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november 2008 Special edition for Airshow China 2008 & IndoDefence/IndoAerospace 2008

SUKHOI FIGHTERS on Asian market

Su-35 programme progress [p.22]

[p.18]

Tikhomirov-NIIP from phased array to AESA

HIGH TECHNOLOGIES SAFEGUARDING PEACEFUL SKIES

[p.38]

Russia’s largest defence holding company more than 40 industrial and research organizations powerful research and productive potential full range of air defence systems and assets integrated technological process from development to serial production of weapons and military equipment full liability and timely fulfillment of contractual obligations

Our products are successfully operated in 50 countries worldwide

Air Launch for Russia and Indonesia

MiG-29K again at Nitka

[p.46]

[p.28] ALMAZ-ANTEY CONCERN 41, Vereiskaya str. Moscow 121471, Russia Теl.: (495) 780-54-10; Fax: (495) 780-54-11 E-mail: vts@almaz-antey.ru

New Russian airborne weapons

[p.10, 26]

november 2008 Editor-in-Chief Andrey Fomin

Deputy Editor-in-Chief Vladimir Shcherbakov

Editor Yevgeny Yerokhin

Columnist Alexander Velovich

Special correspondents Alexey Mikheyev, Vladimir Karnozov, Victor Drushlyakov, Andrey Zinchuk, Valery Ageyev, Alina Chernoivanova, Natalya Pechorina, Marina Lystseva, Dmirty Pichugin, Sergey Krivchikov, Sergey Popsuyevich, Piotr Butowski, Alexander Mladenov, Miroslav Gyurosi

Design and pre-press Grigory Butrin

Web support Georgy Fedoseyev

Translation Yevgeny Ozhogin

Cover picture Alexey Mikheyev

Publisher

Director General Andrey Fomin

Deputy Director General Nadezhda Kashirina

Marketing Director George Smirnov

Director for international projects Alexander Velovich

News items for “In Brief” columns are prepared by editorial staff based on reports of our special correspondents, press releases of production companies as well as by using information distributed by ITAR-TASS, ARMS-TASS, Interfax-AVN, RIA Novosti, RBC news agencies and published at www.aviaport.ru, www.avia.ru, www.gazeta.ru, www.cosmoworld.ru web sites Items in the magazine placed on this colour background or supplied with a note “Commercial” are published on a commercial basis.

Editorial staff does not bear responsibility for the contents of such items.

The magazine is registered by the Federal Service for supervision of observation of legislation in the sphere of mass media and protection of cultural heritage of the Russian Federation. Registration certificate PI FS77-19017 dated 29 November 2004

Dear reader, You are holding another issue of the Take-Off magazine – a special supplement to Russian national aerospace magazine VZLET. The issue has been timed with Airshow China 2008 and IndoDefence/ IndoAerospace 2008.

By tradition, the aerospace exhibition in Zhuhai has been attended by numerous Russian participants and businessmen. Small wonder, because the Russian-Chinese aerospace cooperation has been given a strong impetus over the past dozen and a half years. As a result, China has become a top importer of Russian aircraft, first and foremost, Sukhoi jets. Today, the Russian-made Sukhoi Su-27SK/UBK and Su-30MKK fighters have been the mainstay of PLAAF’s new-generation fighter fleet while two dozens Su-30MK2s serve with PLANAF. Moreover, China’s own aerospace plants have mastered Su-27SK’s licence production.

Engine deliveries also have been high on the priority list of the RussianChinese aviation cooperation, with these turbofans powering both Russia-supplied and advanced indigenous Chinese fighters, the J-10 and FC-1 (JF-17). Russian experts consult their Chinese counterparts developing new aircraft, e.g. latest Chinese trainer L-15, to power which an advanced Ukrainian-Russian AI-222 turbofan engine afterburner version is intended.

However, the Russian-Chinese cooperation does not limit itself to combat planes. China operates Russian-made Mil Mi-8 and Mi-17/Mi-171 helicopters and Ilyushin Il-76 freighters on a large scale, with Beriev Be-103 light multipurpose amphibians and Tupolev Tu-204-120CE freighters to start arriving to Chinese buyers soon. The cooperation has been on the rise, with new contracts for combat and commercial aircraft could be placed in the future.

Another country in the region, Indonesia, has become an important Russia’s partner in the field of aerospace cooperation. Indonesia has already bought four Sukhoi fighters and a batch of Mil Mi-35 helicopters with new deliveries of six Su-30MK2 and Su-27SKM jets are expected in 2008 and 2009. Moreover, Russia and Indonesia have established a joint venture aimed at implementation of the unique Air Launch aerospace programme. Russian-Ukrainian Antonov An-124-100 transport plane will take-off from Indonesia’s airfield at Biak island to airdrop at a height of 10 km a new Russian space launch vehicle to orbit satellites for customers in Indonesia and other countries.

All these themes became the main topics of this issue. As usual, you are also getting news on the other key events in the Russian and CIS aerospace fields over the past couple of months. I hope the materials will come in handy for you to have a better grasp of the large Russian expositions at the Zhuhai and Jakarta shows and keep abreast of the latest development in Russia’s aviation and space exploration fields.

I wish all participants and guests of Airshow China 2008 and IndoDefence/IndoAerospace 2008 to meet new partners, establish useful links and snag lucrative contracts. See you at new air shows!

© Aeromedia, 2008

Sincerely,

P.O. Box 7, Moscow, 125475, Russia Tel. +7 (495) 644-17-33, 798-81-19 Fax +7 (495) 644-17-33 E-mail: info@take-off.ru http://www.take-off.ru

Andrey Fomin Editor-in-chief Take-Off magazine

contents

CIVIL AVIATION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 More Tu-204-300 and A320 for Vladivostok Avia Beefing up Red Wings’ fleet Another Tu-214 built Aeroflot-Cargo gearing up for getting Il-96-400T Aeroflot kicks off discarding its Tu-154 fleet

November 2008

8

MILITARY AVIATION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8 Blackjacks over the Caribbean

JDAM and JSOW а la russe

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Last summer, the Bazalt federal unitary company, which turns 70 this year and is Russia’s major diversified company specialising in developing and manufacturing close-in battle weapons for the Army and aerial weapons for the Air Force, held a presentation, during which the company’s leaders shed some light on weapons systems under development. Bazalt Director General Vladimir Korenkov said that the company was completing the development of several cutting-edge air-launched precision-guided weapons systems expected soon to start fielding with the Russian Air Force and being sold abroad in addition to rocket launchers, mortar bombs, hand grenades and self-propelled gun rounds well known abroad, as well as unguided aerial weapons of all types long and widely employed by RusAF. The novelties in question include, in the first place, the advanced PBK-500U commonised gliding cluster-bomb unit (CBU) with homing submunitions and a special set of glide-and-guide range-extension modules to fit production gravity bombs. The development of the two systems is a kind of response of Russian designers to the US development of the JSOW gliding CBU and a series of JDAM smart bombs already in the inventory of the US Air Force, US Navy’s air arm and a number of other militaries.

Take-off’s correspondent Yevgeny Yerokhin attended Bazalt’s presentation

CONTRACTS AND DELIVERIES . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12

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Beriev and Vega carry on with AEW systems Mi-171 for Mongolian military Ka-226T throws its hat into Indian tender ring IFC increases Russian airliner exports to Latin America Russian-German JV gets first order for A320 conversion First Ukrainian An-148 delivered Il-114-100 finds new buyers

Sukhoi fighters on Asian market

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According to the annual arms output rating of Russia’s major defence manufacturers published by the Russian independent Centre of Analysis of Strategies and Technologies last year, the Sukhoi company ranked first in 2007, having more than doubled its income. Its proceeds exceeded $1.9 billion last year, which accounted for almost half the gross revenue of the United Aircraft Corporation. Sukhoi produced such high production and sales results owing to its export success in the first place, with customers having taken delivery of over 50 aircraft of the Su-30MK family. In 2007, Sukhoi’s exports exceeded $1.35 billion, totalling almost a quarter of the aggregate revenue earned from all Russian weaponry exports that year. More than half of the Sukhoi aircraft exported last year went to Asian countries. The Asian market remains key to Sukhoi that has clinched deals to deliver upwards of 550 Sukhoi fighters to the region, of which more than 350 have been delivered. This is the lion’s share of the Sukhoi aircraft exported after the dissolution of the Soviet Union, which makes the Asian market especially important to the company

Su-35: two prototypes under tests!

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The second prototype of the advanced Sukhoi Su-35 multirole fighter completed its maiden flight in Komsomolsk-on-Amur, Russia’s Far East, on 2 October 2008, controlled by the Sukhoi design bureau’s test pilot Sergey Bogdan, an Honoured Test Pilot of the Russian Federation. The mission lasted about an hour. Sergey Bogdan tested the operation of fighter’s powerplant and fly-by-wire system in various modes, examined its stability and controllability and became completely satisfied with the aircraft’s performance. It means that already two Su-35 prototypes are undergoing flight tests now with the third one to join them soon. The first Su-35 aircraft made its maiden flight earlier this year, on 19 February, and have successfully fulfilled more than 40 test sorties by the beginning of October. Joining the second flying prototype to flight test programme enables to fasten Su-35’s testing process that is to be completed in a couple of years. According to Sukhoi, the full-rate production of the cutting-edge 4++ generation fighter and its deliveries to both domestic and foreign users are slated for 2011. “The Su-35 entering service will bolster the national defence capability and enable Sukhoi to remain competitive on the global market until its fifth-generation fighter becomes ready for deliveries”, Sukhoi’s press release emphasises. Andrey Fomin analyses Su-35 programme progress

www.take-off.ru

contents

New weapons for advanced Sukhoi fighters

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In early June, the Tactical Missiles Corp. launched a campaign to promote a number of latest air-launched guided missiles on the market. The weapons promoted include the new-generation Kh-38ME air-launched modular guided missile and several heavy upgrades, including the Kh-58UShKE antiradiation missile equipped with a wideband passive radar homer, Kh-59MK2 air-launched guided missile with a self-contained target area recognition capability and KAB-1500LG-F-E laser beam-riding smart bomb. All these weapons will be incorporated in Su-35’s weapon suite being available for other new Russia’s combat aircraft as well. Yevgeny Yerokhin reviews the new Tactical Missiles Corp's weapons

MiG-29K back at Nitka Vikramaditya’s arresting gear kicks off trials in Crimea

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On 1 September, the Crimea-based Nitka training facility saw the kick-off of tests of the first arrestor designed to fit the Vikramaditya aircraft carrier, with the Sevmash company in Severodvinsk working on it under the Russian-Indian Admiral Gorshkov aircraft carrier overhaul and upgrade contract on order by the Indian Navy.

The MiG-29K prototype serialled 312 had arrived from Russia to test the first arresting gear at the Nitka facility in the Crimea-based Saki airbase. A Take-off correspondent Victor Drushlyakov covered the tests

INDUSTRY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30

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IFC orders large batch of Tu-204s from UAC MC-21 clearing ‘second gate’ Sukhoi SuperJet 100 to begin certification tests UAC’s second subsidiary registered Tu-142s upgraded in Taganrog AL-55I trials on MiG-AT started Another Yak-130 enters trials First Taganrog-built Be-200ChS to be ready in three years Work on Beriev A-42 continues Beriev’s new programmes Be-32’s rebirth?

Kamov company turns 60

Tikhomirov’s radars: from phased array to AESA Interview of Tikhomirov-NIIP Director General Yuri Bely A key component of formidable combat capabilities of advanced fighters is the sophisticated fire control system wrapped around an efficient radar. All Sukhoi Su-27/Su-30 family fighters – both exported and in service with the Russian Air Force – are fitted with fire control systems developed by the Tikhomirov-NIIP research institute. Tikhomirov-NIIP became a pioneer in developing phased-array radars. Its first airborne radar debuted on the MiG-31 interceptor, and starting with the Su-30MKI these radars have been equipping Sukhoi fighters. This year, the advanced Su-35 multirole fighter entered the trials, with Tikhomirov-NIIP developing the Irbis-E passive phased array radar – the most refined in its class – to fit it. As far as the future fifth-generation fighter is concerned, the company is developing its first active electronically scanned array radar (AESA). To learn the status of the programmes, Take-off’s editor Andrey Fomin met Tikhomirov-NIIP Director General Yuri Bely who was kind enough to grant us an interview

Aircraft computers made in Ryazan Take-off has repeatedly covered various spheres the State Ryazan Instrument-Making Plant (GRPZ) – a major Russian manufacturer of airborne radars – operates in, including its productionising of the active phased array and development of heliborne radar. In addition, GRPZ develops a family of airborne digital computers and airborne computer systems for various applications. Take-off’s correspondent Yevgeny Yerokhin has been to the plant again and seen Nikolay Andreyev, chief of the airborne computer department of the corporate scientific and technical centre

COSMONAUTICS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46 Air Launch: Indonesian prospects of Russian space programme

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www.take-off.ru

During the Russian president’s official visit to Indonesia in September 2007, about a dozen memoranda and agreements were signed, of which the principal one was the agreement on a $1 billion loan to Indonesia for acquisition of Russian armament and associated equipment. During their official meeting with the media, the two presidents confirmed their interest in stepping up bilateral high-technology cooperation, including joint space programme. This means, among other things, that they gave the green light to the well-known Air Launch programme that became an international endeavour. The programme provides for orbiting small spacecraft by launch vehicles blasting off not from the ground as usual, rather from an altitude of 10 km after air-dropping from an An-124-100 Ruslan carrier aircraft. The first air launch has been slated for 2010.

take-off november 2008

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on the eve of the Day of the Air Fleet celebrated on 16 August.

Meanwhiule, another Airbus A320 medium-haul airliner joined Vladivostok Avia’s aircraft fleet in July. The A320-211 (VP-BEQ) made in 1994 became the fourth aircraft of the type, sporting the colours of Vladivostok Avia. The airline has been flying its first A320-212 (VP-BRB) since February last year, and two A320-214s (VP-BFX and VP-BFY) started flying operation with the airline earlier this year. While Vladivostok Avia’s Tu-204-300s are mostly used for carrying Far Eastern passengers to Moscow, St. Petersburg and

the Ural, its A320s mostly operate from Moscow’s Vnukovo airport on services to Yekaterinburg, Kemerovo, Novokuznetsk, Abakan, etc.

Due to an avgas price spike, Vladivostok Avia works hard to

Andrey Pechenkin

Two Tupolev Tu-204-300 medium/long-haul airliners built by Aviastar-SP in Ulyanovsk this year on order from the Ilyushin Finance Co. (IFC) joined the aircraft fleet of Far-Eastern airline Vladivostok Avia this summer, having become the fifth and sixth airliners of the type operated by the carrier since 2005.

Its Tu-204-300s log an average of 400 flight hours monthly.

The first of the two airliners (RA-64044) was received in a ceremony in Vladivostok on 12 July, with the other Tu-204-300 (RA-64045) arriving from the aircraft factory to Vladivostok a month later,

Valdivostok Avia

More Tu-204-300 and A320 for Vladivostok Avia

renovate its aircraft fleet with more operationally efficient Airbuses and Russian-made Tu-204-300s. It is going to ditch all of its Tu-154s by 2009 (in addition to six Tu-204-300s and four A320-200s, its fleet includes now five Tu-154Ms and two grounded Tu-154B-2s). To discard the Tu-154s, the company has signed memorandums of understanding for three more A320s to be delivered in 2009–11. Owing to a hike in business activities in the Far East anticipated in the run-up to the APEC summit meeting and Vladivostok Avia’s plans to buy A330 wide-bodies, it has ordered its first A330-300 with the 327-seat capacity, which delivery is slated for April or May 2009.

Another Tu-214 built

The new Tupolev Tu-204-100V medium-range airliner with side number RA-64043, which had been built for the Red Wings airline on order from the IFC leasing company, flew from the Aviastar-SP factory airfield in Ulyanovsk to Vnukovo airport in Moscow on 13 August. It became the fifth Tu-204 operated by Red Wings, which launched services last year on four earlier-built Tu-204-100s, and the 35th production Tu-204 made by Aviastar-SP. The acceptance ceremony took place at Aviastar-SP on 3 June this year, but the new aircraft’s commercial service entry had dragged feet due to the need of obtaining certification documents reflecting the Tu-204-100V’s standard design modifications (the planes has a Russian-language flight deck and the 210-seat cabin layout). Finally, IAC’s Aircraft Registry

Another new Tupolev Tu-214 (RA-64513) airliner conducted its maiden flight from the airfield of the Kazan Aircraft Production Association (KAPO) on 16 August 2008. The aircraft’s construction had been ordered by the Financial Leasing Company (FLC) for the Transaero air carrier.

KAPO built Transaero’s first Tu-214 (RA-64509) in November 2006, with the airliner entering commercial operation on 19 April 2007. Transaero expected the same year to take delivery of another airliner of the type, but its assembly was completed only

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issued Type Certificate Supplement No. ST233-Tu-204-120CE/D06 and Aircraft Noise Certificate Supplements No. SSh170-Tu-204/D01 and No. 63/D02, thus allowing the new aircraft to carry passengers.

Under the contract Red Wings and IFC signed in August last year, Aviastar-SP is to deliver five more new Tu-204s to the airline in 2008–09. The sixth Tu-204 earmarked for Red Wings (Tu-204-100V RA-64046) was built by Aviastar-SP and completed its maiden flight in September 2008, with its delivery slated for October.

Ildar Valeyev

Beefing up Red Wings’ fleet

this summer. According to Transaero, its personnel started the reception of the new Tu-214 from KAPO in late September, with its delivery and commercial service entry slated for earlier November. In all, under the Transaero – FLC contract made in 2005, the airline is to lease for 15 years ten Tu-214s, of which five were to enter operation before 2006 year-end and another five during 2007. Unfortunately, the deadline has slipped behind schedule considerably, and Transaero has had to buy more foreign-made planes.

www.take-off.ru

civil aviation | news

Aeroflot-Cargo gearing up for getting Il-96-400T six Il-96-400Ts for 15 years in June 2007. Under the contract, IFC is to lease three aircraft in 2008 and three in 2010 to the carrier. The first two transports (RA-96102 and RA-96101), which VASO made last summer and this spring respectively and which had initially been earmarked for Atlant-Soyuz carrier, are virtually ready for commercial operation, with the former already painted in the Aeroflot-Cargo paint scheme.

