LCA News and Discussions, 22-Oct-2013

srai · Post by **srai** » 02 Sep 2014 13:56

Not everything can be privatised effectively. Some examples where public sector are required are building of national infrastructure, research & development of critical technologies, and providing affordable education and healthcare. While much of this work can be/are sub-contracted to private sector, private enterprises are generally better in projects that are much narrower in scope and ones with good ROI.

member_28108 · Post by **member_28108** » 02 Sep 2014 18:23

It is made to look as if people in DRDo are sitting and hatching eggs- Trust me I ahve seen them struggle against a lot of odds.Imagine how difficult it is to function when on one hand you are asked to do work and on another hand the hand that feeds you is trying to pull your efforts down too. Imagine having people like Mulayam Singh Yadav as Raksha Mantri and others trying to jsut fill their coffers. Of course there are problems but do not forget that the onbes who work hard really toil and have to face difficulties for eg - forcing to "outsource" and the "imported" team leads keep changing every few months with disturbance of continuity and frankly sometimes the outsourced work needs to be redone by the team again. I know of one case where the code for one "outsourced " piece of software was finally written again completely by the local team as they were frustrated with what happened and it was painful to get "manuals" done.

If Modi is monitoring this - this needs to be urgently attended to.manpower needs to be on a continuous available basis for projects. get accountable people and pay them well.There are enough patriotic people ready to do the work if they are given enough recognition and not have to worry about money etc etc that turns the brilliant away .Best thing - give incentives and give competing teams projects with rewards both monetary and social on achieving targets and see how things chug.As far as the army and airforce - they must be made to stick to their requirements and not keep a shifting post - that has to be in a future version- we must walk before we can run.

tsarkar · Post by **tsarkar** » 02 Sep 2014 18:43

srai wrote:Not everything can be privatised effectively.

This precisely indicates the mindset of the establishment. Opening up a sector to all Indians does not equate to privatization. In all my earlier posts, I never once used the word "private".

A publicly listed company is owned by shareholders and not subject to the whims & fancies of a owner. It is subject to corporate governance under Companies Act enforced by Ministry of Corporate Affairs, its financing by SEBI and its activities by other regulators.

FWIW, military aviation in India started privately with Walchand Hirachand partnering with erstwhile Mysore State under its Diwan Sir Ismail Mirza to establish HAL in partnership with Curtis Wright to assemble & overhaul P35 & P40 fighters for USAAF in China-Burma-India Theatre. The famed Flying Tigers used HAL assembled/overhauled fighters.

srai wrote:Some examples where public sector are required are building of national infrastructure, research & development of critical technologies

Now that's a very 70's socialist statement that any organization other than government wont take defence or R&D projects because they wont make profits. Defence industry is profitable, which is why companies want to get into it. And loads of money is pumped into Indian DPSU's that waste it like a sieve.

Since you spoke of National Infrastructure, on the ground, roads and dams are built by Indian Organizations. Ports and shipyards are built by Indian Organizations. State Owned shipyards like HSL collapsed under their cholesterol. Indian Railways is opening up. In Civil Aviation, the most profitable airline is a private airline. The only state owned airlines is running huge losses. MRO of the entire civil aviation fleet is private.

Please do give specific reasons why any Indian Organization cannot design or build ships or submarines or aircraft or missile. Otherwise, its a classic case of holier-than-thou Indians preventing India & Indians from growing.

NRao · Post by **NRao** » 02 Sep 2014 19:07

This precisely indicates the mindset of the establishment. Opening up a sector to all Indians does not equate to privatization. In all my earlier posts, I never once used the word "private".

To a great extent I agree.

A publicly listed company is owned by shareholders and not subject to the whims & fancies of a owner. It is subject to corporate governance under Companies Act enforced by Ministry of Corporate Affairs, its financing by SEBI and its activities by other regulators.

In addition, such non-government companies will have to establish a "secured" environment. Many a times spinning off companies to ensure that the resources from non-secure and secure entities do not mingle, forget outsiders. They should have totally different emails, etc, etc, etc. Nothing is shared.

Karan M · Post by **Karan M** » 02 Sep 2014 19:59

tsarkar wrote:What you exhaustively posted is just creating a supplier base for existing programs or offsets from foreign purchases. That is equivalent to NREGA or Food Security Bill from a aviation or shipbuilding industry perspective.

