Indian Military Aviation

Shrinivasan · Post by **Shrinivasan** » 03 Jun 2011 09:49

Singha wrote:methinks we need a "anchor" airbase for the mizoram-nagaland-barak valley region with a tacit agreement from Dhaka they will allow IAF to overfly from West bengal in times of emergency. kind of like Tezpur or Chandigarh or Pune role.

Kamalapur in Tripura had been identified as a possible location for a base. other Airports in that area have civilian traffic which is ever increasing. Anyone of these airports can be used in wartime, but IAF would like to base its fighters (and UAVs) in a dedicated base.

SaiK · Post by **SaiK** » 03 Jun 2011 09:56

Didn't we hear recent newj about chinese-mayanmar tickling?

Khalsa · Post by **Khalsa** » 03 Jun 2011 15:06

pragnya wrote:
Vipul wrote:Antonov hands over first upgraded An-32s to India.
also i remember the past discussion in the "transport aircraft thread" months back where it was mentioned our AN-32s are not 'pressurised' in the cargo compartment. has this been taken care of in this upgrade??

TIA.

I have travelled in IAF An-32s and can confirm that they were always pressurised.
It was only the An-12s that were not pressurised.

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 03 Jun 2011 15:10

jorhat allegedly is the transport hub base for IAF in NE - could do with some expansion to take heavy frames like A330, C17 too and better aprons etc. I could be totally wrong here though.

rohitvats · Post by **rohitvats** » 03 Jun 2011 15:34

^^^Home to a AN-32 Squadron which supports the bases further east.

ticky · Post by **ticky** » 03 Jun 2011 16:27

Mizoram airport

Dunno guys but just my 2c here, the mizoram airport is real tiny. Short strip, small apron and not much free area to expand and further lots of flight cancellation due to combination of inclement weather and terrain. I wish the AF also consider Agartala, Silchar maybe.

@Singha,
Saar the silchar airport seems very blessed with real estate as compared to mizoram airport

Gaurav_S · Post by **Gaurav_S** » 04 Jun 2011 06:23

Rs 4,000 crore aircraft project HAL plans in Gujarat

link

GANDHINAGAR: Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd (HAL), a government of India public sector undertaking directly operating under the ministry of defence, has shortlisted Gujarat for setting up a Rs 4,000 crore unit for design, development, manufacture, repair and overhaul of aircraft, aero engines and helicopters.

Well-placed sources in the state industries department told TOI on Friday that senior officials of HAL, led by its executive director, Ashok Tandon, met principal secretary, industries, Maheshwar Sahu in Gandhinagar on May 30 and discussed minor details of the project.

"State government officials offered two different locations to the HAL team - Dholera, where a special investment region (SIR) is being set up in Ahmedabad district, and Vadnagar in north Gujarat, which is chief minister Narendra Modi's birthplace.

However, the HAL team expressed its desire to locate its plant at three alternative preferences it has identified -- Dholera, Sanand and Dahej. "Its officials went to these places and have conveyed to us that they will tell us their final location in due course," a senior official said, adding, "It will be a Greenfield project."

HAL's main office is situated in Bangalore, from where the planning chief of the helicopter manufacturing division and head of the finance division also came down to Gandhinagar along with Tandon for talks. "The team told us that it wanted 600 acres of land," the official said, adding,

"When the unit starts operating, initially the HAL plans to go in for maintenance, repair and overhaul (MRO). But it would later diversify into design, development and manufacture of aircraft, aero engines and helicopters."

State officials said, a land site along the northern tip of Dholera SIR can be an "ideal location" for the HAL, as just outside the SIR, the state government plans to set up a new commercial airport, preferably with private help. Also to be a Greenfield project, area for the airport, about 7,500 hectares (ha) of government land, has been set aside off Fedra village, 20 kilometres outside the Dholera SIR boundary. It has received a nod from the Airport Authority of India (AAI).

