Indian Military Aviation

sanjaychoudhry · Post by **sanjaychoudhry** » 24 Sep 2008 03:32

India to develop regional transport aircraft

Cashing in on the boom in the civil aviation sector, India has embarked on its second project to develop an indigenous 70 to 110-seater regional transport aircraft within six years, a defence official said Tuesday.At a meeting chaired by Defence Minister A.K. Antony here Tuesday, it was decided to undertake the project with foreign collaboration, with state-owned Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd. playing the anchor role.

“We are shortly sending Chandrayan-1 to the moon but we are still importing aircraft. India has the capability of developing the aircraft,” Antony told the meeting of experts.

The main aim of the project will be to come up with a “cheaper, rugged and easy to maintain” aircraft.

According to civil aviation ministry, India will require more than 1,200 aircraft by 2025 to meet the growing demands of various operators.

While the foreign collaborator has not yet been identified, it could be Brazil’s Embraer or China’s Avic, both of which manufacture regional transport aircraft. This is the second time India is venturing into the sector after an agreement with Russia to develop a medium transport aircraft that has both military and civilian applications.

“The proposed aircraft will have 70 to 110 seats and a range of 3,000 km. The aircraft will be developed keeping in mind the regional and domestic traffic,” a defence official said.

Estimated to cost Rs.40 billion, the aircraft will be developed within six years of the details being finalised.

“Most of the experts attending the meeting felt that the environmental performance of the aircraft in terms of carbon emissions and noise should meet international standards,” the official added.

A detailed project report will be prepared before the next meeting.

http://www.thaindian.com/newsportal/bus ... 99051.html

HAL, NAL plan 70-seater aircraft
http://www.hindu.com/2008/09/22/stories ... 971200.htm

Rahul M · Post by **Rahul M** » 24 Sep 2008 03:39

if they can manage it, it would be the perfect platform for CABS AEW&C.

Himanshu · Post by **Himanshu** » 24 Sep 2008 10:26

Agra is also the Home Base of the MARS sqd..

http://www.bharat-rakshak.com/IAF/Image ... sits/Agra/

NRao · Post by **NRao** » 24 Sep 2008 13:26

First oppertunity also to demonstarte C-130 and Ch-47s to IAF personnel during the exercise .

Are the 47s a done deal?

Heard about the 130 and attack Helos, but not yet about the 47s.

Himanshu · Post by **Himanshu** » 24 Sep 2008 15:16

47's a are vying for the Heavy Lift Chopper Tender to be floated soon..

Nitesh · Post by **Nitesh** » 24 Sep 2008 18:17

Not worried about US upgrading Pak F-16s: Air Force chief

New Delhi, Sep 24 (PTI) Amid reports that the US is upgrading Pakistan's F-16 fighter fleet, Indian Air Force chief Fali H Major today said the development was not very worrisome.
"Not very (worrisome)," he said when asked about the US proposal to upgrade the fleet of F-16 fighter aircraft it sold to Pakistan a few decades back.

The US has agreed to upgrade the Pakistan Air Force fleet of F-16 fighter aircraft at a cost of over USD 230 million, which will bring the aircraft to the the advanced Block 50/52 level, an advanced version of the F-16.

Major admitted that China had a better air force in terms of size and capability but said it would not be proper to compare it with the Indian Air Force.

"China has been ahead of us and has developed immense capabilities in aerospace and space technologies because of many other factors ... They have a different form of government, different form of judiciary and bureaucracy.

"It is difficult to compare China with a vibrant democracy like ours," the Air Chief Marshal said releasing the brochure on the 3rd International Conference on 'Energising Indian Aerospace Industry: New Partnerships, New Opportunities'.

On the the Indian private defence industry, Major said the indigenous industry needed to develop its capabilities to gain from the new defence procurement policy.

