vikasrehmanLO status comes not only from materials and RAM coatings but a large number of other factors, each of which contributes towards reducing the RCS. Whereas F-35 was ‘designed’ with LO in mind from the start, SU-35 will be an enormously ‘modified’ flanker that in itself was not designed for LO reasons. I would say its rather safe to assume that F-35’s RCS would be considerably lower than any flanker’s giving it a major advantage in any 1 on 1 fight.
vikasrehmanOk, fast forward 8 years, how do you think an F-35 measures up to an Su-35 + LPI-AESA + KS-172 + ramjet R-77Ms + LO material treated + Thales co-developed/produced HMD- in performance & cost?
JSF for BVR…any day.;)
Su-35 + LPI-AESA + KS-172 + ramjet R-77Ms + LO material treated + Thales co-developed/produced HMD…in terms of costs would be a lot closer to a JSF than a simple SU-35.
vikasrehmanI do think that Tejas programme still has considerable ‘respect’ amongst fighter enthusiasts, but that it has lost a lot of ‘credibility’ after so many delays and new deadlines. While i always pointed the finger of blame at the incompetent project management for these and other able contributors have pointed out different factors, i fail to understand why the same thing keeps happening again and again and again. Why are they still so ambitious with the handout of their deadlines only to quitely announce delays later? One recent example ‘the trainer version of Tejas PV-5 will take off by August 2007‘ from the following site;
http://www.lca-tejas.org/updates.html
Its April 2008. Has it happened?
vikasrehmanWhy continue with the (N) LCA when the IAF hasn’t worked out the problems with the landbased variant????
I might be wrong but it appears that navy are more interested in a naval variant of LCA than AF being interested in a land-based one. BTW someone might be able to carify if IN has already allocated some funds for naval LCA?
vikasrehmanThe Gripen was a true multirole/swing aircraft when the first A/B-versions entered squadron service over 10 years ago. (Well, the Swedish airforce did´nt buy the reconnaissance pod until a few years ago cause we did´nt needed it back then but the aircraft was still cleared for it).
If Im not mistaken, Gripen was cleared for opertional service in 1996/97. Any ideas which types of missiles/munitions it could carry at the time?
vikasrehmanoh and Vikas, regarding your question about whether the IAF will accept the Tejas in a pure air-to-air role in the first blocks and then gradually make it multi-role- if that was the case, ADA would’nt have integrated the Litening on the Tejas. if nothing else, its a clear indication that the IAF will not accept anything less than a fully multi-role fighter. the MMR’s biggest issues were in the A2G modes, not the A2A modes (one of which was not working well, but I can’t recall which one).
If so, I cant think of any other newly designed fighter following such a route in recent times. Every other modern fighter (i can think of at this late hour) has gone through an evolution.
vikasrehmanAnkush, what you said makes sense. However, I was more interested in technological comparisons. I mean would IAF be happy with Tejas if its avionics etc were only as good as those on early M2Ks?
Anyway, here is an article by Ravi Sharma (not a very popular figure among Tejas fans…from what i gather) I just came across, and since we are talking about Tejas this is as good a place to post it.
http://www.thehindu.com/2008/04/03/stories/2008040356001200.htm
Tejas: ADA looks to Boeing to provide help
vikasrehmanvikasrehman, as per ADA/DRDO, the Tejas shall achieve IoC by 2010. As we discussed earlier, going by the track record of slow procurements, the MRCA deal is unlikely to finalize before 2015, with deliveries to start even later. This delay may be increased further by the high number of competitors.
Thus, the Tejas has a chance of being considered for the MRCA “sweepstakes”, ADA shall have sufficient time to prove its capabilities to the IAF. Note that the ASRs of the Tejas are nearly equivalent to that of the Mirage-2000 of the IAF, and as the MRCA proposal actually began “incubation” only as a need for more Mirage-2000s (before France stopped all production), the Tejas can justify the role.
It is a misinformation generated by the media that ASRs of Tejas are equal to MiG-21. As per the article of Mr. Parthasarthy and Mr. Raman (quoted earlier), the ASRs of Tejas nearly match or exceed the Mirage-2000 in technology. These 2 gentlemen were advisors to the defence ministry, and have strongly proposed the Tejas as the MRCA — the first major media “voice” to say so.
Abhimanyu, I personally have no doubt that ASR of Tejas would be superior to Mig-21s. Its simple logic for this to be the case, otherwise IAF would have simply replaced the old Mig-21s with new ones. However, your post raises an interesting point. If the ASRs of Tejas nearly match or exceed the Mirage-2000 in technology, are you referring to original M2K or later updates of M2K? OTOH, if MRCA is to be as late as you are saying-in this could actually happen in every likelihood-what would happen to IAF’s overall strength in between? Am i right in assuming that they would be forced to look for further stop-gap solutions, i.e. possibly buy more MKIs etc and/or upgrade more Mig-21s?
With regard to ASR, soes IAF want LCA to be a fully fledged true multirole machine from its induction or are they planning to take a machine which is able to do a few things like air defence (to start with) and gradually evolve into a true multirole platform?
vikasrehmanYour premise is wrong or you succumbed to the internet warriors propaganda. IAF have not raised bar, for them they still need a fighter capable of replacing Mig-21, no more no less. But the LCA flight expansion is not hapening, as the LCA has too much drag. Just see the flight parameters it has not progressed since 2005 and the speed is stuck at Mach 1.4.