This is a another major development. Dholera is approx 80-100Km from Ahmedabad where State government is planning Fedara international airport. This falls in DMIC route.

Added later: Anyone who doesn't know what Greenfields is see this wiki link as this terms has various meanings in different industry sectors. Basic idea though is "anything that is built from scratch"

karan_mc · Post by **karan_mc** » 04 Jun 2011 07:58

IAF launches indigenous software to predict aircraft accidents

RoyG · Post by **RoyG** » 05 Jun 2011 05:28

MI-28 in India?

http://russianplanes.net/ID45029

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 05 Jun 2011 07:07

what does translator sw say? note the arbalets radar....must have been for the heavy gunship trials. indicates we are considering the longbow too not vanilla apache.

Rakesh · Post by **Rakesh** » 05 Jun 2011 07:08

^^^must have come to India for trials as part of the IAF combat helo competition.

Dmurphy · Post by **Dmurphy** » 05 Jun 2011 07:54

RoyG wrote:MI-28 in India?

http://russianplanes.net/ID45029

After translating whats written below, I see " the photo of Mi-28 during a demonstration performances in ALGERIA"

VinodTK · Post by **VinodTK** » 06 Jun 2011 03:33

India beefs up China front with UAVs, copters to monitor PLA

India is now deploying spy drones or UAVs (unmanned aerial vehicles) and light observation helicopters along the borders with China to keep a hawk-eye on the stepped-up activities of People's Liberation Army.
:
"Sukhoi-30MKI fighters are already being based in IAF airbases like Tezpur and Chabua. Army Aviation bases in Assam are also now being upgraded, with seven helicopters and four Israeli Searcher-II UAVs already been deployed there," a defence ministry source said.
:
The Army is also pushing for a mountain strike corps after having raised two new mountain infantry divisions. The new divisions, with 1,260 officers and 35,011 soldiers, have their HQs in Zakama (56 Div) in Nagaland and Missamari (71 Div) in Assam.

Juggi G · Post by **Juggi G** » 06 Jun 2011 09:52

Peeved IAF Looks Beyond Russia To Revive Ilyushins
Live Fist

Seemingly exasperated by low-availability/serviceability for years as a consequence of what it has described unofficially as "unpredictable Russian support" and the country's apparent unwillingness to honour after-sales commitments, the Indian Air Force is looking for the first time beyond Russia for long-term maintenance and product support of its fleet of Ilyushin-76 heavy transports and Ilyushin-78M tanker transports at Agra, Chandigarh, Delhi and Nagpur.

In April this year, the IAF broke with tradition and floated a global tender to provide its Il-76/78 fleet "service support to ensure IAF requirements to maintain present airworthiness standards" for a period of five years, extendable to ten. The IAF has been improvising plenty to keep the heavy jets airworthy, but does not believe it can continue to do so without solid support. The Russian OEM, apparently, cannot be relied upon. The IAF has stipulated that bidders need to have the support of the Ilyushin Design Bureau.

According to the tender document, "The primary requirement of the contract is to ensure a minimum serviceability of 70% of number of [aircraft] included in the contract during the currency of contract. Period of contract shall be five years, further extendable for another five years. The vendor is required to meet this requirement by providing all the required maintenance and product support." It further stipulates that, "on any single day the serviceability of each fleet (IL-76 and IL-78) should not fall below 50% of total number of ac included in the contract."

Interestingly, the IAF has offered to pay the winning bidder an incentive if higher serviceability percentage above the minimum specified is achieved during execution of the contract. And they'll be penalised if they fall short of the required mark.

Nine IAF Ilyushins which will be undergoing overhaul and total life extension at the time the contract is expected to be awarded will not be included. An additional unspecified number of Ilyushins has remained grounded indefinitely "for want of spares/aggregates which have become unserviceable or expired their TBO/TTL".

Here's the Full IAF Request for Information.