"The Indian industry has been found wanting in terms of capability and it would be difficult for it to absorb offsets that would worth over 15 to 20 per cent of the USD 100 billion being spent by the Defence Ministry in the next plan period," said Major. PTI

http://www.ptinews.com/pti/ptisite.nsf/ ... enDocument

sum · Post by **sum** » 24 Sep 2008 19:37

"Not very (worrisome)," he said when asked about the US proposal to upgrade the fleet of F-16 fighter aircraft it sold to Pakistan a few decades back.

Not sure as to why the journos keep asking this question to every IAF top boss they meet...What answer do they expect for the question as to whether we should be concerned about the F-16s?

HariC · Post by **HariC** » 24 Sep 2008 20:59

Himanshu wrote:Agra is also the Home Base of the MARS sqd..

http://www.bharat-rakshak.com/IAF/Image ... sits/Agra/

but neither the regular Il-76s nor the Mi-26s are based there

Sontu · Post by **Sontu** » 24 Sep 2008 23:00

HariC wrote:
Himanshu wrote:Agra is also the Home Base of the MARS sqd..

http://www.bharat-rakshak.com/IAF/Image ... sits/Agra/

but neither the regular Il-76s nor the Mi-26s are based there

Hari, I take back this sentance as "the Mi-26s are based at Agra" but i remeber i had read that IL-76 sqdns were placed there. Any way my objective was to find out answer for the question why the Venue is Agra.

Looks like USAF is bringing specially only those transport aircraft and helicopters which will be put in the future Indian transport and heli tenders.

1. Medium-lift Tender (Lockheed is fielding their C-130 in this tender)- USAF bringinging their C-130 for this Ex.
2. Hevy Lift Heli Tender (Boeing is fielding their CH-47 in this tender)- - USAF bringinging their Ch-47 for this Ex.
3. LOH Util Heli Tender (Bell is fielding their Bell-407 in this tender)- I think USAF bringinging the same Bell heli for this Ex.

Why not C-17 or C-5's or other helis are participating in this Ex ?

Also I too have a question..that who from IAF will be evaluating/field trials the MRCA crafts ...the best pilots we have from MKI's Rihno Sqdns ? who participated in Red-Flag recenly ? or some body else ?

Regards,

Regards,

narayana · Post by **narayana** » 26 Sep 2008 08:54

Pretty Intelligent Russians selling their junk with a new flashy brochure

http://www.zeenews.com/articles.asp?aid=471939&sid=NAT

IAF to procure MI-17 V5 choppers from Russia
The Indian Air Force is likely to add MI-17 V5 medium lift helicopters in its fleet as negotiations to procure them from Russia are in final stages, a senior IAF official said on Thursday.

http://livefist.blogspot.com/2008/08/pr ... irony.html

the Indian Air Force (IAF) is eager to induct into service a product that has already been declared a relic by its OEM. We are of course talking about the IAF’s plans to acquire 80 Mi-17V-5 medium-lift air-mobility/utility helicopters.

vivek_ahuja · Post by **vivek_ahuja** » 26 Sep 2008 11:07

narayana wrote:Pretty Intelligent Russians selling their junk with a new flashy brochure

http://www.zeenews.com/articles.asp?aid=471939&sid=NAT
IAF to procure MI-17 V5 choppers from Russia
The Indian Air Force is likely to add MI-17 V5 medium lift helicopters in its fleet as negotiations to procure them from Russia are in final stages, a senior IAF official said on Thursday.

http://livefist.blogspot.com/2008/08/pr ... irony.html
the Indian Air Force (IAF) is eager to induct into service a product that has already been declared a relic by its OEM. We are of course talking about the IAF’s plans to acquire 80 Mi-17V-5 medium-lift air-mobility/utility helicopters.

Don't get taken in too much by what these guys talk about. Look for actual facts in their report such as numbers ordered, time-lines etc but leave their analysis for a day when you are looking for humor. Put it simply, these guys are suffering from a case of brochuritis themselves.

Basically speaking, the Mi-8 with the 1500HP engines when replaced by Mi-17s with around 2200Hp engines will make a big difference in capability while maintaining fleet commonality. At high altitudes, they will be worth their weight in gold, allowing greater payload at given altitudes or otherwise allowing much greater service ceilings or sufficient maneuvering capability to evade enemy fire. For the price you cannot beat it.