Under the delivery schedule, the airline will have received the third airliner before year-end 2008, with VASO completing the airliner now.

The Il-96-400Ts being leased to Aeroflot-Cargo are the first aircraft of the type. They can haul up to 92 t of cargo on medium and intercontinental routes on all types of international-standard cargo pallets and containers loaded through the side-loading door.

IFC

On 2 September, personnel of the Aeroflot and Aeroflot-Cargo carriers started receiving two new Ilyushin Il-96-400T long-haul freighters on the premises of the Voronezh Aircraft Production Association (VASO). The planes had been ordered by Aeroflot-Cargo, a subsidiary of Aeroflot – Russian Airlines. The supplier is the Ilyushin Finance Co. (IFC).

IFC and Aeroflot-Cargo struck a deal for financial leasing of

The Il-96-400T is a derivative of the Il-96-300 long-haul wide-body airliner, from which it differs in having a stretched fuselage. It is powered by advanced Perm Motors PS-90A1 enhanced-thrust turbofan engines and is fitted with a Russian-made upgraded flight navigation system allowing the aircraft unrestricted operation throughout the world.

Before the arrival of the first Il-96-400Ts, Aeroflot-Cargo’s fleet had been made up of foreign-built aircraft only. At present, the company flies three MD-11F and three DC-10-40F wide-bodies as well as two Boeing 737-300F medium-haul freighters. With returning the DC-10-40Fs to the lessors, Aeroflot-Cargo is going to start operating three more MD-11Fs it is going to buy. The carrier hauls cargo on its regular operations to Germany, Finland, Norway, France, Japan, South Korea, China, Hong Kong, the UK and Kazakhstan.

Aeroflot kicks off discarding its Tu-154 fleet

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Aeroflot is intent on beginning to discard the remaining Tu-154Ms in the fourth quarter of 2008. As a result, the first seven eldest aircraft made in 1988 will have been written off by early 2009. Next year, 14 more aircraft, which were built in 1988–90, will be decommissioned gradually and, finally, the last four Tu-154Ms manufactured in 1990–92 will retire in 2010.

The airline will continue its acquisition of Airbus A320s to

replace its written-off Tu-154Ms. In October through December, Aeroflot is to take delivery of five more new A320s being leased from RBS, GECAS and AerCap under various deals. In 2009, they are to be joined by six more A320s and four A319s, and most of them will have entered operation by the beginning of next summer. The new airliners will beef the Russian flag carrier’s Airbus fleet up to 53

units. To date, Aeroflot has been operating as many as 38 such aircraft – 11 A319s, 17 A320s and 10 A321s. The company is going to keep on buying new West European aircraft. For instance, it made another deal with Airbus at the recent Farnborough air show on 16 July for five A321 powered

by CFM-56 engines. The planes will be delivered from August to December 2013.

Sergey Krivchikov

The Aeroflot – Russian Airlines company has gone public with its plans for decommissioning its fleet of Tupolev Tu-154M medium-haul airliners. As Aeroflot’s chief Valery Okulov has repeatedly said, the Russian flag carrier is going to cease operation of the aircraft of the type by 2010. Now, some details have been published.

A largest Russian Tu-154 operator along with the Siberia (S7) air carrier, Aeroflot had had 26 aircraft of the type by this summer.

Following the June incident in Pulkovo airport, their number dropped to 25. (As is known, on 30 June 2008, Moscow-bound Tu-154M (RA-85667) suffered the disintegration of the left engine on takeoff, which caused fire on board; fortunately, the skilled aircrew managed to abort the takeoff, suppress the fire and avoid a grave flight incident, but the structural damage sustained prompted the decision not to rebuild the airliner).

www.take-off.ru

military aviation | news

Alexey Mikheyev

Blackjacks over the Caribbean

Expanding the zone of continuous aerial patrolling resumed on order from the Russian president in August last year, the Russian Air Force’s Long-Range Aviation has been going ever farther away from the national boarders. The turn of South America and the Caribbean has come this time around.

On 10 September, two Tupolev Tu-160 strategic bombers with the 37th Air Army, named after Alexander Molodchy and Vassily Senko, stationed at Engels AFB vic. Saratov made the first long-range non-stop flight over the neutral waters in the Arctic and Atlantic oceans and landed at the Venezuelan Air Force’s Libertador airbase at 20.50 hrs Moscow time on the same day under the remote area air patrolling plan and Russian-Venezuelan intergovernmental agreements.

Their visit to a Latin American country came as no surprise, since RusAF Commander-in-Chief Col.-Gen. Alexander Zelin said as far back as August that the Long-Range Aviation might well use airfields of other countries.

The mission featured a long flight over terrain lacking any reference points. The flight lasted about 13 hours, during which about 10,000 km were covered.

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On the initial leg, a pair of NATO’s F-16s escorted the bombers briefly over the neutral waters to be replaced with two USAF F-15 fighters following them for 10–15 minutes on approach to Iceland, after which the Tu-160s proceeded to Venezuela ‘in relative solitude’.

“In the course of the flight, we are going to familiarise with the situation in the area and navigation conditions so that other our aircrew know what environment they may have to operate in”, Maj.-Gen. Pavel Androsov, commander, Long-Range Aviation, said at a news conference.

The Venezuelan voyage of the Russian strategic bombers have been their first ever mission to the Americas. According to Maj.-Gen. Androsov, another reason for the flight being unique is that the landing had been performed during a thunder in high ambient temperature and high humidity. “We have made certain that our aircraft are prepared to operate anywhere in the world”, the Long-Range Aviation commander emphasised.

Rear Adm. Joseph Kernan, US Navy 4th Fleet commander, in turn, told foreign media that his command would keep the tabs on the operations of the Russian strategic bombers in the 4th Fleet’s AO (the

Caribbean and South America), but said, “In my mind if the Russians flew those aircraft down to this region because of a threat from the U.S., then I think they wasted gas”.

The flight was led by Long-Range Aviation Deputy Commander Maj.-Gen. Alexander Afinogentov who flew the Vassily Senko bomber. The other aircraft, the Alexander Molodchy, was manned by the crew led by Deputy Regimental Commander Lt.-Col. Andrey Senchurov qualified as 1st class pilot.

In Venezuela, the Russian aircraft stayed at Libertador air base near Caracas. According to the Russian crews, Libertador fits the Tu-160 in terms of infrastructure with its 3,000m runway, good surfacing and all relevant equipment.

On 13 September, the bombers conducted the first of the flights scheduled for the TDY, flying over the Caribbean towards Panama and back. “The flight was uneventful and lasted about six hours. We have flown along the coastline of the Caribbean countries”, Maj.-Gen. Afinogentov said afterwards, “There have been no incidents, and the materiel operated like clockwork”.

The second mission, which lasted six hours too, was accomplished on 14 September towards Brazil this time. They flew over the neutral waters far enough from the coastline. Foreign fighter planes did not escort the Tu-160s on both training missions. “The missions have been accomplished”, said Maj.-Gen. Anatoly Zhikharev, chief of staff, Long-Range Aviation.

Having taken off from Libertador air base at 10.00 hrs Moscow time on 18 September, the two bombers set off for long a way back home. Their return flight took about 15 hours. On the final leg of the flight, the Tu-160s performed a nighttime mid-air refuelling from an Ilyushin Il-78 tanker plane over the Norwegian Sea. While near Norway, they were accompanied

by Norwegian Air Force F-16 fighters for about 5 minutes. The bombers landed at Engels AFB at 01.20 hrs on 19 September. The crews were given a high-profile reception attended by Long-Range Aviation commander Maj.-Gen. Androsov.

“All flights by Russian Air Force aircraft have been performed over the neutral waters in compliance with the international aerial navigation rules without intrusion into airspace of other states”, a RusAF spokesman said concerning the trans-Atlantic mission.

www.take-off.ru

TURBOFAN ENGINE

PS-90А-76 PS-90A-76 turbofan engine is a version of PS-90A turbofan featuring a thrust of 14,500 kg (with a possibility to increase up to 16,000 kg).

PS-90A-76 is intended for remotorisation of Ilyushin Il-76 family aircraft now in operation with D-30KP engines as well as for fitting new aircraft.

Aircraft powered by PS-90A-76 turbofans meet ICAO Chapter 4 standards for noise and emission (2008).

PS-90A-76 ADVANTAGES: • operation costs reduction by 1.7 times; • powerplant reliability increase by 1.5–2 times; • fuel consumption reduction by 13–15%; • engine on-condition maintenance; • FADEC installation.

PS-90A-76 turbofan engine powers the following modern aircraft:

Il-76TD-90

Il -76MF

Il -76MD-90

www.ukpmk.ru

Viktor Drushlyakov

military aviation | weapons

Yevgeny YEROKHIN

Last summer, the Bazalt federal unitary company, which turns 70 this year and is Russia’s major diversified company specialising in developing and manufacturing close-in battle weapons for the Army and aerial weapons for the Air Force, held a presentation, during which the company’s leaders shed some light on weapons systems under development. Bazalt Director General Vladimir Korenkov said that the company was completing the development of several cutting-edge air-launched precision-guided weapons systems expected soon to start fielding with the Russian Air Force and being sold abroad in addition to rocket launchers, mortar bombs, hand grenades and self-propelled gun rounds well known abroad, as well as unguided aerial weapons of all types long and widely employed by RusAF. The novelties in question include, in the first place, the advanced PBK-500U commonised gliding cluster-bomb unit (CBU) with homing submunitions and a special set of glide-and-guide wing modules to fit production gravity bombs. The development of the two systems is a kind of response of Russian designers to the US development of the JSOW gliding CBU and a series of JDAM smart bombs already in the inventory of the US Air Force, US Navy’s air arm and a number of other militaries. Take-off’s correspondent attended Bazalt’s presentation.

PBK-500U: Russian response to JSOW Bazalt launched development of the advanced gliding cluster-bomb dispenser as far back as the mid-1990s to enhance RusAF’s effectiveness and combat capabilities. However, the programme was affected by the economic turmoil in the country and has been re-energised and completed only recently. As was said at the presentation, flight tests of the advanced weapon are to begin this year. The official trials are supposed to take place in 2009. If they prove to be a success, the fielding of the PBK-500U with the Air Force may launch already in 2010.

Bazalt’s advanced gliding cluster bomb is, essentially, a Russian analogue of the American JSOW weapons system. Bazalt’s earlier RBK-500 disposal CBU as well as fragmentation, concrete-busting, shaped-charge, incendiary, cluster, homing and mine submunition modules for the KMGU airborne container are an effective means to destroy hostile aircraft, missile systems and armoured vehicles. The lethality of such weapons is several times as that of monoblock bombs. With the same calibre, RBK and PBK

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need 10 times less munitions to destroy similar targets, with their yield being adaptable to a specific target.

The advanced PBK-500U gliding cluster bomb packing SPBE-K homing submunitions is derivative of the RBK-500 series of disposable cluster bomb units, ensuring more effective application by tactical aircraft, such as the Su-34, etc.

It is designed for all-weather round-the-clock standoff employment with precise delivery of submunitions to the target. The gliding CBU has a calibre of 500 mm and kills armour, SAM systems, command posts and other military installations with the radar or infrared signature giving them away against the underlying terrain in the face of clutter and countermeasures from an altitude ranging from 100 m to 14,000 m at the carrier aircraft’s speed varying from 700 km/h to 1,100 km/h. The weapon’s range is about 50 km if released from an altitude of 10 km. The CBU is 3,100 mm long and 450 mm in diameter.

The baseline model now undergoing tests has its submunitions dispenser fitted with the inertial navigation system (INS) and a GPS/

Bazalt

JDAM and JSOW а la russe

GLONASS satnav receiver to ensure accurate delivery of submunitions to the target area.

This is an all-passive guidance package requiring no information contact with the target neither before, nor after the release, which is important for the survival of the launch platform and for mission accomplishment. The PBK-500U is a launch-and-leave weapon.

The PBK-500U can be fitted with various cluster submunitions or monoblock warheads.

The baseline model is fitted with SPBE-K combined heat-seeking/radar-homing submunitions wiping out a wide range of military weapons systems and vehicles in various types of terrain. According to Bazalt representatives, even rather old homing submunitions, such as SPBE-D, remain superior to many western analogues, while the new-generation SPBE-K does not even have rivals abroad. A single CBU packing such submunitions can knock off up to six armoured vehicles – both those emitting in the infrared part of the spectrum and those emitting nothing. The SPBE-Ks can be applied against enemy tanks in a www.take-off.ru

military aviation | weapons close-range armoured free-for-all, since it has the identification friend-or-foe capability. The submunitions are expected to be extremely effective even against future armoured threats.

The CBU’s version filled with BETAB-M concrete-piercing submunitions is superior to all known analogues too.

The advantages offered by the commonised gliding CBU over an air-to-surface missile handling similar tasks are its lower cost, much heavier warhead totalling more than 70% of the PBK-500U’s weight and multiple-kill-per-pass capability.

According to Bazalt’s leaders speaking at the presentation, in future the PBK-500U is to be fitted with an efficient motor, which will considerably extend the weapon’s controlled flight distance while retaining its precision. This PBK-500U variant will be comparable to the US-made JSOW-ER.

PBK-500U

Dumb bombs gaining wings Bazalt Director General Vladimir Korenkov said during the presentation that his company’s development of special commonised glide and guidance kits has been in full swing to fit them to gravity bombs and disposable cluster-bomb dispensers. One or more kit comprising folding wings and guidance, navigation and satellite update packages will be attached to a bomb depending on the mission. Such kits may be fitted to the existing dumb bombs in RusAF’s inventory and all of the future ones. The programme will enhance the range, precision and functionality of gravity bombs and, depending on the type of kits, create, essentially, precision-guided weapons released from low altitude at a standoff range.

Such an approach to aerial bombs upgrade have been used by the United States deriving the GBU-31, GBU-32, GBU-38 and other smart bombs from the production Mk-82, Mk-83, Mk-84 and a number of other 500, 1,000 and 2,000lb gravity bombs under the www.take-off.ru

Yevgeny Yerokhin

FAB-500M62 with MPK model

JDAM programme. However, Bazalt’s upgrade costs far less. Mounting the new tailkit, guidance package and empennage under the JDAM programme involves factory assembly, and any factory assembly jacks up the costs. Bazalt offers a cheaper and more flexible variant: the modular design allows assembly of smart bombs in the required configuration at the airfield, rather than at the factory.

In addition, the urgency of retrofitting Russian bombs with range-extension wing kits is highlighted by the fact that development of similar-performance missiles or smart bombs to handle the same tasks would have cost 50 times more, according to Bazalt.

At present, the design that has advanced farthest is the one providing the wingkitting of a most mass-produced Russian bomb, the FAB-500M-62, remaining in the inventory of many air forces throughout the world.

According to Bazalt’s managers, there are four different baseline upgrade variants. The first one provides for equipping a bomb with the so-called ‘simple’ wing kit. This is a purely aerodynamic solution allowing the bomb to self-stabilise and offset the wind drift and providing for attaching only a simple glide-and-guide module to the bomb’s body without any electronic modules. The kit’s cost will be within the cost of the weapon itself. Aerial bombs in such a configuration can be used at a range of 6–8 km but from a minimum altitude of 50–100 m, rather than 3,000–4,000 m usual for ‘dumb’ HE bombs and making the aircraft vulnerable to hostile air defences.

The second option goes for using the standard-issue glide-and-guide module and the small-size INS unit, the latter allowing the bomb’s in-flight stabilisation and arrival to the target area. This variant will ensure a release range of 12–15 km while retaining the required accuracy.

The third version provides for beefing up the INS-based range-extension kit, whose accura-

cy is not too high, with extra drives and a GPS/ GLONASS satnav receiver. The solution will allow release at a range of 40–60 km depending on the carrier aircraft’s flight mode and speed and will ensure a circular error probable (CEP) of at least 10 m.

The fourth variant’s kit comprises a pulsed ramjet engine in addition to the glide-and-guide module and guidance package and will have a range of 80–100 km.

Upgraded bombs in the ‘glide-and-guide module + INS/GPS’ and ‘glide-and-guide module + INS/GPS + engine’ configurations gain new characteristics turning them into full-fledged standoff PGMs producing a greater bang for a far smaller buck. An advantage of modernised bombs is the payload weight totalling in the neighbourhood of 70 per cent of the launch weight as opposed to 15–20 per cent of a similar-purpose missile.

As far as the range-extension kit cost is concerned, Vladimir Korenkov said it would cost only 5 to 10 times more than the bomb, which is much cheaper than the cost of advanced smart bombs and guided missiles. The bombs upgraded by Bazalt will feature the following characteristics: 400 mm in diameter, 645– 2,000 mm in wingspan and 3,000 mm in length. The ‘winged’ bomb will weigh up to 540 kg, with its warhead weighing 300 kg.

On the eve of Bazalt’s anniversary, the Russian government issued a resolution on setting up an integrated entity based on Bazalt to make aerial bombs and close-in battle weapons. Under the presidential decree dated 10 July 2008, Bazalt and members of the future integrated entity joined the Russian Technologies state corporation. The emergence of the integrated entity will speed up the development of cutting-edge munitions, so, hopefully, advanced Bazalt-built glide CBUs and ‘winged’ bombs will enter service with the Russian Air Force and foreign air forces real soon. take-off november 2008

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contracts and deliveries | news

in brief III

Beriev and Vega carry on with AEW systems

The Sri Lankan Air Force has taken delivery of five MiG-29 fighters, the local daily Sri Lanka Watch reported on 1 October. The talks on buying four upgraded MiG-29SM singleseaters and a MiG-29UB twin-seat combat trainer worth estimated $75 million had been under way since early 2007. The acquisition of the MiG-29 fighters is being implemented under the national air defence modernisation programme to beat back air attacks of the Tamil Tigers insurgents.

III 6 August witnessed the handover ceremony for six new Mil Mi-17V-5 helicopters to the Indonesian Army Aviation at Surabaya air base, Indonesia.