Hey, the IAF's Request for Information has the Serial Numbers of the Entire Il-76/78 Fleet.

Austin · Post by **Austin** » 06 Jun 2011 10:38

They want to subcontract the spares/maintenance job to a middle player rather then directly dealing with OEM for better serviceability of IL fleet , that would increase the cost of spares and maintenance but takes the headache of dealing with OEM.

chackojoseph · Post by **chackojoseph** » 06 Jun 2011 15:54

Indian Cabinet okays 10 Boeing C-17 Globemaster-III heavy transport aircraft deal

Juggi G · Post by **Juggi G** » 06 Jun 2011 19:01

India Approves $4.1 bn deal for 10 Boeing C-17 airlifters from US

Surya · Post by **Surya** » 06 Jun 2011 19:25

paging naysayers who wanted RFPs and did not believe IL fleet had any problems

Do you now believe we have been having severe problems with our IL fleet??

of course all this will get solved once Putin finishes his reform of the Russian MIC

karan_mc · Post by **karan_mc** » 08 Jun 2011 10:22

Air Commodore Rohit Varma Test Pilot in Tejas Program ,quits air force over No promotion

Link here

Surely Bad News ,this has been a trend for a while , and pilots don't want to kill their promotions chances by joining Test Programs ,this is why we have few test pilots joining Tejas Program

Kartik · Post by **Kartik** » 08 Jun 2011 10:37

this is truly horrible news. This was exactly what Air Marshal Rajkumar had written in his book, about having to approach the then Air Chief Marshal Tipnis about his being overlooked for promotion on the premise that being in Bangalore was a "plush" posting.

Pratyush · Post by **Pratyush** » 08 Jun 2011 11:39

Karan the link is not working.

karan_mc · Post by **karan_mc** » 08 Jun 2011 11:44

Pratyush wrote:Karan the link is not working.

link

jai · Post by **jai** » 08 Jun 2011 12:33

karan_mc wrote:
Pratyush wrote:Karan the link is not working.
link

Makes me wonder how many of our general ranked officers are gallantry award winners and if we do not see gallantry award winners going onto general ranks, what might the cause be.

How does this compare to other major professional armies of the world ?

suryag · Post by **suryag** » 08 Jun 2011 13:57

Hope Cmde Verma joins Mahindra Aerospace/desi aerospace company or the nal civilian aircraft program. If he chooses the the civil aviation route it would be a great waste of talent.

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 08 Jun 2011 16:18

suryag wrote:Hope Cmde Verma joins Mahindra Aerospace/desi aerospace company or the nal civilian aircraft program. If he chooses the the civil aviation route it would be a great waste of talent.

Hey he can join HAL as test pilot. Or Kingfisher airlines as bindaas pilot

Dmurphy · Post by **Dmurphy** » 08 Jun 2011 17:36

shiv wrote:
suryag wrote:Hope Cmde Verma joins Mahindra Aerospace/desi aerospace company or the nal civilian aircraft program. If he chooses the the civil aviation route it would be a great waste of talent.
Hey he can join HAL as test pilot. Or Kingfisher airlines as bindaas pilot

Cmde Verma must be happy seeing these options being thrown up

Viv S · Post by **Viv S** » 08 Jun 2011 17:47

jai wrote:Makes me wonder how many of our general ranked officers are gallantry award winners and if we do not see gallantry award winners going onto general ranks, what might the cause be.

How does this compare to other major professional armies of the world ?

Gallantry awards have absolutely no bearing on an officer's progression within the organisation. Statistically too I doubt if there are any identifiable trends - officers who are recipients of gallantry awards and officers who go on to become generals are both a very small subsets of a large officer body.

chackojoseph · Post by **chackojoseph** » 09 Jun 2011 18:20

Sunday "An insight into Darin-II and Project Tiger fighter aircraft upgrade programmes in India"

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 09 Jun 2011 19:41

http://articles.economictimes.indiatime ... t-aircraft

Hindustan Aeronautics hands over 'Dornier 228' aircraft to Indian Coast Guard
May 26, 2011, 05.22pm IST

KANPUR: The Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) today handed over 100th maritime surveillance aircraft 'Dornier 228' (DO-228) built by it to the Indian Coast Guard (ICG).

