India Worried After Russia Grounds MiG-29s

slim10 SG

http://www.defensenews.com/story.php?i=3995571&c=ASI&s=AIR

Snippets:

Sources also say the grounding could hurt the chances for the derivative MiG-35 in India's $10 billion Combat Aircraft order.

The crashes may also affect talks, said to be near completion, between India and Russia for the purchase of more MiG-29Ks, ministry sources said.

sundaytimes SG

India cannot rely on Russia fighter planes forever. India has to develop it own fighter planes.

Example China , now they can build their own fighter planes and export to many third world countries. Their J-6(copy of mig-19) had sucessfully sold to many countries.

sundaytimes SG

India cannot rely on Russia fighter planes forever. India has to develop it own fighter planes.

Example China , now they can build their own fighter planes and export to many third world countries. Their J-6(copy of mig-19) had sucessfully sold to many countries.

slim10 SG

It would interest you to know that self development of fighter planes has been a desire of India for 5X years now.

The problem has been engines.

Even in the early years, India manufactured the HF-24 marut fighter and got into problems with the engine (Read about BOr, Orpheus 703, RD-9 issues).

Fast forward to the LCA or Tejas. India wanted indigeneous engines ie Kaveri for the LCA. Went into a lot of problems and now ends up with the F404 after goodness knows how long a development period that practically guarantees the aircraft will be obselete on entry.

China on the other hand, basically got into licensed production arrangements. Nevertheless it faces the same problems as India except that it had better capabilities in engine manufacture eg WP-9s for the J-7s. It still runs into issues eg lack of RD-93 for export FC-1s.

India still does license productions fairly well eg Su-30mki except that the AL-31 engines are still proprietorily held by the Russians. China tried to copy the speys for the JH-7, took 20 years and still ended up signing a license production of the engine for the JH-7As.

Ultimately, if India is to be successful, it will need to manufacture its own engines. As the kaveri example shows, its not that easy.

stellazio SG

aiyah even F22 also recently crashed..

slim10 SG

Yup, but there's a difference of having 2 crashes over 6 years in the case of the F-22 (or 3 in 17 years) and 2 crashes in just 1 year for an almost similar number of Mig 29s.

Sepecat SG

A good & successful modern fighter is an immensely complex machine.

No country can afford to build one entirely on its own unless it has the time , will , money and talent to undertake such a Herculean effort. Even the Europeans have to join forces to build the state of the art Typhoon. Economies of scale are critical.

slim10 SG

Well, the French have their Rafale and the Swedes the Gripen.

Only a select group of countries have fighter engine producing capabilities. Russia, US, France, China, UK are the usual group. The Germans, Japanese and Italians (having a tradition of manufacturing aircraft engines) probably have the capability but choose not to do so. Israel can probably be added to the latter group.

sundaytimes SG

American, Russian will not sell the top model fighterplanes.

They will only sell the export models.

India had been buying Soviet weapons since 1970s until today.

Many billions of dollars had gone into their pocket.

Currently, India is buying the Russia second hand aircraft carrier. The Russia keep on asking India to pay more.

Sepecat SG

Well, the French have their Rafale and the Swedes the Gripen.

Slim10

Yes, but the French and Swedes already have a long history of building fighters. However, although Rafale and Gripen are excellent aircraft , I believe that they fill niche markets & cost per aircraft are rather high. They are also produced in small quantities.

Shotgun SG

Well considering planes either crash or land, its not a real surprise that crashes do happen. Can't exactly park the plane in mid air and call the tow right?

There are lots of measurements to how good an aircraft is. The same aircraft might crash 3 times a year at Air Force B, and Once in 3 years at Air Force A. It's the same aircraft, but different level of experience and maintenance.

Naturally, maintenance friendly aircraft are more than welcomed. If an aircraft has to switch out its engines everytime it lands... then theres really no point in keeping it.

slim10 SG

And so has India in the production of fighter aircraft. From the Harlow PC-5 to the Mig-21/27 variants to the Hawk fighters to the Su-30mki. Just that in most cases, these are licensed productions rather than self-designed ones. India's aircraft industry is not a young one. It would not be difficult for India to design an aircraft.

India's fighter fleet has numbers requirements that can justify self production. That's why the Tejas was designed.

The problem as mentioned has always been to get a suitable engine for the fighter. That is a different case.

Sepecat SG

Licensed productions usually entail assembling the planes with some manufacturing content. Even then, manufacturing are based on designs and blueprints from the supplier.

It is a very long way from being able to designing a good fighter plane if you only have production / assembly experience.

sundaytimes SG

Licensed productions, still need to get key parts eg engine from the russians. The russia will not reveal the secret of the jet fighter.

Still not made indigenously.