LCA news and discussion

k prasad · Post by **k prasad** » 05 Mar 2009 09:38

shiv wrote:
KiranM wrote:My paanwallah's loyal customer saw a firangi babu step out of GTRE this morning. Looks like things speeding up on Kaveri front.

Babu looked like a TFTA Eiropean.
Well if you ask my uncle's driver's brother in law he will tell you that there are Amriki techincians and even Cheenis right in the middle of the LCA assembly line servicing machinery.

But a little birdie I know told me that he heard his master's driver's paanwallah's doodhwallah saying that there are some firangs down here for meetings with DRDO ppls in continuation to b2b meetings held during air show... and also some more firangs here for more interesting non-kaveri related stuff...

rakall · Post by **rakall** » 05 Mar 2009 09:45

Cain Marko wrote:
Holeee! where are these bums being bummed? Also, what kind of range does this indicate on the itty bitty Tejas? IIRC, IFR has not yet been done. After doing all the weight reduction etc, etc, 3000km ferry on internal fuel looks within realm of possibility. Thats MKI range! I'll be blowed.

CM

Pathankot or JaiSalmer...

Dont get too excited about the range.. they would have gone there via Nagpur or someother place..

rakall · Post by **rakall** » 05 Mar 2009 09:58

Kakarat wrote:Photos from an LCA bombing run - Ajai Shukla

Looking at all the vegetation on the ground near the target - I think this photo is from the first test (which AJai Shukla blogged).. the vegetation fits the location of that test.. Or is there so much vegetation in Pokhran? Do they generally have so much vegetation around test ranges - did we see that any of the fire power demonstrations?

But all the multiple 'radiation symbol type paintings' on the bombrack - those were not there in the taxing photos before the first test (which AShukla posted in his blog)..

Anyway - nice going Tejas..

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 05 Mar 2009 10:10

vsunder wrote:
What is this cloak technology? Many people are talking about it. Can it be used to build better cloak rooms for the Indian Railways? Clock technology must be the time warp project that will make the LCA a potent weapons platform in the 1965 war. Jagan will have to re-write his book. That clock project is headed by Manikavachagam Pillai.

Well you are the one who should be telling us about cloak tech

. I am the clock tech expert around these parts.

k prasad · Post by **k prasad** » 05 Mar 2009 10:15

vsunder wrote:What is this cloak technology? Many people are talking about it. Can it be used to build better cloak rooms for the Indian Railways? Clock technology must be the time warp project that will make the LCA a potent weapons platform in the 1965 war. Jagan will have to re-write his book. That clock project is headed by Manikavachagam Pillai.

Anyone who remembers the good Vachagom Pillai saar is either a very conscientious maths lecturer or at least 60 years old!!!

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 05 Mar 2009 10:18

k prasad wrote:
vsunder wrote:What is this cloak technology? Many people are talking about it. Can it be used to build better cloak rooms for the Indian Railways? Clock technology must be the time warp project that will make the LCA a potent weapons platform in the 1965 war. Jagan will have to re-write his book. That clock project is headed by Manikavachagam Pillai.
Anyone who remembers the good Vachagom Pillai saar is either a very conscientious maths lecturer or at least 60 years old!!!

Anyone wants to have a look at these?

The latter paper is ref 20 in the former

http://www.ams.org/bull/2009-46-01/S027 ... 1232-9.pdf

http://www.math.rutgers.edu/~chanillo/inverse.pdf

krishnan · Post by **krishnan** » 05 Mar 2009 10:54

rakall wrote:
Kakarat wrote:Photos from an LCA bombing run - Ajai Shukla

Is that a helipad?

Aditya_V · Post by **Aditya_V** » 05 Mar 2009 11:09

Don't know if this was posted before, anyways putting it again

Tejas scores direct hit in first test sortie

http://www.hindu.com/2009/03/05/stories ... 340100.htm

Bangalore: India’s light combat aircraft Tejas was on Wednesday bang on target in the first test sortie in the second phase of weapon testing under way from an Air Force base in north-western sector, said the DRDO.

