RuAF News and development Thread part 15

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I wonder why they cant add 5th HP on the wings end or close to it for a R-73 ? , It would be a waste of Wing Area space or may be for 4 HP they can have a dual rack for A2A missile as seen on some western fighters

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So, what is going on with this strange MiG-35 display @ MAKS:

Not real aircraft i guess. Though strange as there IS MiG-35 with AESA equipped. They only need to repaint and add mock pylons for T-220. But i guess that airframe is not available atm.

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[USER="3598"]Austin[/USER] - The wingtip contains the radar warning receiver and the laser detection system. I doubt it is much of a structural element at all. Just a bunch of electronics beneath the shell.

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From https://www.aex.ru/docs/3/2019/8/26/2950/

First shown at the Beijing Civil Aviation Exhibition in 2011 as a large-scale copy, the CJ-1000A engine, according to local experts, “failed.”

This is the first time I've heard this allegation. Have you come across anything else which corroborates it? I know the CJ-1000AX that they ran in May of last year was a de-rated variant. But that de-rating was a program decision (and conservative). The Chinese want to run it for a while at 90% of thrust before they take a second prototype up to full thrust. That's not a failure of the design.

Not only that, but it seems a good portion of this shortage comes, interestingly enough, because of some US vendors that are not increasing their output:

https://www.ainonline.com/aviation-n...s-engine-parts

For Russia the path is clear, create the PD-8 and say goodbye both to an extremely expensive Safran and to their unsurprisingly unwilling US suppliers.

Same mechanism at work there as with Safran - with the SSJ not meeting its original sales projections (partly because of the reliability problems that these shortages helped create, partly because it was badly delayed and the E-Jets saturated the market in the meantime - Sukhoi owns the latter!), investing in higher production rates is uneconomical to them. No malice involved, it's just that the unprecedented production rates for the LEAP and GTF families are putting such severe strain on the supply chains that serving this demand is a better way to spend finite resources.

In fact the stress is so acute in some areas that it creates room for new entrants into the supplier market - an opportunity for Russian industry to widen its scope beyond domestic projects and secure increased business with Western engine OEMs. If it wasn't for the sanctions that is - if Safran is genuinely interested in establishing such a relationship despite the difficult political environment as described in that article, Russian suppliers should not wait for the government to endorse the move! That is an offer almost too good to be true, the government bureaucracy in Russia is too ponderous, slow and inefficient, fight *tooth and nail* to make it happen with or without their support!

In the long run, a healthier domestic supplier base with income from deals with Western engine manufacturers will make Russian engine & aircraft projects more internationally competitive as well.

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Moar Gold from Snaks 2019;

https://youtu.be/oJfgKyrPq8g

Awesome_Sauce at 03:30!

Good video and amazing horizontal turn at that time mark :eagerness:

@Trident:

In a better world it would be indeed a great business opportunity for Russia to participate as supplier for the global engine market, no doubt. But diverting scarce resources to tackle projects that are so vulnerable to political intentions could backfire. Maybe there is no malice in US vendors not scaling up production in the current market environment, but as soon as malice is needed it will be used, screwing Russia is an official state policy in US.

Let us see how France position themselves, they have been bolder lately than I personally expected. If Safran is serious over the long term then it is worth giving it a try (from the article, UFA should be already looking at manufacturing titanium pieces for them as we speak), but what should not be done is to delay the real deal (the domestic engine projects) because of some nice words and stunning hypothetical profits. The thing that makes Russian industry's position stronger over the long term is the ability to go solo. In a bit more than five years with their civilian aviation industry restored, Russia will not depend on the West, but maybe Safran will be in need of Russia and willing to pay accordingly. If the expected trade war US-EU starts in earnest they will be highly vulnerable because of their sole-sourced parts, the French are probably acutely aware of this and hence their current interest.