Having said that, if a new helicopter type has to be inducted to replace the Mi-17 further down the line, then it should be an indigenous one, not a Russian one. For the moment I believe its a good decision to not go in for another helicopter type simply because it is in the market.

-Vivek

andy B · Post by **andy B** » 26 Sep 2008 11:25

Sontu wrote:

[/quote]

Also I too have a question..that who from IAF will be evaluating/field trials the MRCA crafts ...the best pilots we have from MKI's Rihno Sqdns ? who participated in Red-Flag recenly ? or some body else ?

Regards,

Regards,[/quote]

I would have to say that the pilots will probably be from TACDE these are the guru guys AFAIK. The Rhino pilots look quite young I am not saying that, looking young translates to inexperience however you would want pilots who have been on multiple types, have trained and developed tactics and strategies for the force in general to critically analyse everything about the MRCA candidates. For that they will probably go for these senior gurus and TACDE would be a ideal pool for that. Just my 2 cents....

vivek_ahuja · Post by **vivek_ahuja** » 26 Sep 2008 12:08

vivek_ahuja wrote:Don't get taken in too much by what these guys talk about. Look for actual facts in their report such as numbers ordered, time-lines etc but leave their analysis for a day when you are looking for humor. Put it simply, these guys are suffering from a case of brochuritis themselves.

Basically speaking, the Mi-8 with the 1500HP engines when replaced by Mi-17s with around 2200Hp engines will make a big difference in capability while maintaining fleet commonality. At high altitudes, they will be worth their weight in gold, allowing greater payload at given altitudes or otherwise allowing much greater service ceilings or sufficient maneuvering capability to evade enemy fire. For the price you cannot beat it.

Having said that, if a new helicopter type has to be inducted to replace the Mi-17 further down the line, then it should be an indigenous one, not a Russian one. For the moment I believe its a good decision to not go in for another helicopter type simply because it is in the market.

-Vivek

In relation to the above, I have posted a chart from the AHAPS program:

The terms in the chart:

Full ROC: Rate of Climb (the one you read about in brochures)
Combat ROC: 500ft/min (Minimum prescribed take-off requirement by most military forces in the world)
IGE: In Ground Effect (Power Requirement condition at take-off)
OP-CON: Operating Condition (One of several, such as IGE, OGE (Out of Ground Effect), Vertical Liftoff at Combat ROC, Rolling liftoff, Forward Flight etc)

NOTES:
a) all payload calculations assume a minimum range of 100 Km as a desired condition during optimization.
b) All calculations within 10-15% of actual values

-Vivek

Rahul M · Post by **Rahul M** » 26 Sep 2008 17:12

thanks vivek, could you explain what IGE means in case of choppers ?

vivek_ahuja · Post by **vivek_ahuja** » 26 Sep 2008 21:21

Rahul M wrote:thanks vivek, could you explain what IGE means in case of choppers ?

Rahul,

Ground Effect in helicopters is pretty important. Basically speaking, when the helicopter is hovering close enough to the ground, the main rotor induced angle of attack is made higher a result of "reflected energy" from the ground. I won't go too much into that stuff but the idea is that with the increase in the induced angle of attack causes the lift force from the rotors to increase for the same power rating from the engines. In other words, you get more bang for the buck.

The ground effect is not prevalent as you increase altitude above the ground. When you are beyond a height of one half of the main rotor diameter, the effect is negligible and hovering under these conditions is called OGE or Out of Ground Effect.

Now at high altitudes as found in the Himalayas, most helicopters are running at negligible safety margins on the engines, and that makes carrying payload difficult. So if you can make the ground effect work for you, you can increase the payload capacity for the same power while in hover. Later on, as you transition from hover to forward flight, the power requirement anyway reduces, so the extra payload that you picked up while hovering in IGE conditions can actually be carried anyway.