Any idea what this test was yesterday

nrshah · Post by **nrshah** » 05 Mar 2009 11:41

Aditya_V wrote:
Any idea what this test was yesterday

http://www.india-defence.com/reports/4262

HAL Tejas: DRDO Conducting Two Week Long Weaponization Tests

India's premier defence agency DRDO is carrying out a two-week second phase weapon testing trials of the Light Combat Aircraft (LCA) at an Air Force base in the north-western sector.

"The focus of the current phase of testing is safe separation and accuracy of weapon delivery. The results from the tests would validate aerodynamic interference data as well as complex weapon release algorithms in different modes of release," DRDO officials said.

A composite test team comprising specialists from Aeronautical Development Agency, IAF, HAL and other aerospace agencies is based at the trial location to evaluate the performance of the indigenous combat aircraft. DRDO has directly linked the trial location with the base telemetry station at Bangalore via enabling designers and other specialists to monitor the activities in real time. ISRO's GPS Radiosonde is used for gathering accurate upper air data at the trial location.

DRDO is expected to hand over the first squadron of the LCA in December 2010 to the IAF in the initial operational clearance (IOC) configuration. A total of seven LCA squadrons will be inducted in the IAF. The first two squadrons of the IAF will be in the IOC configuration whereas the rest five will be the LCA Mark II, which will be an upgraded version of the aircraft.

ArmenT · Post by **ArmenT** » 05 Mar 2009 11:54

krishnan wrote:Photos from an LCA bombing run - Ajai Shukla

Is that a helipad?

Could be the target potentially? Why would they want to test a bombing run next to a helipad.

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 05 Mar 2009 17:43

krishnan wrote: Is that a helipad?

Its a target - a flat area marked with lines and circles and visible from the air.
Helipads have similar requirements - but it is probably inadvisable for a helo to land on that no matter how tempting it appears.

Gaurav_S · Post by **Gaurav_S** » 05 Mar 2009 18:14

shiv wrote:
krishnan wrote: Is that a helipad?
Its a target - a flat area marked with lines and circles and visible from the air.
Helipads have similar requirements - but it is probably inadvisable for a helo to land on that no matter how tempting it appears.

Maybe this is newbie quetion.

If that helipad is the target then why the bomb is being released now? Wouldnt it be early?
Or may be they are doing carpet bombing?

rakall · Post by **rakall** » 05 Mar 2009 18:23

gauravsurati wrote:
shiv wrote:
Its a target - a flat area marked with lines and circles and visible from the air.
Helipads have similar requirements - but it is probably inadvisable for a helo to land on that no matter how tempting it appears.
Maybe this is newbie quetion.

If that helipad is the target then why the bomb is being released now? Wouldnt it be early?
Or may be they are doing carpet bombing?

Bcoz the bomb when released has a horizontal velocity equal to the plane and hence will travel a distance from the point where it is released - instead of falling down like a stone dropped from 100th floor of a building.. Agree?

Before next newbie question "please" try to find the answer.. you may not find it here(after)

Gaurav_S · Post by **Gaurav_S** » 05 Mar 2009 18:32

rakall wrote:
Bcoz the bomb when released has a horizontal velocity equal to the plane and hence will travel a distance from the point where it is released - instead of falling down like a stone dropped from 100th floor of a building.. Agree?

Before next newbie question "please" try to find the answer.. you may not find it here(after)

Rakall ji, had idea of this science but given the less altitude of LCA was in doubt. Thought better to clarify.

vsunder · Post by **vsunder** » 05 Mar 2009 18:38

shiv wrote:

Well you are the one who should be telling us about cloak tech . I am the clock tech expert around these parts.

I shall try. First Shiv I claim you know as much as anyone else. Tomography that you encounter as a surgeon and invisibility that everyone's uncle and aunt are talking about are the reverse and obverse of the same coin.

