verbatimit is not maximum passenger but weight of technical equipment/larger fuel tanks that full size version aircraft is needed. TU-214 has MTOW of 108 tons while MS-21 is 80 tons.
So what? Max useful load is allegedly similar.
Empty weight is still not released, but they are officilly two aircrafts designed with similar requirements and performance.
They are only 30 years and a lot of composites apart….
verbatimNo, it got too expensive. 20385 was attempt to fix the problems of the already overgrown and overarmed 20380, and the end result was a corvette that costs as much as a frigate.
It was an almost straightforward conclusion.
Too much punch in a small hull, if you look for a frigate’s performance, either you get a frigate with related costs, or split the capabilities between several types.
I still think 202380 and derivatives could be (or have been) a sound concept if splitted in several mission specific variants.
Find the real core mission, build around it variants with a few more capabilities built on them.
If patrolling and surveillance are the core mission, differentiate the sub classes between one with surveillance and ASW capabilities, another with surveillance and antiship capabilities and so on.
A large corvette hull makes sense, just do not expect them to turn in a multimission frigate at a corvette’s pricetag.
You’ll get ten times out of ten a corvette at a frigate’s price tag.
The sad part in the story is that switching to 21365, apparently a derivative of Buyan-M with a displacement around 900 tons, they will lost the chance to get a vessel deployable at a decent range and able to perform close escort duties.
Think of the so called Tarsus express, even a single 20380 would be a decent companion with larger vessels, as frigates and destroyers, shadowing the convoy while retaining a larger freedom of manouvering.
I’m stll convinced Russian Navy is following, with regards to small vessel, the wrong path.
Designing larger and simpler vessels, is the way to go. A little price increase in buildind and servicing for daily tasks, for a big boost on deployability and auxiliary’s tasks capabilities.
verbatimIdeal platform will be Tu-214 with PD-14 engines. this will give 16 hours loiter time. MS-21 is smaller in size and not have that range.
It’s likely the chosen platform for Il-38 replacement shall be Tu-214, but on ground of standardization and reduced technological risks.
But there are no evidences MS-21 would be neither smaller nor shorter legged compared to Tu-214.
I would bet against it on ground of large use of composit structures and parts, potentially far more expensive to modify to adapt the airframe.
verbatimWhy has it to be rubbish?
Atleast I think there is no urgency for PAK-FA as there is no threat on the horizon that cannot be dealt with the current Russian air-defence units and proper utilization of existing air-assets . I believe we have seen exactly that with the way Russia has been modernizing. I can take two examples.
1) Strengthening the air-defence (due to lack of aircrafts)
2) Strengthening the anti-armour with Mi-28/Ka-52 (due to lack of modernised MBTs)Btw, PAK-FA is not going to be a replacement for MiG-31. Landmass/airspace of Russia still calls for high speed interceptors and only a dedicated MiG-31 replacement will replace it.
Perhaps it’s me being naïve, but assuming a serial PAK-FA enter actual combat service around 2018, that means it’ll be available in meaningful numbers well in the 20s.
I don’t see great margins for delaying induction too much. A couple of years, maybe, just for a budget trimming, but nothing longer.
About Mig-31, it’s top speed coupled with range is going to be less and less relevant.
Air refueling do just that, extend practical range of any aircraft provider with a probe, and high speed endurance, i.e. supercruise, is a better answer to long range patrolling.
The problem with patrolling is mainly a patrol aircraft density problemi, i.e. how to assure two BASIC requirements
a) how to provide every point in a sector with a scan every T1 time by the patrol aircraft in charge foe that sector
b) how to provide an engagement in T2 time in an arbitrary point in the sector if any other suirveillance asset get a contact.
So redesigning sectors and patrols’ pattern, the dame result could ne assurde by a supercruise platform instead of a one with enormous dash speed.
verbatimI have seen that concept somewhere else 😉
The most interesting part of that news is the unveiling of the Kremlin’s new strategy. It’s not a surprise but the arrogance of such an announcement is a little bit… concerning.
And meanwhile the world seems more concerned by some lady’s emails….
As someone said not so long ago: a little bit of gossip makes for the fun. Then…
I see the Business Insider’s piece far more arrogant, to say the least.
Let’s see: An-124 maximum payload 150 metric tons, An-225 maximum payload >200 metric tons.
It does seem that sometimes, somewhere, those two ridicolous aircrafts actually took off, too.
A max payload around 200 metric tons should be plainly feasible, provided a real requirement has been formulated.
About supersonic flight, well it actually seems just not possible at all, it’s really counterintuitive to try it on an oversize cargo aircraft when it has proved until now a loss making venture in the passengers’ market.
verbatimIn-country the efficient way to do it is to make a fuel stop IMHO – I can’t see how you’d recoup the cost of the tanker flight (fuel, maintenance, crew) by merely avoiding a possible modest detour.
The Il-76 isn’t that much smaller than the -96, the difference is smaller than between the A400M and the A330MRTT. And while your logic does work with the latter pair, you need to consider that those are both modern, efficient aircraft – but where the A400M has super-efficient turboprops and a modern wing like its big brother, the Il-76 has derated versions of the Il-96’s engines and a hopelessly outdated late 1960s wing design. As a result you are going to get little if any cost benefit going from the Il-96 to the Il-76 – hell, the -96 might end up cheaper!