They had been built by Kazan Helicopters under the deal clinched in 2005. The first three aircraft were brought from Russia on 3 July and the other three had arrived by early August. A group of Indonesian flying and ground crews had been given relevant training in the city of Kazan in operating and maintaining their Mi-17V-5s prior to the delivery.

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The Vega Radio Engineering Corp. has maintained a long-time partnership with Beriev company in developing airborne early warning and control systems (AEW&C).

The A-50 AEW&C aircraft developed by the tandem have been in service with the Russian Air Force for almost a quarter of century (by the way, this year will mark the 30th anniversary of the maiden flight of the first prototype A-50 that took place on 19 December 1978). These days, Beriev and Vega have been cooperating in two principal fields – the A-50EI programme for the Indian Air Force (IAF) and the A-50 upgrade programme for the Russian Air Force.

Take-off has already covered the status of the Russian-Israeli-Indian contract on three A-50EI aircraft for IAF, estimated at $1.1 billion. As is known, the first A-50EI derived by Beriev from a TAPC-built Ilyushin Il-76TD airlifter airframe and fitted with four PS-90A-76 engines from Perm Motors completed its maiden mission in Taganrog on 29 November 2007 and was ferried to Israel on 20 January 2008 for installation of the radar system and conduct of the full set of improvements and tests.

The guidance and communications equipment for the aircraft was supplied by Russian concern Vega. The

aircraft is now in Israel where the Phalcon radar from Elta has been mounted and tested on it. The flight trials of the first A-50EI carrying the Israeli-made Phalcon radar kicked off in Tel Aviv on 5 June 2008.

According to Vega’s Director General Vladimir Verba speaking at Gidroaviasalon 2008 held in Gelendzhik in September, the first A-50EI is slated for delivery to India in January or February 2009 (the aircraft will arrive to the customer directly from Israel). The remaining two aircraft being assembled now in Taganrog will be delivered during the subsequent two years. Vladimir Verba stressed that “there may be more orders for the aircraft”.

During the Gidroaviasalon 2008 show, Beriev, Rosoboronexport, Perm Motors and Vega clinched a deal on launching the establishing of the A-50EI aftersales maintenance system for IAF.

Vega’s chief also said the company in cooperation with Beriev carried on with upgrading the airborne warning and control systems of the A-50s in service with RusAF. The first aircraft has been upgraded and, according to Mr. Verba, “is undergoing the official trials with success”. Vega’s leader did not go into detail, confining himself to a statement that “the upgraded system will be on a par with the best international achievements in the field, and they surpass their Western-made analogues in a number of ways”.

In addition, Vega also works on other types of AEW systems. “At present, the Vega concern has been working proactively on developing such a system based on a medium-haul aircraft due to the interest shown by several Southeast Asia countries”, Vladimir Verba said in Gelendzhik.

Rami MIzrahi

On 12 August, the Peruvian Air Force’s Chiclayo air base saw the signing of a $106 million contract on overhauling and upgrading all of the 19 MiG-29 fighters in service with the Peruvian Air Force. Work will be handled by MiG Corp. and include bringing the MiG-29 singleseaters to MiG-29SM multirole fighter standard. As is known, Peru bought 16 Soviet-built single-seat MiG-29s and two twin-seat MiG-29UB combat trainers from Belarus in 1996, which were then beefed up with three new MiG-29SEs procured directly from MiG Corp. One of the Belarus-exported aircraft was lost in a crash, with another being decommissioned later on.

The Peruvian government took a decision to have the remaining 19 MiG-29s overhauled and upgraded under the $645 million Peruvian armed forces development programme until 2011.

Rami Mizrahi

III

www.take-off.ru

contracts and deliveries | news

Mi-171 for Mongolian military UUAP trained a group of the customer’s flight and ground crewmembers on its premises. The Mi-171 flew to Mongolia on its own.

Not long before the delivery, the Mongolia-ordered Mi-171 had been shown as a static display during the 6th International Mi-8/Mi-171

UUAP

The Ulan-Ude Aviation Plant (UUAP), a subsidiary of the Russian Helicopters joint stock company, delivered the first Mil Mi-171 multirole helicopter to the Mongolian Defence Ministry. The machine was delivered under a contract signed last November.

Earlier under the same contract,

User Conference hosted by UUAP (see picture). The machine was a hit with the participants owing to its avionics suite and a new layout of its instrument panels.

Although the Mi-171 has been bought by the Mongolian Defence Ministry, it will be used in various civil roles, such as search and rescue (SAR), ambulance and cargo hauling in the first place. To this end, the machine is equipped with two rescue hoists with the 150kg and 300kg capacities, a set of medical gear for carrying up to 12 patients on stretchers, an enlarged starboard-side sliding door, an electrically and hydraulically powered cargo ramp, an external sling and other equipment.

The helicopter is fitted with numerous flight navigation instruments, including a GPS receiver doubling as a backup VHF radio, the VOR-ILS navigation system,

directional/glide-path indicator, air traffic control responder, rangefinder, encoding foot-graduated altimeter, EGPWS, TCAS, etc. To make it easier for the crew to handle the wide range of avionics, the cockpit was fitted with an integrated instrument panel instead of two as in the standard layout.

This layout is used in the Mi-171 helicopter for the first time.

It is worth mentioning that the cooperation between UUAP and Mongolia has been surging. The company trained a big group of Mongolian flight and ground crews late in 2007. Then the Mongolians took delivery of a Mi-171. The Mongolian Civil Aviation Department issued the Mi-171 with the type certificate in February 2008. Now, another team of flight and ground crews has been trained and another aircraft delivered under a new contract.

Ka-226T throws its hat into Indian tender ring

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cent. A considerable part of the helicopters is to be licence-produced by HAL. Tenders were issued to Eurocopter, Bell Textron, AgustaWestland and Kamov.

Kamov joins the tender as a division of the Russian Helicopters holding company, pitching its upgraded Ka-226T helicopter that differs from the earlier Ka-226 model in being powered by Turbomeca Arrius 2G1 engines.

The engines boost the machine’s performance, especially when operating in the ‘high and hot’ environment. A prototype Ka-226T was re-engined with Turbomeca Arrius as far back as late 2004. The prototype’s tests have displayed a considerable improvement in its flight characteristics.

To implement the programme, Russian Helicopters is launching the Ka-226T large-series production on the premises of another of its subsidiaries, the Kumertau Aircraft Production Plant (KumAPP). To this end, Vnesheconombank in September issued it a 2.38 billion ruble (about $95 million) loan. The measures being taken may result already by

late 2011 in KumAPP churning out up to 70 Ka-226s annually, including at least 50 Ka-226Ts. Under the company’s business plan, KumAPP will have built 398 helicopters by 2020, with their worth estimated at $4–5 million.

According to Kamov company Executive Director Roman Chernyshev, in addition to the potential lucrative Indian contract, the Ka-226 order book includes 120 more aircraft ordered, includ-

ing firm orders for 40 machines.

Following an additional work under the updated specification, an updated contract with the Gazpromavia company for 40 Ka-226AG is to be signed. In addition, helicopters of the type remain in demand with the Russian Emergencies Ministry, Federal Security Service and Ministry of Interior. Negotiations also are in progress with several foreign customers, covering, inter alia, the Ka-226’s licence production abroad.

Alexey Mikheyev

It became known in September that the Kamov company, a subsidiary of the Russian Helicopters holding, was gearing up for competing in a major tender issued by the Indian Defence Ministry earlier this year and estimated to be worth almost $2 billion for replacing the obsolete Cheetah and Chetak light helicopters in the Indian Army Aviation’s and Air Force’s (IAF) inventories with advanced light multirole aircraft.

Indian Defence Minister A.K. Antony officially stated his decision on issue a new helicopter tender in April, several months after the $600 million programme on buying and licence-producing 197 Eurocopter AS550C3 helicopters for the Indian Army Aviation had been cancelled in December 2007 (60 machines were to be imported, with the rest to be licence-produced by India’s HAL corporation). The Indian military’s requirement for advanced light helicopters have now been estimated at 384 units, of which 259 are to be received by the Army Aviation and 125 top go to IAF, with the offsets hiking to 50 per

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contracts and deliveries | news

IFC increases Russian airliner exports to Latin America delivered during 2005–06, two Tu-204-100E medium-haul airliners delivered in December 2007 and a Tu-204CE medium-haul freighter delivered in August 2007. Russia has assisted Cuba in setting up a maintenance centre to support their operations.

Russian aircraft are exported to Cuba under the Russian governmental programme on financial (guaranteed) support of industrial production export. The government provides such guarantees to banks issuing long-term loans to buyers

During the Cuban visit of the Russian governmental delegation led by Deputy Prime Minister Igor Sechin, the Ilyushin Finance Co. (IFC) and Cuban foreign trade company Aviaimport made a contract on delivery of another Tupolev Tu-204CE cargo aircraft to the Cubana de Aviacion airline.

This has been the seventh Russian-made aircraft leased by IFC to the Cuban airline over the past three years. Cubana de Aviacion operates three Ilyushin Il-96-300 long-haul wide-body airliners

of Russian planes. Russia’s Bank of Development and Foreign Trade (Vnesheconombank) is the main lender to foreign buyers.

According to UAC President Alexey Fyodorov attending the contract signature ceremony, Russia has always regarded Latin American countries as partners and has had successful long-term trade and economic relations with Cuba. A good example of the cooperation is the programme on exporting Russian commercial aircraft to Cuba, which lays the foundation for expanding the Russian aircraft exports to other countries in the region. “The Cuban party has shown interest in buying more Russian planes. We will continue the negotiations, hoping that that we will keep on running successful joint programme with our Cuban partners. The five-year experience of our company’s work in Cuba allows us to count on this”, said IFC Director General Alexander Rubtsov.

The Aviastar-SP plant in Ulyanovsk built the second

Cuba-destined Tu-204CE freighter (production number 64037) earlier this year. The plane has completed most of its tests and been given the customer’s paintjob and registration number (CU-C1703). The contract for the plane was signed as part of the Russo-Cuban agreement made during the MAKS 2007 air show and providing for making two more Tu-204 family aircraft and three Antonov An-148 regional aircraft for Cuba to the tune of over $150 million.

Meanwhile, IFC announced on 26 September that its leaders and the Venezuelan authorities had agreed on delivery of Russian commercial aircraft to Venezuela for service with local airlines. The agreement was reached during the September visit to Venezuela by a Russian governmental delegation led by Deputy Prime Minister Igor Sechin. “Relevant contracts are being drafted for signing before year-end”, the IFC announcement said.

On 16 July, Russian-German joint venture AFC (Airbus Freighter Conversion GmbH) signed a contract on conversion of 30 Airbus A320/321 airliners into freighter variant for the first customer, a major leasing company AerCap (the Netherlands).

AFC is a joint venture set up

by Russian corporations UAC and Irkut, on the one hand, and EADS divisions EFW (Elbe Flugzeugwerke GmbH) and Airbus, on the other.

The venture was established in Dresden in April 2007. The Russian share in the venture stands at 50 per cent and is divided equally between UAC and Irkut, with the other 50 per cent divided by Airbus (18 per cent) and EFW, EADS’s aircraft plant in Dresden (32 per cent).

AFC was set up specifically for converting A320/321 airliners into cargo versions. Project work kicked off at the facilities in Toulouse, Hamburg, Bremen and Dresden in December 2007. In the course of

16

EADS

Russian-German JV gets first order for A320 conversion

take-off november 2008

conversion, the passenger cabin is dismounted, reinforced floor and cargo handling gear are installed and a large cargo hatch is cut in the fuselage to facilitate loading and unloading operations. Conversion kits will be made by Irkut Corp.’s aircraft plant in Irkutsk, and conversion itself will take place in Dresden and Zhukovsky.

The first prototype of the converted A320 is to be released in 2011, with the production kickoff slated for 2012. It is planned that up to 40 airliners are to be converted annually by 2016. A320/321P2F freighters, capable of hauling 21–28 t of cargo on services up to 3,700 km long, will become the only up-to-date solution in the small freighter segment to

serve the quickly growing urgent cargo delivery market. According to a preliminary estimate of both parties, the venture’s annual turnover may account for $200 million with the estimated market capacity until 2026 equalling 400 aircraft.

“Russia’s United Aircraft Corporation is very keen on the A320 conversion programme. The Irkut Corporation is the prime contractor under the programme. Now, a facility is being prepared for converting airliners into freighters in the Zhukovsky (Moscow Region), the promising Russian aircraft-making centre”, UAC President Alexey Fyodorov emphasised after signing the contract.

On 10 October 2008 the first fuselage of A320 (c/n 004) was delivered from Toulouse to Dresden onboard Airbus A300-600ST Beluga special transport aircraft to test conversion technologies and optimise design solutions under A320/321P2F programme at EFW facility of AFC Russian-German joint venture.

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contracts and deliveries | news

First Ukrainian An-148 delivered on 17 December 2004. It was used for conducting certification tests.

However, the bulk of the certification trials fell on the second prototype (c/n 01-02, UR-NTB) built in April 2005. Therefore, delays in productionising the An-148-100 by the Aviant plant in Kiev and the liabilities to the Kazakh launch customer prompted the manufacturer to prepare the aircraft c/n 01-01 for delivery to the first Ukrainian operator.

Naturally, all test gear had to be dismounted, the passenger cabin fit-

attending the ceremony, thanking his team for the timely completion of the work and underlined that they had to maintain the same pace in continuing the development of the construction and tests of the 99-seat of An-148-200 ‘stretch’ and other new An-148 variants.

Leasingtechtrans Director General Alexander Vlasishen expressed his satisfaction with the pace of the first An-148-100’s preparation for service entry, in particularly, he said, “The An-148 is the future of our aviation.

We are very glad to be Ukraine’s launch customer for the aircraft. We have signed a firm order for four such aircraft”.

It remains unclear yet which airline will lease the first Ukrainian An-148-100B. At first, Leasingtechtrans had planned to deliver it to the airline of the 410th plant (ARP-410), but the airline itself has shown no optimism in this connection. Therefore, it is possible that the first An-148-100 will first be received by the Ukraine government-owned company providing transport services to top national officials and operating an An-74TK-300 in the VIP layout already.

and in the third quarter of 2010”, Mr. Pogrebnoy said. The airliners are being delivered under the contract snagged in April this year.

“The financing has been launched, and construction of the first aircraft has begun”, he added.

Russian Aircraft is going to make the second contract for four Il-114-100s for Russian carriers before year-end. “We are mulling over ordering 25 Il-114-100s, which would keep TAPC’s production lines busy”, Vladislav Pogrebnoy said in this connection. In particular, the Il-114-100’s

unveiling in India is slated for mid-October 2008, during which a contract with local carrier Hindavia for 10 airliners is planned for signature.

Fulfilling the orders of Uzbekistan Airways and Russian Aircraft will allow TAPC to launch a real Il-114-100 series production.

As is known, the full-rate production of the Il-114-100 is to become a main field of TAPC’s cooperation with Russia’s United Aircraft Corporation (UAC). TAPC is supposed to make 120–150 airliners of the type prior to 2015.

Andrey Fomin

A key event on the first day of Ukrainian international air show Aviasvit XXI held at the Kiev-Antonov airfield in Gostomel near Kiev on 25–29 September was the delivery of the first new-generation Antonov An-148 regional passenger aircraft to the customer. The customer was Ukrainian government-owned leasing company Leasingtechtrans, and its first aircraft was the first An-148 (c/n 01-01, reg. number UR-NTA) built by Antonov almost four years ago and flown for the first time

ted and, overall, the layout had to be brought in line with the standard An-148-100B layout approved by the IAC Aircraft Registry’s type certificate dated 26 February 2007.

The rollout of the modified aircraft from the assembly shop of the Antonov company took place on 3 July 2008. The aircraft will enter commercial service as soon as it has completed all acceptance tests, during which all of its systems will be tested in operating mode. Mind you, some of the tests will continue even after the aircraft’s delivery to Leasingtechtrans.

Before the roll-out, Antonov Director General Dmitry Kiva addressed those

In September, Uzbek national carrier Uzbekistan Airways received in a ceremony another production Ilyushin Il-114-100 regional turboprop aircraft made by the Tashkent Aircraft Production Corp. named after Valery Chkalov (TAPC). The aircraft is powered by a pair of Pratt&Whitney Canada PW-127H turboprop engines and has been given registration number UK-91105 (c/n 02-05). The Il-114-100 has become the second aircraft in this version, operated

by Uzbekistan Airways and the first one under last year’s contract on supplying the Uzbek national carrier with six new Il-114-100s during 2008–09 to replace the Yak-40 jets being discarded from service now.

The six aircraft to be built under the new contract will differ from the Il-114-100 (UK-91102, c/n 02-02) built by TAPC as far back as 1999 in the advanced TsPNK-114M dig-

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ital avionics suite using Rockwell Collins systems. The avionics have been proved themselves on aircraft c/n 02-05 that has now entered service after being built

by TAPC in 2006. This airliner could be seen at the MAKS 2007 air show in Zhukovsky last August, while the First Aviation Leasing Company, which promotes the Il-114-100 on the Russian aircraft market, teamed up with its Uzbek partners and Ilyushin organised its demonstration tour of Russian cities in the early 2008.

Another leasing company, Russian Aircraft, announced its plans for promoting the Il-114-100 in September. Its Director General Vladislav Pogrebnoy told the media that TAPC would deliver first three Il-114-100s to Russian Aircraft during 2009–10. “The first of the three planes is to be delivered in August 2009 and the other two in December 2009 or January 2010

Dmitry Pichugin

Il-114-100 finds new buyers

take-off november 2008

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contracts and deliveries | market overview

SUKHOI FIGHTERS KnAAPO

ON ASIAN MARKET According to the annual arms output rating of Russia’s major defence manufacturers published by the Russian independent Centre of Analysis of Strategies and Technologies (CAST) last year, the Sukhoi holding company ranked first in 2007, having more than doubled its income. Its proceeds exceeded $1.9 billion last year, which accounted for almost half the gross revenue of the United Aircraft Corporation (UAC). Sukhoi produced such high production and sales results owing to its export success in the first place, with customers having taken delivery of over 50 aircraft of the Su-30MK family. In 2007, Sukhoi’s exports exceeded $1.35 billion, totalling almost a quarter of the aggregate revenue earned from all Russian weaponry exports that year.