Now when waves strike an object, lets say electromagnetic waves strike an object they scatter. So for a given frequency
there is some part that is transmitted, some reflected and so on. Suppose I make a list of this for every frequency say.
Then this is called the scattering data. Now there is an object that encodes the scattering data. It is called the Dirichlet to Neumann map in my article and in the other article by Gunther and Allan. Engineers call it the voltage to current map.
That is for every applied voltage on the boundary measure the corresponding current flux. All the scattering data I allude to above is caught in this voltage to current map. So what I show is that if I know the voltage to current maps for two bodies, then I have completely reconstructed the internal conductivity INSIDE. So boundary information tells me if you have an LCA hidden inside or your pet dog or your girlfriend. There is a small caveat let me explain this later.
If you look at my article, you will see how I construct the scattering solutions via an old inequality of mine.

Okay now the cloaking business. The idea is can I find two different objects that have the same scattering data.
Then I will not know if its your girlfriend hidden or your nasty boss. The answer yes! But then you will ask why is my theorem not violated. The answer is In my theorem I also assume that at each point inside the body if I look at all directions the conductivity of the material looks the same. Off course the conductivity changes point to point but at every single point things look isotropic, i.e same in all directions. The point that Gunther and Allan make is that
if the conductivity is non-isotropic then two objects can have the same scattering data. This is exactly how Pendry and company built their materials, they are highly non-isotropic and have different conductivities in different directions
at a given point. Its weird material but the mathematics already predicted the phenomena oh 15-20 years ago.

So there you go now....

rakall · Post by **rakall** » 05 Mar 2009 18:52

gauravsurati wrote:
rakall wrote:
Bcoz the bomb when released has a horizontal velocity equal to the plane and hence will travel a distance from the point where it is released - instead of falling down like a stone dropped from 100th floor of a building.. Agree?

Before next newbie question "please" try to find the answer.. you may not find it here(after)
Rakall ji, had idea of this science but given the less altitude of LCA was in doubt. Thought better to clarify.

Anyway your post made me calculate a bit.. just for fun..

what altitude does it look like? To me it looks like approx-1Km altitude.. if the plane is travelling at 300kmph (0.25M) then the target should be ~1.2Km away.. if the plane is travelling at 400kmph (0.32M) then the target should be ~1.6Km away..

Do the height of plane & distance of target match the distances..

Gaurav_S · Post by **Gaurav_S** » 05 Mar 2009 19:06

IMO target is less then 1km far. Also altitude seems not to be more then 600-700m. In this regards say if its flying at the speed of 400kmph then it possibly hits the target.

Kailash · Post by **Kailash** » 05 Mar 2009 19:37

would it be possible to test the following things on Tejas, when in flight, without unnecessary risks

1. Redundancy of the FBW by making the primary systems fail
2. Creating a high EW environment and checking the survivability of the craft (just below the point the electronics get fried)
3. Simulated SAM and AAM attacks and the response/success rate (again under high electronic clutter)
4. Simulated partial communication and navigational blackouts
5. Combinations of the above during a night flight.

It would be wise to fortify these systems and their backups before putting it to an actual combat - or before upgrading to Mk-II.

SaiK · Post by **SaiK** » 05 Mar 2009 19:47

good thoughts there kailash.. i wish they can do this on a UCAV that would be more easier than with a piloted LCA.

jaladipc · Post by **jaladipc** » 05 Mar 2009 19:51

It would be great if they test the desi made ejection seat.Like live testing the ejection and spare an aircraft itself.

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 05 Mar 2009 20:18

Kailash wrote:would it be possible to test the following things on Tejas, when in flight, without unnecessary risks

1. Redundancy of the FBW by making the primary systems fail
2. Creating a high EW environment and checking the survivability of the craft (just below the point the electronics get fried)
3. Simulated SAM and AAM attacks and the response/success rate (again under high electronic clutter)
4. Simulated partial communication and navigational blackouts
5. Combinations of the above during a night flight.

