LCA Tejas Mk1 & Mk1A - News and discussions

vstol Jockey said:
As long as we get IPR, there is no problem.
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What if we don't? Besides how is getting the IPR going to help us develop further iterations of the Kaveri? I was given to understand we lack expertise in SCB mettalurgical know how and manufacturing techniques. Is this true or is there something more to it? Finally, are you confirming K9 is coming with a M88 core? If so, why was Kabini abandoned? I learnt from discussions online in various fora that Safran was hired to fine tune the core and other aspects of the Kaveri and all that remained to be done was update the fan (?) . What are your learnings, sir? If you'd be so kind enough as to share them.
 
_Anonymous_ said:
Your opinions on the matter @vstol Jockey ? Is it true that we are abandoning the Kabini core in favour of an advanced iteration of the M88 in the K9 engine & that further iterations viz K10 onwards will be equipped with Safran cores viz more advanced iterations of the M88?

I find the news a bit upsetting. I was under the impression Safran was here to fine tune GTRE efforts not come up with a solution which the IAF discarded more than a decade ago? What does that say about our indigenization attempts? Have we finally given up on the notion of developing home grown turbofans / jets and be restricted to being co opted by a foreign OEM recycling their technology passing it of as our fruits of our own effort?
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No, we are not abandoning Kabini. Dunno how you got misled to believe that. K9 will have Kabini and it will be flight tested on the LCA. Its development will continue and a derivative will be used on IUSAV also.

Halloweene and I are referring to K10 and higher.
 
randomradio said:
Halloweene and I are referring to K10 and higher.
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Can't the Kabini be updated to K10 standards? Does this mean for K10 upwards, all our cores will be of Safran origin? What implications will it have for our strategic programme for developing indigenous Turbo fans then?
 
_Anonymous_ said:
Can't the Kabini be updated to K10 standards?
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Yes, it can. But not in time for AMCA.

Does this mean for K10 upwards, all our cores will be of Safran origin? What implications will it have for our strategic programme for developing indigenous Turbo fans then?
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We are proceeding with developing our own engines for the future. But we are cooperating with France for the sake of AMCA.

The earlier plan for K10 fell through because IAF thought GTRE can develop a K10 on their own. But with the lack of movement on AMCA and focus on LCA, K10 was also pushed back. There was renewed focus once Ghatak came into the picture. And with FGFA on the backburner, AMCA became more important and hence the engine to power it.

After IUSAV is complete, it's obvious we will need to use our own engines for more advanced UCAVs. So, while Kabini may not be used beyond IUSAV and perhaps LCA, it will set the standards for more advanced cores in the future. For the foreseeable future, the development of Kabini and the new French core will happen in parallel. Let's see what will happen when IUSAV and AMCA near completion 10 years hence.
 
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Sathya said:
Bits Pilani , how's it going ,?
Asking just to know whether, company owned institute s are doing well to place students in good workplace.
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Its not about companies starting institutes.

If there is a an IIT or IISc, corporate can sponsor a chair. The person heading this will have a budget which will come from the sponsoring company. So there is a possibility of higher reward for the professor and his research team. It will also help increase the salary levels of candidates, thereby providing a 'real' alternavtive to someone who would have selected computers.

Hope you got the post now. Its not about private institutions. Its about private companies sponsoring research and chairs in existing academia.
 
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randomradio said:
No, we are not abandoning Kabini. Dunno how you got misled to believe that. K9 will have Kabini and it will be flight tested on the LCA. Its development will continue and a derivative will be used on IUSAV also.

Halloweene and I are referring to K10 and higher.
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so K10 and higher will not have variable cycle engine?
 
DzhpFhwWoAE73nJ.jpg

During Vayu Shakti-2019 firepower demonstration
 
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randomradio said:
Didn't they perform a second firing?
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Normally we fire a combination of AAMs but it fired only one missile and the missile seeker seemed to have misbehaved. Do you remember my very old post about interception of a target? Even if you detect, identify, track and launch the missile, success depends on missile flying true, its guidance working fine and in case of BVRAAM, the data link has to work fine without being jammed and finally the missile seeker must acquire the target and be able to prosecute it. You break any link in this chain, you will defeat the missile.
 
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EXCLUSIVE: HAL All Set To Announce LCA-Based Jet Trainer
Shiv AroorFeb 19 2019 9 30 am

When India’s Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd (HAL) announced last week that it would be revealing a new program at Aero India 2019 called ‘Supersonic Omni Role Trainer Aircraft (SPORT)’ aviation watchers wondered what this was. A new aircraft? A clean sheet jet design?
Well, the short answer is no.