On a different topic:

This is taken from a presentation user Sens posted on the F-35 thread. I took this screenshot as I personally think the MiG-41 program could rely on this very engine approach, probably based on the izd. 20 or maybe izd. 30 (the former AL-41F was already in the right size I would say) to get unprecedented supersonic performance with a claimed max speed of 4 M:

[ATTACH=JSON]{"data-align":"none","data-size":"full","title":"RTA_VCE_001.jpg","data-attachmentid":3872337}[/ATTACH]

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This is taken from a presentation user Sens posted on the F-35 thread. I took this screenshot as I personally think the MiG-41 program could rely on this very engine approach, probably based on the izd. 20 or maybe izd. 30 (the former AL-41F was already in the right size I would say) to get unprecedented supersonic performance with a claimed max speed of 4 M:

Now wait a minute.. i thought it was established that this Supersonic speed requirement, was something of the past..?

How about even better mission range over Mig-31, stow some weapons inside the thing, make a side by side crew arrangement for long missions.

The High Supersonic Speed requirements died a silent death in the late 90's.

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Are there any sources available for this claim? It sounds decidedly weird to me that a plane with MTOW of 38 tons cannot take-off with the full internal fuel @ <30 tons, but who knows...

You'll have to ask [USER="1724"]djcross[/USER], he first mentioned this.

While I very much agree that national defence goes a bit further than a pure **** measuring contest, in the end the required capabilities of a new weapons systems are determined by the level of the threat. F-15 as a response to MiG-25, Su-27 as a response to F-15 and so on until PAK-FA. It is simply unavoidable for the VKS to look at what US (F-22) can do in order to counter it. In order to get favourable match statistics, they need to avoid weak spots in each and every one of the aspects. You can reflect on the program and the plane's features to see this holds true for almost all thinkable parameters, because relying on tactics or supporting assets instead of the individual system's capability is not a very robust way of planing force. In terms of cruising speed as said it is not only F-22 that should be of concern, but the newer platforms propelled by adaptive engines, which will be in the best conditions for a very effective supercruise.

"Countering" something doesn't involve matching every performance number. Su-27 was made in response to F-15 but has lower top speed and doesn't out turn F-15 in every part of the envelope.

> Why F-22's cruise speed matters? Because it allows to reduce engagement chances for the enemy and increases the effectiveness of the own missiles and in general, an advantage to control the engagements. Do we agree on this or am I missing something important? Why is supercruise a crucial requirement of 5G?

I'm talking about why it would matter to RuAF if F-22 can reach Mach 1.8 without afterburner? Just because it can do that doesn't mean Mach 1.8 is the normal supercruise speed, which is why that performance number doesn't really matter. Developing a response is not about matching or beating every performance number at every condition.

> Design speed of the F-22: you say that the series design was modified in order to get better area ruling than the YF-22, if I got it right. Was this done to get better fuel consumption and the increase in cruising speed was circumstantial? Little probable, since you claim the redesign reduced the fuel capacity...

I think it's circumstantial but I don't recall the exact reason. Production F-22 does carry less fuel than YF-22, since the prototype carried 1.5 tons more fuel.

In any case it is obvious that if cruising fast is good, the faster you can do it the better, and the more future-proof your design will be. This means increased TSFC of course, but that makes part of the deal once you go for supersonic cruising. A F-22 deployed for CAP in ME for example is not compelled to cruise at 1.8 M, facing peer-level aircraft/SAMs in a high intensity conflict it would be different I am sure!

Reaching Mach 1.8 without afterburners is not future-proofing anything, again that's NOT the F-22's optimal design speed, that's just when max dry thrust and drag are at equilibrium and max dry thrust is not considered cruising. F-22 was NOT specifically designed for Mach 1.8 at max dry thrust, it was designed for most efficient supercruise at Mach 1.5 and the other speed performance numbers are just the result of that. Besides, when defending against SAMs the difference between Mach 1.5 and 1.8 is not going to make much difference, instead of other factors like stealth, weapons, etc.

Thanks for your take on that. I am not implying it will make much of a difference, but probably coming later VKS prefers being a bit in front than a bit behind. The design reserve re. F-22 (in terms of wing sweep, intake size / design) points to them not willing to fall short of further US developments.