It would be wise to fortify these systems and their backups before putting it to an actual combat - or before upgrading to Mk-II.

Some of this can be done on the ground.

The reason all the test pilots - starting from the first flight (and even before the first flight - in the F-16 test bed flown by Rakesh Sharma) using LCA software insisted that the aircraft flew just like the simulator was because a LOT of homework goes into the simulation. So when it is tested in the air - there are no surprises.

I would have thought that the questions you have asked, while valid - are "no brainers" in that anyone who is working on this will realise that these are obvious things to be tested.

Also, with regard to your point number 4 - you haven't read Air Marshal Rajkumar's book have you? You can still buy it online and have it shipped to you via BR. Kapil has taken over that responsibility.

Kailash · Post by **Kailash** » 05 Mar 2009 21:12

shiv wrote:I would have thought that the questions you have asked, while valid - are "no brainers" in that anyone who is working on this will realise that these are obvious things to be tested.

Also, with regard to your point number 4 - you haven't read Air Marshal Rajkumar's book have you? You can still buy it online and have it shipped to you via BR. Kapil has taken over that responsibility.

True, many of this would have been tested on the ground, risk free. If simulators and ground tests can completely account for the actual thing, then it should be fine. OTOH,with the Sukhois, Migs and ground based assets, it should not be very difficult to simulate such an environment for the real. Because imho, that is the closest Tejas would come to a war-like scenario in the near future. It would be a checkpoint before finalizing the mk-II - revalidating the technologies and if necessary improving on them, instead of assuming they would work.

I am just someone with basic mechanics and fluids background, with a lot more questions than answers

More of an enthusiast than a "brainer". Would try to get the suggested book, thanks.

SanjibGhosh · Post by **SanjibGhosh** » 05 Mar 2009 21:51

http://www.flightglobal.com/articles/20 ... radar.html

India's Tejas could get Israeli radar
By Arie Egozi

The Indian air force could equip its Aeronautical Development Agency Tejas light combat aircraft with an off-the-shelf Israeli-made radar until a local version is manufactured.

Israel Aerospace Industries' subsidiary Elta Systems last year began talks with Indian companies that are involved in an effort to develop an indigenous radar for the Tejas, with the discussions linked to Elta's active electronically scanned array EL/M-2052.

India's defence ministry has appointed Hindustan Aeronautics to co-ordinate the effort, as the company has a wider co-operation agreement in place with IAI.

New Delhi's indigenous multimode radar programme has run into difficulties because of the technologies linked to it.

lta is completing the development of its EL/M-2052 system with a prototype being test flown using an IAI-owned Boeing 737 testbed. Elta claims that the long-range AESA fire control system is capable of detecting 64 targets, and of simultaneously engaging "several" using radar-guided missiles.

For ground surveillance, the design is capable of generating high-resolution synthetic aperture radar imagery and of detecting moving surface targets, and can also be used to support maritime surveillance tasks, says Elta.

Kartik · Post by **Kartik** » 05 Mar 2009 22:46

jaladipc wrote:It would be great if they test the desi made ejection seat.Like live testing the ejection and spare an aircraft itself.

the current prototypes are all using a Martin Baker seat. regarding testing of ejection seats, its mostly not done on a fighter while its flying, but rather on a rocket assisted cockpit mockup on the ground, which is running on rails, so that the wind-blast that hits the dummy is somewhat representative of the real thing (subsonic ejection). The only 2 ejection seats that I know of which have had successful supersonic ejections was a K-36M and an ACES II ..

kobe · Post by **kobe** » 06 Mar 2009 00:27

jaladipc wrote:It would be great if they test the desi made ejection seat.Like live testing the ejection and spare an aircraft itself.

both medha patkar and arundhoti roy were unavailable for the test,
no sooner does one of them become available, the test will be conducted.

it is likely that the desi seat will not function correctly during the first two tests, the nitrous oxide cannister has not been filled to right pressure under the ejection seat

SaiK · Post by **SaiK** » 06 Mar 2009 01:08

on 2052s.. the issues remain.. in that it needs to support weapons delivery of Indian, French and Russian origin. what plans? wouldn't that take more time?