While NREGA builds village infrastructure, does it lead to massive national infrastructure building like roads, dams, power plants, etc? No.

Oh please. The comparison is pointless. The supplier list above is exactly what is required to build large scale worldclass programs irrespective of whether the designer or integrator is private or public. Otherwise, be like some of the new "Indian" mobile firms, with an Indian label outside and everything within imported and even designed/supplied by a chinese ODM as they know what is available from the suppliers and achievable limits.

geeth · Post by **geeth** » 02 Sep 2014 20:12

I don't think privatisation is the panacea for the problems plaguing the defence industry in india. There are multiple reasons for the sorry state of affairs.

1. The technical education system in India promote more of theoretical work with very little emphasis on encouraging engineering solutions with the result that those who pass out may become great scientists but most of them dont have the required engineering skills. This is true of those working in both private and public enterprises. The blame goes to the technical education system in the country. That is why the private industry is also not able to make cutting edge world class products even when they have the freedom.

2. Many Govt labs have great talent in theoretical research and they are world clsss in many areas of research. Again they fail to produce any worthy products because of the inability to translate results of research into useful products. In the case of private industry, they lack both in research as well as prodyuct devevopment. Reason is partly due to attitude and partly due to lack of incentive or in some case outright discouragement directly or indirevtly from Govt side.

For the situation to improve, Govt has to take initiative to address these basic issues and build up national talent pool before considering hiving off military production to private industry. If not, what willhappen is something like Tatra truck deal. Crooks will enter into JVs with foreign entities to capture business and country will be made to look like a sucker again.

Build up human skills, set up adequate test facilities, invest in improving engineering standards, insist on quality and facilitate a congenial environment for investment to flourish, and give a free hand to govt labs. Then we can talk of private manufacture of Defence eqipment. Or else stop gap arrangements as is now would continue. I would like to see the Govt labs take up basic research and private industry do the engineering / product development and subsequent manufacture.

tsarkar · Post by **tsarkar** » 02 Sep 2014 21:46

I'm not sure why posters are incorrectly inferring that I'm promoting privatization, or that I'm against DRDO/DPSU.

What I'm against is control. What I'm against is only one way of doing things. What I'm against is a relatively few people (military+bureaucrat+technocrat) deciding how military development in India should be undertaken. Defence of a nation is the nation's responsibility, and let the entire nation participate.

There are many ways of doing things, and the nation should explore every way of doing things, and most importantly, keep discovering newer ways of doing things.

Open the industry to the nation, irrespective of ownership structure, as long as it is Indian, there is strong corporate governance and national interests are well protected.

Let anyone who wants to design an artillery or aircraft design, do so, irrespective whether he learns/copies/ToT/begs/borrows/steals it. Let the service decide whether the design is fit for the purpose.

Let whosoever wants to build, build it as long as its actually built and not white labeled or assembled. Let the service decide whether its fit for the purpose.

If the service doesn't want it, then allow its export. If IA doesn't want Arjun, then export it. Let it stand on the global arena on its own feet and on its own merit.

But unless we open up and give up control or only one way of doing things, we will not gain the critical mass to go nuclear. We'll still remain linear.

Karan M · Post by **Karan M** » 02 Sep 2014 22:07

Nobody was arguing about not opening things up TSarkarji, but your example was completely off in that one bit. That's the only point of disagreement as far as my post is concerned.

Let me elaborate.

As matter of fact, the big reason why companies like TATA can now stand on their feet and claim they can deliver if things are opened up, is because they were brought into the Defence field by the "scientific lobby" using all sorts of loopholes & legerdemain, irrespective of the then GOIs love for PSUs. Kalam went from industrial house to house asking them to join hands in the IGMDP. This is the reason today Godrej & Boyce makes complex structures for the Brahmos.

Its also a matter of record that the LCA itself was intended to be helmed by the private sector as HAL washed its hands off the complexity, and the Tata's, and other industrial houses refused to take it up for much the same reasons & because they refused to park their money in something that was not even guaranteed orders. In the process, they took a low risk approach & HAL got back into the program as the manufacturer. To their credit (somewhat), many years later when the great Kalmadi tried his best to scuttle the program, Ratan Tata et al spoke up in support and helped the program continue.