Wing sweep is not just driven by speed. Higher wing sweep provides larger mean aerodynamic chord in order to tolerate bigger shifts in CG, especially since Su-57 main weapon bays are tandem. As another example, MiG-31 wing sweep is 41 degrees compare to F-15 sweep of 45 degrees and F-22 sweep of 42 degrees yet MiG-31 is faster than both.

This is done when you are late with your engine, which has been the case with a number of Russian and Soviet programs. With the MFI they invested heavily and early in order to avoid that, but then the program failed and they saw themselves in the same difficult situation again with the PAK-FA. It is IMHO not a desired or reasonable practice, because it creates unnecessary expenses and efforts (for instance by creating production lines twice, which is extremely costly). Only in this case I think the 117 will be used in the Flanker fleet, by which they minimize the downsides of this approach.

First stage and second stage engines was planned for PAK-FA pretty much from start of the program. We'll see if this was the right choice to make. Failure of MFI program was because of the change in air combat tactics that puts much more emphasis on stealth than what was required for MFI, and also the chronic lack of funding in the 1990s which doomed MFI and izd.20. Also izd.20 is a much bigger engine than izd.30 which is supposed to be same size as izd.117.

In US fighter programs starting with ATF the engine development occurs even before the aircraft development. This is the case for adaptive engines right now too.

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You'll have to ask [USER="1724"]djcross[/USER], he first mentioned this.

"Countering" something doesn't involve matching every performance number. Su-27 was made in response to F-15 but has lower top speed and doesn't out turn F-15 in every part of the envelope.

I'm talking about why it would matter to RuAF if F-22 can reach Mach 1.8 without afterburner? Just because it can do that doesn't mean Mach 1.8 is the normal supercruise speed, which is why that performance number doesn't really matter. Developing a response is not about matching or beating every performance number at every condition.

I think it's circumstantial but I don't recall the exact reason. Production F-22 does carry less fuel than YF-22, since the prototype carried 1.5 tons more fuel.

Reaching Mach 1.8 without afterburners is not future-proofing anything, again that's NOT the F-22's optimal design speed, that's just when max dry thrust and drag are at equilibrium and max dry thrust is not considered cruising. F-22 was NOT specifically designed for Mach 1.8 at max dry thrust, it was designed for most efficient supercruise at Mach 1.5 and the other speed performance numbers are just the result of that. Besides, when defending against SAMs the difference between Mach 1.5 and 1.8 is not going to make much difference, instead of other factors like stealth, weapons, etc.

Wing sweep is not just driven by speed. Higher wing sweep provides larger mean aerodynamic chord in order to tolerate bigger shifts in CG, especially since Su-57 main weapon bays are tandem. As another example, MiG-31 wing sweep is 41 degrees compare to F-15 sweep of 45 degrees and F-22 sweep of 42 degrees yet MiG-31 is faster than both.

First stage and second stage engines was planned for PAK-FA pretty much from start of the program. We'll see if this was the right choice to make. Failure of MFI program was because of the change in air combat tactics that puts much more emphasis on stealth than what was required for MFI, and also the chronic lack of funding in the 1990s which doomed MFI and izd.20. Also izd.20 is a much bigger engine than izd.30 which is supposed to be same size as izd.117.

In US fighter programs starting with ATF the engine development occurs even before the aircraft development. This is the case for adaptive engines right now too.

Beside Wing sweep, you guys need to look at the Airfoil as a whole.
The Airfoil of Su-27 is pretty "robust" in lack of a better word, at least closer to the LERX.
The Airfoil of Mig-31 keeps much of the same layered dimensions through out.

You could say the same for F-15 Airfoil too.

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International Premiere of MS-21 at MAKS 2019

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Now wait a minute.. i thought it was established that this Supersonic speed requirement, was something of the past..?

You are being ironic ...right? :D

For the MiG-41 the same characteristics of MiG-31 have been named... only taken further. It makes sense for an interceptor, don't you think? The development of hypersonic weapons and the extension of the battlefield into near space do not encourage to abandon supersonic interception requirements, quite the contrary.