2052 means, forcing LCA-MMR to become LCA-MMR-AESA even before its birth, cause once ported, why would IAF go back on the technology specs.

KrishG · Post by **KrishG** » 06 Mar 2009 02:41

SaiK wrote:on 2052s.. the issues remain.. in that it needs to support weapons delivery of Indian, French and Russian origin. what plans? wouldn't that take more time?

2052 means, forcing LCA-MMR to become LCA-MMR-AESA even before its birth, cause once ported, why would IAF go back on the technology specs.

It's said that Elta has specifically designed 2052 for Tejas. Think about it! There are no takers for it and the only market is for Tejas (of course US refused to allow for it to be used on F-16 Sufas)

I think Elta are trying their best to woo the Indians towards 2052 (no objections because it's very good). All f the first 20 batch of fighters and trainers will have the MMR (advanced derivative of 2032).

I think we should see 2052 on Mk-2 because we have a long history of not completing projects on time (that even applies to Mk-2 itself). As I know, India is the only taker of Israeli airborne radars (not that they are bad)

If Elta wasn't confident of the sale of 2052 to India, they wouldn't have tested it for compatibility. The only reason we can see why Elta has moved so far in 2052 is that it's confident that India will buy it. Because Sufas or Turkish F-16s aren't goin to be allowed to use them!

vasu_ray · Post by **vasu_ray** » 06 Mar 2009 12:11

vsunder, would the cloak technology enable a pod or a missile to simulate the radar signature of aircraft that IAF chooses? how is it different from "software based stealth" that Rafale claims to be? modulate the influx current and generate radar reflection waveforms in real time?

Arya Sumantra · Post by **Arya Sumantra** » 06 Mar 2009 18:45

May not be the same but one is reminded of Anti-sound which I read about in Nelkon & Parker's Physics in school days. In some air-conditioners, there is a sensor which analyses the vibration noise from interior of an air conditioner and then generates similar sound waves but 90 degress out of phase. Thus the anti-sound cancels the noise by Destructive-interference. Now does the Rafale use similar tech with EM waves from enemy's radar to achieve stealth?

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 06 Mar 2009 23:16

The LCA pic looks like a 25 lb practice bomb made by OFB

Link

vivek_ahuja · Post by **vivek_ahuja** » 06 Mar 2009 23:25

Arya Sumantra wrote:May not be the same but one is reminded of Anti-sound which I read about in Nelkon & Parker's Physics in school days. In some air-conditioners, there is a sensor which analyses the vibration noise from interior of an air conditioner and then generates similar sound waves but 90 degress out of phase. Thus the anti-sound cancels the noise by Destructive-interference. Now does the Rafale use similar tech with EM waves from enemy's radar to achieve stealth?

Don't know about the other uses of active noise cancellation, but that's what they are planning for the LCA pilot helmet to cancel out the ambient engine noise in the cockpit. Makes it easier to hear communications info over the R/T.

-Vivek

Virupaksha · Post by **Virupaksha** » 07 Mar 2009 01:43

Translating from eenadu
http://eenadu.net/story.asp?qry1=20&reccount=31

Tejas Successful in Weapons testing

The indigenously developed light combat aircraft, tejas was successful in the second stage of weapons testing. On thursday, while testing in the airforce base, the weapon dropped by tejas hits its target directly

Can any gurus explain what this second stage means

Arya Sumantra · Post by **Arya Sumantra** » 07 Mar 2009 01:46

vivek_ahuja wrote:
Arya Sumantra wrote:May not be the same but one is reminded of Anti-sound which I read about in Nelkon & Parker's Physics in school days. In some air-conditioners, there is a sensor which analyses the vibration noise from interior of an air conditioner and then generates similar sound waves but 90 degress out of phase. Thus the anti-sound cancels the noise by Destructive-interference. Now does the Rafale use similar tech with EM waves from enemy's radar to achieve stealth?
Don't know about the other uses of active noise cancellation, but that's what they are planning for the LCA pilot helmet to cancel out the ambient engine noise in the cockpit. Makes it easier to hear communications info over the R/T.