So things are not black & white. As matter of fact, in the recent past, the entire Pvt sector "Raksha Udyog Ratna" proposal to create domestic chaebol style counterparts to the state DPSUs -BEL, HAL, BEML etc didn't face opposition just from the unions of the aforesaid DPSUs (their complaints were expected after all), but also faced a googly from the Army, which thought that this would merely create a cartel of large firms who would be difficult to handle as versus the SME/MSME groups who were supplying many items/lines of spares to the BRDs & IA itself.
In the meantime, IAF wanted the An32 replacement deal to go to the private sector, but it was sought to be scuppered by the unions using a then Minister's shoulders to fire a salvo.

This tells me there is no consistent national policy on how to proceed (or there wasnt).

Point is the situation has been pretty messed up because there was no firm coherence or planning on the matter amongst even the affected users, let alone the MOD (which should have done the most but did the least) & its actually the efforts of folks in the scientific/bureaucrats/armed forces who bypassed byzantine regulations and did whatever they could to salvage the situation & create the sort of ecosystem that exists today, where everything from rocket motors to onboard computers are being made by the private sector for strategic programs.

Ultimately, if private sector has to be brought on board, GOI has to do more to

a) fund the programs better at the start , pay for prototypes and also ensure speedy decisions (few private players can consistently park money on products which go through endless trials - arty farce being an example & a test case whether pvt sector will continue)

b ) also ensure a level playing field (Sarvatra going to BEML after a pvt firm did the heavy lifting with DRDO - simply biased & unfair and the St let everyone down with his decision)

c) the private selection process for large programs/partnership deals (as versus the SME/MSME suppliers above) has to be completely above board. I know of several cases where losing firms went public with really harsh allegations of how they were bypassed for "other private players" in the past eight years, for the wrong reasons. Even if merely rumors and carping, this stuff needs to be managed carefully as all it takes is one large scam for the media to go berserk and all our efforts will go waste.

d) SMEs/MSMEs need to be protected and funded carefully by the MOD. Instead they have been ignored & only the DRDO/DPSU outsourcing has kept them ticking - several other countries regard their SMEs as a national treasure. India's industrial policy under the Saint et al has been non existent.

Karan M · Post by **Karan M** » 02 Sep 2014 22:28

Another big issue is of funds. In the past 8 years, under PC-nomics, even the DPSUs took their notional profits and sent it back as dividends to the GOI - a big farce, and R&D/Capex plans all took a hit. Whither HALs plans to invest billions in its infra & R&D?
Much the same is faced by the private sector who lack even the cushion of the state.
A standard grouse one got to hear from the big OEMs who had to transfer offsets to India was the paucity of partners who would pay for the kind of infra offsets require. So far only a few big names, TATA, Mahindra, L&T have stepped up. But this also means many of the smaller firms lost out & there was no vision or even coherence in the MOD/MOF to create a fund which could sponsor such funding for the smaller firms. Saints reliance on CAG/CBI meant that no bureaucrat would take any radical decisions either lest he be accused of funding a private firm.

In the process, DRDO and some DPSU heads used program funds & large programs (eg Su-30 MKI) to transfer funding/TOT to the private firms. A DRDO head paid the price and was tarred & feathered for parking funds in private players to develop capability.

Sadly, the order of the day in the UPA was headless direction under Shri AKA.

srai · Post by **srai** » 03 Sep 2014 08:48

Karan, great posts as usual.

Karan M wrote:... So far only a few big names, TATA, Mahindra, L&T have stepped up. But this also means many of the smaller firms lost out & there was no vision or even coherence in the MOD/MOF to create a fund which could sponsor such funding for the smaller firms. ...

I think that is what is lost to many people when they talk about privatisation. They don't think about the SMEs but only of the big conglomerates like TATA, L&T and Mahindra. But the reality is SMEs employ the most number of people collectively.

geeth · Post by **geeth** » 03 Sep 2014 10:59

I couldn't post everything I wanted to, since I was typing from my Mobile phone. So, hear are the est..

Why do we have to have "National missions" for developing not so high tech items like a 1500 HP Diesel Engine for MBT? Kirloskar is making Pielstick Diesels for decades under Licence. What is their inhouse R&D effort towards manufacturing a genuine Kirloskar Product? Even for their generator Prime Movers they depend on Cummins and other foreign brands. To my knowledge there are not many diesel engines of Indian design in the market except the 5HP Prime movers of agricultural pumpsets. This after more than a century since the diesel engines were invented. Everything is produced under licence.

