprised if we end with some hi-end Russian attack chopper instead those thingies…our Air Force pilots don’t liked a lot the Army Mi-35M2…in fact they would never like anything that came from our Army Aviation anyway :p
Transport aircraft (GAT 4, 5, 6 and 9) are something mixed…
GAT 4 and 5 are administrative transport, GAT 4 is VIP transport and it will receive new Mi-17 VIP derived…its current thingies (Airbus 319CJ, AS-532UL Cougar, B-737-200 ex VIP and Falcon-50) are more or less very fine..that if our sacred leader :rolleyes: š” decides not to spare our few VIP Super Cougar with his bolivian buddy…
GAT 5 works similar way but more administrative transport, with bunch of those boring transport jets…it works mainly for the Staff of the other armed services and so…Falcon 20F, Citation I and II and so…
GAT 6 is the work horse of transport, and its situation is desparate. Its constituted of C-130H Hercules (6, of wich 3 were more or less updated by Sogerma – France – with updated avionics and so), Boeing 707-320C (IFR) and Shorts 360-300 and G.222 transports…
From the Hercules, only 3 get upgrades and the status of such aircrafts is not that good…they present malfunctions from time to time, it seems our french friends when leaving, didn’t finished some thingies…they would not last much.
G.222 was recently withdrawal from service, a true and damn headache for FAV, inherited from Army Aviation, maybe the worst POS we ever bought.
Boeing 707-320C are horse of all trades, only one of them is working now, it serves for anything, from air refuelling (it’s capable of refuelling, Mirage-50EV/DV, F-16A/B, VF-5A/D and recently was fitted for refuelling our Suhskis!) to air transport all around the world (it recently suffered a little mishap at Nicaragua, but it’s back here)…the other one…god help it…
Shorts work well…
Il-76TD-90VD (updated with PS-90 upgraded turbofan) visited recently Venezuela and it was tested by Air Force personal, if it’s OK and we gave it an “A”, we would buy some 15 (yeah FIFTEEN) of them…so they can happily replace anything and add something else…that number would cover, transport versions, air refuellers, and supposedly in the future AEW&C too…
In February we also tested An-74 (from local Gazprom contingent) and An-140, the first was liked a lot, but the second was flat rejected by all the military services…political administration tries to pull it anyway for airliner services…
An-74 (in the An-74-TK200 version) was tested by Army Aviation and Air Force personal (supposedly also the Navy), and it was pretty much liked…if our Ukrainian friends didn’t made havoc of the contract, we would buy a lot of them..
Finally you have GAT 9, that’s a liason transport unit for the local jungle zones (Bolivar and Amazonas states) and they recently made an open doors here!…they have not really a combat role, but more social oriented.
That seems to be all :p
PitYes, it flew in Bort 712, T-10M-12, I know it pretty well.
And it used Ts100 series radar data processors with limited capabilities. It was not a full fledged system (that happened once the Indians PAID the R&D for the thing)…in fact it ended to be something less capable than it was intended…Chelniok TWT per example, was not integrated (it’s used on Irbis-E instead)…
About the “interchangeable engines”, sure, you can put a new engine (specially one with one ton more thrust at static IA conditions) without any modification…yeah…and this is based on your extensive experience on this topic, isn’t?…
No engine in this world is installed in an aircraft without full certification in such aircraft and the whole documentation prepared for it.
PitIt’s Elta EL/M-2001B radar-range finder (Columbian Kfir C.7)
PitMilitary buys are first political, then economic, then military buys ALWAYS.
Outdated equipment?…outdated against…WHAT?.
Against Columbian Kfir C.7 with range-finder EL/M-2021B with Python-3 flying maybe half the flying hours we do?…
Outdated against a magnificent main regional thread’s IADS that in best case will satisfy itself having 7 long range EWR and that currently have zero (zilch, ein, nada) SAM systems?…
No…not at all…
And the cost, for each aircraft (without weapons system and kit, just the aircraft at all) we paid something like 40 millions US$, with the whole set of kits we paid 62.5 millions US$ in average…and we received it in less than 6 months after contract signature, with full fledged logistic support from the russians…factory fresh.