At the same time, hovering IGE means that if the payload were to remain the same, the hover altitude has increased. If in the above plot I had put standard vertical liftoff conditions, the values for payload would have been much smaller. The concept behind when to use either of these conditions depends on the airfield or helipad, if you will. If you have a runway available, you could do either a rolling liftoff or a IGE hover followed by transition to forward flight while still remaining in ground effect.

On the other hand, if you are in a region such as Siachen, where you are landing on tabletop helipads, this is not possible. Because if you try to transition to forward flight, you have already crossed the small mountain helipad and are beyond the ground effect and so the helicopter can fall out of the sky. There are actual youtube videos of Mi-17s crashing down the mountain slope under this effect.

Note: Watch at your own discretion
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cTb8p0a_s9g

Note how the helicopter is able to lift off with some payload only to not be able to sustain it once it had cleared the mountain top, leading to uncontrolled descent and crash. The pilot was actually able to autorotate just before crashing and that is what probably saved their lives.

All in all this is pretty serious stuff.

-Vivek

Kartik · Post by **Kartik** » 27 Sep 2008 04:48

excellent posts Vivek. all in all, for the price and the capabilities it offers, the Mi-17V5 is a good replacement for the Mi-8s for the next 20 odd years.
a modern cockpit, more powerful engines and good payload capacity is mostly what the IAF requires from its medium-lift helicopter fleet and the Mi-17V5 has all of that.

as it is, the fact is that in IAF service, helis will hardly undergo any serious upgrades, so the point that Mi-17V5s have reached the max upgrade potential is pretty much moot. How many major upgrades have we seen the Mi-8 fleet undergo during its service history?

sarang · Post by **sarang** » 27 Sep 2008 07:28

Sorry vivek but it seems my browser is not displaying the image (firefox, IE).
Can you post another link.

vivek_ahuja · Post by **vivek_ahuja** » 27 Sep 2008 07:43

sarang wrote:Sorry vivek but it seems my browser is not displaying the image (firefox, IE).
Can you post another link.

Okay, try this link below to see if it helps:

http://img300.imageshack.us/my.php?imag ... 663xo5.jpg

-Vivek

Arun_S · Post by **Arun_S** » 27 Sep 2008 07:45

vivek_ahuja wrote: .... .. . .On the other hand, if you are in a region such as Siachen, where you are landing on tabletop helipads, this is not possible. Because if you try to transition to forward flight, you have already crossed the small mountain helipad and are beyond the ground effect and so the helicopter can fall out of the sky. There are actual youtube videos of Mi-17s crashing down the mountain slope under this effect.

Note: Watch at your own discretion
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cTb8p0a_s9g

Note how the helicopter is able to lift off with some payload only to not be able to sustain it once it had cleared the mountain top, leading to uncontrolled descent and crash. The pilot was actually able to autorotate just before crashing and that is what probably saved their lives.

All in all this is pretty serious stuff.

-Vivek

All is correct but the autorotate bit is incorrect.
I have seen this clip in full resolution (few days ago). Few things to substantiate my position:
1. The Utube video res is poor but one can still make out that there was no auto-rotate performed. ( I.e no evidence of rotors stopping and changing direction)
2. Auto rotate is done to recover from engine failure. There was no engine power loss in this case.
3. Even if it was engine failure (which it was not) there was not enough hight to auto-rotate.
4. Lift from auto rotate is much lower than fully powered flight that this was.

The high res version that I saw was with commentary, and the reason for this crash was payload overloading. BTW all people survived this chopper crash into glacier.

vivek_ahuja · Post by **vivek_ahuja** » 27 Sep 2008 07:58

Arun_S wrote:autorotate bit is incorrect.

Noted. My bad. I should have noted that mistake.

The high res version that I saw was with commentary, and the reason for this crash was payload overloading.

That's what I was trying to point out. The helicopter lifted with heavier payload as a result of ground effect assistance but could not transition to forward flight quick enough.

BTW all people survived this chopper crash into glacier.