-Vivek

Can a radar jammer in loop with other devices be modified for active radar signal cancellation to render a plane stealth?

JMT

sum · Post by **sum** » 07 Mar 2009 10:56

ravi_ku wrote: Can any gurus explain what this second stage means

Would assume that it is the second round of weapons trials. The first round(with a 25 lb bomb) was done a few days before the Arero India-09.

SanjibGhosh · Post by **SanjibGhosh** » 07 Mar 2009 11:31

http://www.indianexpress.com/news/a-fil ... ky/432012/

A film to highlight IAF’s prowess in sky

More importantly, the film is the first one commissioned by the IAF that includes a glimpse of the indigenously-developed Tejas Light Combat Aircraft.

The Tejas is being developed by the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) and has given rise to much scepticism in the IAF during its development stage. Predictably, the Tejas features at the very end of the film for a short duration as compared to the already-inducted fighter planes like Mirage 2000H, MiG 29 and MiG21bis.

ChandraS · Post by **ChandraS** » 07 Mar 2009 12:52

sum wrote:
ravi_ku wrote: Can any gurus explain what this second stage means
Would assume that it is the second round of weapons trials. The first round(with a 25 lb bomb) was done a few days before the Arero India-09.

Correction - The first round was to drop 3 kg (7 lb) bombs. Someone here had said they are the most difficult to handle and mastering them implies a very good understanding of the ballistics and a robust computer system for dropping such bombs

m mittal · Post by **m mittal** » 07 Mar 2009 13:20

Hi Guys

I know I am being a bit pessimistic but just imagine if LCA Tejas comes across some sort of accident; what would happen to already much delayed project.

No country who has made a plane did without an accident. So either we have to get everything right the 1st time or be ready for further delays.

I would wish it is former and not latter.

KrishG · Post by **KrishG** » 07 Mar 2009 14:10

m mittal wrote:Hi Guys

I know I am being a bit pessimistic but just imagine if LCA Tejas comes across some sort of accident; what would happen to already much delayed project.

No country who has made a plane did without an accident. So either we have to get everything right the 1st time or be ready for further delays.

I would wish it is former and not latter.

Actually Gripen crashed on it's first test flight.
Ofcourse, after so many delays any more delays due to whatever reasons are unacceptable.

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 07 Mar 2009 14:22

m mittal wrote:Hi Guys

I know I am being a bit pessimistic but just imagine if LCA Tejas comes across some sort of accident; what would happen to already much delayed project.

No country who has made a plane did without an accident. So either we have to get everything right the 1st time or be ready for further delays.

I would wish it is former and not latter.

An accident per se is not the end of the program. We hope and pray that no accidents occur - but they do.

Dileep · Post by **Dileep** » 07 Mar 2009 14:55

I know I am being a bit pessimistic but just imagine if LCA Tejas comes across some sort of accident; what would happen to already much delayed project.

Mittal, do us a favour. Go to a mirror, and inspect your tongue under bright light.

If you see any blemish/dark spot, immediately go to your favourite shiv temple (the doc's home is fine) and do 108 sayana pradakshina, chanting

Kara charana krutam vaak kaayajam karmajam vaa
shravan naya najam vaa maanasam vaaparaadham
vihita maavihitam vaa sarvametat shamasva
jai jai karunabdhe shri maha deva shambho.

A slap across the back of the head is the standard prescription for kids saying such things. Adults need stronger means.