Levsha
The drama is just epic!!
But it’s a pity about the plot (difficult to follow)!:rolleyes:
Incidently, are there any official records published as to how much time the MiG-25 spent in its flying career actually flying at speeds above Mach 2.83 or Mach 3 even?
I’ve seen similar data published for the SR-71…
LevshaThe F-14 had nice capabilities on paper but in reality it was something different.
Its glove vanes were little short of useless, so that it was concluded that it was better to weld them retracted.
Its leding edge slats were of little use because it was restricted to 5 g maneuvers with them extended. Also the AIM-9 firing was forbiden with extended slats !!!
The USN can operate their F-14s any way they like!! If they decide that they don’t need the vanes, well that’s their call, other air arms might think differently. If the USN feel it isn’t safe to fire AIM-9s under certain conditions, thats their call as well. I wonder what sort of operational conditions the Iranians have imposed on their Tomcats – they may be quite different from those of the USN
Its max allowed loading was 6.5 G. Too low compared to Mig-21 bis or MiG-23 ML (8.5G).
True, or maybe not, ask pilots in the Iraqi and Libyan AFs if it makes a whole sh!t load of difference – a few of their fellow pilots came to premature demises against F-14s… while flying MiG-21 and MiG-23s.
More relevantly, ask pilots of the Backfire bomber if a 6.5 G restriction on the F-14 would make any difference to their surviviability or not.
In fact it was a Phoenix missile carrier. Not more.
Just as the MiG-25 and MiG-31 are nothing but battle taxis for the AA-6 and AA-9 missiles as well… and neither of those MiGs spent a lot of time pulling above 6.5 G either:rolleyes:
Levsha…that wonderful Basilica of Our Lady of Peace in Yamassoukro…
Is that the guy in the Ivory Coast you’re referring to (or whatever way you spell it in French)?;)
Didn’t he also build a huge new airport in the West African jungle, and specified that it should be able to operate Concorde??:confused::eek:
Levshado you know this an-22 ?
It’s the first An-22 that ever flew (first prototype).
Date, Registration, Operator,
1965.2.27, CCCP-46191, Antonov Design Bureau
1967.9.9, 01RED, Soviet Air force
1981, CCCP-64459, Antonov Design Bureau (ANTK Antonov Airlines)
1993, UR-64459, Antonov Design Bureau (ANTK Antonov Airlines)
1994.10.23, UR-64459, Antonov Design Bureau (ANTK Antonov Airlines)
It was used to transport the wings for the An-154 and An-225. In such a configuration the the aircraft received the type designation “An-22PZ” (Perevozik – “Load carrier”)
Last flight was on the 23rd of October 1994.
LevshaI do believe that yes, the Super Etendard had a very poor ability to bring any kind of warload back th the carrier…
Gets a bit expensive ditching MM 39 Exocets into the sea after a while.:D
LevshaWho writes this tosh?
1L.
When I first saw the thread title , I thought it was referring to this newspaper article from last week’s Sunday Times…
http://travel.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/travel/news/article4268167.ece
Seems that they are actually 2 different articles – unless there’s some plagerism going on?:rolleyes:
Or maybe people are so fed up talking about high airline fuel prices – so they’d rather talk about scary runways of the world…
LevshaThe Rafale and Super Hornet are just as capable of operating from Ski-Jumps as Mig-29K’s. Really, both have better lift and slow speed handling characteristics……..Regardless, the cost of the ex-Gorshkov is going up by the day!
Really, the Soap Opera just goes on and on……………:eek:
And to elaborate a little further, this was the word in the Indian press a month and a half ago…
India Navy Interested In U.S. F-18s for Russian-built Aircraft Carrier INS Vikramaditya
Dated 24/5/2008
The Indian Navy has asked Boeing for the use of its F/A-18E/F Super Hornet supersonic carrier-based fighter aircraft on board a Russian-made carrier, Russian daily Izvestia said on Thursday.