That's good to know.

BTW, thanks for pointing out the error.

-Vivek

Rahul M · Post by **Rahul M** » 27 Sep 2008 08:00

thanks for the lucid explanation, vivek.

can you actually spot auto-reverse just by looking ? temporal resolution of the human eye can create images of auto-reverse for particular RPMs.
may be you need to analyze flight data to determine if auto-reverse happened in this case, given the poor quality and angle of the shot(not talking of the video quality)

vivek_ahuja · Post by **vivek_ahuja** » 27 Sep 2008 08:16

Rahul M wrote:can you actually spot auto-reverse just by looking ? temporal resolution of the human eye can create images of auto-reverse for particular RPMs.
may be you need to analyze flight data to determine if auto-reverse happened in this case, given the poor quality and angle of the shot(not talking of the video quality)

Rahul,

No need for that. I should have pointed this out before but as Arun says, there was no engine failure. In that case you have a better chance of surviving with full emergency power than if you try to auto-rotate. There was also no time for the pilot to attempt something like that since you can see in the video the short time in which they hit the glacier.

-Vivek

Jagan · Post by **Jagan** » 27 Sep 2008 08:29

but one can still make out that there was no auto-rotate performed. ( I.e no evidence of rotors stopping and changing direction)

Arun, on top of my head - auto-rotation does not involve rotors stopping and changing direction. I believe the pilot merely decreases the angle of attack of the blades to negative to the horizontal by pushing the collective down - the combination fo forward speed and descent helps the chopper land even with no engine power. (the AoA is never negative to the direction of the flight - aerofoil of the blade) but i do agree that it would be difficult if not impossible to judge when the chopper went from powered flight to autorotate looking at the video

neerajb · Post by **neerajb** » 27 Sep 2008 08:52

Arun_S wrote:1. The Utube video res is poor but one can still make out that there was no auto-rotate performed. ( I.e no evidence of rotors stopping and changing direction)

In auto rotation the rotor doesn't stop and change direction. In case of engine failure or tail rotor failure autorotation is performed for safe landing since there is no effective torque in case of autoroatation (bearing friction neglected). In auto rotation the engine is simply cut off from the rotor and the rotor rotates freely but the tail rotor stays connected with the main rotor for yaw authority.

In the helicopter crash, it seems that it was overloaded and as it crossed the cliff it came out of ground effect (could be a gust of wind too). Then the pilot tried to raise the nose and in the process tail rotor hit the ground and then it crashed. Hadn't the tail rotor struck the ground it would have been just a hard landing.

Cheers....

negi · Post by **negi** » 27 Sep 2008 11:46

That helicopter never entered auto-rotation regime infact imo never needed to as there was no engine failure and it was too close to ground to even switch to auto-rotation even if the pilot wished to do so (I guess depending on the type of the chopper there exists a minimum height and speed requirements for any heli to even enter into a stable auto-rotation regime).

As for change of direction of rotation, well if the rotors have variable pitched blades which can be swiveled to negative AOA only then the transition to auto-rotation will not involve change of direction of rotation , else for fixed pitch blades there will be a change in direction of rotation and perhaps this is one of the reasons why one needs to be at a certain minimum altitude to even carry out a safe landing via auto-rotation.

Lastly I wonder if pilot has the controls to even engage/disengage the tail rotor with the main rotor ,afaik pilot has no control over this.

neerajb · Post by **neerajb** » 27 Sep 2008 12:31

negi wrote:As for change of direction of rotation, well if the rotors have variable pitched blades which can be swiveled to negative AOA only then the transition to auto-rotation will not involve change of direction of rotation , else for fixed pitch blades there will be a change in direction of rotation and perhaps this is one of the reasons why one needs to be at a certain minimum altitude to even carry out a safe landing via auto-rotation.

All practical flying helicopters (not RC ones) have variable pitch rotor blades and the pitch is controlled by collective lever which also has the throttle grip. You pull the collective up to increase AOA and push down for decreasing it. Also the throttle is like a bike's throttle grip. The suash plate is used to transfer the collective lever commands to the rotor blades to change AOA. Yes the tail rotor is connected to main rotor transmission and the tail rotor and main rotor cannot be disengaged individually.