Take the case of electro-mechanical actuators for LCA..Years back, one of the scientists involved was saying that the item was being supplied by some Yugoslavian company and they were in search of some Indian company who could make it here. Now I hear DRDO has set up a dedicated facility for these actuators in Hyderabad and they are producing world class products.. Why no private manufacturer is not involved is anybody's guess.

Two weeks back I had visited a small firm for some requirements of Stanless steel spring. It is an obscure unit with an old man sitting in front and older machines. His son later told (and showed) springs being manufactured for HVF Avadi. Small MS springs, but the order is for about a lakh pieces. Nothing wrong, but the quality of the product from that machine will have its own limitations. How did he get the order? Because he was the cheapest ofcourse - This is another big problem - Govt organisations have to purchase the cheapest, even if it is for the cutting edge cryogenic engine. Plus there are issues of promoting small scale industry, curruption etc etc.

In many public organisations the ratio of 80/20 is in vogue - i.e., 20% does most of the work and 80% are deadwood. Amongst scientists, it is even worse..a handful of them do the cutting edge research and there are no percolation of ideas down stream. Indians are notorious for lack of teamwork and this is all the more true amongst scientists. Some of them excel because in their individual efforts, teamwork is hardly necessary and it is actively discouraged also. Some of the senior scientists grab all the funds and glory, and they treat junior scientists like professors treating their students in institutes. Giving youngsters a more free hand would help in improving the results IMO.

A change in attitude amongst private Industry Titans would do a lot of good to the Indian Industry in the field of R&D. Most of them are out to make a quick buck, and we can't blame them beyond a point. Their first concern is to recover the money invested and they are not sure about favourable business environment. It is for these reasons most of the industry look for short term gains instead of investing in long term prospects p Diesel Engine manufacturing is a prime example - Govt policies change according to the whims and fancies of few politicians and the leader of a particular industrial sector or some business houses. Adhochism is what is affecting the performance of Indian Industry.

There is only one way out - invest heavily in the basic infrastructure to create a conducive atmosphre for the business to flourish, whether private or public. Hopefully, if this Govt takes some positive measures in this direction, we can expect some results in a few years. Ultil then, delays and blame game will be the order of the day.

NRao · Post by **NRao** » 03 Sep 2014 11:06

National missions

Too many engineering courses and none in psychology and such. All it means is, IF it succeeds, then it is me, if it fails it is you and do not mention my name. Risk management.

Games.

rkhanna · Post by **rkhanna** » 03 Sep 2014 11:11

I think that is what is lost to many people when they talk about privatisation. They don't think about the SMEs but only of the big conglomerates like TATA, L&T and Mahindra. But the reality is SMEs employ the most number of people collectively.

While as a general statement that might be true i disagree with it. There are a number of SME's in the country who are flourishing under the MoD. Do not want to disclose my job description but a significant number of SME's are doing great (and looking to get acquired by the Majors mentioned above due to scaling up issues, etc).

Alot of DRDO "developed" tech is actually not. They are marketed by DRDO to the services under a partnership (with extremely limited IP sharing) with these SME's.

DRDO provides them facilities to test their products as they know military requirements best and fine tune prototypes (young kids out of IIT's etc get lost in their own thought process without understanding mil standards) and the tie up with DRDO allows them to by pass tendering process, etc and come with the DRDO chapa which is much more palatable for the armed forces.

Alot of start-ups in India face significant capital crunch as Defence Related Investments are Extremely HIGH risk with longer gestated revenue cycles. So while you maybe PAT positive your cashflow (working capital) gets impacted. Policy delays, Tendering delays, elections can play havoc. However this looks to be changing. Department of Science and Technology is actually now willing to give Loans at 5% Interest!!! (with caveats ofcourse) to help these SME's out as they have created value over the past few years.

A TATA/L&T/Mahindra comes with a quality chapa and Scale that is of comfort to the military and hence is far easier to market. These companies also have access to MoD on a political level and clout which makes it far easier to navigate the corridors of power but i have seen a number of SME's eclipse them in pure R&D and are looking to get acquired by them (or are already getting)

P Chitkara · Post by **P Chitkara** » 03 Sep 2014 11:44

Very interesting and informative insights. Made me almost forget I was in the LCA thread.

