Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

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Re: Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

Post by JVKrishnan »

Austin wrote:^^ Changing engine on the fighter is not a simple task , they will have to go through many hours of sucessful flight testing programs and M88 and EJ200 is a proven engine with thousands of flight hours to its credit , something IAF will not feel necessary to change if they opt for one of this bird.

Kaveri is made for Tejas so ideally it should power the Tejas.
Austin,

Perhaps this is OT, somethings to ponder about......

What was the motivation behind French offer to fit Kaveri (when available)? Would they have made this offer without thinking through that it might require 1000s of hours of testing? Another example, take the Honeywell engine offer for Jags!

Interestingly, the French seem to have a good measure of our progress and requirements. How would one explain their offer for 40 Rafales and Kaveri fit? Did they sense that Kaveri was well on its way?

If Ombaba doesn't deliver what we need, Rafale IMHO, is no 1 contender!
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Re: Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

Post by Mayuresh »

Kaveri fitted on the Tejas shall be rejected by the IAF due to low thrust. But can we not still fit it and export the plane as completely indigenious? There are many countries out there who cannot afford any of the single engine MRCA contenders and are thinking of buying the JF-17 from China (or Pak as the case may be). Surely, the Tejas with Kaveri fitted on it will be much better than JF-17 and much cheaper than any single engine MRCA. Probably countries like Iran, Azerbaijan, etc. (not Egypt, Sudan because of their close relationships with the Arab world and by extn, Pak) probably some countries in Latin America or SE Asia, maybe Vietnam?
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Re: Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

Post by sunny y »

Many Many congratulations to our scientists at GTRE, DMRL, ADA & all the other people who were involved with Kaveri either directly or indirectly.....May God bless you & give you the strength to go even further where no one has gone before. Time to turn GTRE into next RR or GE...

It's a pity that no news channel or even any newspaper here in Delhi has even mentioned anything about it let alone doing something to celebrate this occasion. All I have been reading is about the features of Obama's cadillac, Marine one & other show pieces....

Since I am not aware of any other member of electronic media on BRF except Vishnu Som ji, I have a request for you Sir.
Please air some kind of a documentary on this programme. That would be a perfect way to celebrate this historic occasion. NDTV is watched by lakhs of people....If something gets mentioned on a news channel as big as NDTV, it is bound to make an impact...

I am sure all the BRFites here agree with me & I am not the only one with this request....

Thanks
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Re: Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

Post by Austin »

Rahul M wrote:Austin, it is not as big a deal as it is made out to be. aircrafts get re-engined all the time.
Unless the dimension of Kaveri and M88 are "exactly" similar and Kaveri is completely flight worthy with the required testing hours it gets in test and aircraft like Tejas , it is going to be a big deal.

It will need substantial amount of time and flight testing to prove Kaveri on Rafale , when M88 variant have been proven and reliable engine for Rafale.

If they are serious on Kaveri development they should develop a dedicated squadron of Tejas Mk1 with Kaveri and prove its flight worthiness of the engine on the aircraft it was designed for
Last edited by Austin on 05 Nov 2010 12:44, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

Post by Austin »

JVKrishnan wrote:Austin,
Perhaps this is OT, somethings to ponder about......
What was the motivation behind French offer to fit Kaveri (when available)? Would they have made this offer without thinking through that it might require 1000s of hours of testing? Another example, take the Honeywell engine offer for Jags!
I have yet to hear any thing serious about Kaveri on Rafale other then just an idea being floated and you know such idea takes a life of its own on forum discussion :)

IF you a keen follower of aviation you would understand its not a garage job to change engines assuming that you have a very reliable flight proven engine that can match M88 in every respect.

I have read of honeywell offer and if you hear what RR has to say it needs to add ballast as CG would change etc , the claims and counter claims are so serious that IAF is actually conducting a test trials between two engine that will take two years to complete.
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Re: Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

Post by PratikDas »

While the discussions of Kaveri with jet x and jet y are all from well meaning people, why stress? A working and reliable jet engine is such a valuable thing that if the engine is there then the applications will come, there's no doubt about it. Even if not for its peak performance then simply for its cost efficiency the Kaveri should have takers. Even if no Indian plane gets the engine soon, some other country might show interest. Of course, it would be a dream come true surely for the developers and jingos alike to see the Kaveri flying the Tejas.
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Re: Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

Post by Tanaji »

The IL testbed will take care of the 400 to 500 odd hours of testing required to certify the engine as air-worthy.
I thought this was only around 100 hours as per the frontierindia report.
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Re: Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

Post by chackojoseph »

Tanaji wrote:
The IL testbed will take care of the 400 to 500 odd hours of testing required to certify the engine as air-worthy.
I thought this was only around 100 hours as per the frontierindia report.
It should be 50 - 120 hrs approximately. Depending upon how it goes. 50-60 sorties cannot make it 500-600 hours.