Handing over the key and log book of the 19-seater multi-purpose light transport aircarft to ICG Director General Vice Admiral Anil Chopra, HAL Chairman Ashok Nayak termed the aircraft as a landmark addition into the armoury of coast guards for effective and sharp surveillance of country's coastal boundaries.

Speaking on the occasion, Managing Director of HAL Kanpur D Balasubramanian said that with DO-228, HAL holds the distinction of producing 100 such aircraft for the nation.

Underlining the features of the multi-speciality aircraft, Subramanian said DO-228 is equipped with sophisticated techniques which included a 360 degree surveillance radar, Satellite Communication (SATCOM), Forward Looking Infra Red (FLIR) and Automatic Identification System (AIS).

Terming HAL as a premier aircraft manufacturer for the country, Subramanian said that the company is eyeing a business of Rs 550 crores in the financial year 2011-12.

On the future plans of the company, Subramanian said that HAL will continue to produce sophisticated aircrafts for the defence forces in coming years which include Intermediate Jet Trainer, light-weight "Saras" aircraft and a Regional Transport Aircraft ( RTA).

Established in 1960, HAL has given some of the highly sophisticated and multi-speciality aircrafts to the nation which include SH-748, ITG-3 Glider, an agriculture aircraft called HA-31 Basant and a basic trainer aircraft called HPT-32, Subramanian said.

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 09 Jun 2011 19:45

can someone extract the TOI article today which mentions a big role for TCS in the RTA project?

New regional transport aircraft project moves fast - Times of ...
9 Jun 2011 ... New regional transport aircraft project moves fast ... Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) is already working on the Saras avionics for NAL. ...
lite.epaper.timesofindia.com/mobile.aspx?...2011...

Austin · Post by **Austin** » 09 Jun 2011 20:08

New regional transport aircraft project moves fast

Final Design Sent To Govt;IT Firm To Work On Avionics
Prashanth G N TNN

Bangalore: Unlike the country's first civil aircaft project Saras which has been saddled with many glitches,the newly proposed 90-seater regional transport aircraft has seen some astonishingly fast work in the past few months.A final configuration has not only been finalized but submitted to the government for approval.

Former Isro chairman G Madhavan Nair,who heads a high-powered committee on civil aircraft,has been able to bring together aircraft experts from NAL and HAL and at least a dozen private companies to give a specific configuration to the newly proposed aircraft.

As soon as approval comes in,it's the question of calling tenders for development,manufacture and fabrication of various technologies,components and parts for the aircraft, Nair told TOI.

Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) is already working on the Saras avionics for NAL.Their experience on Saras avionics will be a crucial input in the building and manufacture of new aircraft, Nair explained.
TCS has been contracted by NAL to independently verify and validate software of critical equipment to be fitted in the Saras cockpit and develop the auto pilot system.It has to help one instrument talk to the other within the cockpit and ensure the software and equipment function in line with Federal Aviation Authority standards.

TCS would be developing the communication and display systems inside the Saras cockpit with the entire system and sub-systems generating coherent output to fly the aircraft.Aero experts have converged on a 90-seater which will have a range of around 2,500 km to be able to fly from one end of the country to the other and is meant to meet this specific requirement.

While structure,aerodynamics,configuration,design,system integration and avionics for the aircraft would be indigenous,the team would have to depend on a foreign company for engine.Global engine companies like Snecma,GE,Pratt and Whitney and Rolls-Royce are being considered.We have already contacted them.They have given preliminary data.Based on that we are seeing how best we can match with our design, Nair said.