Cheers...

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 27 Sep 2008 14:49

In fact I was under the impression that changing the angle of attack of the rotor blades to negative and disconnecting the engine will automatically put the rotor in autorotate - without reversing.

Is this correct? - I mean is it possble to turn the blades to negative AoA?

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 27 Sep 2008 14:52

Arun_S wrote: The high res version that I saw was with commentary, and the reason for this crash was payload overloading. BTW all people survived this chopper crash into glacier.

Just curious. It appears to me that if the overloaded helicopter took off - it was because it managed to hover "within ground effect" but once it passed the edge of the mountain the ground effect disappeared and the helo went down. Is that right?

neerajb · Post by **neerajb** » 27 Sep 2008 15:28

shiv wrote:In fact I was under the impression that changing the angle of attack of the rotor blades to negative and disconnecting the engine will automatically put the rotor in autorotate - without reversing.

Is this correct? - I mean is it possble to turn the blades to negative AoA?

I could find this video only on youtube which shows the effect of cyclic control on swash plate.

So essentially for tilting (pitching/rolling) the rotating rotor disc the swash plate dynamically changes the AOA of blades as they rotate to change the orientation of rotor disc by changes in lift generated by blades as they rotate to different positions. For collective input, the whole of the swash plate is either lifted up or goes down in it's current orientation for changing the AOA of blades in addition to the dynamic change in AOA of blades caused by the cyclicl control.

Cheers......

rkhanna · Post by **rkhanna** » 27 Sep 2008 20:12

Sukhoi to invest 2 billion euros in India facility, will employ 15,000 Indians (Nagpur's MIHAN facility)

http://www.domain-b.com/aero/aero_mfg/2 ... ukhoi.html

Initially, Sukhoi expects the plant to manufacture between 25-50 civilian aircraft on an annual basis with production rates being ramped up to 100 aircraft a year, in four years. The aircraft will be the 90-130 seater Sukhoi 100 Super Jet medium-haul passenger aircraft.

The plant alone is expected to create 15,000 direct and 75,000 indirect jobs. The minister also said that Sukhoi was prepared to spend whatever it took to compensate people whose land would be acquired for the project

Arun_S · Post by **Arun_S** » 27 Sep 2008 22:25

Jagan wrote:
but one can still make out that there was no auto-rotate performed. ( I.e no evidence of rotors stopping and changing direction)
Arun, on top of my head - auto-rotation does not involve rotors stopping and changing direction. I believe the pilot merely decreases the angle of attack of the blades to negative to the horizontal by pushing the collective down - the combination fo forward speed and descent helps the chopper land even with no engine power. (the AoA is never negative to the direction of the flight - aerofoil of the blade) but i do agree that it would be difficult if not impossible to judge when the chopper went from powered flight to autorotate looking at the video

Thanks for pointing that out. I stand corrected.
BTW I have only seen one auto-rotate landing of a Amri-khan chopper at an airshow.

shiv wrote:
Arun_S wrote: The high res version that I saw was with commentary, and the reason for this crash was payload overloading. BTW all people survived this chopper crash into glacier.
Just curious. It appears to me that if the overloaded helicopter took off - it was because it managed to hover "within ground effect" but once it passed the edge of the mountain the ground effect disappeared and the helo went down. Is that right?

Yes, that is correct, as pointed out by Vivek Ahuja.

Arun_S · Post by **Arun_S** » 28 Sep 2008 10:05

I looked at the full resolution video of that Mi-17 crash again. Here is some more info for those who might be interested.