I’m not quite sure what you mean by more rugged and nimble – again, the size difference isn’t that big, the Il-76 isn’t exactly a 737 either 🙂 Also, consider that the Il-96 is perfectly capable of delivering the same fuel off-load as the Il-76 to much greater (I think I conservatively calculated an additional 1000kkm in- and outbound in one scenario) radii, so it isn’t obliged to rely on forward basing nearly as much as the Il-76 might be. It can’t land on unprepared fields, but then again it is difficult to imagine why it would ever have to, when it can be easily based much further from the action.
Due to the obsolete design of the Il-76 you just end up throwing away performance for little if any gain by choosing it over the Il-96.
Where to start with?
Ruggedness: ability to operate from unimproved airfields, lacking ILS cat. III, lacking evenly paved runaways, andò so on.
Economics: is it really an issue how much fuel a tanker burn compare to numbers andò availability? It’s pretty silly to strade the ability to leverage on larger numbers and wider basing ability for a 10% saving in fuel.
Efficiency: when rhe requirement is to deliver 30 tons of fuel at 700nm, there is no gain doing so with an aircraft able to offloaf 80 tons of fuel instead of doping so with another abile to offload 50 tons. The requirement shall talk about 30 tons nonetheless.
While a tanker based on Il-96 could be a useful asset for global deployments and large aircrafts’ support, on a tactical level a smaller aircraft, in larger numbers, is and will be the best choice.
In RuAF orbat, that reads Il-78, whatever the merits of Il-96.
verbatimVirginia class CVN was under 12k full load displacement. Truxton CVN was under 9k full load.
Those are SSNs, not surface vessels.
While in SSN and SSBN designs break even point between displacement and propulsion plant doesn’t play a role, in a surface vessel’s design it does.
verbatimSo the only reason they did not have a tanker more like the KC-10 in service previously is that until the Il-96, they lacked a more suitable host airframe for conversion into one – not because they would in fact have been wholly content with a KC-135-class performer!
I don’t think so.
Tactical means supporting operational missions.
Given the fact you don’t wait until getting into reserve to refuel, even half a regiment of Su-27/30/35 would require around 5 tons of fuel each Evert refueling.
That traslate in roughly 60 tons of fuel ooffloaded.
Why send a larger tanker, requiring larger and scarcer land infrastructures, to provide exactly the same kind of capabilities one could get from a more rugged and nimble (relatively speaking)?
The real plus one could get from Il-96 as a tanker reside in long range missions performed by large aircrafts like various Tupolev 95 derivatives, Il-76 and An-124 and so on, where each single receiving aircraft requires fuel by the tens of tons.
verbatimThey are just two different beasts.
Il-78 is suited for tactical roles, as the KC-135 for the USA.
A notional Il-96 tanker will be the equivalent of KC-10, devoted mainly to support strategic forces and long range deployments.
verbatimThe airframe could come straight from a scrapyard, but pylons seem to be brand new!
verbatimA Khukri/Kora class replacement: bigger than these, yet smaller than Kamorta class. Ships of these two classes have been on fleet deployments with larger units, e.g. to Singapore, Philippines, Malta even.
So, what is the rational behind such kind of vessels now?
Anything could sail across oceans, still there is little a corvette, even if on steroids, can offer nowadays competitive with real frigates.
Assuming a 2:1 ratio between frigates and corvettes both in terms of acquisition and running costs, there is little a new class of corvettes could add to IN capabilities.
Apart fresh work for local design bureaus, of course.
Having a look to the indian coastline, one would wonder where corvettes could be needed in numbers, and why half that number of additional full fledged frigates could not do better.
Not even mentioning the additional capabilities that could be squeezed in the future in a larger hull.
verbatimThe RFP states: AShM + PDMS + VSHORADS + CIWS + medium gun + light cannon
So, if they are not requiring any rotary wing facilities, it shall be something along Germany’s K-130 corvette, otherwise Steregushi would be a more adeherent reference.
At least if they do not expect to pack all that stuff in a hull comparable to the Tarantul itself.
The question I still ask myself is which real use could IN have in the XXI century for a corvette.
They have just one littoral scenario, the western one, and a single fregate could do better than two corvettes being more flexible.
Getting rid of anything not ocean going save the usual coast guard and SAR hulls could prove more sensibile both financially and operationally.
verbatimThat’s just …. wrong!
I don’t understand all the drama around Ivan Gren’s fate.
It’s a project born conceptually old, nobody in his sane mind would require or expect a landing ship to beach itself to disembark troops and vehicles.
It’s even small and unable to provide logistic support, something obe could use only in very short range missions, like within Black Sea.
No reason neither to rely on old concepts nor to reinvent the wheel: between LSD, LPD and logistical vessel there are plenty of working concepts waiting just to be picked up and tailored to specific black berets’ force structure and missions requirements.
verbatimSorry, I mixed Ka-92 and Mi X1 in my tougths!
verbatimWhat would they do, convert to an X2 setup with counter rotating blades and a pusher prop? IDK. Would impede ramp operations.
I think Rii was referring to the new project started by Kamov, not to any Mi-38 hypothetical conversion.
Supposedly, the Kamov project is about something along the lines of X2 and tail pusher propeller should be of ducted type, so embarkement and disembarkment through a rear ramp should be safe to a certain degree, the most if the pusher propeller is maintained idle or near idle while such operations are performed.
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