Also, this was the same number of hours that the Sukhio superjet 100's SaM146 engine went through.
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Re: Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

Post by chackojoseph »

I wanted to show folks a very interesting stuff
Rolls-Royce has also faced problems with its military engines, where it has teamed with General Electric to build an alternate engine for the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter. Both companies are battling to keep the Pentagon from canceling the project. They disclosed in late September that one of their test engines had experienced an anomaly that damaged the airfoils. Pratt & Whitney has the main contract to build engines for the fighter, and the government sales could reach $100 billion over 25 years.
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Re: Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

Post by Austin »

Marten wrote:Austin, does an engine's airworthiness need to be proven on the platform it was supposedly designed for?
Yes Sir , that will ideally be the best platform since the platform/engine is designed around
The IL testbed will take care of the 400 to 500 odd hours of testing required to certify the engine as air-worthy. Is there a different criteria that we are not aware of? If the platform for which the Kaveri was planned itself has changed, why would you expect airworthiness testing on that single-engined platform?
Kaveri will fly for ~ 100 hours on IL-76 and then the data generated will be analysed and then LCA MK-1 will be used as flying test bed , as per P Rajkumar latest interview in Force.

Some excerpts
Do you see the Snecma-Kaveri engine entering service in the LCA?

I definitely do not see the Snecma-Kaveri engine powering either the LCA Mk-1 or Mk-2. However LCA Mk-1 will be used as a flying test bed to put the engine through its paces, before it enters service. However we have to develop the Snecma-Kaveri engine because we cannot call ourselves an aeronautical power in any sense of the word unless we have our own engine. As we speak the Kaveri engine is getting ready to fly in Russia which will give us an enormous amount of confidence. After the 100 hour programme we will have a significant amount of data. With the French coming in the Kaveri will now become a reality and it will get test flown on the LCA airframe at some point of time. My estimate is that this will happen sometime between 2015 and 2018, once we sign on the dotted line. That is the engine that the MCA will be designed around and it will power this aircraft.
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Re: Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

Post by chackojoseph »

Marten wrote:Thanks a lot, Chacko. Did I misunderstand the total number of hours including static as FTB? afaik, there were 8 engines on static test at GTRE. Is that correct?
The total number of hours including all tests should be 3000 hours.
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Re: Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

Post by Bala Vignesh »

check out what the Good Karnail Sahab has said on the Kaveri flight test in his blog.
Karnail's Blog
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Re: Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

Post by shiv »

Engines is very very tricky business and the sooner we dig into the tech the better.

While the CFM 56 engine has logged a total of 500 million flight hours - the Rolls Royce engine for the A 380 has only today thrown a blade or something and scared the crap out of 450 odd Qantas passengers while Qantas has grounded all its A 380s pending checks.
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Re: Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

Post by Tanaji »

As regards to the A380, wasnt there an active volcano in Indonesia in the region the aircraft was flying? I wouldnt be surprised if that had something to do with it.

Quantas is just trying to cover its backside by blaming the engine and saying not a maintenance issue prematurely when no findings are known yet: they have had issues with their planes recently sprouting holes ...

But yes, I agree engines are tricky business. Sad that there is no Kaveri on LCA ever. BTW Mk3 for LCA comes (if there is one), the demand for thrust would be more than what Snecma KAveri would provide, so it will never catch up.

What happened to Kaveri Marine? What happened to Kaveri for NLCA?
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Re: Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

Post by SaiK »

If hearts can be transplanted, engines can be too. It is the same oomph that drive our kids to perform a 4x400 gold run to a heart transplant in chennai that could drive the brains to replace engines of future IAF crafts with different versions of Kaveri.