If LCA could have met the basic flight parametrs, the IAF would have gladly inducted the LCA progressively.
I dont know much about LCA’s flight expansion or its drag issues but i do know it still has some distance to cover in terms of getting IOC status. As for IAF raising the bar, I am of the opinion that while IAF would like to go totally indigenous, they (probably) dont have the required faith in local capabilities. They have Pakistan on one hand and China on the other with ever increasing responsibilities which have come as a result og growing Indian economy and stature. Under these circumstances, they would want things to happen today rather than tomorrow (and LCA has not been able to deliver thus far)…and hence probably would pay more attention to foreign fighters rather than home grown products. I think LCA in its present format can start replacing Mig-21 in couple of years, but unfortunately the project management has probably foolishly made too many promises and IAF simply wants those promises delivered now.
vikasrehmanThus, in my view, Tejas’ empty weight must not exceed 5,500 to 6,500 kgs. Because, then either ADA is mistaken, or PAC Kamra must revise the weight of JF-17 by over an estimated 800-900 kgs
May be someone meaning to write 5,600 kg for LCA put down 6,500 kg instead. Its a simple mistake that can so easily happen and get through different checks.
vikasrehmanWith regard to Raptor, i agree with you guys that its importance in terms of air dominance cant be ignored. However, one must also understand why a better armoured Humvee would be more important to a soldier putting his life on the line in places like Iraq or Afghanistan. Its simply a no-win argument.
vikasrehmanLike you I am not against the LCA. Yet, I think we have to face the facts? That the type will not likely enter service or at very least not anywhere near the numbers originally projected! In my opinion (and thats all it is) I think the Indian Goverment would drop the LCA in a second if it could find political cover…………….So, don’t be surprised if the LCA is suddenly cancel after the MMRCA is selected!
Unlikely.
While I do agree with you that it is unlikely to enter service in numbers originally projected (recently i have come across six squadron figure in some places), I dont think any Indian govt would have the guts to drop the project…without SOLID political cover…and MMRCA selection alone is not enough. I personally dont think that India should drop this project. In spite of massive delays, this project has helped them to re-establish the foundations of aviations industry and gain considerable experience. Once LCA enters service, it will be continuous reminder for Indians as to what they can achieve. Dropping the project would be a step backward for this industry.
Having said this, I have always been of the opinion that these delays (to start with at least) were due to their inexperience (though this is no excuse for poor project management). Recent delays are probably due to consistent raising of the bar by IAF etc. It would have been a lot better for IAF to accept and DRDO to offer LCA in gradual phases. It didn’t have to be a top notch machine from Day 1. First get the thing into service (even with limited performance) and then work gradually to improve. Nearly every other fighter has evolved in this manner. Take a look at Gripen, Typhoon (blk 1, 2, 5 etc), and so on. If IAF wants LCA to be a true multirole machine from the start, then I dont have many hopes for this machine.
vikasrehmanBut then what do you expect from our news reporters
This is what happens when an ordinary journalist not knowing ABC of defence sector tries to cover the latter. Unfortunately, even those newspapers with large circulation do not employ special correspondents. And when it comes to editing, its probably nothing more than ‘spelling check’ though i even doubt that.
vikasrehmanHaving seen a number of FC-1/JF-17 pictures & videos since its first flight, I think that ‘smoky engine’ problem still persists though to a lesser extent than with the first prototype.
What has Pakistan developed on FC-1? Are there any genuine Pakistani systems?
That is a question to which I dont think we will get an answer for sometime yet. Although Chinese and Pakistanis have advertised this machine for obvious reasons, we still don’t know much about it even the most basic things, e.g. how many flight hours have the flying protoypes and LSP machines (not even sure if its 8 or 16) have logged etc. All we know is that a large contingent of Pakistani engineers and technicians have been working alongside their chinese colleagues for years now.
vikasrehmanvikas, when a design is frozen, it basically means that the wind tunnel, CFD models and other tests have yielded a configuration and that the outer mould line of the aircraft is frozen..the design of the parts that make up the airframe, etc. will only start after that..in the case of the Tejas, this was approximately the time that Dassault was the design consultant. and when I say Design Consultant, I mean that Dassault helped ADA choose and finalize the configuration, not that they were helping doing detail design work.
As we discussed earlier, the 1/7 scale model was based on the PD document, which was formalized between Sept. 1987 to 1988. The design was frozen based on that.
The authors in this article mention “design and development” of Tejas began in 1992″, possibly referring to the beginning of the production (or “metal-cutting”) of the full-scale unit. If freezing the paper design, or drawing board design is considered, then that would be the finalization of the PD in 1988.
But most authors usually take the 1993 date i.e. when the full-scale model begun development, as the start date for design. This is because only the on-paper PD may not be sufficient enough to formally end of design stage.
While the above does make sense, the statement from the article saying that “design and development” of Tejas began in 1992″ does not appear to be the most accurate one (on its own). From what I know, to someone in the west, designing the layout, building & testing wind tunnel models etc would form part of regular design and development phase. But if this was not the case and initiation of design and development was to be considered from cutting of metal, I wonder how LCA would compare with other 4th gen fighters.
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