How about even better mission range over Mig-31, stow some weapons inside the thing, make a side by side crew arrangement for long missions.

First two make sense, and as suggested above the use of a VCE would greatly help to get a longer subsonic range, but the third is difficult to reconcile with speed requirements, unless the plane is huge.

The best would be a plane with very long patrol time at subsonic speed but capable of very fast dashes. This would reduce a most critical aspect in interception missions, the time needed to put your aircraft in the air. A plane on station with 4 M speed would in principle cover 4 times as much airspace as a plane capable of only 2 M, to put it in round numbers, not to talk about the brutal energy/range imparted to all kind of missiles it would carry. Its defensive capabilities would be amazing too, to the point that a current AMRAAM could not even overcome its top speed. It would be very capable too, to launch ASAT weapons, as implied in the RTA slide, and who knows what other weapons, like a big brother of Kinzhal or even substrategic gliders. The key is propulsion, if this is solved, many opportunities will appear.


Reaching Mach 1.8 without afterburners is not future-proofing anything, again that's NOT the F-22's optimal design speed, that's just when max dry thrust and drag are at equilibrium and max dry thrust is not considered cruising. F-22 was NOT specifically designed for Mach 1.8 at max dry thrust, it was designed for most efficient supercruise at Mach 1.5 and the other speed performance numbers are just the result of that. Besides, when defending against SAMs the difference between Mach 1.5 and 1.8 is not going to make much difference, instead of other factors like stealth, weapons, etc.

Ok, I understand, but that does not mean that a kinematic advantage is not an advantage in the end. Between 1.8 and 1.5 M there is a 20% difference in speed and hence less time for the SAMs to react and engage. Sorry, I cannot help considering it relevant, besides the question remains: why do you think ATF had as a most relevant parameter to attain supersonic cruise? They certainly were seeing an advantage in sustaining a high speed. A plane flying more than 20 km high at almost 2 M is a pretty difficult target and in practice only highest-end SAMs have a chance at catching them.


Wing sweep is not just driven by speed. Higher wing sweep provides larger mean aerodynamic chord in order to tolerate bigger shifts in CG, especially since Su-57 main weapon bays are tandem. As another example, MiG-31 wing sweep is 41 degrees compare to F-15 sweep of 45 degrees and F-22 sweep of 42 degrees yet MiG-31 is faster than both.

Yes, but it is a factor that reduces drag at high speeds, so consistent with a high cruising speed.

What you say regarding the chord and CoG is interesting, I assumed they would play with the LEVCONS and TVC to have a very wide base to accommodate for balance changes. The large aerodynamic chord has also another advantage which is allowing wing tanks of big capacity despite low relative height needed for supersonic flight, as stated in the patent. Interestingly, the downside of such wing of having increased drag during turning was reduced in the same way as in the F-22 by overlapping the tails and the wing at its root...

The example of the MiG-31 is maybe a bit misleading, since as an interceptor it does not have the same lift / turning requirements as the other fighters you mention, but of course a design needs to be considered as a whole, that I agree.

So, what is going on with this strange MiG-35 display @ MAKS:

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Been displayed in the subscale form before:

http://maks.sukhoi.ru/media/photo/maks2007/maks2007d5p252.jpg

(from MAKS 2007).

While these improvements will increase its competitiveness against the Eurocanards it doesn't appreciably alter the status of the MiG-35 as too little, too late though. Maybe if they'd followed through with it back then and walked away with the Indian MRCA contract, but 10 years on it's just a dead end. IMHO MiG's future as a competitive OKB ended when their Skat UCAV initiative failed to raise interest with the Russian military, also in 2007. Not sure whether their own leadership or the military must accept more of the blame for that mistake, but it was a turning point as PAK-FA was always going to be Sukhoi's to lose. MiG-29 derivatives simply don't offer enough of a cost saving over Flankers to be worthwhile, as the defection of numerous promising export prospects demonstrates (Algeria, Malaysia, Venezuela, Vietnam, Indonesia, Uganda, Myanmar).