More than half of the Sukhoi aircraft exported last year went to Asian countries, with India getting 18 Su-30MKI fighters and eight licence production kits and the Royal Malaysian Air Force fielding its first six Su-30MKMs. The Asian market remains key to Sukhoi that has clinched deals to deliver upwards of 550 Sukhoi fighters to the region (including licence production kits for China and India), of which more than 350 have been delivered. This is the lion’s share of the Sukhoi aircraft exported after the dissolution of the Soviet Union, which makes the Asian market especially important to the company in light of the prospects of development of the air forces in this corner of the world.

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contracts and deliveries | market overview

Tske-off's archive

Su-27UBK twin-seat fighters were delivered to China in several batches in 1992, 1996 and 2000–2002

Sukhoi fighters exports to Asian countries in 1991–2008 Contract signing date

Contract type

1991

delivery

1995

delivery

1996 1999 1999 2001 2003

license production delivery delivery delivery delivery

1995

delivery

1996

delivery

2003

delivery

1996

delivery

1998

2007 2007

delivery license production delivery delivery

2003

delivery

2007

delivery

2003

delivery

www.sinodefence.com

At the photo above: Su-27SK and Su-30MK fighters of the Indonesian Air Force delivered in 2003 Bottom: Su-27SK of the PLAAF with its full combat load

2000

* ** *** N/A

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Aircraft type Supplier and number Contracts with China 22 Su-27SK KnAAPO 4 Su-27UBK Irkut 16 Su-27SK KnAAPO 6 Su-27UBK Irkut 200 Su-27SK*

Delivery dates

Contract value, billion US$

1992 1992 1996 1996

1,7

KnAAPO

1998–2004

2,5

28 Su-27UBK Irkut 38 Su-30MKK KnAAPO 38 Su-30MKK KnAAPO 24 Su-30MK2 KnAAPO Contracts with Vietnam 5 Su-27SK KnAAPO 1 Su-27UBK Irkut 2 Su-27SK KnAAPO 4 Su-27UBK Irkut 4 Su-30MK2V KnAAPO Contracts with India 8 Su-30K Irkut 32 Su-30MKI Irkut 10 Su-30K Irkut

2000–2002 2000–2001 2002–2003 2004

N/A 1,5 N/A N/A

140 Su-30MKI

Irkut

18 Su-30MKI*** Irkut 40 Su-30MKI Irkut Contracts with Indonesia 2 Su-27SK KnAAPO 2 Su-30MK KnAAPO 3 Su-30MK2 KnAAPO 3 Su-27SKM KnAAPO Contracts with Malaysia 18 Su-30MKM Irkut

contract suspended after 105 kits delivered including two Mi-35 helicopters delivery trade-in deal (18 earlier delivered Su-30Ks returning back to Russia) no data available

1995 1995 1998 1997–1998 2004

N/A N/A N/A

1997 2002–2004 1999

N/A

2004–2014

3,3

2007 2008–2009

N/A N/A

2003 2003 2008–2009 2008–2009 2007–2008

1,8

0,2** N/A 0,9

All data and figures are based on information published in Russia’s and foreign mass media

take-off november 2008

19

SUKHOI JETS

Sergey Krivchikov

IN ASIA

Su-30MKI in service with Indian Air Force, February 2007

Su-30MKK of the first batch delivered to PLAAF in 2000–2001

KnAAPO

Tske-off's archive

Another Su-30MK2 just arrived in Vietnam, November 2004

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contracts and deliveries | market overview

KnAAPO

Su-27SK fighter in service with Vietnamese Air Force

sinodefence.com

Chinese Su-27SK and J-11 locally assembled fighters

Andrey Fomin

Su-30MKM of the Royal Malaysian Air Force, December 2007. Delivery of the whole batch of 18 fighters is to be finished by 2008 end

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take-off november 2008

KnAAPO

Su-30MK in service with Indonesian Air Force, September 2003.

Six more Su-30MK2 and Su-27SKM fighters are to be delivered to Indonesia in 2008-2009

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Sukhoi

contracts and deliveries | project

Su-35 TWO PROTOTYPES UNDER TESTS! The second prototype of the advanced Sukhoi Su-35 multirole fighter completed its maiden flight in Komsomolsk-on-Amur, Russia’s Far East, on 2 October 2008, controlled by the Sukhoi design bureau’s test pilot Sergey Bogdan, an Honoured Test Pilot of the Russian Federation. The mission lasted about an hour. Sergey Bogdan tested the operation of fighter’s powerplant and fly-by-wire system in various modes, examined its stability and controllability and became completely satisfied with the aircraft’s performance. It means that already two Su-35 prototypes are undergoing flight tests now with the third one to join them soon. The first Su-35 aircraft made its maiden flight earlier this year, on 19 February, and have successfully fulfilled more than 40 test sorties by the beginning of October. Joining the second flying prototype to flight test programme Andreyenables FOMIN to fasten Su-35’s testing process that is to be completed in a couple of years. According to Sukhoi, the full-rate production of the cutting-edge 4++ generation fighter and its deliveries to both domestic and foreign users are slated for 2011. “The Su-35 entering service will bolster the national defence capability and enable Sukhoi to remain competitive on the global market until its fifth-generation fighter becomes ready for deliveries”, Sukhoi’s press release emphasises.

Our magazine has covered the Su-35’s features in detail (see Take-off, June 2007, p. 46–53). Therefore, let us only touch on its principal features setting it apart from other aircraft of the Su-27/Su-30 family being popular on global market and on the programme progress over the past year.

Mention should be made outright that the differences are far more numerous than meets the eye, with the Su-35 resembling the usual Su-27 and Su-30MK in outward appearance only. Virtually all elements of its structure, systems, powerplant, avionics and weapons suites have been modified with an extensive use of design solutions borrowed from the current fifth-generation fighter development programme. This is a reason for calling the Su-35, essentially, an all-new aircraft.

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The airframe was modified heavily to meet the requirements for the assigned life extension up to 6,000 flying hours, service life extension up to 30 years, an increase in the fuel load and introduction of latest aircraft and avionics systems. The fuselage, wing and empennage basic components were reinforced to this end in the first place. The introduction of the advanced Tikhomirov-NIIP’s Irbis-E radar and mid-air refuelling system resulted in a modified design and layout of the forward fuselage. The aft-cockpit avionics bay was shortened, and the remaining volume now houses an extra fuel cell. The upper surface of the fuselage centre section lacks the air brake, with his job now being handled by differentially operated rudders. The rudders were enlarged and now have the vertical trailing edge, while the tail tips are made of metal.

The central and side tail booms have extra room to house fuel. The fuel load grew by more than 2 t, totalling 11,500 kg.

In addition, the Su-35 is the first in the Flanker family able to carry two drop tanks 2,000 litres each. Another first for the aircraft of the type is the Aerosila TA14-130-35 gas-turbine auxiliary power unit (APU) in the fuselage tail section (previously, each engine had had a starter APU of its own).

The TA14-130-35 is designed to start the engines and provide power supply and air conditioning of the equipment and cockpit during maintenance autonomously. The fighter also has an integral oxygen generation unit to enhance its self-contained operation capabilities. To reduce its radar signature, the aircraft makes an extensive use of radio-absorbing materials, and the cockpit www.take-off.ru

contracts and deliveries | project

canopy has electro-conductive coating.

Wrapping up this outline of the basic airframe modifications, mention should be made of the total revamping of numerous antennas on the fuselage, wings and empennage due to the introduction of advanced avionics.

An important feature distinguishing the Su-35 from the previous aircraft of the Su-27 family is its NPO Saturn 117S engines, which thrust has grown by 2,000 kg and assigned life has increased up to 4,000 flying hours. The engines are fitted with an integrated digital control system and swivelling nozzles embodying the all-aspect thrust vector control concept.

The fighter carries a radically advanced digital integrated quadruple-redundant control system KSU-35 from Avionika company. It allows both manual and automatic control of the aircraft in all axes, ensures the fighter’s stability, controllability and centre of gravity, controls the swivelling nozzles, ensures supermanoeuvrability, flight conditions constrains, aircraft control while on the ground, and wheel braking.

By the way the Su-35’s primary difference from the earlier Su-27 derivatives is its new-generation avionics suite. Let us underline once again the advantages furnished by the fighter’s cutting-edge Irbis-E phased www.take-off.ru

ev Alexey Mikhey

Andrey FOMIN

array radar with additional hydraulic steering from Tikhomirov-NIIP. The radar guarantees lookup acquisition and lock-on at a range of 200 km (170 km in the lookdown mode) and features an unrivalled range in a more narrow coverage sector of 100 sq.deg., spotting airborne threats with the 3 sq.m radar cross-section at the record-breaking 350–400 km range.

The Irbis-E tracks up to 30 targets in the track-while-scan mode and can engage eight of them at the same time. It acquires surface targets at a range of 400 km. Its electro-hydraulic actuator steering the array in azimuth and roll allowes a considerable coverage sector increase in azimuth – up to 120 deg., with all advantages of electronic scanning retained.

The second information channel of the

Su-35’s fire control system – the infrared search and track (IRST) sensor – uses targets’ IR signature to acquire and track them at a range of 90 km in the pursuit mode. The IRST ranges aerial and surface targets with its integral laser rangefinder at 20 km and 30 km respectively. In addition, the IRST can be used to paint ground targets for laser beam-riding missiles. A surveillance/targeting optronic pod will provide the fighter with even greater capabilities in the lookdown mode and in the navigation and piloting roles.

The Su-35 has a drastically different cockpit management system. The 30x20 deg. wide-angle head-up display (HUD) and two large 15” colour LCDs on the instrument panel display all data the pilot needs to fly the fighter and use its weapons. The aircraft is controlled by means of the joystick-type control stick, pedals and strain-gauge throttles. take-off november 2008

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contracts and deliveries | project KSU-35 three-channel digital fly-by-wire system actuator

Sukhoi Su-35 multirole fighter Drawing by Alexey Mikheyev

TA14-130-35 APU

Strengthened airframe with increased service life

Rudder of enlarged area also used as an air brake

NPO Saturn 117S turbofans with more power, increased service life and TVC

New fin tip made of metal

Formation flight lights

New RWR/elint system aerial

RVV-AE medium-range AAM

R-73E close-range AAM

New RWR/elint system

New ECM system pod

KAB-500Kr TV-guided bomb KAB-1500Kr TV-guided bomb

B-8M1 rocket pod

S-8 rocket KAB-500S-E GPS/GLONASS-guided bomb

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contracts and deliveries | project Increased internal fuel cell

New navigation and communication systems modules

R-27ER1 semiactive radar-homing medium-range AAM

RVV-AE active radar homing medium-range AAM

R-27ET1 heat-seaking medium-range AAM

Canopy with electro-conductive coating K-36D-3,5E ejection seat Kh-31A/P antiship/ anti-radiation ASM

New 'glass cockpit' with two 15'' LCDs and a new wide-angle HUD Refuelling probe

OLS-35 optronic system GSh-301 cannon Irbis-E phased-array radar

Strengthened landing gear 30mm rounds for GSh-301 cannon

S-108 communication suite forward aerial

KAB-500L

Kh-29T TV-guided short-range ASM KAB-500LG laser-homing bomb 3M-14AE/3M-54AE1 active radar-homing long-range ASM Kh-59MK active radar-homing ASM

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take-off november 2008

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contracts and deliveries | project All key system and weapon controls are on the stick and throttles in line with the HOTAS concept. There is a helmet-mounted target designator at the pilot’s disposal. To reduce the workload on the pilot, his information support involves the so-called ‘dark cockpit’ approach, with prompting messages issued to him in an emergency only. Piloting and navigating are made much easier owing to a precision laser strapdown inertial/satellite navigation system, digital moving terrain map and radio-technical navaids. The Su-35’s BINS-SP inertial/satellite navigation system was developed by the Moscow Institute of Electromechanics and Automation in cooperation with other members of the Aviapribor-holding company. Several other navaids and the display system were developed by the Ramenskoye Instrument Design Bureau and other members of the Technocomplex scientific production centre.

The S-108 communications suite from the Nizhny Novgorod-based Polyot company includes two UHF/VHF radios and a short-wave one and Link-16 datalink capability. The S-108 allows voice and data communication between the aircraft and ground control stations, among aircraft within a mixed package, etc. Automatic data swapping is exercised through the radios’ channels with both voice and data communications being encrypted.

The Su-35 is very capable in battle owing to its sophisticated electronic warfare suite comprised by an individual/mutual protection active electronic countermeasures (ECM) system and a group protection ECM system (at the customer’s request), an antiradiation missile targeting system, radar and laser warning receivers, a missile attack warning system and chaff/flare dispensers.

Along with the existing guided and non-guided weapons used by the Su-30MK and Su-27SM, the Su-35’s weapons suite is to be beefed up with latest precision-guided munitions under development by the Tactical Missiles Corp. and Novator design bureau, including advanced long-range air-to-air and air-to-surface missiles. The Su-35’s maximum payload on 12 hardpoints accounts for 8,000 kg.

The first Su-35 prototype designated Su-35-1 and given side number 901 was built by the Komsomolsk-on-Amur Aircraft Production Association (KnAAPO) in summer 2007. In August, it was ferried to the Gromov LII Flight Research Institute in the town of Zhukovsky, Moscow Region, where it was unveiled during the MAKS 2007 air show (see Take-off, November 2007, p. 14). Right on the heels of the show, Sukhoi and its subcontractors

New weapons for advanced Sukhoi fighters In early June, the Tactical Missiles Corp. launched a campaign to promote a number of latest air-launched guided missiles on the market. The weapons promoted include the new-generation Kh-38ME air-launched modular guided missile and several heavy upgrades, including the Kh-58UShKE antiradiation missile equipped with a wideband passive radar homer, Kh-59MK2 air-launched guided missile with a self-contained target area recognition capability and KAB-1500LG-F-E laser beam-riding smart bomb. All these weapons will be incorporated in Su-35’s weapon suite being available for other new Russia’s combat aircraft as well.

Tactical Missiles Corp. unites most of Russian developers of precision guided munitions for the Russian and foreign militaries. The corporation’s subsidiaries are the manufacturers of both all up-to-date Russian air-to-air guided missiles carried by fighters (R-73E dogfight missile, various variants of the RVV-AE and R-27 medium-range missiles and R-33E long-range missile from the Vympel design bureau) and a wide range of tactical air-to-surface guided missiles (Kh-25M short-range missile family from the corporation’s head plant, Kh-29L/T short-range missile from the Vympel design bureau, Kh-25MP and Kh-31P antiradiation missiles from the head plant and Kh-58E from Raduga, Kh-31A and Kh-35E antiship missiles from the head plant and Kh-59MK from Raduga, etc.) and also a whole family of KAB-500 and KAB-1500 smart bombs with various guidance packages from Region company.

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Yevgeny YEROKHIN

The performance of the missiles is on a par with those of advanced Western designs, however, to meet market requirements better and enhance the effectiveness of upgraded and cutting-edge aircraft, Tactical Missiles Corp.’s have been for several years both developing radically novel guided weapon types and modernising the existing missiles and guided bombs heavily. The efforts have been under way under the Comprehensive Air-Launched Weapon Development Programme devised

by Tactical Missiles Corp. in 2006, the corporation’s President Boris Obnosov said during the MAKS 2007 air show last August.

Among the latest designs from Tactical Missiles Corp., the family of new-generation Kh-38ME modular multirole short-range air-to-surface missiles under development by the corporation’s head plant that are designed to kill a wide range of armoured, hard and soft single and multiple ground targets and surface

threats in the littorals as well. The model line includes four basic versions with combined guidance systems: Kh-38MLE (with INS and semiactive laser homing head), Kh-38MKE (with INS and satnav update capability), Kh-38MTE (with INS and heat-seeker), and Kh-38MAE (with INS and active radar homer).

Over time, the Kh-38ME variants are to oust the corporation’s existing versions of the Kh-25M and Kh-29 missiles from Russian warplanes’ weapons suites. In terms of the dimensions, the new weapon is to occupy a niche between them, with the Kh-38ME’s launch weight to equal 520 kg. Its 250kg warhead is to have various types of payload. The missile measures 4.2 m in length and 310 mm in diameter. Its maximum firing range will be 40 km.

Another Tactical Missiles Corp. novelty is the Kh-59MK2 medium-range air-to-surface missile being derived by the Raduga JSC from the Kh-59MK radar homing antiship missile. www.take-off.ru

Yevgeny Yerokhin

Kh-38ME

contracts and deliveries | project been rolled out for its first taxiing. Following a series of tests on the runway, including high-speed taxiing, the methodological council allowed its first flight, and Sukhoi design bureau test pilot Sergey Bogdan took the Su-35-1 to the skies for the first time at 11.25 hours on 19 February. Another Sukhoi fighter, the Su-30MK2 side number 502 two-seater, accompanied the new aircraft. During the flight at altitudes up to 5,000 m, operation of key systems, stability, controllability and powerplant operation were tested. Sergey Bogdan landed safely 55 minutes after the takeoff. According to Sukhoi, the tasks assigned for the first mission were fulfilled. By the early October, the Su-35-1 successfully fulfilled more than 40 test flights with the most of its performances approved.

The second flying prototype, the Su-35-2 with side number 902, became

ready to join flight tests by early autumn.

Its maiden flight took place on 2 October at the KnAAPO’s airfield in Komsomolsk-on-Amur with the Sukhoi’s test pilot Sergey Bogdan under controls.

Su-35-2 became the first aircraft of the type to be fitted with advanced Irbis-E phased array radar. The next prototype, Su-35-4, is under construction by KnAAPO now to join the test programme in early 2009.

The Su-35 test programme is slated for completion by 2010–2011 when KnAAPO will launch the full-rate production of aircraft of the type. Sukhoi Director General Mikhail Pogosyan told the media, “Deliveries of Su-35s to the Russian Air Force will begin in 2011. We also are going to promote the fighter on our traditional markets in Southeast Asia, Africa, the Middle East and South America”.