A Boeing spokesman confirmed that his company had received a request from India for use of the fighters on board the Vikramaditya, formerly named the Admiral Gorshkov. Russia was to start deliveries of MiG-29K Fulcrum-D carrier fighters to India for the Admiral Gorshkov in May. The contract, signed in January 2004, stipulates the delivery of 12 single-seat MiG-29Ks and four two-seat MiG-29KUBs by 2009, to be later deployed on the Admiral Gorshkov, currently being retrofitted in Russia for the Indian Navy.
A MiG spokesman denied any knowledge of negotiations between the Indian Air Force and Boeing. Russian military experts have said using F-18 Super Hornets on the Admiral Gorshkov would pose difficulties. After long-running delays and disputes, Russia and India agreed in February to raise refit costs for the aircraft carrier, berthed at the Sevmash shipyard in north Russia for the past 12 years.
The carrier is to replace India’s INS Viraat, which although still operational is 50 years old. India contracted the $1.5 billion Admiral Gorshkov for its navy in 2004. Moscow has since demanded an additional $1.2 billion, a sum New Delhi has called exorbitant.
http://www.india-defence.com/reports-3852
Another similar article from the Hindustan Times with more information on the possibility of operating the F/A-18E from the Gorshkov.
Now Navy wants Super Hornets
Rahul Singh, Hindustan Times
Lemoore Naval Air Station, California, May 14, 2008
It Is now sufficiently clear that the Indian Navy wants to be able to use the air force’s assets of war. In a revelation so far kept under wraps, the Navy has asked Boeing a contender for India’s $10-billion tender for 126 air force fighters if the F/A-18E/F Super Hornet can operate off the INS Vikramaditya, the rechristened Russian aircraft carrier Admiral Gorshkov currently being refurbished in Russia for the Indian Navy. None of the fighters in the IAF’s existing fleet have the capability to operate from the deck of an aircraft carrier.
Boeing’s campaign manager for the Indian deal Michael E. Rietz has revealed that after detailed simulations conducted at the company’s test centres, the Super Hornet on offer to India, can in fact operate off the Gorshkov. The significance of Boeing’s finding lies in the fact that the Super Hornet – which by default is launched using a steam-powered catapult on American super-carriers – has never before been known to be able to take off from an angled ski-jump – the launch mechanism on India’s sole aircraft carrier INS Virat, as well as the Gorshkov and the under-construction indigenous aircraft carrier.
Rietz told HT at Lemoore, which holds half of the US Navy’s striking power in the Pacific, “In our simulation, we discovered that not only could the Super Hornet take-off from a ski-jump, but could do so with a significant weapons load.” Landing the Super Hornet on the Gorshkov would pose no problem since the warship comes equipped with an arrester cable. The 16 MiG-29K fighters that will come with the Gorshkov will land using this “trap” method.
A typical scenario illustrates the import of the newly identified ability. A Super Hornet flying with the air force from a shore base can fly hundreds of kilometres over the sea, then land on an aircraft carrier, refuel and proceed onward. The reach advantage it would give the aircraft is something the air force has only envisaged with mid-air refuellers so far. Aircraft carriers, by their very nature, can obviously stay out at sea for far longer.
In 2004, the Navy had sent out a request for information to another American firm Northrop Grumman about whether the latter’s carrier-based airborne early warning and control aircraft, the E-2 Hawkeye, could operate off the Gorshkov. However, plans to procure the aircraft in a ship-based role have since been shelved.
LevshaNot necessarily – any local Indian item developed is evaluated vs its international peers for an “open IAF requirement”, only when it meets relevant benchmarks, its inducted, otherwise its not.
It can sometimes lead to never ending scope creep as well, as each local item is constantly compared against a best in class system developed by a much more experienced vendor and then its specs are redrawn and its sent back for further development.
Oh, I’m not trying to imply that the IAF would throw quality control out the window – if the Indian product is only 50% or 80% as good as the foreign product, it probably wouldn’t be even considered, but if the difference was 99% or even 95%, along with factoring the likelyhood that the Indian product being substantially cheaper, then it would be a different matter entirely… would it not?