Livefist can confirm that HAL’s SPORT will be, quite simply, an ‘LCA Lite’ — an aircraft that sports the LCA Mk.1 twin-seat trainer airframe, but stripped of high end sensors and avionics, and given a training specific panoramic cockpit.

Announcing that it would be unveiling a SPORT simulator at the upcoming show, HAL said in a statement, ‘HAL is keen to launch the indigenous development of SPORT (Aircraft) with 4++ generation or equivalent capabilities to bridge the gap in pilot training to command front line fighters. The SPORT aircraft will be utilized for fighter training after Advanced Jet Training stage and before induction of pilots into a frontline fighter squadron.’

To be sure, a pared down LCA Tejas being rigged as a medium performance trainer has been an idea for years, but this has owed more to the baseline LCA’s earlier troubles with meeting the Indian Air Force’s performance requirements. With the SPORT, HAL has signalled that it’s taking an idea and giving it actual shape in the form of a funded program.

The proposition is likely being pushed as a low risk platform that HAL can build quickly if it manages to persuade the IAF of its utility within the current training regimen. But several questions remain.

To begin with, HAL wants to wedge the SPORT as a training step between advanced jet training on HAL-built Hawks and fast jets of the Indian Air Force. The air force currently has a two phase training program that sees pilots first fly the Pilatus PC-7 propeller trainers, before moving to the Hawks for jet training. The retirement of the HJT-16 Kiran intermediate jet trainers and HAL’s failure to successfully deliver its much-needed replacement — the HJT-36 Sitara or IJT, a program now practically shelved — compelled the air force to evolve a trainining regimen that utilised the two available aircraft platforms. What HAL is now proposing to do is add a step after the Hawks, before pilots progress to frontline jets.

Proposing such a step isn’t new though — not even for HAL. The company in 2017 unveiled the Hawk-i, shortly after BAE Systems announced an ‘Advanced Hawk’ developed jointly with HAL.


HAL’s Hawk-i
Just why HAL and BAE Systems would unveil two similarly souped up versions of the Hawk trainer around the same time was perplexing, and still unclear (while the Hawk-i sports Indian software and some equipment, the Advanced Hawk sports design changes in the wings, among other things). Both the Hawk-i and Advanced Hawk were also pitched for a low cost training segment after the baseline Hawk training phase. The idea was that these aircraft could take on, at low operating cost, the otherwise expensive business of pilots flying routine training sorties on high performance jets, while giving them the near full experience of a fast fighter. The air force is considering the segment, but hasn’t decided on if, how or when it plans to take a call. There have been signs that the Air Force isn’t particularly inclined to tinker any more with its training regimen if it doesn’t involve a low cost intermediate trainer between the basic and advanced stages — something HAL has failed to deliver.
The Advanced Hawk broke cover here on Livefist in 2017.

HAL’s SPORT trainer would appear to be aimed at this same space — an economical training platform that allows the air force to ease off usage of its frontline fighters, leaving them in better shape for more urgent operational duties. With a proposal to fund the program through internal accruals, it is also clear that HAL wants to push ahead with it. The plan, plain to see, is for the product to pick airframes off the LCA production line.

Finally, it would also be interesting to see how HAL explains the rationale for an LCA-based trainer, when an LCA Mk.1 trainer already of course exists. Will there be special economies that HAL plans to illustrate? Why would the IAF want an LCA trainer as well as a SPORT? Or could the SPORT be pushed chiefly as an export product to air forces looking for a fighter jet lite. The full story will hopefully be known this week. That this isn’t a clean sheet aircraft proposal is, however, reassuring from the perspective of risk, time and cost.

https://www.livefistdefence.com/2019/02/exclusive-hal-all-set-to-announce-lca-based-jet-trainer.html

And finally the LIFT version breaks the cover. Good decision by HAL considering export potential, however less likely to make sense for IAF since it makes more sense to purchase combat versions of Tejas instead. Could be interesting to see if IAF decides to use this as an option due to the difficulty in ordering more new Hawk aircraft from BAE due to high costs. With combat version MK1 costing roughly $25 million, a stripped down trainer version could give a tough competition to Hawks that costs approximately $15 million now.
 