The Kh-59MK2 can be used in any season, under the 10-3–105 lux condition and in any terrain. The weapon is designed to kill a wide range of static ground targets with known coordinates, including those with no radar, infrared and optical signatures. The missile is a fire-and-forget weapon reliant on autonomous target area identification. The low-altitude route is downloaded to the missile together with its mission. The Kh-59MK2’s navigation and self-contained control system is wrapped around the strapdown inertial navigation system, satnav receiver and optronic system. It provides a circular error probable (CEP) of 3–5 m. The Kh-59MK2 will have a launch weight of up to 900 kg, with the weight of the penetrator-type or cluster bomb warheads to be 320 kg and 283 kg respectively. The missile is 5.7 m long, with its diameter measuring 380 mm (nose section – 420 mm) and its wingspan standing at 1.3 m. The maximum range is estimated at 285 km. The weapon can be fired within the 200–11,000m altitude bracket with the launch platform travelling at a speed of Mach 0.5–0.9.

The target aspect angle at launch may be up to ±45 deg. After launch, the Kh-59MK2 will fly at a speed of 900–1,050 km/h and at an altitude of 50–300 m depending on the relief.

The advanced Raduga Kh-58UShKE antiradiation missile, which full-scale mockup was unveiled at MAKS 2007, differs from the known Kh-58E and Kh-58UShE missiles in a new folding wing. The pop-up wing enables the weapon to be launched from both external weapon stores of the existing fighters and internal weapons bays of future combat aircraft. The Kh-58UShKE carries a wideband passive radar homing head operating in the A, A’, B, B’ and C bands and a navigation/autonomous guidance system

based on the strapdown navigation system.

The missile is designed to eliminate ground radars operating in pulse radiation mode in the 1.2–11GHz band and in continuous radiation mode in the A band. The missile can be launched at both pre-programmed and pop-up radar targets. The Kh-58UShKE has a launch weight of 650 kg, with its HE warhead weighing 149 kg. The weapon is 4.19 m in length and 380 mm in diameter, and its wing span measures 0.8 m. In case of internal carriage, the lateral dimension of the missile with the wings and empennage folded drop to 0.4x0.4 m. When launched from underwing hardpoints at an altitude 200– 20,000 m, the missile has a maximum range of 76–245 km. The minimum range in case of the 200m altitude launch is 10–12 km, with the aircraft flying as fast as Mach 1.5 and the target aspect angle at launch being up to ±15 deg. The solid-propellant motor

accelerates the weapon to 4,200 km/h, or almost 1,200 m/s.

Tactical Missiles Corp. recently also provided information on an advanced 1,500kg guided bomb, the KAB-1500LG-F-E with the gyro-stabilised laser homing head (its predecessor, the KAB-1500L, mounts the so-called ‘feathering’ gimballed laser homer).

The 1,525kg bomb with the 1,170kg HE warhead (HE fill weighs 440 kg) is reported to be designed for eliminating stationary surface pinpoint targets (reinforced-concrete shelters, railway and motorway bridges, military and industrial installations, ships, ammunition dumps, rail junctions, etc.). The CEP is 4–7 m. The bomb is 4.28 m long and 580 mm in diameter with the 0.85m and 1.3m wing span in the folded-wing and extended-wing configurations respectively.

The KAB-1500LG-F-E is released from an altitude ranging from 1 km to 8 km at the carrier’s speed from 550 to 1,100 km/h.

www.take-off.ru

Yevgeny Yerokhin

launched the planned preparations for the Su-35’s maiden flight. Efforts were mostly focused on debugging its advanced integrated flight control system and ground tests of other sophisticated equipment.

Concurrently, a test programme was being run on the 117S engines intended to power the Su-35 on its maiden mission. The whole prototype batch passed the set of tests. The batch consisted of the 117S-01 used in special trials in support of the Su-35’s fight flight; the 117S-02 used in gas-dynamic stability and endurance tests; the 117S-03 tested on the Su-27M (T10M-10) flying testbed; and the fourth and fifth prototypes (117S-04 and -05) delivered to KnAAPO and mounted on the Su-35-1 last spring following their rig tests.

By mid-February, the ground tests of the avionics had been over, and the fighter had

Kh-58UShKE

take-off november 2008

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contracts and deliveries | report As is known, the Indian Navy’s Vikramaditya aircraft carrier, once overhauled and upgraded, will be able to carry and operate advanced MiG-29K and MiG-29KUB multirole fighters whose first production batch is being made by MiG Corp.’s production centre in Lukhovitsy (Moscow Region). Today’s MiG-29K and MiG-29KUB fighters are heavily upgraded versions of the MiG-29K carrierborne fighter tested on board the Tbilisi through-deck cruiser (Russia’s only current carrier designated as Admiral Kuznetsov now) in the Black Sea in 1989–91. The aircraft did not enter the inventory then, but displayed high accuracy of landing on arrestors during the trials. Therefore, when devising the upgrades for the former Admiral Gorshkov carrier for the Indian Navy, designers decided to fit her deck with three sets of arresting gear (instead of the four fitting the Admiral Kuznetsov).

In accordance with the performance specification, advanced arrestors developed and produced by the Proletarsky Zavod plant in St. Petersburg should undergo ground tryout on

Victor DRUSHLYAKOV Photos by the author

MiG-29K BACK AT NITKA Vikramaditya’s arresting gear kicks off trials in Crimea On 1 September, the Crimea-based Nitka training facility saw the kick-off of tests of the first arrestor designed to fit the Vikramaditya aircraft carrier, with the Sevmash company in Severodvinsk working on it under the Russian-Indian Admiral Gorshkov aircraft carrier overhaul and upgrade contract on order by the Indian Navy. The MiG-29K prototype serialled 312 had arrived from Russia to test the first arresting gear at the Nitka facility in the Crimea-based Saki airbase. A Take-off correspondent covered the tests.

an aircraft before being fitted to the carrier. To this end, a decision was taken to use MiG-29K No 312 that used to fly from the Tbilisi and now being used by MiG Corp. under the ‘Indian’ MiG-29K/KUB’s test programme. The task can be fulfilled only at the Nitka facility situated in the Crimea and owned by the Ukrainian Defence Ministry. For this purpose, Russian state-owned company Rosoboronexport and Ukraine’s Ukroboronservice made a contract on organising and conducting the trials of advanced arrestors.

This summer, the first arrestor was brought by train to the Crimea and assembled at Nitka. MiG-29K side number 312 controlled by MiG Corp. chief test pilot Pavel Vlasov arrived in mid-August. Against the backdrop of the conflict in the Caucasus and the growing tension concerning the Sevastopol-based Russian Black Sea Fleet, the trials at Nitka could have been disrupted, but, nonetheless, did take place, albeit after a delay.

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On 1 September, the MiG-29K controlled by MiG Corp. test pilot Mikhail Belyayev completed its first roll onto the new arrestor and snagging of its cable with the hook. Several days later, following a number of snaggings, during which the fighter’s weight and speed varied and the manufacturing plant’s engineers debugged the arresting gear, the work was continued by MiG Corp. test pilot Nikolay Diorditsa who had had a wealth of Admiral Kuznetsov landing experience dating back to the trials of the Sukhoi Su-33 carrierborne fighter.

The Nitka training facility’s experienced top-notch staff led by Alexander Pleshkov has provided invaluable assistance in preparing and conducting of the tests of the advanced arrestors. Those specialists have for years been supporting the training of the pilots of the 279th Independent Carrierborne Fighter Air Regiment of the Russian Navy’s Northern Fleet.

Northern Fleet pilots were supposed to begin another training session at Nitka in August. They were gearing up for hopping in their Su-33s and Su-25UTGs to the Crimea and the advance party of ground crews flew in from Severomorsk on board an An-12 airlifter. However, another deterioration of the Russian-Ukrainian relations due to the problem of basing of the Black Sea Fleet in Sevastopol, coupled this time with the crisis in South Ossetia and Ukraine’s whole-hearted support of Georgia, Ukrainian leadership at the last moment took a political decision not to allow Russian naval pilots to the Crimea. On 9 August, the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry issued a statement calling Russia pilots’ training in the Crimea ‘inexpedient’ in a situation like that. In all probability, Kiev must have decided that Russian carrierborne fighters arriving to Nitka, naturally, without any weapons would hamper “the prevention of the return of the Russian warships” www.take-off.ru

contracts and deliveries | report

then third arrestors. The process will take some time and will be followed by testing new MiG-29Ks and MiG-29KUBs at the Nitka ground facility, flight training of the lead-in team of Indian pilots and, after the Vikramaditya puts out to sea, first arrested landings on and ramp-assisted takeoffs from the upgraded carrier.

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Yevgeny Sholkov

to Sevastopol, conceived by Ukraine. The decision remained unchanged irrespective of the advance payment for using the facility this year, which, according to the RIA Novosti news agency, had been made, with the total payment to be to the tune of $17 million. As a result, the Severomorsk-based naval pilots got no training at the ground training facility this year due to the decision of Ukrainian leaders, as they did two years ago. For this reason, they had to refresh their deck landing and takeoff skills on board the Admiral Kuznetsov, which could not but complicate the training of rookies.

However, let us get back to the September tests at Nitka, which did take place, unlike the naval pilots’ training derailed by Ukraine’s demarche. Following two weeks of tests, including those involving the MiG-29K No 312, the first arresting gear was dismounted and shipped to Sevmash for installation on board the Vikramaditya.

It will be succeeded by the second and

Specialists of Nitka facility, Proletarsky Zavod plant, Sevmash plant and MiG Corp., who took part in Vikramaditya's arrestor tests.

MiG Corp.'s test pilot Nikolay Diorditsa is the fifth from right

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industry | news

and abroad (foreign lessees could include Iran and Latin American countries).

As far as the current Tu-204 production programme is concerned, UAC’s head Alexey Fyodorov said that the 2008 plan provides for Aviastar-SP to make seven airliners – two Tu-204-300s for Vladivostok Avia and five Tu-204-100Vs for Airlines 400 also known as Red Wings.

Alexey Fyodorov also spoke about the prospect of manufacture of the Tu-204 family. Once the upgraded Tu-204-100SM has been certificated

and its production has been launched, all aircraft newly built by the plants in Ulyanovsk and Kazan will be made in a commonised variant (today, Kazan-made Tu-214s feature a number of substantial differences from Ulyanovsk-built Tu-204s), with all passenger versions to be made by Aviastar-SP alone while KAPO will manufacture only special variants under the governmental procurement programme. KAPO also will make wings for all aircraft of the type being assembled both by it and by Aviastar-SP. As far as the Tu-204 is concerned, UAC pins great hopes on the so-called Iranian contract. According to Alexey Fyodorov, the current plans provide for Iranian carriers to receive in the upcoming 10 years advanced medium-haul aircraft with a total capacity of 20,000 seats, with the bulk of them to be made in Iran.

Talks on Tu-204 delivery and licence production have been under way for quite a while and have reached the decisive stage recently, with a draft contract submitted to the Iranians, according to Fyodorov. Thus, UAC may be looking at about a hundred Tu-204-100SMs to be built by Aviastar-SP and licence-produced by the HESA plant in Isfahan.

to make the wing and empennage all-composite. As to the use of composites as part of the fuselage, “the issue is being pondered” and will have been decided on before the third gate, i.e. the preliminary design approval stage.

Irkut launches the MC-21 preliminary design work late this year. The preliminary design stage is supposed to last throughout 2009.

Andrey Matveyev believes the MC-21 programme may become international. In such case it could be joined by the aircraft industry of China that is running a ‘large passenger aircraft’ programme of its own. However, Russia will remain the MC-21’s systems integrator in any case, Matveyev thinks, with Irkut to remain the prime contractor under the programme.

This summer, Alexander Rubtsov and Alexey Fyodorov, the leaders of the Ilyushin Finance Co. (IFC) and United Aircraft Corporation (UAC) respectively, signed an agreement on IFC’s acquisition of a large batch of advanced Tupolev Tu-204-100SM airliners to be built by UAC’s Aviastar-SP plant.

Under the agreement signed on 15 July during the Farnborough air show, IFC in 2010–12 is to buy 31 such aircraft for the tune of about $1.5 billion in list prices for subsequent lease to air carriers.

The Tu-204-100SM will differ from the current-production Tu-204 in an upgraded Russian-made avionics suite meeting all current and future navigation accuracy and flight safety standards and enabling the aircraft to be flown by a crew of two pilots (the so-called twin-member flight crew). In addition, the aircraft will be powered by advanced PS-90A2 engines being developed by Perm Motors assisted by Pratt&Whitney.

The aircraft ordered will also mount a new digital air conditioning system and electric drives of the wing high-lift devices. Other systems

Andrey Fomin

IFC orders large batch of Tu-204s from UAC

of the Tu-204-100SM will be upgraded as well, which will boost its consumer properties by far. The updated airliner’s certification trials are slated for completion by 2010.

The agreement signed by the two companies also makes provision for 30 options for IFC during 2010–12.

According to IFC Director General Alexander Rubtsov speaking at the signing ceremony, all Tu-204-100SMs ordered “have already been earmarked for specific buyers” and will be delivered to IFC’s customers both in Russia

In September, Irkut Corp.’s MC-21 prospective short/medium-haul airliner passed a key stage – the conceptual design approval stage also known as ‘the second gate’. Not long before, during the Farnborough air show, the developer had shared some details on the status of the programme in the course of Irkut’s news conference.

UAC leader Alexey Fyodorov said at Farnborough that the programme’s worth was estimated at 150 billion rubles (about $6 billion), half of which is to be provided by the government. The sum does not include the costs of developing the engine to power the MC-21. According to Yakovlev Chief Designer Andrey Matveyev, who is dual-hatted as Irkut’s vice-president for the MC-21 programme, tenders for a powerplant and equipment for the new airliner will be issued this

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Andrey Fomin

MC-21 clearing ‘second gate’

autumn right after the conceptual design has been approved. The tender on the MC-21’s engine is to be completed by next summer: Matveyev promised to announce its results at the Le Bourget air show in June 2009.

The MC-21 is to feature a lot of composite materials as part of its design. According to Andrey Matveyev, a decision has been taken

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The Sukhoi SuperJet 100 regional airliner is getting ready for certification tests. The president of the Sukhoi Civil Aircraft Company (SCAC), Victor Subbotin, said at the Farnborough air show in July that the SuperJet 100’s certification tests were to kick off in earnest in August or September this year after the first flying prototype (No. 95001) had flown from Komsomolsk-on-Amur to Zhukovsky in the Moscow Region.

As of 14 July, the SuperJet 100’s first flying prototype had logged 12 flights totalling more than 30 flying hours under the development flight test programme in Komsomolsk-on-Amur. According to Subbotin, the takeoff weight of the aircraft varied from 35 t to 40 t during the test flights at an altitude of up to 3,000 m and at a speed of 680 km/h, with maximum individual flight duration standing at 4 hr 10 min. However, as of early October, the aircraft remained in Komsomolsk-on-Amur where it completed its 22nd sortie on 30 September. The delay of the certification tests is attributed to the need to debug the brand-new SaM146 engine being co-developed for the SuperJet 100 by Russia’s NPO Saturn and French Snecma. This is believed to have been the reason for a brief lull in the development flight tests of the first SuperJet 100s and a delay in the second flying prototype joining the trials.

In Farnborough, Victor Subbotin said that the SuperJet 100’s certification was to be completed in mid-2009 and its deliveries to begin in September 2009, with the aircraft first to be certificated under the Russian and EU airworthiness rules and then under US ones. The four flying prototypes are to enter the certification trials gradually (one more is to be used for endurance tests), with all four SuperJet 100s to fly before year-end 2008. In this connection, the company’s flight service started converting additional aircrew to fly the prototypes: Nikolay Pushenko first flew a SuperJet on 29 June and Leonid Chikunov first flew in the SuperJet left pilot’s seat on 2 July.

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Marina Lystseva

Sukhoi SuperJet 100 to begin certification tests

Under a revised schedule as of early October, the second flying prototype (No. 95003) is to enter the trials in October, the third one (No. 95004) in December and the fourth one (No. 95005) in January 2009. The second non-flying prototype (No. 95006) will be made and subjected to endurance tests at the same time. In this situation, the SuperJet will hardly obtain its type certificate until later next year, and its delivery to its launch customer is unlikely to commence until late 2009 or early 2010.

At the same time, NPO Saturn believes the SaM146’s debugging is running on schedule agreed with SCAC. As of 20 September, SaM146 engines had powered the SuperJet 100 in flight 21 times, having logged over 60 flight hours as well as over 52 flight hours on board the Il-76LL flying testbed.

The SaM146’s total operation time, including its rig tests, had accounted for 1,617 hr by the date.

November is to see the beginning of the SaM146’s flight tests second stage on the Il-76LL, during which the FADEC system’s software will be tested in the first place.

Concurrently, TsAGI will continue testing the static-test SuperJet 100 prototype (No. 95002) in support of launching the certification trials.

Each of the flying prototypes plays a part of its own in the certification test programme. The first and second flying prototypes will be used

mostly for gauging the flight, takeoff/ landing, stability, controllability and strength characteristics. They also will be used in the most hazardous tests involving high-alpha and stall flying and assessment of aeroelastic stability and flutter safety. The third and fourth flying prototypes are designed, in the first place, for testing the avionics and cabin equipment, in particular, for demonstrating emergency passenger evacuation procedures. In addition, they will be used for proving the operational performance category and declared environmental noise.

Under the certification test programme, the four aircraft are to make more than 600 flights preceded by brief (10–40 flights for each aircraft) development tests at SCAC’s flight-test station in Komsomolsk-on-Amur.

It is important that KnAAPO, NAPO and VASO plants have started making parts for the first production aircraft without waiting for the certification tests to begin: KnAAPO in June launched the assembly of the wing centre section of the first production SuperJet 100 that will become the seventh aircraft of the family.

By mid-summer, SCAC had 73 firm orders for the advanced airliner.

Some more new orders were announced during the Farnborough air show in July. On 15 July, SCAC and Perm-based Avialeasing company went into a preliminary

agreement on 40 SuperJet 100s worth a total of more than $630 million. Under the agreement, Avialeasing is to make 24 firm orders and have 16 options. SCAC President Victor Subbotin said in Farnborough, “the fundamentals of the contract have been agreed on, and SCAC and Avialeasing are going to sign it in the near future”.

Construction of the aircraft intended for Avialeasing is to start in 2011.