As per initial assessment,India is projected to need 500 such regional transport aircraft in the next 10 years,while the global demand is pegged at 3,500 Demand is robust and global market is good,so team's focus is on an aircraft being cost-effective,reliable and able to generate confidence Discussion is on to make configuration more efficient,ensure right engine for design and right aerodynamics for fuel saving and other eco-friendly measures

VinodTK · Post by **VinodTK** » 11 Jun 2011 01:25

http://www.hindustantimes.com/rssfeed/NewDelhi/Air-chief-PV-Naik-in-favour-of-flexing-missile-power/Article1-708062.aspx

India's rising global stature demands developing intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBM), air force chief Air Chief Marshal PV Naik told HT in an exclusive interview.

This is the first time that a serving military chief has argued for broadening India's strike capabilities beyond the immediate neighbourhood.

Naik, who heads the chiefs of staff committee, said, "India should pursue an ICBM programme to acquire ranges of 10,000 km or even more. Breaking out of the regional context is important as the country's sphere of influence grows. We have no territorial designs on any country, but India needs the capability to match its sphere of influence."

Juggi G · Post by **Juggi G** » 11 Jun 2011 07:31

A PoW Story Not to Wow

Bloody Paki B@stards

Viv S · Post by **Viv S** » 11 Jun 2011 10:18

Juggi G wrote:A PoW Story Not to Wow

The first time I read about the IAF PoWs and famous jail break to Afghanistan was in a book by D.S. Jafa. I'm forgetting his rank but he was a Squadron Leader when he was shot down in his Su-7 over West Pakistan. Its an account of his days as a PoW as well as some really inspiring stories from and before the war. I met him about 10 years back at Faizabad and got my copy autographed. A wonderful gentleman.

You can buy it here.

http://www.indiaplaza.com/three-countri ... 62022x.htm

P.S. There's a tale about 'Kala' Sandhu that very few people know about. It was like nothing I'd ever read before and I've heard many inspiring stories. That alone is worth buying the book for.

chackojoseph · Post by **chackojoseph** » 12 Jun 2011 09:48

An insight into "Darin-II" and "Project Tiger" fighter aircraft upgrade programmes in India

For the jingos. This article was properly formated by akimalik @ BRF . All credits to him.

SaiK · Post by **SaiK** » 12 Jun 2011 10:13

nice 3 videos here
http://wn.com/Indian_Air_Force_Jaguar_Darin_Iii_Upgrade

Surya · Post by **Surya** » 13 Jun 2011 18:07

x posted from Pictures thread

Surya, this is for you.

Jaguars were built for the Royal and French air forces. But today, most of them are operated by the IAF and the Royal Air Force of Oman. Indian aeronautical engineers also added overwing pylons on the aircraft to carry French Matra missiles, and this innovation was adopted also by other air forces.

chacko

not really a reference material

Go back and check a Janes AWTA from mid 70s to early 80s.

chackojoseph · Post by **chackojoseph** » 13 Jun 2011 18:21

Surya wrote:x posted from Pictures thread

Surya, this is for you.

Jaguars were built for the Royal and French air forces. But today, most of them are operated by the IAF and the Royal Air Force of Oman. Indian aeronautical engineers also added overwing pylons on the aircraft to carry French Matra missiles, and this innovation was adopted also by other air forces.

chacko

not really a reference material

Go back and check a Janes AWTA from mid 70s to early 80s.

If possible, I will figure that out.

Surya · Post by **Surya** » 13 Jun 2011 18:51

chacko

one of the Delhi libraries (USIS, IDSA etc ) should have them. ideally 76 -77

even British council

shiv · Post by **shiv** » 13 Jun 2011 19:45

The export version of the Jaguar was designed to have overwing pylons for AAMs. Why? I wonder whether those were added to suit an Indian interest in the Jaguar international for DPSA? Clearly the "Jaguar International" was for export only. Why did they put that in the export version when the Brit and French versions did not need them?