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R!cK said:
EXCLUSIVE: HAL All Set To Announce LCA-Based Jet Trainer
Shiv AroorFeb 19 2019 9 30 am

When India’s Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd (HAL) announced last week that it would be revealing a new program at Aero India 2019 called ‘Supersonic Omni Role Trainer Aircraft (SPORT)’ aviation watchers wondered what this was. A new aircraft? A clean sheet jet design?
Well, the short answer is no.

Livefist can confirm that HAL’s SPORT will be, quite simply, an ‘LCA Lite’ — an aircraft that sports the LCA Mk.1 twin-seat trainer airframe, but stripped of high end sensors and avionics, and given a training specific panoramic cockpit.

Announcing that it would be unveiling a SPORT simulator at the upcoming show, HAL said in a statement, ‘HAL is keen to launch the indigenous development of SPORT (Aircraft) with 4++ generation or equivalent capabilities to bridge the gap in pilot training to command front line fighters. The SPORT aircraft will be utilized for fighter training after Advanced Jet Training stage and before induction of pilots into a frontline fighter squadron.’

To be sure, a pared down LCA Tejas being rigged as a medium performance trainer has been an idea for years, but this has owed more to the baseline LCA’s earlier troubles with meeting the Indian Air Force’s performance requirements. With the SPORT, HAL has signalled that it’s taking an idea and giving it actual shape in the form of a funded program.

The proposition is likely being pushed as a low risk platform that HAL can build quickly if it manages to persuade the IAF of its utility within the current training regimen. But several questions remain.

To begin with, HAL wants to wedge the SPORT as a training step between advanced jet training on HAL-built Hawks and fast jets of the Indian Air Force. The air force currently has a two phase training program that sees pilots first fly the Pilatus PC-7 propeller trainers, before moving to the Hawks for jet training. The retirement of the HJT-16 Kiran intermediate jet trainers and HAL’s failure to successfully deliver its much-needed replacement — the HJT-36 Sitara or IJT, a program now practically shelved — compelled the air force to evolve a trainining regimen that utilised the two available aircraft platforms. What HAL is now proposing to do is add a step after the Hawks, before pilots progress to frontline jets.

Proposing such a step isn’t new though — not even for HAL. The company in 2017 unveiled the Hawk-i, shortly after BAE Systems announced an ‘Advanced Hawk’ developed jointly with HAL.


HAL’s Hawk-i
Just why HAL and BAE Systems would unveil two similarly souped up versions of the Hawk trainer around the same time was perplexing, and still unclear (while the Hawk-i sports Indian software and some equipment, the Advanced Hawk sports design changes in the wings, among other things). Both the Hawk-i and Advanced Hawk were also pitched for a low cost training segment after the baseline Hawk training phase. The idea was that these aircraft could take on, at low operating cost, the otherwise expensive business of pilots flying routine training sorties on high performance jets, while giving them the near full experience of a fast fighter. The air force is considering the segment, but hasn’t decided on if, how or when it plans to take a call. There have been signs that the Air Force isn’t particularly inclined to tinker any more with its training regimen if it doesn’t involve a low cost intermediate trainer between the basic and advanced stages — something HAL has failed to deliver.
The Advanced Hawk broke cover here on Livefist in 2017.

HAL’s SPORT trainer would appear to be aimed at this same space — an economical training platform that allows the air force to ease off usage of its frontline fighters, leaving them in better shape for more urgent operational duties. With a proposal to fund the program through internal accruals, it is also clear that HAL wants to push ahead with it. The plan, plain to see, is for the product to pick airframes off the LCA production line.

Finally, it would also be interesting to see how HAL explains the rationale for an LCA-based trainer, when an LCA Mk.1 trainer already of course exists. Will there be special economies that HAL plans to illustrate? Why would the IAF want an LCA trainer as well as a SPORT? Or could the SPORT be pushed chiefly as an export product to air forces looking for a fighter jet lite. The full story will hopefully be known this week. That this isn’t a clean sheet aircraft proposal is, however, reassuring from the perspective of risk, time and cost.

https://www.livefistdefence.com/2019/02/exclusive-hal-all-set-to-announce-lca-based-jet-trainer.html

And finally the LIFT version breaks the cover. Good decision by HAL considering export potential.
Click to expand...

Well, PKS was spot-on when he suggested several years ago that HAL do exactly this.
 
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Parthu said:
Considering we worked on making a twin-seat OCTs instead of making a LIFT, it's clear its only recently that the idea of separate LIFT version came to gain weight.
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That's because there is no requirement. This is only good to have.
 
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