Ah...
When you compare two aircraft, you talk about empty weight. When you compare capabilities, you compare MTOW. The former is more important because the latter only tells you what class the aircraft is in, nothing else.
And that's what we're talking about here - whether the Mk2's changes over Mk1 enable it to fight in a higher weight class.
They do.
You should read what you said. You pointed out the MTOW difference between H and SH puts it in the same category as the Mk1 and Mk2. I provided actual figures and said the difference is actually much bigger.
So you're just making my point for me.
And that while the SH uses a new airframe design, the Mk2 uses the same Mk1 airframe.
Mk2 is structurally different to Mk1 as per the Project Director. I'll take his word over your's, thank you.
ADA withdrew that classification, they themselves admitted it remains part of LCA.
It's for semantics. They want to make it seem like an LCA upgrade cuz IAF is already invested into LCA. Makes matters easier in the MoD. If you emphasize the fact that you cannot just take a Mk1/1A and upgrade it into a Mk2 (like you can with F-16A>>F16V). it would make it seem like it was ADA's failure for not making the product upgradable. It will be used as an excuse by import dalals to convince uninitiated babus to push for more imports. ADA has to play these games in order to survive.
The point is, the design hasn't changed/downsized since they called it an MWF. So for all practical intents & purposes, an MWF it still is.
And why shouldn't it be? If a 16.5T Gripen-E can be accepted as a competitor for MMRCA, then why can't a 17.5T Tejas Mk2 be considered medium-weight?
Call it Super Tejas if you want, but it is no different from Hornet to Super Hornet.
Well H and SH are different aircraft with significantly different airframes, so yeah.
It doesn't need higher payload for the same fuel fraction. For example, you can put 2 Brahmos M each on both Mk2 and F-16E, but the Mk2 will still outrange the F-16. So who cares about MTOW now? What it means is the F-16 requires more engine power and a larger airframe and still be inferior to the Mk2.
Eh? So you're just making my point for me? Well thanks for that.
What's Mk2 got to do with Mk1A here?
Mk1A was chosen 'cause it met the requirement to replace the Mig-21. It was not an airframe problem, but an engine problem. It has nothing to do with the Mk2.
Had we gone with a larger airframe from the start, then we needn't have developed the Mk2 at all.
Just block upgrades to Mk-1A, then Mk-1B, C etc. would have been enough. Just like with F-16. You could have taken any Mk-1 airframe, zero-lifed it, and upgraded it to keep up with all contemporary requirements. Like Slovakia or Turkey are doing to their F-16A/Cs upgraded to Vs.
But for us, it's not possible to upgrade Mk-1/1A to Mk-2 capabilities. If we want to put an IRST on it, we can't. If we want to double its payload, we can't.
Even Western SEFs. What, you think the Mig-21 cannot match the Gripen A/C or the F-16?
In exercises in India, it's flown 6+ sorties a day.
That's the surge rate. All jets can manage that - just not for long. That's what I meant by losing the ADF backbone in a month instead of keep going for years. The RuAF is suffering from the same problem:
Had Ukraine been in possession of a large fleet of F-16s prior to the conflict, the RuAF would have been demolished less than a year into the war. More details on that here in a previous conversation of mine on a different thread, read the linked RAND report as well:
Post in thread 'Ukraine - Russia Conflict'
Ukraine - Russia Conflict
This is also why the Tejas Mk-1/1A & Mk-2 would easily pummel the JF-17/J-10C in a prolonged war. There was a point of time when IAF, like the Army, thought that a war wouldn't last more than a month or two, so that's all they need to be prepared for. But this thought process is gone now. IAF wants to be capable of carrying out a sustained air campaign. Our ground forces will have air support on call, throughout the war.
That's part of the reason why we go out of our way to push any Russian competitor out of fighter tenders for the last 20 years. We know that the current gen of Russian engines can never be a serious contender for our future requirements.
And that's also why our 5th gen engine JV is only talking with GE, RR & Safran even though Russians parade around their Izdeliye 30 with '5th gen tech'. We want none of it, cuz we know it cannot deliver what we want.
There was no indigenous effort at the time. The original Mk2 from 2014 was a direct capability successor of Mk1.
The original in 2000s was meant to kill the Mk-1's growth potential. Had that gone through, most probably we'd never have seen Mk-1A and the line would have ended with 40 instead of 220 and Tejas would've been chalked off as another Marut saga.
The Mk2's 2017 avatar is what killed SEF MII. And it's final avatar in 2019 is what we are currently developing.
SEF was only killed thanks to Manohar Parrikar's push for Tejas Mk2.
Otherwise they'd have bought a Gripen or F21 and said there's no need to develop another fighter in the class cuz we have ToT of a proven one now.
You can see from the image that it's literally a resized Mk1. Just 2 plugs and a slightly wider wingspan.
"Your drawing of a horse is nice, just a few touches needed. You just need to change the legs, the head, the body & maybe the tail too. The rest is fine."
Dude there's literally no full part of the Mk2 that's the same as the Mk1. Just cuz it retains a few aerostructures (largely cuz they're proven & fit the bill) doesn't mean it's the same aircraft. Even the basic FC laws are rewritten cuz of the new control surfaces. It effectively carries twice the warload. Sensors are worlds apart. The way the pilot interfaces with the plane is totally differnt (side-stick vs centre stick).
You simply cannot take a Mk-1 and MLU it into a Mk-2. It's not an upgrade like F-16A to F-16V. It's a whole new aircraft.
As Saurav Jha said, the commonality in components between the two is only around ~25%. The Mk2 is essentially a new design made for executing entirely new mission profiles. We just reused as many parts from the Mk1 as we could to save time & money. That doesn't mean it's the same plane and therefore needs to be treated as in the same class.
The graphic just illustrates the basic change in dimensions over time.
or see big problems in every solution.