Originally Posted by star49
Ruaf has alrelady declared Su-27SM as superior to any other exported flanker in 2004. so whats the point of discussing?
Well if the RuAF says it, it must be true then, right??:rolleyes:
India also upgraded MIG-21 with radar/R-77. Do u think Ruaf should also do the same?
If the RuAF were still operating the MiG-21 as a front line AD fighter (and they haven’t done so for over 35 years), I have no doubt that they would indeed have carried out the same upgrade as the IAF Bison, Kopyo/R-77/R-73 etc…
LevshaSo isn’t that definitive proof that Indian processors must therefore also be a generation ahead of western processors as the Indians could as easily have bought western processors instead of using Indian ones?
The Indian air force may or may not believe that there is a better processor available from a Western supplier but the indigenously developed Indian product will always be the first choice, wouldn’t it?
Yeah that is a convincing argument to prove Russian radars are crap.
Who said Russian radars are crap? I didn’t (don’t put words into my mouth).
Wonder why the Indians bothered to buy the Flankers when everything the west makes is a generation ahead… why didn’t they simply by Rafales?
Because, on the whole, it was the best aircraft on offer, probably equally as good as the Euro-canards and a lot cheaper. I don’t doubt that for one minute, but the Indians obviously decided that some of the original avionics had to go.
Hahaha… you are really funny.
Yeah, well, you crack me up very often as well…
The Marxist Leninist centrally planned economy won the space race, but can’t build radars… Strange that the Maoist Leninist economy in China seems to be doing better than the Busche Hitler economy in the US.
0 correct statements, 4 incorrect statements and 1 crude insult against an entire nationality, all in 2 short sentences… is that a record for you?:rolleyes:
An important part of a SAM system is its radar search and tracking assets…
I was talking about airborne applications where weight and compactness are of crucial importance.
Which means sweet FA. Maybe 1% of all western radars are brand new state of the art. 40% will be average, 40% will be older generation and 19% will be obsolete. The situation will be remarkably similar for the Russian radar, The situation will be remarkably similar for the Russian radars, so what you are actually saying is that maybe 5% of US radars (which actually make up a small fraction of the 1% of western radars) are state of the art… and you base that on maybe 200 aircraft based radars that are AESA.
I wonder how you manage to demarcate the different percentages? looks pretty screwed up to me. Try to define those percentages – which 1%, which 40%…?:confused:
I don’t want to start a willy waving contest (but you always seem to reply to other peoples’ posts like as if it were) – but I’d say the most modern fighter radars in Russian service today are the presumably developed versions of NOO1 series on the 2 dozen or so Su-27SMs in RuAF service, followed by the Soviet era BARS that have been exported. In the case of the USA it would probably be the APG-77 on the 100 or so F-22s… I rest my case.:rolleyes:
Originally Posted by flex297
Go on the street and start asking people walking by about what an AESA type radar is. How many will have a clue? 1 or 2%The VSS Vintorez rifles are very popular among Russian SpecOps. I’d say that would be the most preferred weapon in Russian forces today.
OK. The Russian firearms industry has developed a particularly advanced and specialized weapon for the Russian military – the Russian army gets the weapon that they specified… great for them. It happens all over the world believe it or not, but what has that got to do with the past Soviet or present day Russian avionics industry?
LevshaCan you scan and post the Flypast article?
Good description of the event from the Washington Post.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/07/17/AR2007071701940_pf.html
LevshaSo what are you saying? They have parity with radio telescope technology, but are behind in Radar technology? Or are they behind in everything?