Kaveri ko jai ho!
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Re: Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

Post by chackojoseph »

Bala Vignesh wrote:check out what the Good Karnail Sahab has said on the Kaveri flight test in his blog.
Karnail's Blog
I am not sure there will be a burial. AURA project now has GTRE onboard, guess for what? :wink: I am not implying that "existing" kaveri will be implemented, but I think they should not go for AL-55I addl option exercised.
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Re: Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

Post by PratikDas »

Bala Vignesh wrote:check out what the Good Karnail Sahab has said on the Kaveri flight test in his blog.
Karnail's Blog
Kaveri is just the beginning. I hope there is a plan to design a smaller cruise missile engine.
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Re: Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

Post by shiv »

PratikDas wrote:
Bala Vignesh wrote:check out what the Good Karnail Sahab has said on the Kaveri flight test in his blog.
Karnail's Blog
Kaveri is just the beginning. I hope there is a plan to design a smaller cruise missile engine.
Every engine manufacturer who manages to get a basic working engine eventually uses the same thing to make modifications to create different variants.
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Re: Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

Post by skganji »

Nice pics above. Congratulations to GTRE . I am surprised that Russia is helping India in so many ways and India is still after U.S. God knows why they are neglecting Russia.
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Re: Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

Post by rgsrini »

Thank you ChackoJi. I can't believe I am actually seeing it. Several times when I look out from the plane and see the engine hanging on the wings, I would think to myself that hopefully, one day I will see an Indian engine there. It is an awesome feeling to actually see the pictures posted by you.

Take a bow GTRE!!! I know it is not the final thing. But this is certainly a huge milestone for Indian aviation. Thank you for the self belief, hardwork and perseverence, even when you were attacked by some of the most virulent criticisms ever seen.
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Re: Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

Post by vina »

Bala Vignesh wrote:check out what the Good Karnail Sahab has said on the Kaveri flight test in his blog.
Karnail's Blog
Ah.. The Good Karnail despite protestations to the contrary cannot make out the difference between wet thrust and dry thrust even if someone hits him on the face with a wet towel and tells him about it, nor can he ever realize that a flat rated engine putting out 65KN is probably equivalent to a 80KN ISA that the brochures of the others suggest. A GE 404 on a carrier in the Indian ocean at 40C is sure as hell not putting out the 75/80KN whatever is the advertised figure, while this SDRE engine will guarantee 65KN or whatever it is putting out currently.

That said, what the program will give is the confidence of having "been there/done that kind of thing" in developing a fully functional and proven engine. More than the French getting their core, what GTRE/DRDO desperately needs to do is to tap into the vendor base in US and Europe of the PW, GE, RR, Snecma and MTU for stuff like blisks and latest material for hot sections (turbines, combustor, A/B etc) and get the engine core's thermodynamic efficiency up to the levels of the EJ200/M88-3 or better.

The current core is obviously too large and the core flow is too high , but with better materials and getting the pressure ratio and TET up, the Kabini core could become the "Gangotri" able to power a "Ganga" sized engine. Sure for for MCA/LCA kind of applications, using an off the shelf high tech /latest materials kind of tinku , chikna core should do the job, if mated to the existing Kaveri LP system.

If they do go with Snecma to come up with a Kaveri with the Snecma core, what I do hope is that the resulting engine has all blisk compressor stages, contra rotating LP and HP spools, latest materials and TB coatings and film cooling giving one highest TETs around and an overall pressure ratio of 30+. And oh.. don't go for a piddly 70/80 kn engine, go for a 110KN/125KN class engine, coming out in around 2015 time frame, if the babu monkeys sign off on 2011 or so and give the "No Objection Certificate" (got to hand it to 'em Yindoos, this No Objection business is profound, as profound and pill-o-soppical as the zero/shunya/nothingness. After all, it is only a culture that can imagine and invent zero can invent something like the "no objection", all others will have invented only an "objection certificate") in triplicate and laminate it and get it notarized by a govt officer notified in the presidential gazette.

The current Kaveri core with infusion of the latest materials and technologies can be used as the building block of other engines for other applications.
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Re: Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

Post by Gaur »

^^
Vina,
I have posted a Kaveri related query in newbie thread. Could you please look that up? :)
Thanks.
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Re: Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

Post by Indranil »

Very important point by Vina

"go for a 110KN/125KN class engine". Otherwise we will always be behind the curve.
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Re: Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

Post by vic »

Re Vina


IIRC the rumours are that frenchies will use M88 core with a new LP "designed in france" which means nothing from kaveri will be retained. some indian scientists will be be allowed to go to france to "observe" while they tinker around with indian money. the babus will still not release the money for high tech labs to be set up in india. and frenchies will take around 20 + years to pass on the technolgy as in shakti engine. the french engine will get a US$ 2 Billion Indian label.

Now to AMCA, again we have designed a chutka plane rather then just copying something like F-22. so we will have low margins and trouble cramming in everything. so the engine will have to chukta and chikna rather then the brute which kaveri can spawn.