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If the expected trade war US-EU starts in earnest they will be highly vulnerable because of their sole-sourced parts, the French are probably acutely aware of this and hence their current interest.


It is not US-EU trade war but French has started trade war on Germany. French are very tough on Brexit, US, China, Brazil etc. These markets where Germany make money and the backlash will fall on Germany.
same with closing the door further East.
https://balkaninsight.com/2019/07/16/macron-dampens-serbias-hopes-of-rapid-eu-membership/
I will not be surprised French ask for Russia help in 6G fighter and further help in Airbus to make it more soverign.

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n7m33jLMsJM

What can i say.. i wish i was there:applause:

You are being ironic ...right?

:D

For the MiG-41 the same characteristics of MiG-31 have been named... only taken further. It makes sense for an interceptor, don't you think? The development of hypersonic weapons and the extension of the battlefield into near space do not encourage to abandon supersonic interception requirements, quite the contrary.

No i am very serious here.
Just because the Aviation Industry has advanced significally since the SR-71 days, it does not in the slightest mean we can now build and fly an Interceptor that can operate meaningfull between Mach 3-4. It is simply not realistic.
The SR-71 had some big @ss cameras and tons fuel inside it. And it very much needed that fuel. It was a lumbersome aircraft to handle due to exessive weight, with all that fuel. It couldn't even Take-off with maxed up fuel tanks.
As has been debated a million times already, when you approach the Mach 2.5-3 barrier, Physical stuff(Termophysics) starts to happen with your aircraft. You have to overcome it, and you simply can't have a Mig-31 sized Interceptor with all the required space for Internal weapons and other sensors, going that fast and still retain a good Subsonic mission range!
like the Aircraft would have to be tweaked and designed for these Supersonic dashes, thus it cannot be at the same time designed for long duration subsonic flight.

Get real about this. You have to choose the one over the other. You cannot have both.
The Weapons however can be both supersonic or even Hypersonic, but that is a debate for another time.
You do not need to go at Mach 3 or 4 to make these weapons effective.

The Mig-31 has semi-recces Hardpoints, it has 14 tons of fuel inside. It mostly operate at Sub-Sonic speed when on mission, like +90% of its missions.
I guess you could go with a little wider design like Su-57, make it bigger with larger engines.
But then it will come at the cost of overcome High Supersonic Dashes.

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No i am very serious here.
Just because the Aviation Industry has advanced significally since the SR-71 days, it does not in the slightest mean we can now build and fly an Interceptor that can operate meaningfull between Mach 3-4. It is simply not realistic.

Well, I don't know. When I hear professionals saying the MiG-41 will fly at speeds up to 4.2 M, at first I can be sceptic that we are talking about anything with a real base or to be done any time soon, because I didn't know any usable propulsion system capable of such speeds, but essentially they are the ones in the know so our claims don't carry so much weight against theirs I would say. Then I start reading about real engines being developed, the last one of those, the RTA, is based on the YF120 and meant almost exactly for that speed range, and I have to think there is actually a possibility for Russians to be onto something real, since the applicable propulsion concept exists and furthermore the original AL-41F was a similar engine to YF120.

Regarding the thermal loading, materials today allow things that were not possible before, like the latest developments in hypersonics prove.

As for the aerodynamics to have both long subsonic range and high max speed, Tu-160 is a good example of a plane having both, so I guess you are being too categorical. Apart from variable geometry I don't know what concrete solutions could be used in the MiG-41, it seems it will be a very unique plane, and to be honest I have not thought much about it, but seeing it from the VKS perspective it would make a lot of sense to have shortest reaction times, which will be critical to fight against mass attacks of increasingly faster missiles. At a certain missile speed, you will simply not have the time to get your planes in the air to help blunt a saturation attack and you will need to have as many aircraft permanently in the air as possible.

You do not need to go at Mach 3 or 4 to make these weapons effective.