I’m not so sure about Russian radio telescopes…
But yes, Soviet era avionics didn’t have the same reputation that most Western avionics might have had, especially radar systems. Soviet airborne radar systems where characterized by excessive weight and low processing power. The working end of Soviet era radars, the radio engineering, wasn’t so bad, but the processing power backing up the radio engineering was abysmal – probably one reason why Zaslon and NOO1 series were almost twice the weight of their Western equivalents: AWG-9 and APG-63, even though they are more modern designs than the Western designs (by about 10 years – yeah, we’ll call it one generation) This “tech gap” is still persistent today with Russian avionics and is well illustrated by Indian Su-30MKI Bars radars which were delivered with an Indian developed processor, Malaysian and Indonesian Su-30s were also delivered with the Indian processor. In fact, apart from the actual PESA antenna unit there doesn’t seem to be much Russian content in the avionics fit of most recently exported Su-30MKs (French mostly). There are reasons why a Marxist-Leninist centrally planned economy like the Soviet Union’s couldn’t develop the most advanced avionics, but I don’t see any ideological or cultural reasons why the present day Russian Federation can’t do so – we’ll have to wait until we know more about the capabilities of the Su-35’s much vaunted Irbis-E radar and EW kit, I expect it will be up to scratch, we’ll see.
Originally Posted by Azhar leb
He’s saying that its not a radar but a telescope, nothing more nothing less. “Its twenty years old and still going strong” is a compliment too not a dig at the Russians, they are however generally behind in everything but thats fairly well known.
Why, thank you Mr. Azhar Leb, that was more or less what I had in mind… oh, and welcome to the forum.
Originally Posted by SOC
You have obviously never heard of any of their modern SAM systems
Always an exception to the rule I suppose, and Russian SAM systems would want to be top notch considering the resources pumped into them.
Originally Posted by GarryB
His original claim was that Russian radar technology is 1 to two generations behind.
That alone tells us he is wrong.
…but to suggest that “russian radars are (all) 1 to 2 generations behind (all) US radars is ridiculous…
I never said any such thing. I think that the Russians are still a little bit behind even today, but they have closed the gap and are nowhere near lagging behind like they were 20 years ago.
Or the suppressed assault and sniper rifles and even underwater assault rifles they have had in service for more than 20 years.
No, most people probably haven’t heard about such rifles. Are they of any importance or interest to anyone, even to special forces?:confused:
It is probably fair to say their anti tank weapons capability is probably better too.
Yeah! In your vivid imagination perhaps!:rolleyes:
LevshaYeah, the Russians are behind in Radar technology… is that why American congressmen want to incorporate Russian radars into a new system to look for earth collision asteroids? If American radars are generations ahead surely they’d want the best eyes on the ball.
Originally Posted by GarryB
http://en.rian.ru/russia/20080619/111323021.html
I looked it up – it’s actually a radio telescope, not an air defence radar. It’s 20 years old (and still going strong).
LevshaIt is a sensible observation. The British had a great aeronautical tradition of fighters and bombers and all classes of aircraft.
Britain still has a great aeronautical tradition of fighters and bombers and all classes of aircraft.
Now they have a part share in Typhoon and a part share in the JSF and American attack helos and the Lynx general utility light helo…
Swerve has more or less said all that needs to be said about any country’s indigenous aerospace industry/capability. The French have recently abandoned their policy of self sufficiency for combat aircraft – Rafale will probably be their last completely indigenous fighter. In Russia, PAK-FA will probably be their last completely indigenous fighter, (presuming that India will not be taking a financial or development stake in it) Many of Russia’s projects already have a foreign component/ cooperation: Sukhoi Super Jet, Mi-38, space programme, Brahmos etc.
Even the United States has a load of foreign partners for its F-35.
What radars? Krona? I haven’t heard this one before.
Nothing more than a proposal for the time being. If its available for use, why not use it?
LevshaOnly two of those actually went to series production. BTW, how many new aircraft types British have developed in the same time period having incomparably larger budget available? Typhoon… What else?
Very simplistic observation, the British military-industrial complex has been very much integrated into the European MIC for a while now and can’t really be compared as a stand alone entity, now can it?
LevshaBecause it would look even cooler. Does there need to be any other reason? 😉 (Thing is actually making me jealous.)
Well yes, that would be a good reason to bolt on a gun turret on to it… would look a lot cooler if the gun turret was in the nose though…;)
Any chance of a “gunship version”, a la C-130 Spectre, that would be just as cool?;)
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