According to Subbotin, Avialeasing plans to lease them to the UTair carrier that is holding a tender now for regional aircraft to replace the Tu-134s it is discarding from service. However, if UTair does not select the SuperJet 100, opting for the An-148, Embraer or Bombardier airliners instead, Avialeasing will offer the SuperJet 100s it buys from SCAC to other carriers.

On 16 July, the SuperJet International joint venture, which had been established for selling the advanced Russian regional jet on the global market and providing it with logistic support, and Swiss leasing firm AMO signed an agreement for five SuperJet 100s to the tune of $150 million. SuperJet International also announced a firm contract with an unnamed European customer for 20 more airliners worth a total of $600 million or so. Deliveries to AMO will kick off in 2011. According to the Kommersant daily, the unnamed ‘European customer’ may be Icelandic airline IcelandAir.

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UAC’s second subsidiary registered The legal registration of the United Aircraft Corporation’s (UAC) transport aircraft division was completed on 21 August. The joint stock company dubbed UAC – Transport Aircraft (Russian acronym – OAK-TS) was set up on the basis of the Ilyushin JSC. Ilyushin Director General Victor Livanov, who had been appointed UAC’s vice-president for transport aircraft a month before, was appointed Director General of the UAC – Transport Aircraft subsidiary.

The devision will deal with managing projects on production and delivery of ramp-fitted transports for commercial users and the military. UAC owns the

85.93% package of the stock of the UAC – Transport Aircraft JSC. UAC’s transport aircraft strategic development goals stipulated by the Fundamentals of the UAC Development Strategy until 2025 are restoration of Russia’s independence in developing and manufacturing freighter aircraft, meeting the demand of the Russian Armed Forces and aggressive promotion of Russian freighters on the global aircraft market. UAC – Transport Aircraft will work to achieve these objectives.

The product line of ramp-fitted freighters under development, production and upgrade by UAC

is based on implementing a four-element baseline model concept and comprises extra-heavy (An-124 family), heavy (Il-76 family), medium (MTA international programme) and light (Il-112 family) transports. UAC’s strategy of development for the period until 2025 provides for Russia to retain its 12–15% share of the global transport aircraft market.

UAC – Transport Aircraft is the second registered subsidiary of UAC. The first one, UAC – Civil Aircraft, was established in May this year (see Take-off, July 2008, p.18), with UAC President/Chairman of the

Board Alexey Fyodorov appointed Director General.

It was reported in July that there had been other new assignments made in UAC’s leadership. Tupolev President Igor Shevchuk was appointed UAC vice-president for long-range aircraft, while Irkut President Oleg Demchenko got the job of UAC vice-president for the MC-21 programme. Shevchuk will supervise production of long-range and special aircraft and the corporation’s further work in this field. Demchenko will be in charge of developing and productionising the MC-21 airliner – UAC’s largest-scale promising commercial aircraft programme.

case totals 15.3 t (the aircraft can haul 9.1 t of various weapons in its bomb bay). The Tu-142ME has a maximum takeoff weight of 185 t, a cruising speed of 690–705 km/h and a low-level (400–2,000 m) loitering speed of 450 km/h. The aircraft will have a maximum range of 9,500 km with eight Kh-35E missies on board and 7,500 km with six BrahMos missiles. The loitering time at a distance of 2,000 km away from

the air base stands at 6.7–7.6 hours and that at 4,000 km away equals 1.9–2.2 hours.

The Tu-142MR relay aircraft was derived from the Tu-142M by Beriev and was in series production

by TAVIA. Several such aircraft are operated by the naval arms of the Northern and Pacific Fleets of the Russian Navy. A similar aircraft has been offered to potential foreign customers (apparently, one such customer is the Indian Navy already operating Tu-142MEs).

The Tu-142MRE long-range relay aircraft designed to maintain communications with submerged submarines has a maximum takeoff weight of 184 t and a maximum range of 12,000 km that is extended through in-flight refuelling. The aircraft loiters with its antenna extended (the antenna is several-kilometres-long cable reeled out from a special wire reel under the fuselage) at an altitude of 7,500–9,000 m at a speed of 550–600 km/h.

Andrey Fomin

During the Gidroaviasalon 2008 airshow in Gelendzhik in September, Taganrog-based aircraft makers, Beriev company and the TAVIA JCS officially unveiled their proposals on promoting export of upgraded naval aviation long-range warplanes – the Tu-142ME (Tu-142MSD) multirole patrol/ASW/strike aircraft and Tu-142MRE submarine communications relay aircraft.

Developed by the Tupolev company and built in series by the aircraft plant in Taganrog (now known as TAVIA), the Tu-142M long-range ASW aircraft is in service with the Russian Navy’s air arm in several versions, being operated by the Northern and Pacific Fleets.

In addition, eight Tu-142ME ASW planes were exported to India in the later 1980s. In all probability,

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it is them that the proposed upgraded Tu-142ME is aimed at (its designation is Tu-142MSD, with SD standing for the Sea Dragon advanced surveillance and targeting system from Leninets company), being designed for seeking, tracking and sinking submarines, killing surface and littoral targets with antiship missiles, refuelling other aircraft in midair, conducting MASINT, patrolling and observing the national littoral area, fulfilling environment-protection sea monitoring, etc. A new avionics suite and a new antiship guided weapons suite are the principal features of the new aircraft version that carries eight Kh-35E or six Russian-Indian BrahMos antiship missiles under wing on four double hardpoints.

The Tu-142ME’s combat load in this

Andrey Fomin

Tu-142s upgraded in Taganrog

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MiG-AT prototype No. 823 (side number 83) with one of its organic French-made Larzac engines had been replaced with an advanced NPO Saturn AL-55I completed its maiden flight from LII’s airfield in Zhukovsky (Moscow Region) on 28 July. The plane was flown by MiG Corp. test pilot Oleg Antonovich.

On the 31-min maiden mission at an altitude of up to 3,000 m and at a speed of up to 610 km/h, Antonovich tested the powerplant in various modes. According to MiG Corp.

Chief Designer – MiG-AT programme manager Vassily Shtykalo, the AL-55I operated smoothly and proved all of manufacturer’s performance rating, the aircraft systems worked like clockwork too and the mission task was fulfilled.

The first stage of the AL-55I flight test programme implies 30 test flights on MiG-AT No. 823.

According to NPO Saturn’s

spokesperson, six missions had been flown by 19 August, during which the AL-55I’s start-up at various altitudes and its operation in various modes, including in the negative g-load mode, were tested.

The test missions were flown on both engines and on the AL-55I alone. With the Larzac running, the AL-55I was used for start-up tests in autorotation mode. The AL-55I proved the manufacturer’s performance rating in all operating modes. Test pilot Oleg Antonovich specifically mentioned the excellent controllability of the new engine.

The AL-55I is a twin-shaft turbofan with the subsonic non-variable-area convergent jet nozzle. Its takeoff thrust equals 1,760 kg. NPO Saturn’s spokesperson stressed that the basic engine core could be used to derive a family for various applications with a thrust varying from 1,700 to 3,500

Alexey Mikheyev

AL-55I trials on MiG-AT started

kg to be competitive on the Russian and foreign markets.

The AL-55I is under development on order from Indian corporation HAL to power its HJT-36 trainers under NPO Saturn’s international contract that came in force on 1 August 2005. NPO Saturn and UMPO joint stock companies have teamed up on the parity basis to productionise the prototype engine batch, have the engine certificated and provide its licence production in

India. The developer believes that the success of the AL-55I engine family development programme may lead to fitting a Russian-made powerplant the MiG-AT trainer now flying on French-made engines only.

As is known, Oleg Antonovich also has been flight-testing another MiG-AT prototype (No. 821) since 27 June 2008 to test the TMKB-Soyuz RD-1700 turbofan engine mounted instead of one of its Larzacs too (see Take-off, July 2008, p. 22).

(GLITs) in Akhtubinsk for tactical application tests.

From August to November 2007, two Yak-130s (No. 01 and 02) were used in tests to prove the flight performance declared.

Based on the results produced, the Irkut corporation in last November received the Yak-130 Preliminary Joint Official Tests Conclusion giving the green light to making and

delivering a first batch. Both aircraft had been debugged from November 2007 to January 2008 to iron out the deficiencies noted by the Air Force, and the Yak-130 combat trainers have been at the basic weapons tests stage of the joint official test programme since January this year.

To date, the stability, controllability and flight load tests have been completed under the Yak-130 joint official test programme. Flights with a maximum takeoff weight of 10,290 kg (full fuel load and 3,000 kg of combat load) and a maximum landing weight of 9,000 kg (10% of fuel remaining and 3,000 kg of bring-back load) have been completed with success.

The fire control system of the aircraft has been tested in full, and planned avionics software improvements are underway.

If all goes to plan, the Yak-130 will have completed its basic weapons tests stage of the joint official tests before year-end, with deliveries of production aircraft to the Russian Air Force and the foreign launch customer, the Algerian Air Force, to begin.

Another Yak-130 enters trials

Alexey Mikheyev

Another new-generation Yakovlev Yak-130 combat trainer built by the Sokol plant in Nizhny Novgorod joined the Yak-130 test programme in July. It became the fourth production-configuration Yak-130 and the third aircraft of the type participating in the test programme (as is known, the third Yak-130 was lost on 26 July 2006).

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Following several check test flights in Nizhny Novgorod, the new Yak-130 flew to the Yakovlev design bureau’s flight test facility in Zhukovsky (Moscow Region) on 13 August to take part in the joint official tests, and two first pre-production Yak-130s (No. 01 and 02) were ferried from Zhukovsky to the proving ground of the Defence Ministry’s State Flight Test Centre

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Alexey Mikheyev

First Taganrog-built Be-200ChS to be ready in three years

Alexey Mikheyev

As many as two Beriev Be-200ChS multirole amphibians have been displayed at the recent Gidroaviasalon 2008 air show in Gelendzhik. One of them, RF-21512, is owned by Beriev and was flown by the company’s test pilots. The other, RF-32767, was displayed by the amphibian’s launch customer, the Russian Emergencies Ministry. In all, seven Be-200 aircraft have been built to date: two prototypes (the first Be-200 and Be-200ChS are used by Beriev), four production Be-200ChS amphibians are in service with the Emergencies Ministry and one more Be-200ChS was delivered to the first foreign customer, the Azeri Emergencies Ministry, in April this year (see Take-off, May 2008, p. 7).

All of them were made by Irkut Corp.’s aircraft plant in Irkutsk, which is now completing two more production amphibians ordered by the Emergencies Ministry. However, all subsequent aircraft of the type

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are to be assembled by Beriev in Taganrog with the TAVIA plant participating.

During the Gidroaviasalon 2008 air show, Beriev Director General Victor Kobzev shed some light on the transfer of the Be-200 production to Taganrov, saying that the rigging had been moved from Irkutsk to Taganrog and Beriev had launched production of parts for the initial batch of ten Be-200s in August 2008. At the same time, the Be-200 programme is to retain the close cooperation with the aircraft plant in Irkutsk, which will keep on making wing and high-lift device kits for all amphibians of the type. The completion of the first Be-200 built by Beriev in Taganrog is slated for 2011.

Victor Kobzev estimates the total worth of the Be-200 programme’s Irkutsk-to-Taganrog switch and manufacture costs of the first five Taganrog-built aircraft at 4.8 billion rubles (about $200 million), of

which around 1.7 billion rubles ($70 million) are costs of the production transfer proper. Vneshekonombank will issue a loan to this end.

Construction of five more aircraft of the Beriev-made 10-ship initial batch will be paid with the money earned by new contracts Beriev is going to make with Irkut and UAC, Beriev’s Director General believes. According to Mr. Kobzev, the government has ordered eight more Be-200ChS amphibians for the Emergencies Ministry in addition to the current order for seven aircraft, of which three are to be delivered in the near future. Finer points of the new contract are expected to be hashed out by November. In addition, maintains Kobzev, several European countries, Greece and Portugal in the first place, may well order several amphibians. However, Be-200ChS-E deliveries to Europe will be feasible only after the EU has certificated the amphibian, to which

Beriev attaches priority importance.

The government provides some money to the company under the UAC commercial aircraft programmes to have the aircraft certificated and develop a 68-seat passenger and cargo variants.

Beriev’s head deems it possible that the Russian Defence Ministry will think about buying Be-200s sooner or later. The Be-200’s dimensions are similar enough to those of the Be-12 amphibian that used to be used widely enough by the Navy’s air arm and which production was terminated as far back as 1973. In Gelendzhik, Russian Navy Air and Air Defence Deputy Commander Maj.-Gen. Nikolay Kuklev said that the Be-12 remained in service with the Black Sea Fleet alone as a nine-ship fleet, with eight aircraft operated in the ASW role. All of them have long needed upgrade and their good repair leaves much to be desired. Beriev and TAVIA have been extending the service life of the Be-12s, but according to Victor Kobzev, they cannot remain in the inventory for longer than five to seven years in any case.

“They’ve got to retire on time”, he said, otherwise their further safe and effective operation will cost the Navy an arm and a leg. In this context, the Be-200 can come in handy as a good replacement of the venerable Be-12, even more so that deriving the ASW and patrol versions from the Emergencies Ministry’s Be-200ChS version has been proposed a long time ago. However, the Russian Navy’s acquisition of Be-200s has been barely given thought, according to Victor Kobzev.

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D-27A propfan engines, similar to those powering the Antonov An-70, and a 5,200kg Klimov RD-33AS turbofan engine booster. Another difference is the upgraded avionics suite including the Sea Dragon surveillance and targeting system, ARIA-V flight navigation system, etc. The A-42PE propfan-powered model has been repeatedly demonstrated at air shows in Gelendzhik; however, Beriev’s head Victor Kobzev said as far back as at the previous Gidroaviasalon show in September 2006 that the Albatross would be given another powerplant further down the road.

A few years back, the Defence Ministry ordered the development of the A-42 multirole patrol/SAR amphibian powered by a pair of PS-90A-42 turbofans. Replacing the current 12,000kg D-30KPV turbofan engines used on the A-40 prototype will improve the aircraft’s performance and increase its takeoff weight even further. Perm Motors has been deriving the PS-90A-42 from the PS-90A engine powering the existing Tu-204 and Il-96 and upgraded Il-76 airlifters.

Some details of the Defence Ministry’s plans for the future A-42 became known during this air show.

According to Maj.-Gen. Nikolay Kuklev, Deputy Air and Air Defence Commander, Russian Navy, who

spoke at the show, the military anticipate the arrival of the first A-42 already in 2010. “Developing the advanced A-42 aircraft, we went for expanding the number of missions the A-42 would be able to accomplish. It has a longer range and a longer endurance and features a 20% increase in fuel efficiency. Naval aviation is to receive four A-42 amphibians prior to 2013, of which the first one will enter service in 2010”, Maj.-Gen. Kuklev told the RIA Novosti news agency.

However, the general may have been a bit too optimistic.

At least, Beriev Chief Designer Victor Ponomaryov, who is in charge of the A-40 and A-42 programmes, was less enthusiastic

in his estimates of the A-42’s programme schedule. Taking the relevant question at a news conference during Gidroaviasalon 2008, he said the programme was at the development stage, but the work schedule “leaves much to be desired” and would be determined by the actual funds allocated by the customer.

The flying A-40 is used in support of the A-42 development programme as well. For instance, using the Gidroaviasalon 2008 air show for ferrying the Albatross from Taganrog to its test and experimental base in Gelendzhik, Beriev had the A-40 fly several test missions, in particular, to test the amphibian’s SAR gear, right in the course of the show.

Alexey Mikheyev

As usual, the most impressive participant in the demonstration flight programme of the Gidroaviasalon 2008 air show was the prototype of the world’s largest amphibian jet, the Beriev A-40 Albatross, whose maximum takeoff weight may reach 86 t. Air shows in Gelendzhik are a reason for maintaining the air worthiness of the aircraft bearing side number 20 and being the second A-40 prototype made almost two decades ago, in November 1989 (the first A-40, side number 10, first flew from the airfield in Taganrog on 8 December 1986 and from water on 4 November 1988; however, it has not flown for a long time since then).

As far back as the later ‘90s, following the high-profile sinking of the Kursk submarine, Beriev’s team was tasked with deriving a dedicated search-and-rescue (SAR) variant, designated as A-42, from the A-40 amphibian. Construction of the unfinished third A-40 prototype was in that variant. In the mid-‘90s, the programme evolved into that of a multirole patrol/SAR amphibian whose export designation was A-42PE. It was to differ from the A-40 both in the maximum takeoff weight increased to 96 t and in a new powerplant made up by two 14,000hp Ivchenko-Progress

Alexey Mikheyev

Work on Beriev A-42 continues

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tests are under way, in particular) and a marketing research is being performed. Both aircraft have a similar configuration, differing, essentially, in the powerplant layout only. Both feature a tail cargo hatch for handling various types of cargo, including vehicles and outsize cargo.

This makes them very effective in hauling passengers and cargo on commuter lines.

The Be-112 is to have the 11,000 kg takeoff weight and 2,350 kg payload (27 seats with two crew members). Its cruising speed is 370 km/h and maximum cruising speed is 420 km/h while the range is 1,000 km. The Be-112 can operate from unpaved or rolled-snow airstrips only 850 m long. Its takeoff run on water

measures 860 m and roll is 515 m, with a maximum allowed wave height of 0.8 m. The powerplant under consideration includes two 1,400hp PT6A-67R turboprops mounted in the fin leading edges.

The Be-114 is twice as heavy: its maximum takeoff weight stands at 22 t and maximum payload equals 6 t or cargo or 44 passengers.

The amphibian’s maximum

cruising speed is 530 km/h, maximum-payload range accounts for 1,000 km and range with a 2t cargo is up to 4,900 km. A 1,300m dirt or rolled-snow airstrip will be enough for the Be-114 to operate.

It will be able to take off from water at the wave height of 1 m. The Be-114’s powerplant is made up by two wing-mounted TV7-117S Series 2 turboprop engines 2,800 hp each.

interest in the upgraded Be-32KM that is just the thing for operations at high latitudes. Beriev Director General Victor Kobzev said in Gelendzhik that the parties had reached “the stage of signing a leasing agreement”. Yakutia’s administration and the Financial Leasing Company (FLC) may clinch a deal for ten Be-32KMs in the near future. It is quite possible that the news of the reincarnation of Beriev’s half-forgotten late-‘60s project will come soon.