Rien · Post by **Rien** » 03 Sep 2014 14:42

P Chitkara wrote:Very interesting and informative insights. Made me almost forget I was in the LCA thread.

Jingos get philosophical and want to fix the problems we see year, after year. I do think privatization and opening up to all comers in R & D and production is the key. Look at what China has done, Brar linked this.

http://www.airbus.com/company/worldwide ... -in-china/

Brazil has succeeded very well with Embraer. And we do have the very start of this process, based on much maligned offsets which are vital for the aerospace industry.

http://businesstoday.intoday.in/story/p ... /5733.html

That could change in future. Boeing India said in February that it saw $80 billion worth of business from India in the defence and civil aviation sectors over the next 10 years. Of this, civil aviation - besides Air India, it counts Jet Airways and SpiceJet as customers- alone would make up $50 billion. Boeing has already outsourced gun bay doors and wire harness system for its F-18 Super Hornet fighter jets to HAL, and its Head for Integrated Defense Systems in India Vivek Lall said he expects his company's offset liabilities in India to be between $7 billion and $12 billion in the next decade.

Asia is one of the largest markets for helicopters as well. We are located exactly where the most amount of money is spent on aerospace, and yet we don't currently have a product in every category. What we have right now.

Tejas, Saras,Dhruv.LCH, Sukhoi Superjet,PAKFA,MTA

But we are very weak in engines, which means 1/3rd of the cost of the plane is spent on imports. We could export Tejas on a worldwide scale if it had Kaveri. Most countries that would buy the Gripen would prefer a cheaper fighter that comes minus all the terms and conditions that any US gear must have.

Looking at the worldwide market for fighters, there is no real competition for the Tejas. The Gripen isn't even in the running, due to its US engine. The Chinese fighter is just a modern Mig-21. This is our chance to produce the modern equivalent of the F-16 and Mig-21. And we don't even have any competition.

With Astra and Sudarshan, and LIFT we can we provide the full package of support, training, and weapons. Vietnam, and various other friendly countries could be our market. Even the EU would want to replace their obsolete 4th generation fighters, and the Typhoon/Rafale are too expensive for a 1:1 replacement.

Vashishtha · Post by **Vashishtha** » 03 Sep 2014 15:35

Tejas, Saras,Dhruv.LCH, Sukhoi Superjet,PAKFA,MTA

I was under the impression that the Saras project was put in cold-storage/discontinued...

rakall · Post by **rakall** » 03 Sep 2014 15:46

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en"><p>Air Marshal SBP Sinha AVSM,VM Deputy Chief of Air Staff flew the Tejas trainer at HAL airport in Bangalore today. <a href="http://t.co/lqVTS2NBkU">pic.twitter.com ... BkU</a></p>— Anantha Krishnan M (@akxpress) <a href="https://twitter.com/akxpress/status/507 ... >September 3, 2014</a></blockquote>
<script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

merlin · Post by **merlin** » 03 Sep 2014 17:47

rakall wrote:<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en"><p>Air Marshal SBP Sinha AVSM,VM Deputy Chief of Air Staff flew the Tejas trainer at HAL airport in Bangalore today. <a href="http://t.co/lqVTS2NBkU">pic.twitter.com ... BkU</a></p>— Anantha Krishnan M (@akxpress) <a href="https://twitter.com/akxpress/status/507 ... >September 3, 2014</a></blockquote>
<script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

So that must have been the Tejas that I saw flying at 10.50 AM today.

chackojoseph · Post by **chackojoseph** » 03 Sep 2014 18:29

DRDO release
Deputy Chief of Air Staff Flies Tejas

Bhaskar_T · Post by **Bhaskar_T** » 04 Sep 2014 15:25

Everything good except the article pointing to FOC next year (no source mentioned though).

BANGALORE: The indigenous Light Combat Aircraft (LCA) Tejas programme got a shot in the arm on Wednesday when the Indian Air Force (IAF) deputed a senior officer to fly the aircraft.

Military sources told Express that Air Marshal S B P Sinha, Deputy Chief of Air Staff, who was on a two-day visit to Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd (HAL) and Aeronautical Development Agency (ADA) facilities in the city, flew the trainer version of Tejas. Sinha visited HAL and ADA to review the programme, which is heading towards Final Operational Clearance (FOC).