1. The helipad altitude was 14,000 ft
2. Location the name of the place sounded like a Chinese version of a Tibetan mountain/glacier
3. The pilot on first liftoff noticed it was too heavy. Comes down and orders excess goods and passengers to be off loaded.
4. On the fateful second takeoff the craft loses lift as soon it clears the ridge (and ground effect), and sinks down.
5. Pilot increases crafts angle of attack to avoid an incoming mound of earth, and starts to revers the altitude loss, but its skies makes small contact with the mound, but that changes the craft's attitude to even more steeper climb.
6. Then the fateful chain of events resulting in actual crash starts. The tail rotor makes contact with the thin snow, throwing up small amount of snow and dust. That damage to the tail rotor sets the craft into uncontrolled spiral (unable to match engines main rotor torque with tail rotor torque), eventually main rotor hits the glacier floor.
7. No one was serious injured.

Raj Malhotra · Post by **Raj Malhotra** » 28 Sep 2008 10:42

sanjaychoudhry wrote:India to develop regional transport aircraft

Cashing in on the boom in the civil aviation sector, India has embarked on its second project to develop an indigenous 70 to 110-seater regional transport aircraft within six years, a defence official said Tuesday.At a meeting chaired by Defence Minister A.K. Antony here Tuesday, it was decided to undertake the project with foreign collaboration, with state-owned Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd. playing the anchor role.

“We are shortly sending Chandrayan-1 to the moon but we are still importing aircraft. India has the capability of developing the aircraft,” Antony told the meeting of experts.

The main aim of the project will be to come up with a “cheaper, rugged and easy to maintain” aircraft.

According to civil aviation ministry, India will require more than 1,200 aircraft by 2025 to meet the growing demands of various operators.

While the foreign collaborator has not yet been identified, it could be Brazil’s Embraer or China’s Avic, both of which manufacture regional transport aircraft. This is the second time India is venturing into the sector after an agreement with Russia to develop a medium transport aircraft that has both military and civilian applications.

“The proposed aircraft will have 70 to 110 seats and a range of 3,000 km. The aircraft will be developed keeping in mind the regional and domestic traffic,” a defence official said.

Estimated to cost Rs.40 billion, the aircraft will be developed within six years of the details being finalised.

“Most of the experts attending the meeting felt that the environmental performance of the aircraft in terms of carbon emissions and noise should meet international standards,” the official added.

A detailed project report will be prepared before the next meeting.
http://www.thaindian.com/newsportal/bus ... 99051.html

HAL, NAL plan 70-seater aircraft
http://www.hindu.com/2008/09/22/stories ... 971200.htm

I wonder if NAL-Hal is trying to build a aircraft which is jack of all and thus will be shunned by everybody rather than building a pure bred as required. Let me explain:-

MTA or MRTA is now configured with MTOW of 68 tons, which means that it is NOT an An-32 replacement. MRTA is a good project and must be seen through but simultaneously we must start a indigenous project for replacement of An-32 which would be “Military turboprop” of around 20tons MTOW. m Trying to shoe horn MRTA into AN-32 role will not work. We will end up with Dhruv which is neither Chetak nor Mi-17 read neither An-32 nor Il-76.

NAL started developing RTA. Teamed up with HAL it is now called IRTA. This again seemed originally like 70 passenger aircraft with 50 seat and 90 seat versions. Now the emphasis in on 90-110 seats (or so it seems). If reference to 110 seats in in two class versions then this IRTA is civilian aircraft with MTOW of around 60-70 tons again. This means that we still need a turboprop version for regional feeder which would be desi ATR-50/70 series.

What I want to say is that NAL vision seemed to be for a civilian version with 50-90 seaters in turboprop and turbofans but now it seems to be morfying, the issue is-into what?
I thnk NAL should go in for 50 passenger turboprop with military version which would give us desi version of ATR-50/70 and C-27
Hal should have develop turbofan MRTA with civilian version like MS21 which would give us a 120-180 passger civilian aircraft

vavinash · Post by **vavinash** » 28 Sep 2008 10:59

IAF will have to replace the HS 748's (50-60) and An-32's (100+) and 45 MTA's won't cut it. I hope the RTA morphs into a ideal replacement for both. 60 MTA + 90 RTA would be a good fleet for IAF along with IL-76 MF and Saras (dornier replacement).