Beriev is developing a new fuselage nose section with composite

components to fit the upgraded Be-32KM. In addition, the avionics suite will be renovated through and through. The powerplant will consist of a pair Canadian-made PT6A-65B turboprop engines 1,100 hp each. Depending on the cabin layout, the aircraft seats 7 to 15 passengers with the 1+1 seating arrangement out to 1,950 km at a maximum cruising speed of 520 km/h, with the required runway length, including unpaved runways, being only 830 m. The Be-32KM’s takeoff weight is 7,300 kg. The aircraft is flown by a crew of two.

Alexey Mikheyev

Beriev company continues to develop several advanced commercial amphibian aircraft with the takeoff weight ranging from 1.5 t to 22 t, such as the light four-seat Be-101, 27-seat Be-112 and 44-seat Be-114. Take-off learnt some details of the programmes’ status during the Gidroaviasalon 2008 air show in Gelendzhik in September.

The Be-101 light multirole amphibian designed for commercial and private operation can carry a pilot and three passengers or 225 kg of cargo. A 310hp Teledyne IO-550N piston engine with the MTV-9 pusher propeller powers it. Its maximum takeoff weight is 1,570 kg, maximum speed 275 km/h and range up to 1,000 km. The Be-101 can operate from both unpaved airstrips (with run of 210 m and roll of 190 m) and small reservoirs at least 0.9 m deep with waves up to 0.45 m high (with run on water of 350 m, and roll of 270 m).

According to Chief Designer Vadim Zdanevich, manufacture of the rigging for making the first Be-101 is nearing completion. A key feature of the programme is that it is aimed, among other things, at testing composite technologies intended for naval aviation.

Unlike the Be-101, the Be-112 and Be-114 are still at the R&D stage, at which the concepts of the amphibians are being studied (remotely controlled flying model

Andrey Fomin

Beriev’s new programmes

Be-32’s rebirth?

It became known during Gidroaviasalon 2008 air show that Beriev company had resumed work under the Be-32 light turboprop commuter plane designed as far back as when Georgy Beriev was still alive (the first Be-32 of the low-rate initial production batch made its first flight in 1970). In its day, the Be-32, which had passed its tests, was sacrificed to the cooperation policies of the Ecomcon member states, when export of Czechoslovak L-410 aircraft of the same purpose to the Soviet Union started en masse in the ‘70s. No work had been done

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on the Be-32 for almost 20 years, but an attempt to ‘reanimate’ it was made in the mid-‘90s by restoring the airworthiness of the first preproduction aircraft renamed Be-32K (that time around, it was fitted with Canadian PK6A-65B engines planned for production by a joint venture with the Klimov company in St. Petersburg).

However, the attempt failed too.

Now, another decade and then some later, Beriev’s ‘flying minivan’, possibly, has a chance.

The administration of Yakutia, a province of Russia, has taken

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Alexey Mikheyev

The Kamov joint stock company – a subsidiary of the Russian Helicopters holding company and one of the world’s major helicopter makers – celebrated its 60th anniversary early in October. Kamov’s Executive Director Roman Chernyshev and Designer General Sergey Mikheyev dedicated a news conference to the event, during which they spoke about the key current and future programmes of the company.

According to Mr. Chernyshev, roughly half of the work being handled

by Kamov deals with fulfilling orders under the governmental defence procurement programme. This is mostly due to the ongoing official joint trials of the Ka-52 advanced combat helicopter. In June this year, the Progress aircraft plant in the town of Arsenyev rolled out the second Ka-52 prototype (see Take-off, July 2008, p. 22), with the assembly of the first production Ka-52 completed and that of next machines continued in September. According to Chernyshev, the Ka-52 has been submitted for its official trials, and its delivery under the governmental defence procurement programme is to launch in 2009.

Sergey Mikheyev said the talks on export deliveries of helicopters of the

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type had been under way with several foreign countries.

Another Kamov’s military-related line of work is the development of an advanced shipborne helicopter.

At present, the backbone of the shipborne helicopter fleet of the Russian Navy and a number of foreign navies – the Indian and Chinese ones in the first place – is made up by heavy ship-based helicopters of the Ka-27 family (Ka-28, Ka-29, Ka-31).

However, Designer General Sergey Mikheyev says that future ships will need a lighter helicopters due to the Russian Navy development tendencies, “We plan to develop a drastically novel shipborne helicopter. It is clear that it is not going to be a heavy aircraft in the class of the current Ka-27 with the 12t takeoff weight, rather a helicopter weighing less than 10 t. We have been developing such a helicopter proactively”.

The heavy shipborne helicopter line will evolve through upgrade and development of new Ka-27 derivatives.

Kamov has been doing that for foreign customers. Roman Chernyshev says Kamov in November will submit its bid to the tender for upgrading the Ka-28 helicopter fleet of the Indian Navy with participation of foreign companies.

Alexey Mikheyev

Kamov company turns 60

In all, the Indian Navy is planning an upgrade and additional acquisition of a total of 30 Ka-28s. The Ka-28s and Ka-31s – both those delivered and those yet to be ordered – are to join the carrier air groups of the Indian Navy’s new aircraft carrier Vikramaditya being converted from the Admiral Gorshkov CV by Russian shipyard Sevmash, and future indigenous Indian aircraft carriers. China has been keen on updating its Ka-28s too.

Sergey Mikheyev also hopes for the Russian Navy to order an upgrade of its Ka-27s: “Although the production of the Ka-27 was wrapped up in 1991, the existing helicopters will have remained in the inventory for 20 years more. We count on the government to order in the near future their upgrade through the use of cutting-edge

highly-automated flight/navigation and surveillance/targeting systems”.

As far as civil programmes are concerned, Kamov is going in the near future to focus on supporting the deliveries and operation of its Ka-32 medium transport helicopters, which are in high demand all over the world, and developing and productionising the modified Ka-226T light helicopter (see the article in this issue’s Contracts and Deliveries section) as well as Ka-62 medium multirole helicopter that has been included in the future product line of the Russian Helicopters holding company (for detail see Take-off, July 2008, p. 39).

According to Roman Chernyshev, the drafting of an investment programme for the project is in the final stages. “In November, we and Russian Helicopters will jointly ask Vnesheconombank to consider the feasibility of its participation in the project”, said Mr. Chernyshev, who believes a decision on the matter can be taken before year-end.

As far as longer-term requirements are concerned, they will be met by a radically novel high-speed transport/ passenger helicopter (the Ka-92 programme was unveiled during the HeliRusia 2008 show in May this year; see Take-off, July 2008, p.

36). The project is being developed under the governmental programme of the Russian Helicopters holding company. Roman Chernyshev says, “This work will be done not only by the Kamov and Mil design bureaux, but also with participation of virtually all scientific organisations working in this field. The priority facing the scientific and technical council of the Russian Helicopters is to determine forms and methods of implementing the project”.

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A key component of formidable combat capabilities of advanced fighters is the sophisticated fire control system wrapped around an efficient radar. All Sukhoi Su-27/Su-30 family fighters – both exported and in service with the Russian Air Force – are fitted with fire control systems developed by the Tikhomirov-NIIP research institute. Tikhomirov-NIIP became a pioneer in developing phasedarray radars. Its first airborne phased-array radar debuted on the MiG-31 interceptor, and starting with the Su-30MKI these radars have been equipping Sukhoi fighters. This year, the advanced Su-35 multirole fighter entered the trials, with Tikhomirov-NIIP developing the Irbis-E passive phased array radar – the most refined in its class – to fit it. As far as the future fifth-generation fighter is concerned, the company is developing its first active electronically scanned array radar (AESA). To learn the status of the programmes, Take-off's editor Andrey Fomin met Tikhomirov-NIIP Director General Yuri Bely who was kind enough to grant us an interview.

TIKHOMIROV’S RADARS: from phased array to AESA Interview of Tikhomirov-NIIP Director General Yuri Bely How are the trials of the Irbis-E phased array radar?

The programme is going with a swing. We continue to fly the Su-30MK2 flying testbed with an Irbis-E prototype that has a 1kW emitter. We have been doing that for almost a year and a half, having proven most of the radar’s basic characteristics and having tested most of the operating modes, e.g. the multirole lookup, long-range acquisition and low-, medium- and high-resolution lookdown modes. In addition, we have made a set of radar units, including 5kW emitter that is undergoing lab tests slated to wrap up this year.

In addition, we have made two complete radar sets for installation on Su-35

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prototypes. The first of them lab-tested in house and then by KnAAPO has been mounted on the second Su-35 flying prototype. We will turn it on when the time comes for the radar system flight trials.

A vehicular check and repair station has been developed in support of the Irbis-E’s tests on the Su-35, so we will start flying a real aircraft carrying the complete Irbis-E set soon. The second set for the next prototype has been made, checked and accepted, too, and soon will be mounted.

Thus, the Irbis-E test programme is in full swing, and the radar will have been developed fully by the time the Su-35 is ready for full-rate production.

Yuri Ivanovich Bely was born in 1951. A graduate of the Moscow Bauman Higher Technical College, he received a commission in 1974 and served as military representative at NIIP and then department deputy chief in the Air Force Procurement Directorate.

In 1987, he was appointed chief of the Military Representative Office at NIIP. He holds the military rank of colonel (ret’d). In March 1998, Mr. Bely becomes director of the NIIP. Now he is Director General of Tikhomirov-NIIP JSC. He holds a degree of Doctor of Engineering (DEng), academician of International Academy of Informatisation. He is a member of Russian Government’s Military Industrial Commission Scientific Council. He holds several state awards.

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industry | interview

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Bars phased array radar now under series production for Sukhoi Su-30MKI, Su-30MKM and Su-30MKA fighters being delivered to India, Malaysia and Algeria. License assembly of Bars radars is now developing in India, and Tikhomirov-NIIP is working on its further upgrade

Andrey Fomin

Can the Irbis-E be fitted to the existing Su-27s as part of their upgrade package?

Such an option has been looked into under the Su-27SM2 programme.

Essentially, this is the 1kW-emitter radar variant undergoing test on the flying testbed (the 5kW-emitter radar cannot be used on older Su-27s due to their power supply capacity). So, the Irbis-E variant being tried on the flying testbed is the virtually complete set for upgrading combat unit fighters. However, it looks like the financial considerations will prompt the decision to upgrade Su-27s without replacing the current radar, rather by beefing up its capabilities through introduction of new operating modes, support of advanced weapons, etc. Such an aircraft has been built and entered its flight trials this year.

However, it should be kept in mind that the trials may take a few years, while the remaining calendar life of the existing fighter fleet, the newest of which were made in the early 1990s, will be expiring steadily.

The only way out may be acquisition of new aircraft, e.g. the Su-35, already fitted with the Irbis-E phased array radar. The Air Force has been on the brink of taking such a decision. During the Su-35 unveiling ceremony in Zhukovsky in July 2008, Russian Air Force Commander-in-Chief Col.-Gen. Alexander Zelin told the media that the service has been mulling over ordering Su-35s for fielding with two or three air regiments.

Are there any improvements planned for the Irbis-E’s predecessor, the Bars fitting the Su-30MKI-family fighters? Is there any future for its further development?

There still is room for improvement.

Take for instance the Su-30MKI. The current Bars variant has undergone evaluation tests on Su-30MKIs in India, proving that all glitches had been ironed out. Now, the Indian Air Force has raised the question – is it reasonable to license-produce all of 140 aircraft under the programme through 2014 in the variant approved as far back as the late ‘90s? Therefore, they suggest an upgrade of the Bars in the course of the licence production, including introduction of the AESA. We have devised proposals of our own, providing for a two-stage upgrade.

At Stage 1, the Bars will retain the passive phased array but the radar’s performance and operating modes will be beefed up.

At Stage 2, it will be possible to equip the Bars with the AESA, given the active phased array advances achieved under the fifth-generation fighter programme. IAF is pondering our proposals, and we hope that it will soon decide on how the Bars should be updated.

Since we have mentioned modernisation programmes, would you tell us about the status of the MiG-31 interceptor’s Zaslon fire control system upgrade programme?

The Russian Air Force has reported officially that it had taken delivery of its first upgraded aircraft of the type this spring.

Speaking of the Zaslon, it is our baseline design, with which we started using airborne electronic scanning and digital computers – these were the firsts for us.

The MiG-31 interceptor’s Zaslon phased array radar is an undisputed priority of not only Tikhomirov-NIIP, but our country as well. It has been a while since the MiG-31’s service entry in 1981, and the radar is naturally in need of upgrade. The work on it is going on. The first stage of the upgraded MiG-31’s official joint trials was completed last year. The Leninets plant has launched deliveries of improved radars for installation in the interceptors that has started getting the operational status this year. At the same time, Russian Defence Ministry’s Flight Test Center (GLITs) is running tests under Stage 2 of the official test programme in Akhtubinsk and is going to wrap them up before year-end.

What has been done? Firstly, we have upgraded the cockpit management system at the navigator’s combat station, having introduced an advanced LCD-based display system able to show new types of information. Secondly, the radar’s range has been extended. Thirdly, now it can handle more types of weapons. The radar’s array itself remained unchanged, but some of the fire control system units have been replaced with advanced ones and the com-

puter system has been replaced totally. The MiG-31’s computers, which production had long been discontinued, have been ousted by new-generation digital computers. We are going to beef up the radar’s capabilities even further in the future.

Now we have reached the name of the game – the programme on the active electronically scanned array (AESA) radar. Just over a year ago, at the MAKS 2007 air show, Tikhomirov-NIIP unveiled full-scale elements of prototypes of active phased arrays. As is known, your institute is the prime contractor for developing the AESA multifunction radio-electronic system to fit the fifth-generation aircraft. What has been achieved in this field?

The programme is on schedule under the contract we signed with Sukhoi. Under the schedule, the first full-scale adjusted AESA fitted with the complete set of transmit-receive (T-R) modules will be placed on the rig in November this year for mating with the rest units of the radar. The first array has been assembled, completed and handed over for adjustment. The Istok company has launched the production of T-R modules based on monolithic microcircuits.

The second array is being fitted with parts and modules, and the third one has just entered the process. Thus, three arrays are in production now. They will be tested subsequently – the first one in November, as I said before, the second one in next March or April, etc. AESA is to be fitted to one of the fifth-generation aircraft prototypes under construction by KnAAPO next year, with its flight tests to kick off in 2010.

Today, I can say that all technical problems take-off november 2008

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industry | interview Irbis-E phased array radar onboard Sukhoi Su-35 fighter prototype at MAKS 2007 airshow (picture above) and during its tests on Su-30MK2 flying testbed (below)

Yevgeny Yerokhin

pertaining to developing and making T-R modules have been resolved. Now, we are working on the radar as a whole, handling such issues as cooling, mating, beam control, etc., but again everything is being done on schedule. As the tests go, we will beef the radar system’s composition gradually first on test benches, then onboard aircraft, achieving the system’s complete set stipulated by the specification requirement in the end.

How long may the full cycle of the AESA tests take?

As is known, developing an up-to-date radar takes about five to seven years.

Starting with 2008 when the real trials of the equipment has begun, our system is to be ready for service entry about 2014–15.

The similar situation is abroad: even the AESA radar of the F-22, which has entered service a rather long time ago, has several operating modes that have not been refined yet. In this connection, I have got to mention that Tikhomirov-NIIP has a wealth of experience in phased arrays. The Americans skipped the passive phased array stage and went right from slotted arrays AESA at once, while we are well versed in passive phased arrays, having developing them for about 40 years (we maintain that the AESA differs from the passive one, essentially, in the emitter technology, while we take the mathematical modelling tools from phased arrays well known to us). This gives us considerable advantages, including those in development time. Nobody else throughout the world has the expertise in phased array we have!

Tikhomirov-NIIP

You are certainly abreast of the AESA programmes both in Russia and abroad.

Would you name some features of your programme setting it apart from others? What are its advantages?

Well, it is hard to compare ours with what the Americans have developed, because actual, rather than advertising information is scarce and we can judge only by indirect indications. Still, we believe we have been achieving characteristics that are at least on a par with those of the F-22’s and F-35’s radars and superior to them in some respects. As far as other Russian developers’ programmes, the principal difference between our design and theirs lies in technology. We use the monolithic microwave microcircuit technologies that are at the cutting edge now throughout the world,

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industry | interview

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Fragment of the X-band AESA prototype developed by Tikhomirov-NIIP unveiled at MAKS 2007 airshow in August 2007

Andrey Fomin

while our domestic colleagues rely on the so-called hybrid technologies that have been already abandoned, say, in Europe.

Just like us, the Americans develop their AESA using monolithic microcircuits with the possibility of enhancing the degree of their integration and switching further down the road to what is called ‘smart skin’, i.e. the arrangement, under which T-R modules can be placed anywhere onboard the aircraft to generate the relevant radiation field. Thus, we are at the cutting edge of global AESA development.

Could the technologies emerging from the AESA development under this programme be used in the future for developing radars to fit other aircraft and other materiel whatsoever?

Certainly. For instance, sooner or later, there will be the question raised of developing light fifth-generation fighter or fitting upgraded Generation 4+, 4++ fighters with AESA radars. In such a case, instead of reinventing the wheel, it is better to use proven technologies while keeping the manufacturers busy at the same time, because the larger the scale of T-R module production, the less their cost.

In this case, the problem boils down to scaling – the very same technologies and

components will remain but the array’s diameter will be diminished. This problem is not scientific, rather a design one. Then, the productionised T-R modules can be used in the radars operated, say, by surface-to-air missile systems. So, the more applications for proven technologies, the better. While in the past, we needed to set up and launch T-R modules production facilities, now a reverse problem may crop up, like, production is in full swing, while consumption is low. The cost of modules can be affordable only in case their production is on a large scale.

What do you think about room for both phased array lines – active and passive ones – in the future? Or will the advent of AESA doom passive ones?

I believe each line will have a niche of its own in the near future, at the least.