I hope that this Indian kaveri is used for LCA-LIFT and AURA-UCAV
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Re: Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

Post by Bala Vignesh »

Chackochetta,
pardon the minor nit-pick but the photo you've posted on the forum previously did not show GTRE-DRDO painted in red on the Test Bed. But the photos's above show it so..
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Re: Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

Post by abhik »

Cain Marko wrote:
uddu wrote:Now can the Rafale or Typhoon being selected can have the Kaveri instead of the underpowered engines. Can we fit two Kaveris into Rafale or Typhoon?
Not too long ago, the French were talking precisely of this option - Kaveri powered Rafales. As of now the engine is a mite to heavy imho, but still it does provide greater thrust than the M88s. Ideally it would shed 150kgs and then make it to the rafale. If that a/c manages to keep its empty weight around 10000kg, and has 2X8.5ton Kaveris powering it; its TWR will be insane!

CM.
:-? Err.. from where did that figure ( Kaveri= 8.5t thrust) come from?
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Re: Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

Post by maitya »

Yes, excellent news and a perfect Diwali gift - kudos to GTRE, well done.

But having said that let's do some introspection shall we:
From a layman's point of view, the design level dry thrust (52KN) was achieved but it failed on wet thrust (achieved 65KN as opposed to 81KN).
And this is direct result of a reduced massflow within the engine 24.3kg/s (while the design goal was 78kg/s).

Now as the thrust depends on velocity of the gases and the mass of those gases, the thrust can be increased by increasing the quantity of the gas flow or by increasing the speed of the gas flow.
The type of nozzle mass flow (sum total of afterburner entry mass flow plus the effective afterburner fuel flowrate) required is just not possible to achieve as the afterburner entry mass flow is just too low in the 1st place (there is only so much of fuel that can be added).

So, the only option is to increase the mass flow rate to solve this wet thrust problem - Vinaji brings an interesting observation, reduce the volume of the core itself so that the mass-flow rate can be increased. Others will say, do that by inventing/getting/ToTing blisk manufacture/SCB tech so that the TeT can be increased.

But I'd still like to remind what Al Enqyoob-ud-din-e-Gas-Turbine once told us:
narayanan wrote:
It's a lot better than that. Note that stage pressure ratio for Kaveri is onbly about 1.3. Long way to improve, and this does not require SCB. Just good aerodynamics, or maybe just good fabrication of the existing design (based on other things I've seen, I suspect strongly that the actual fabrication quality control is where they lose 50% of their design performance). If they can get even this improved, they can probably save a lot of weight on the engine. Or they can beef up the turbine blades with the saved weight, or add cooling and increase T.i.T.

Also, the T.i.T is still a long way from getting to the levels where SCB is needed.

IOW, a number of small improvements, whose cumulative effect is a drastic improvement. Just plain hard work and good management and coordination.
So yes while it's a fantastic achevement and a milestone a bit of introspection is also of the order, IMVVHO.
:|
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Re: Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

Post by chackojoseph »

Bala Vignesh wrote: Chackochetta,
pardon the minor nit-pick but the photo you've posted on the forum previously did not show GTRE-DRDO painted in red on the Test Bed. But the photos's above show it so..
Ja! I too noticed that. But, as you said its a minor nitpick. DRDo has sent us an early integration pic. This is da latest. They must have painted it.
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Re: Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

Post by VikramS »

It is easy to see which one is the Kaveri; it does not smoke :D
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Re: Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

Post by Cain Marko »

abhik wrote: :-? Err.. from where did that figure ( Kaveri= 8.5t thrust) come from?
Off the cuff conservative figure - based on the publicly declared figure of around 9 tons for the Snecma-GTRE JV Kaveri version. The larger point being that such a powerplant might be suitable for a high thrust Rafale.

CM
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Re: Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

Post by Cain Marko »

Austin wrote:
Rahul M wrote:Austin, it is not as big a deal as it is made out to be. aircrafts get re-engined all the time.
Unless the dimension of Kaveri and M88 are "exactly" similar and Kaveri is completely flight worthy with the required testing hours it gets in test and aircraft like Tejas , it is going to be a big deal.

It will need substantial amount of time and flight testing to prove Kaveri on Rafale , when M88 variant have been proven and reliable engine for Rafale.

If they are serious on Kaveri development they should develop a dedicated squadron of Tejas Mk1 with Kaveri and prove its flight worthiness of the engine on the aircraft it was designed for
Austin, AFAIK - the engines don't have to be exact replicas, even the M88.3 (9ton variant) is certainly heavier than the bitty M882s that currently power the Rafale. IOWs, the French were willing to stick a much larger/powerful engine into the Rafale had the UAE deal gone through - so why not the Kaveri a few years down the road?

