Yeah but we are talking about export. There are countries out there like Mine, Vietnam and maybe Venezuela too operating Su-27/30 family with N001 which nearing its end of usefulness. Having N036 derivatives will help bring more life in these aircrafts. and I even wonder if N035 is backward compatible with previous flanker. It is indeed tested onboard Su-30MK2 flying laboratory but i haven’t see it being offered as backfit to previous flankers.
As good as it is. The N035 still retain conventional tubes. Despite greatly increased service life of 1500 hrs compared to previous radar’s 200-500 hrs. It still in long term no longer competitive against longer life solid state modules. Increased coverage through antenna slewing is a thing but reduced maintenance offered by active array is also something worth consider too. Plus it is flexible in both transmit and receive. Plus it will help reduce development cost for Russian AESA’s through scale of mass production.
What you didn’t IMHO consider is that installing an AESA radar in substitution of a mechanical steered one would change completely the plane balance itself (as they are extremely nose-heavy compared to them), at the same time it would mean to have a quite limited FoV. when russians absolutely prefer to not compromise such value.
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What do you think would be the remaining useful life of those old Su-27?
1000? No problem at all. 1500? a little extra investment on maintenance. 3000? you take them aground a week, change the tubes and the antenna and you are ready to go again.
Adapting the N036 would mean to spend years into developing it, as no studies have ever made to adapt it to a Flanker even the newer ones, while the work about installing a Pesa radar are already been made but in the end not implemented for Su-27-SM3 update.
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