The idea to fly a senior IAF official was to give him a first-hand feel of the aircraft. “Every pilot has praised the handling capabilities of Tejas. During the debriefing session, the Air Marshal expressed satisfaction over the aircraft’s capabilities both on the ground and in the air,” an official said.

Since the Initial Operational Clearance of Tejas, the project has been reviewed regularly by the Ministry of Defence officials in their attempt to avoid further slippages. Both HAL, ADA and other agencies in the project are now gearing up for the FOC, expected next year.

http://www.newindianexpress.com/cities/ ... 414072.ece

member_28108 · Post by **member_28108** » 04 Sep 2014 23:58

FOC is not as easy- Politicians ask for timestamp of some date but procurement's for additional items are easier said than done when the scientists have to deal with bureaucracy .

SaiK · Post by **SaiK** » 05 Sep 2014 00:06

scientists have to deal with bureaucracy should not be a whine for non-delivery. bring it out, and let us take it to PMO. there are limits and thresholds to corruption. we have to nip it when push comes to shove. i think we have a new gov, that would take this matter seriously..

unless of course these scientists are hiding under bureaucratic setup for their failures.

member_26622 · Post by **member_26622** » 05 Sep 2014 04:15

chackojoseph wrote:DRDO release
Deputy Chief of Air Staff Flies Tejas

WOW - Does this mean that IAF chief has not flown a Tejas so far? He went to France for Rafale joy ride but not willing to go for a ride in Tejas?

Is this a class issue?

Light class LCA fighter - Deputy Air Chief flies vs. Medium class Rafale fighter - Air Chief flies

ADA, HAL and IAF camaraderie at its best!

chackojoseph · Post by **chackojoseph** » 05 Sep 2014 06:54

Nik

There is a need for certain level of confidence before you let the Air Chief fly it. Rafale is an aircraft on duty.If Tejas has been cleared for Dy Chief, its a huge confidence winning occasion. Principally, I agree with you.

NRao · Post by **NRao** » 05 Sep 2014 07:08

Wake me up when the French CAS flies the LCA. MK-I.

deejay · Post by **deejay** » 05 Sep 2014 12:29

nik wrote:
chackojoseph wrote:DRDO release
Deputy Chief of Air Staff Flies Tejas
WOW - Does this mean that IAF chief has not flown a Tejas so far? He went to France for Rafale joy ride but not willing to go for a ride in Tejas?

Is this a class issue?

Light class LCA fighter - Deputy Air Chief flies vs. Medium class Rafale fighter - Air Chief flies

ADA, HAL and IAF camaraderie at its best!

No Sir, the Chief of IAF is a prisoner of his own designation. I am sure the Chief will jump at the opportunity to fly the Tejas. He would hardly be getting any flying now. Its the way things are.

JayS · Post by **JayS** » 05 Sep 2014 18:56

chackojoseph wrote:Nik

There is a need for certain level of confidence before you let the Air Chief fly it. Rafale is an aircraft on duty.If Tejas has been cleared for Dy Chief, its a huge confidence winning occasion. Principally, I agree with you.

Not making an issue about why no Air Chief didn't fly Tejas so far. But on the point you made about confidence:

Tejas is been flown by bunch of IAF pilots for over a decade now, without any incidence. I am sure CAOS wouldn't be (or wouldn't need to be) doing 9G manoeuvres or some fancy "air show" stuff with the LCA. Its more like a symbolic gesture, isn't it?? If a decade long flying experience of IAF boys cannot instill confidence in CAOS's mind for some docile symbolic flight, then what would??

member_28108 · Post by **member_28108** » 05 Sep 2014 19:09

nik wrote:
chackojoseph wrote:DRDO release
Deputy Chief of Air Staff Flies Tejas
WOW - Does this mean that IAF chief has not flown a Tejas so far? He went to France for Rafale joy ride but not willing to go for a ride in Tejas?

Is this a class issue?

Light class LCA fighter - Deputy Air Chief flies vs. Medium class Rafale fighter - Air Chief flies

ADA, HAL and IAF camaraderie at its best!