Yes, it is not flightworthy as of today, but it should allow for the Snecma-GTRE variant a degree of confidence to begin with.

CM.
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Re: Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

Post by ShivaS »

notice the red GTRE on side of the A/c
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Re: Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

Post by Christopher Sidor »

If Kaveri can scale up in thrust and scale down in weight, then India has a killer engine. We can replace, starting with a very few and select fighters, the existing engines with Kaveri. Then depending on our experience we can extend this to most of IAF aircrafts. The cost savings would be enormous. Add to it that we would be safe from any probable denial due to sanctions or some other tom-dick-harry reason. For example post 1971, Iran was denied essential spares and engine parts for their F-14s. We would not face a similar situation.
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Re: Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

Post by Pratik_S »

Bala Vignesh wrote:check out what the Good Karnail Sahab has said on the Kaveri flight test in his blog.
Karnail's Blog
65kN figure is definitely wrong. If this was true than there would have been no point in testing the engine on the Il-76 as it failed in its primary goal to generate 80+kN wet thrust. And the people in charge in their sound mind would have never gone on to spend so much on a mere flame thrower.

Meanwhile does anybody know how much India is paying to Russia for these test ?
Christopher Sidor wrote:If Kaveri can scale up in thrust and scale down in weight, then India has a killer engine. We can replace, starting with a very few and select fighters, the existing engines with Kaveri. Then depending on our experience we can extend this to most of IAF aircrafts. The cost savings would be enormous. Add to it that we would be safe from any probable denial due to sanctions or some other tom-dick-harry reason. For example post 1971, Iran was denied essential spares and engine parts for their F-14s. We would not face a similar situation.
Bold but impossible. The only aircraft which can get the Kaveri is probably the MiG-29 which is undergoing upgrades and we have singed contract to produce its engines.
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Re: Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

Post by Austin »

Cain Marko wrote:Austin, AFAIK - the engines don't have to be exact replicas, even the M88.3 (9ton variant) is certainly heavier than the bitty M882s that currently power the Rafale. IOWs, the French were willing to stick a much larger/powerful engine into the Rafale had the UAE deal gone through - so why not the Kaveri a few years down the road?
Well they have to be dimensionally similar to M88 and should be as reliable as M88 if not more , I am looking at more of IAF perspective if they think of getting Kaveri on Rafale , but its a long shot as we do not know if Rafale will make in.
Yes, it is not flightworthy as of today, but it should allow for the Snecma-GTRE variant a degree of confidence to begin with.
I think they have not yet finalised on Snecma deal and if P Rajkumar is to be believe the Kaveri-Snecma deal will end up powering the MCA , if that deal goes through.
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Re: Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

Post by shiv »

Pratik_S wrote: Meanwhile does anybody know how much India is paying to Russia for these test ?
This was stated in one the news items linked earlier. It costs 60 crores in Russia while setting up facilities in India would be some hundreds of crores (IIRC)
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Re: Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

Post by Drishyaman »

Pratik_S wrote:65kN figure is definitely wrong. If this was true than there would have been no point in testing the engine on the Il-76 as it failed in its primary goal to generate 80+kN wet thrust.
Can some one confirm this ? What is the latest AB Thrust ?
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Re: Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

Post by PratikDas »

shiv wrote:
PratikDas wrote:...
Kaveri is just the beginning. I hope there is a plan to design a smaller cruise missile engine.
Every engine manufacturer who manages to get a basic working engine eventually uses the same thing to make modifications to create different variants.
One would hope so shiv, but I haven't read of any funds being sanctioned yet. Perhaps the team is fully occupied with Snecma integration.
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Re: Newsflash: Kaveri engine successfully test flown!

Post by tejas »

Can anyone enlighten me as to what India gains from this SNECMA joint venture? If they are bringing in their own core what the hell have we gained. We are stuck with an engine which is putting out an extremely anemic wet thrust. The latest Umrikhan engines for the F-16 are putting out 32,000++ lbs of thrust with afterburners.

While we can buy weapons from Umrikha and France at exorbitant rates, there is not enough money to set up test facilities for the Kaveri in India at a measly 400 crores!! Whatever resources are needed to make a usable engine have to be provided. India can never be an independent aerospace power and have to import a fighter's engine. Whoever the MMRCA contract goes to MUST help India in this effort. That will make the contract worth every cent. Given the state of the Oiropean economy, I think both the Eurofighter consortium and France can be made to play ball. Giving this contract to Umrikah would, IMHO, be treason.
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