Malay · Post by **Malay** » 28 Sep 2008 11:25

Mate there is a NEED for a plane that is between the An-32 and the Il-76. Its the Medium transporter-Like the C-130'J'.

We need a plane that is carries 20 tons. Its a multirole transport aircraft. It would become the backbone of the transport fleet of the IAF. It can be used in many roles, from carrying our own AEW&C to spec-ops carrier for various services to a dozen other things. The carrying capacity of the An-32 is too low, many a times, Il-76 needs to be roped in when a much smaller plane can do the job easily. The operating costs of the Il-76 are verry high. Not to mention it cant land at all the airstrips, it needs a large airstrip to land. This MRTA would be quite like the C-130 series-able to land on short and unprepared airstrips.

neerajb · Post by **neerajb** » 28 Sep 2008 13:37

shiv wrote:I mean is it possble to turn the blades to negative AoA?

Yes it is possible.
[youtube]URZEaYAn5J0&feature=related[/youtube]

Cheers.....

Raj Malhotra · Post by **Raj Malhotra** » 28 Sep 2008 20:45

vavinash wrote:IAF will have to replace the HS 748's (50-60) and An-32's (100+) and 45 MTA's won't cut it. I hope the RTA morphs into a ideal replacement for both. 60 MTA + 90 RTA would be a good fleet for IAF along with IL-76 MF and Saras (dornier replacement).

That is exactly what I want to say that we "need" a equivalent replacement of An-32. US and Europeans use C-27/CASA-295 even though they have C-130s/A-400. MTA cannot take over all the roles of Turboprop An-32.

The second Problem is that NAL was initially projecting RTA as a civilian version which is pretty different from military version/requirements. Also HAL was touting an 100 seater civilian aircraft. if these two are combined we will be neither here nor there. We need 4 seperate type of aircrafts being :-

A (i) civilian and (ii)military 50 passenger/20ton MTOW turboprop aircraft

And a (iii)military turbofan being 68ton MRTA alongwith a (iv) 130-180 passenger civilian aircraft.

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 28 Sep 2008 20:49

It was not as if the IAF had any great degree of choice when it selected the An 32. The Russians up-engined the An 26 and offered it that's all. And now that it has become standard - is it being considered as the gold standard that the IAF dearly wanted and selected and should be replaced precisely?

We don't know that the An 32 was the exact requirement. It was what was available - That's all.

vavinash · Post by **vavinash** » 28 Sep 2008 22:57

Never heard IAF complain about the An-32 nor could the west really offer an alternative that would have let us buy 120 odd planes of that class.

sanjaychoudhry · Post by **sanjaychoudhry** » 29 Sep 2008 01:41

India, Russia to sign jv for transport aircraft

India is planning to set up a joint venture (JV) with the Russians for a collaborative project for development of a 20-tonne multi role transport aircraft for the armed forces of the two countries.

The blue chip public sector undertaking Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) will be the Indian partner while Russia will come with the Rosoboronexport and Ilyushin in the joint venture.

“We are planning to start a joint venture company with the Rosoboronexport and Ilyushin aircraft company for the development of the MTA. We are in discussions with the Russians and they would come up with a proposal for setting up of the company,'' HAL c hairman Ashok Baweja told PTI here today.

The government would soon approve the proposal for a 51:49 per cent stakes for New Delhi and Moscow respectively in the joint venture. It is one of the issues Russian Defence Minister Anatoly Serdyukov would discuss with his Indian counterpart A K Anton y during his official visit beginning tomorrow, and an agreement is to be signed in this regard, it is learnt.

The Joint Venture would be on the lines of the already successful Indo-Russian BrahMos Aerospace, which designed and developed one of the world's advanced cruise missiles of the same nomenclature. The aircraft would be designed to perform multiple trans port duties for Indian and Russian air forces and would transport troops and cargo, and also be used for special forces operations.

www.thehindubusinessline.com/blnus/09281410.htm