Do you really think that they will allow the chief of staff to fly a plane that is under development ?

member_28108 · Post by **member_28108** » 05 Sep 2014 19:11

nileshjr wrote:
chackojoseph wrote:Nik

There is a need for certain level of confidence before you let the Air Chief fly it. Rafale is an aircraft on duty.If Tejas has been cleared for Dy Chief, its a huge confidence winning occasion. Principally, I agree with you.
Not making an issue about why no Air Chief didn't fly Tejas so far. But on the point you made about confidence:

Tejas is been flown by bunch of IAF pilots for over a decade now, without any incidence. I am sure CAOS wouldn't be (or wouldn't need to be) doing 9G manoeuvres or some fancy "air show" stuff with the LCA. Its more like a symbolic gesture, isn't it?? If a decade long flying experience of IAF boys cannot instill confidence in CAOS's mind for some docile symbolic flight, then what would??

they ahve been making coninuous and incremental changes.They will not allow either the chief of staff or the prime minister or president to fly in it.Simple this is a commonly followed rule for many such things in development.

Kersi D · Post by **Kersi D** » 05 Sep 2014 19:14

NRao wrote:Wake me up when the French CAS flies the LCA. MK-I.

Good Night Mr Rip van Winkle

SaiK · Post by **SaiK** » 05 Sep 2014 19:37

FOC delays happen only when we have feedback from users seeking changes or upgrades. This is the same reason raptor walas and jassoos wala of the khaan land went to capability based engineering route. focus on certain areas of testing and acceptance, and get done with it. but for that, we need the stage - 1. ie, the core basic platform. the massans had the f-16 as the formiddable platform to try out. we have only the prototypes of LCA. so, FOC delays should not be a concern but an information of progress. of course that also mean, that our lab boys were very rudimentary in their demonstration rather looking at from user centric designs. i think these lessons must be transferred to mk2.

deejay · Post by **deejay** » 05 Sep 2014 20:42

September is the month for the delivery of the first LCA to IAF. Hope it happens.

abhik · Post by **abhik** » 05 Sep 2014 21:15

^^^
Yup, the roll out of SP-1 is what is really important now, a few months delay in the FoC will hardly matter.

Asit P · Post by **Asit P** » 06 Sep 2014 02:13

HAL gets a pat on the back

Chief of air staff Air Chief Marshal Arup Raha, on Friday appreciated efforts of defence PSU Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) in establishing the state-of-the-art Iron Bird facility at its Aircraft Research and Design Centre (ARDC).

"It is a unique facility and an asset to the LCA Tejas programme," HAL chairman R K Tyagi said, adding that Raha 'appreciated the joint team efforts of HAL and other agencies that has resulted in completion of more than 14,370 hours of rigorous software testing of the aircraft.

The facility allows for an integrity test for the flight control system for statically unstable aircraft such as LCA and very few countries in the world have access to such testing platform.

Iron Bird is the final platform where all the issues of LCA Tejas flight control systems are resolved to ensure safety of the flight.

chackojoseph · Post by **chackojoseph** » 06 Sep 2014 07:15

prasannasimha wrote: they ahve been making coninuous and incremental changes.They will not allow either the chief of staff or the prime minister or president to fly in it.Simple this is a commonly followed rule for many such things in development.

Very well put. Majority of the time it flew it flew with a new requirement. Why risk Air Chief in it?

SaiK · Post by **SaiK** » 06 Sep 2014 08:51

nice to know on ironbird.. hopefully they have FBL testing with FBW as backup/fallback and test setup especially to handle inter-operating and integrating aspects of various components (COTS) that we source can be tested and as we mature, we can see huge cost reduction if we had to do every r&d on a TD or prototype platform.

can we get more information on the facility?

deejay · Post by **deejay** » 06 Sep 2014 08:58

Asit P wrote:HAL gets a pat on the back

This is good.

The IAF Chief complements HAL. A sign of better times ahead?

merlin · Post by **merlin** » 06 Sep 2014 10:48

deejay wrote:September is the month for the delivery of the first LCA to IAF. Hope it happens.

It was June earlier. Missed. Now September. Will be missed as well.

Kartik · Post by **Kartik** » 06 Sep 2014 12:18

I find it quite amusing to see HAL publicising such a facility as the Iron Bird Rig. The rig has been around for more than 2 decades and is a nearly mandatory facility for a program such as the LCA. So what if thousands of hours of software validation work was done on it? Concentrate on meeting timelines and publicise such things- how they met the bloody deadlines for once, rather than releasing stupid snippets of a visit by an ACM.

deejay · Post by **deejay** » 06 Sep 2014 12:47

merlin ji, any source?