AESA may oust passive phased arrays only if their electronic componentry becomes very cheap. So far, at the current level of technological sophistication, the costs of active and passive phased arrays are unlike as chalk and cheese. Thus, it is a bit too soon for passive phased arrays to become a thing of the past.

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industry | interview Take-off has repeatedly covered various spheres the State Ryazan Instrument-Making Plant (GRPZ) – a major Russian manufacturer of airborne radars – operates in, including its productionising of the active phased array and development of heliborne radar. In addition, GRPZ develops a family of airborne digital computers and airborne computer systems for various applications.

Take-off’s correspondent Yevgeny Yerokhin has been to the plant again and seen Nikolay Andreyev, chief of the airborne computer department of the corporate scientific and technical centre.

Cases and modules of the SOLO-21 and SOLO-35.01 airborne digital computers

What was the beginning of the work on computers at your plant? This was an absolutely new field for GRPZ, wasn’t it?

Let me start with the fact that our specialised department, whose principal task is the development of airborne digital computers, is turning 10 in November this year. How did everything begin? GRPZ is a specialist in making radars for fighter jets.

As is known, there used to be partnering among manufacturing plants throughout the country during the Soviet times, and GRPZ would receive airborne digital computers for its radars from its subcontractors. With the beginning of the economic upheaval in the 1990s, problems with computer supplies cropped up, and the plant was unable to make its end-products without them.

AIRCRAFT COMPUTERS MADE IN RYAZAN

Airborne computer system of the Mi-28N helicopter

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In that situation, the most urgent task we faced was learning to produce certain types of dedicated computers (various versions of the Ts100 in the first place) to fit the radar systems we made. To learn producing airborne digital computers as a new product class to the company, and to learn to support production, the corporate scientific and technical centre set up the airborne computer department in 1999 and hired relevant staff. This minimal task was fulfilled with success, but we did not stop at that.

Development of an in-house airborne digital computer came next, right?

Right. The Tikhomirov-NIIP research institute in the town of Zhukovsky was www.take-off.ru

industry | interview upgrading the radar fitting the Sukhoi Su-27 fighters family. Advanced high-performance digital computers had to be introduced to the radar. Analysis of the computers offered by various manufacturers indicated that none of them met Tikhomirov-NIIP’s requirements to additional radar modes in technical or economic terms. Against this backdrop, GRPZ on agreement with Tikhomirov-NIIP decided to launch development of its own digital control computer to fit radars in the course of the upgrade.

The performance specification for developing the SOLO-54 airborne digital computer was issued in 2002. The computer was developed extremely quickly. In cooperation with Tikhomirov-NIIP, the SOLO-54 passed its ground and flight tests as part of the N001V radar fitting the Su-27SM, with the trials wrapped up in 2004. The same year, GRPZ launched production of the radar SOLO-54 version with an expanded interface set in 2005. The SOLO-54 radar was appreciated by the customer, Tikhomirov-NIIP, that used the computer in three versions of its radar – the N001V, N001ER and N001VEP. This was the beginning of a new field for GRPZ to explore.

The surface-mounting line of the airborne computer assembly shop

The successful completion of the SOLO-54 and SOLO-54.01 development stage gave impetus to GRPZ to start development of more airborne digital computers and airborne computer systems mostly for airborne radar applications. The development of new types of computers followed several paths, e.g. development of

SOLO-54.01 control aiborne digital computer

The SOLO-54 computer is based on the RISC processor with MIPS architecture. It has good performance and a good set of front-end interfaces compared with other similar computers. The SOLO-54 is housed by a compact case and requires no forced-air cooling. This is especially important for radar modernisation when the airborne digital computer had to be integrated in a system with the well-established layout. The real-time operating system used by the airborne digital computer supports multithreaded applications and has a POSIX-compatible interface.

The efficient software development and debugging means available allow a drastic reduction in the time needed to develop application software for airborne radars.

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high-performance specialised computers for control tasks, programmed signal processing devices wrapped around digital signal processors and computer systems uniting these types of computing devices.

Development of advanced computers relied on up-to-date system interface and module-and-unit design standards, including international ones. Functional modules of airborne digital computers are designed depending on the requirements with the use of the Euromechanics constructs of the 3U or 6U dimension types.

Airborne digital computer modules are integrated in sealed cases with conductive heat removal and external air cooling (ATR Short construct). Such a design provides effective protection from outside exposure and good electromagnetic compatibility with other electronic systems.

The scientific and technical centre is known to have developed a number of other airborne digital computers…

A case in point is the development of a small-size airborne computer system to fit the heliborne radar being developed by the plant too. The airborne computer system is part of the avionics of the Mil Mi-28N attack helicopter. It is wrapped around the Compact PCI system bus interface with the use of Euromechanics 3U dimension type in the 1/2 ATR Short case. The airborne computer system embodies a control computer with a relevant front-end interface set, programmed digital signal processor, radar clock driver, intermediate frequency controlled amplifier and AD converter that are part of the radar’s reception path.

At present, the computer is being tested, with GRPZ productionising both the radar and the airborne computer system.

Another stage of development of airborne take-off november 2008

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industry | interview radar computers was the emergence of the SOLO family of multiprocessor airborne digital computers wrapped around new architecture – a common commuted computing environment. The work is being done under GRPZ’s Chief Designer Andrey Pershin and involves the latest achievements in intermodular connections on the basis of the PCI Express high-capacity serial interface. The common commuted computing environment allows the removal of limitations on the capacity of the multiprocessor system as compared with known architectures wrapped around the common system bus.

Based on the common commuted computing environment architecture, two airborne digital computers were developed to fit the Irbis-E radar under development by Tikhomirov-NIIP for Sukhoi Su-35 fighter. They were the SOLO-35.01 airborne digital computer designed for radar signal processing and SOLO-35.02 airborne digital computer – a high-performance multiprocessor control computer. The SOLO-35.01 has a control data processor module and up to four digital signal processor modules connected via the PCI Express system interface. The SOLO-35.02 comprises up to four data processor modules mounting mezzanine interface modules made to PMC (PCI Mezzanine Cards) standard.

Both computers are made of modules of the Euromechanics 6U dimension type in the 1/2 ATR Short case, interconnected via a high-speed datalink and constitute the integrated computer system of the fire control radar.

The computers have passed ground tests and are being flight-tested as part of the radar on a flying testbed at the Defence Ministry’s Main Flight Research Centre (GLITs).

We are developing the SOLO-21 airborne digital computer using the same common commuted computing environment architecture to equip prospective aircraft.

The SOLO-21 is a high-capacity computer comprising a multichannel ADC, several digital signal processor modules, several data processor modules and several interface modules. The computer uses Euromechanics 6U dimension-type modules and PMC interface modules and is housed by the modular ATR Short case. The avionics suite consists of two SOLO-21 airborne digital computers linked with a high-performance optical line.

The development of the computer has been mostly completed, several prototypes have been made and their trials are beginning.

Is there any competition on the Russian airborne digital computer market and how

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Module mounting quality control

would you describe GRPZ’s position on the market? What are your advantages?

Of course, there is competition, but we have got rather solid positions and good prospects. The SOLO digital computer family is progressing from the rather basic – and, nonetheless, still popular – SOLO-54 to the most sophisticated SOLO-21 computer system designed to fit the future fighter.

As far as advantages are concerned, our developments are based on the developed production facilities of a manufacturer plant. The degree of sophistication of these technologies heavily influences the functionality and design of our products that, in turn, influence the evolution of our technologies. I mean precise machining and multilayered printed circuit boards (PCB), including flexible/rigid PCBs, in the first place. The establishment of the airborne computer assembly shop at the plant proved to be a considerable progress in pursuing this line of work.

The workshop is fitted with automatic surface-mounting assembly lines with soldering quality optical and X-ray control units, a laser installation to make metal patterns for solder paste application, and module moisture-protection polymer

coating equipment. To adjust, check and test computer modules and units, the workshop is furnished with dedicated automated workplaces and equipment to conduct environmental and mechanical tests.

In addition, the advantage offered by the plant’s airborne digital computer development is also the development running in parallel with the productionising efforts.

This enables us to slash the productionising and manufacturing costs radically.

Is there a chance for SOLO airborne digital computers to be used in spheres other than aviation?

Certainly. They have already been used in other branches. We have developed the BMS-M baseline mobile station for the Army automated control system’s command echelon. It is a sort of special-purpose PC. We are developing five types of computers to fit ground radars. Their constructs are different from those of airborne digital computers, but share the concept and architecture. In addition, these days, we have more orders for development of various digital computers for the Air Force and other services. Such a prospect and demand for our products let us face the future with confidence. www.take-off.ru

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cosmonautics | project

AIR LAUNCH: Indonesian prospects of Russian space programme Dmitry VORONTSOV, Igor AFANASYEV During the Russian president’s official visit to Indonesia in September 2007, about a dozen memoranda and agreements were signed, of which the principal one was the agreement on a $1 billion loan to Indonesia for acquisition of Russian armament and associated equipment. During their official meeting with the media, the two presidents confirmed their interest in stepping up bilateral high-technology cooperation, including joint space programme. This means, among other things, that they gave the green light to the well-known Air Launch programme that became an international endeavour. The programme provides for orbiting small spacecraft by launch vehicles (LV) blasting off not from the ground as usual, rather from an altitude of 10 km after air-dropping from an An-124-100VS Ruslan carrier aircraft. The first air launch has been slated for 2010.

In the beginning, there was…

The project of the Air Launch airborne space-rocket system dates as far back as 1997. Two years later, in 1999, the Polyot airline, space rocket developer Energiya Corp. and Chemical Automatics Design

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Bureau (KBKhA) set up the Air Launch corporation to pursue the programme, with TsSKB-Progress and several other companies signing up as subcontractors. Energiya became prime contractor for the carrier rocket dubbed Polyot (Russian for ‘flight’) At first, the air launch vehicle was to burn a lox/LNG mixture, but a decision was taken in 2000 for it to use a more customary lox/kerosene fuel. The then prime minister ordered four An-124 military airlifters in the disposal of the corporation in support of the Air Launch programme. Two aircraft were overhauled and upgraded to An-124-100 standard and then entered service with the Polyot air carrier to earn money to pay for the programme.

After Energiya Corp. pulled out of the programme, the Makeyev design bureau succeeded it as prime contractor for the rocket segment of the system. The Air Launch programme has passed all stages of scrutiny by relevant commissions and been included into the Russian Federal Space Programme for the Period of 2006 through 2015. The companies running the programme were to pay for it out of pocket and have the system enter operation in 2010.

Features of the concept The Air Launch system features the launching in midair following the rocket airdropped by a carrier aircraft. Compared with the traditional ground-launched LVs, the Air Launch system offers such advantages as the rocket’s high specific-weight characteristics in terms of payload with rather low development and operating costs: there is no need of building expensive ground launch facilities, selection of a launch corridor is more flexible and launch vehicle afterbody drop areas are smaller and may be well outside populated or industrial areas, e.g. in the ocean or in deserts. To cap it all, the use of a carrier plane for launch improves the energy performance of the system owing to blastoff at a non-zero speed and a considerable reduction in lift-to-drag losses and off-nominal rocket engine operation losses.

The initial design of the Air Launch space rocket system has been virtually completed.

The final version of the LV has a common diameter of 2.66 m. The first stage includes the NK-43M liquid-propellant engine designed by the Kuznetsov design bureau (it was developed in the ‘70s to power the second stage of the N-1 super-heavy LV for lunar www.take-off.ru

cosmonautics | project missions). The second stage includes the RD-0124 engine from KBKhA. The most technically difficult tests are believed to be those of air-dropping a launch vehicle weighing at least 100 t by means of the steam generator (the so-called mortar-type launch) and turning on the powerful first-stage lox/kerosene engine in midair.

Nonetheless, Air Launch designers maintain the technical problems have got solutions to be proven through several drop tests of a mass-size evaluation model of the rocket.

One of drop tests is slated for trying the start of the NK-43M engine. Designers are certain that they will meet the deadline – 2010.

Mention should be made that in addition to general advantages of air-launched space rockets, the Polyot LV features a number of its own strengths, firstly, reliance on the existing components – the NK-43M and RD-0124 engines ground-tested thoroughly (the RD-0124 has been tried in flight on new Russian launch vehicle Soyuz-2.1b, to boot), the control system borrowed from the Soyuz-2 after relevant adaptation, the nosecone from the Molniya LV, etc. Virtually the only new element of the rocket is the first-stage propellant module. The upper stage needed for geostationary orbit insertions embodies proven solutions too, particularly, the RD-0158 engine derived by KBKhA from the RD-0124’s chamber. These measures are to result in rocket development costs of only $120–130 million.

Together with Indonesia Owing to its rather high power and economic efficiency, the Air Launch programme turned a few heads in the developing countries of Southeast Asia, Indonesia in the first place.

Indonesia is a state situated on thousands of islands of the Malay Archipelago and the western part of the island of New Guinea. Its population exceeds 242 million people. The country is vitally interested in developing telecommunication technologies and a monitoring system to keep an eye on its territory. Satellites are the best thing ever built for these purposes. Malaysia, too, has displayed interest in the programme, as did several developing nations in Africa. In principle, the rather inexpensive and effective Air Launch is designed specifically for such customers.

At present, the most feasible Air Launch system operation option looks to be operations from the airfield on the Biak Island in Indonesia. A relevant preliminary Russian-Indonesian agreement was achieved as far back as late 2005. The agreement between the Government of the Russian Federation and the Government of the Republic of Indonesia on Cooperation www.take-off.ru

in the field of exploration and the use of outer space for peaceful means was signed during Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono’s visit to Russia in late November and early December 2006. Late in March last year, Jakarta hosted a working meeting between Air Launch Corp. President Anatoly Karpov and Indonesian National Institute of Aeronautics and Space (LAPAN) Chairman Adi Sadewo Salatun. The efforts made by the parties resulted in the signing of an agreement on establishing an international company to implement the Air Launch programme. The agreement was signed at the international fair in Hannover on 6 April 2007.

Thus, governmental support of the interesting endeavour has been provided, enabling Anatoly Karpov to speak with confidence about the programme entering its final stage. On 28 September 2007, Karpov said, “The principal problems have been resolved, investment agreements have been signed, a space operations licence has been obtained and the Federal Space Agency has approved the specification – we are in the stretch”. The Air Launch Corp. president noted that everything what depends on the Federal Space Agency “is done quickly enough”.

Construction of infrastructure for Ruslan airlifter basing and payload handling has been under way on the Biak Island. On the island, there is an excellent Class 1 airfield used by Boeing 747s for stopovers on services from Asian countries to the United States.

24 hectares of real estate have been provided as well. The Indonesian expenditure will total about $25 million. The Russian contribution will be made up of the intellectual property, aircraft conversion, expenditure on the launch vehicle and control system, and fitting the airfield with ground launch preparation equipment.

In October 2006, a 50:50 joint venture was set up to manage the programme, with risks, costs and income to be shared on a parity basis.

As far as carrier aircraft preparations are concerned, the routine operation of the Air Launch system implies completing the overhaul of the two remaining Ruslans and their handover to the prime contractor, the Makeyev design bureau, for subsequent conversion to air-launch platforms. According to Anatoly Karpov, one of the operational Ruslans will have to be “pulled out of cargo operations” after aircraft conversion work has kicked off in 2009. Possibly, the plane will be turned into a convertible. “When there are no launches scheduled, it may be used for hauling cargo, with some of the air launch gear remaining aboard… However, it weights little and will pose no significant problem to take-off november 2008

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cosmonautics | project cargo services”, believes the president and Director General of the Polyot air carrier. He assumes that satellite insertions “will earn far more income” than cargo carriage will, and it may turn out to be more reasonable to use a plane or two solely in support of Air Launch missions.

Polyot

Realities and prospects The kickoff of the Air Launch space rocket system’s flight tests and the first space launch are slated for 2010. A contract for orbiting six small communication satellites is said to have been signed for customers from Southeast Asia and South Africa. A tender for satellite production has been issued, with Russian manufacturers and German corporation EADS participating. Contractual and other details, however, have not been disclosed yet.

Blasting off from Indonesian island Biak sitting mere 70 km away from the Equator, Polyot launch vehicles will be able to insert satellites weighing up to 4 t in low earth orbit (LEO) and those weighing up to 800 kg in geostationary orbit or departure trajectories towards other planets of the solar system.

Insertions in sun-synchronous orbit with both ‘northern’ and ‘southern’ launch azimuths are feasible too, since launch corridors run mostly over sea.

Current estimates promise the requirement for inserting about 600 small satellites in the coming 10 years. Firstly, they include low-orbit telecom satellite constellations, such as the Globalstar.

Secondly, advances in microelectronics allow development of low-weight satellites as capable as large satellites developed in the 1990s. In particular, there have been developed remote sensing satellites with the resolution of 1 m and a weight of only several hundred kilograms, which have been gaining popularity with the users. In addition, several space companies have

been mulling over developing geostationary platforms sized as mini- and even microsatellites. Certainly, demand for such satellites is rather limited, but it does exist.

Mind you that many developing countries willing to enjoy space technologies just have no money enough to buy ‘full-size’ satellites while having the craving (and in Indonesia’s case an urgent need) for such satellites. Operating small satellites orbited by light LVs is a good way out for such countries. Thus, the odds are good that the Air Launch system will gain a foothold on the new emerging market, if it succeeds.

Igor Afanasyev

Air Launch main performance Missile length, m 36 2.66 1st and 2nd stages diameter, m Nosecone diameter, m 2.7 Air-droppable weight, t 103 Launch weight, t 102.3 Payload weight, kg: - polar base line orbit, H=200 km 3,000 - geo-transfer orbit 1,600 - geostationary orbit 800 Geostationary orbit insertion time, hr 7 Powerplant: - 1st stage NK-43M - 2nd stage RD-0124 - upper stage RD-0158 (RD-0161)

Air Launch system blastoff diagram

1. Ejection of the rocket from the An-124 aircraft by means of the steam generator 2. Start-up of the solid-propellant rocket motor 3. Separation of the units of the first and second fixing-driving bands and obturator band 4. Powerplant ignition. Solid-propellant engine cut-off 5. Rocket’s verticalisation 6. Separation of the support of the third fixing-driving band with the solid-propellant rocket motor. Beginning of the programmed trajectory

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take-off november 2008

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