About the Bars, AL-31FM-1 and similar…
Do you really think you can wrap around a new engine in something like a Sukhoi-30 so quick?
Before you can even think on export those things, you have to:
a) Test the damn thing on the aircraft.
b) Prepare ALL the documentation related (and believe me…that’s a lot of trees you have to cut from Siberia!)
c) Prepare and test the logistical support system (from designing the new test beds for manteinance to designing the new support procedures).
d) Check all back and forth
e) Certificate the aircraft and see what went good and what went wrong (so you have to made changes to FBW logic, or different hydrauilical, electrical and pneumatic systems)
f) Launch massive production of the engine…
In 6 months??…are you kidding?…
Al-31FM-1 was certified on Su-27 testbeds (and first flights on Su-27SM prototype) last year…if you think a Su-27S testbed is similar at all to a Su-30MKK/MK2…think twice.
You don’t have only to prepare engine documentation (that takes LOTS of time) but you have to update your aircraft documentation too…that takes slightly more than 20 flights.
As per Bars…
RSLU-30MKI (the name of the whole weapons complex around N-011M Bars) is constituted of mixed equipment, Russian and Indian, nobody here doubts that ok?…
Indian equipment is related to Radar Data processor and the software it runs. The functions of those processors are intimate to the functions of the radar, it doens’t only controls PRF or target tracking, it controls whole weapons employment (per example it controls the kinematic launch dinamic range zones for all missiles, and it contains the software asociated to such missiles and bombs) it also works with some physical properties of the radar (so that it controls the beamforming system that allows simultaneous air/air and air/ground weapons modes)…
If you get out those RC1/RC2 you have to get back and try the whole thing from scratch…RLSU-30MKI was an improved (and finished) version of the complex that formed N-011M with some russian gadget…those gadgets (Ts100 series RDP) were not finished in software and logic implementation (that’s why Su-30MKI mk1 that used those pieces of equipment is limited compared to Mk3 that have the indian stuff) and when you asks for Bars (Malaysia, Argelia), you have to deal with the Indians too…that’s why Su-30MKM uses those RDP and you could be sure Su-30MKA will do it too…
Production of those items are far stretched to deal with today deals (the local production of Su-30MKI, the Su-30MKM deal, the Su-30MKA deal, the new Su-30MKI mk3 and so)…there is also the possibility that India could be enforced not to supply those items…and you have to go to scratch back from the begining and R&D all again…
You can say similar on the MC-486 (the mission computer, one of the most important things in a current combat aircraft)…
Then you have to see if KnAAPO could wrap all around (Bars, if its used needs the canards, it needs new tests for the Su-30MKK derived airframe that bears some differences with the Su-30MKI, with the new engines or without them, callibrate the FBW and so on…) and get the whole thing in…6 months?…
Not posible at all.
Su-30MK2 was a political buy (as every military buy) but in the end, it was the best it could be bought for the strict limitances and circunstances that surrounded the situation of the institution and country that currently serves it.
Pit:rolleyes: If you said so…
PitZhuk-MSFE could well be flown on some tests.
That says nothing that such tests were finished and indeed they weren’t.
Zhuk-MSFE development was stopped some time ago, and funds were redirected to MiG-29 developments.
PitCold0 at ACIG.org wrote this and quoted a source…
There is something that Colonel-General Yury Solovyov hasnāt said and that can help to understand the actual capacities of the S-400. When the USSR collapsed the S-400 project was partially limited and transformed in a 3 step program.
In the Phase 0 the S-400 was based on the missiles, launchers, radar of the S-300 PMU-2; the only innovation was an updated version of the algorithms and electronic of the system. This S-400 Phase 0 was considered 15% more capable than the S-300 PMU-2.