Yeah, and you surely don't need planes at all since there are missiles which fly much faster. You seem to forget the enormous energy advantage that planes have against missiles due to their big fuel tanks and capacity to generate lift in an economic way. Making planes progress in the kinematic aspect is always going to be very important, in order to use and defend from missiles effectively. Form the interceptor's point of view, speed continues to be important because you cannot cover the land with SAMs in order to defeat a concentrated attack of big size, less even considering the arms race we are heading to.

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While these improvements will increase its competitiveness against the Eurocanards it doesn't appreciably alter the status of the MiG-35 as too little, too late though. Maybe if they'd followed through with it back then and walked away with the Indian MRCA contract, but 10 years on it's just a dead end. IMHO MiG's future as a competitive OKB ended when their Skat UCAV initiative failed to raise interest with the Russian military, also in 2007. Not sure whether their own leadership or the military must accept more of the blame for that mistake, but it was a turning point as PAK-FA was always going to be Sukhoi's to lose. MiG-29 derivatives simply don't offer enough of a cost saving over Flankers to be worthwhile, as the defection of numerous promising export prospects demonstrates (Algeria, Malaysia, Venezuela, Vietnam, Indonesia, Uganda, Myanmar).

True, MiG needs to ensure their viability on their own and the only way is by selling the -35 in meaningful numbers, this will mean probably very low prices and go for the Indian tender as if there is no more tomorrow, with aggressive maintenance and ToT proposals. Indians have the opportunity to make a very good deal I think. Other air forces may be compelled to do the same if Russian and Indian experience is good, many countries have no meaningful AF or are operating such obsolete planes that a MiG-35 at a substantial discount would be a wonderful deal for them, among them many of Russia's traditional allies. For MiG and their supplier base to sell with minimum profit would still be much better than to keep writing loses year after year until Rostec's patience runs thin and they are finally consolidated. This can be pretty much the defining moment for MiG I think.

BTW, Tarasenko claimed new wing and keels for improved structure and aero performance, it seems like there is an ongoing development until they freeze design for a relevant contract? All indicates the VKS orders of MiGs are just an industrial base motivated decision I would say: [INDENT]"We installed a new radar with an active phased array which can simultaneously track 30 targets simultaneously hit six goals, both in the air and on the ground. We did here the new wing and the keels - this is from the point of view of the aircraft structure. Improved aerodynamics," says General Director of JSC RAC "MIG" Ilya Tarasenko.[/INDENT]

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Another issue with hypersonic vehicles is avionics/systems cooling. A hypersonic missile, with total flight time of <15 minutes, can use thermal heat sink or evaporative cooling for avionics. A long duration hypersonic drone or manned vehicle requires a cooling system which can operate up to an hour+. Even exotic systems like the Space Shuttle ammonia boiler was marginal for systems cooling. Your expensive hypersonic airplane is useless if the avionics stop working because they got too hot.

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[FONT="Roboto",arial,sans-serif]https://www.air-cosmos.com/article/maks-2019-le-dmonstrateur-de-radar-m…[/FONT]

The Russian electronics group Kret now includes most of the technological gems in the field of avionics, electronic warfare and radar. Due to the security context, Kret no longer presents any of its equipment at the Maks show. However, the exploitation of recent scientific publications and company newspapers makes it possible to judge the dynamism and often original approaches of Russian scientists.


Thus, in order to optimize the Mig-35 export opportunities, Phazotron has developed a new Aesa radar with a range of 170 km, the Zhuk AE-AR. Most importantly, in cooperation with the Baumann Institute in Moscow, Phazotron has produced a multi-function radar demonstrator for UAV 35kg in Ku-band, and not in X-band as its Western competitors. With weather, radiolocation, altimetry, and Gmti modes, its SAR imaging capabilities with a range of 80 km could be as low as 25 cm. But especially the use of the Ku-band would allow it to resist a large part of the NATO jamming systems.

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So Zhukovsky-AE-AR only for the export MiG-35? VVS MiG-35s will continue to have the MSA Zhuk then?