Phase 1 was based on the integration of 3 new missiles system: the 9M96E/E2 with an inferior range (with a quadruple launcher instead of a 9A83M launcher) and a new long range missile called 40N6 with a range of 400 km.
The 9M96E is a monostage missile with a dual mode guiding system, radar active in the final phase and inertial with radio- control in the cruising phase. Against manoeuvrable target it uses a gas-oriented thrust, first time that a russian SAM thrust-oriented manouvrability. The 9M96-2 is the same missile with a longer impulse.
The Phase 2 is based on the integration of a new phased array tracking radar, with 2.041 electronic elements.
Itās improbable that the actual version of the S-400 declared operative combined all the 3 Phased described above. Probably the system is in a Phase 2+, deployed with the 9M96E/E2 missiles and with the all improvements of the Phase 0. Cleary the long range 40N6 was tested, but Iām not sure when the missile and the new radar will became operative. So the S-400 deployment today is not much different to an āImprove FAVORITā.
By the way itās well know that the Almaz is working on an S-500, described (September 2002) as an improvement of the Phase 2 S-400, with new missiles, radar and so on.
Source āNew generation of Russian SAMā, Tomasz Szulc, Italian version on Rivista Italian Difesa, December 2006.
PitOh my god dear, you asked the wrong individual.
I hate to talks politics, and I use this mediums (internet) to get an escape from the never-ending political climate here.
Sorry my friend, I don’t want to degenerate this thread in another political rant discussion, we have here nearly 200 local forums for that!…
I’m asking the Gripen thingie because it’s indeed surprising, hope to get something back.
PitHuh. My MiG-31 books are still unlocated, so I can’t reference anything other than memory, but it’d seem that this should be an R-33S test then, not a basic R-33. That’s a 120 NM launch range, outside the range envelope of the basic R-33.
Also, baseline MiG-31s with modifications were used to test the R-37. Given that the R-37 was still classified then, it could be that the missile designation was purposely misreported. Either way it’s a good test.
It could well be indeed a R-33S/Zaslon-A test, I also think similar some time ago…we have to understand anyway that even R-33/Zaslon SBI-16 combo is not that well known here on the west…getting aside US Technical Intelligence (those freaks at the CIA/DIA and similar)…who knows?…
I considered it interesting because it’s one of the only missile tests from Russia/FSU I have heard with so much concise information from the perspective of the launch (flying profile for both launcher and targert)…be sure it was a very fat RCS target.
PitLooks like you have… Read this last issue of Combat Aircraft.
Incredible nobody here ever mentioned that…well, I don’t work with the air force, but this class of things should be well known here…
Would have to ask the author of the article, anyway, thanks for the heads up.
PitGroup 13 is made of Group 16 (F-16), Group 11 (Mirage-50EV) and Group 12 (CF-5A/B/NF-5A/B) pilots.
PitAl’fa missile (3M51) was a prototype of concept for the 3M54E missile now used on the Klub system.
Its R&D have been stopped, and an air launched version of 3M54E should be called 3M54A, as much as the cruise missile version is called 3M14AE (export).
PitC’mon boys, let’s play the topic fair. No political rants here…hope the moderators are in caution now…
Pitwow…eight delivered already with training programs ongoing…sounds like the AMV is on the right track with their new Flankers…so is there any truth to the rumors of the Air Force or Navy acquiring Su-35s or Su-39 mud movers in the near-future? (I’ve heard alot about the Navy getting the Su-39s)…Thanks for all the pics and videos guys…those have to be the best looking Flankers I’ve seen!!!
There have been strong rumours along with some official information from Sukhoi about the interest of the AMV (Venezuelan Air Force) on the Su-35 since nearly one year ago…let’s see how this would end.
About Su-39, let’s pray we don’t end in the navy with those aircraft…they’re useless for us.
PitCould you comment the diferences between those systems PiBU?;)
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