To my understanding WS-10 turned out fine eventually, why wouldn't India do the same?
Indian Military News, Reports, Data, etc.
- Thread starter bd popeye
- Start date
Sure all that but J-20 and F-22 are not being exported and likely will never be. That's 2 out of 4 currently in service 5th gen fighters that aren't for export.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
AMCA's challenge won't be securing a supplier for engines. That'll be done one way or another. It's too small a hurdle to really threaten this project. The real challenge will be developing domestic avionics and sensors that are befitting and modern enough for the 2030-2050 landscape (whenever it actually gets to service). They can also purchase these things from various places and force it all together with much effort and time a la MKI/ Taiwanese La Fayette. Another challenge will be manufacturing an aircraft to 5th gen standards, the metamaterials, flight control for stealthy geometry, and how to built it with internal bays with a structure that can pull sustained 9G and do all that many, many, many times without degrading the skin, the frame, the bay mechanisms etc. All of this are smaller engineering challenges but they add up to monumental difficulties. This isn't manufacturing a bike or a bus or a diesel engine.
The Koreans abandoned internal bays early on because their highly capable engineers and strong manufacturing industries and talent already determined the cost and time to develop these things thoroughly and properly is simply not worth it. That's how hard it is. Don't give me BS about how it'll be implemented sometime in later upgrades. These things are clean sheet designs and cannot be upgraded into an existing design and production line without overhauls so extreme it's better off going from scratch.
J-20? F-22? F-35C?
It's "based on", not a copy.
Given the scale of necessary R&D to produce it, you may as well consider it an independent product.
It may sound bold, but designing modern jet engine(envisaging) ain't that difficult. Making it real, on a real plane, and for some reasonable time - is one hell of a rocket science, though.
Structure, materials & FCS are not that big a deal.
Internal bays are structurally much like Central pylon here except there are covers.
RAM-coating withering away is an issue. But that's a cost & maintenance problem. Cheaper the better.
There is quite a lot of trick in making them working on fighter, though.
Reliable supersonic ejection/payload ejection under various G conditions require extensive flight testing and proofing.
Yes, agreed. But only for CCMs.
But in this case they are taking it step by step.
Internal bays of AMCA Mark1 to carry only BVRs & bombs. Not to be launched in high-G. It's for BVR sniping & stealthy strike missions. Closest A2A engagement would be Astra-IR launched from many km away.
The team is planning to introduce CCM sidebays in AMCA Mark2 probably.
Materials are a big deal. Metamaterials feature extensively on the skin of J-20 and F-35 as disclosed at least for the J-20. The hint is that VLO and the use of metamaterials go hand in hand but how is rather confidential. So far we've not seen any other nation outside of China that has publicly talked about this particular sort of stealth "coating" metamaterials for unknown electromagnetic properties. There are many solutions and methods of course but dismissing things as not that big a deal when the planning phase has barely even started... sorry but AMCA prototypes is so far away I doubt many on these military forums will still be alive to see it in IAF service if it ever gets to IAF service. Many members of these military forums are rather young too. I will happily put a bet that AMCA prototype as a genuinely domestic design i.e. not a rebranded F-35 or Su-57 like FGFA, will not fly until well after 2030 with service into IAF well after 2040, if the program delivers.
Fanboys talking about 2025 prototype flight are being mislead by the authorities.
Internal bays are nothing structurally like central pylons. You have totally ignored the doors, their mechanisms, the rather dynamic ejection parameters. It absolutely is not like covering a fuselage tunnel because the engine covers and inlet designs need to be completely redesigned.
If it was as simple as you stated, then it should be easy to modify a design like a Flanker or Fulcrum with a cover and door where the current fuselage tunnels are. Those fighters will only have internal bays with at best two missiles worth of volume. The 5th gens have at least 4 large MRAAMs worth of carriage if not quite a lot more. That's even ignoring the mechanisms for the doors and these doors themselves need a lot of reinforcing to pull those turns.
Stealth technology will probably change quite a lot in the coming decades as better sensors become available and revolutionary technology begin to defeat the current state of stealth technologies. I would be surprised if Indian efforts will still be using RAM coatings then.
I'm sure many on this forum look forward to seeing AMCA materialise in a working prototype - flyable. Less as a matter of anticipation/excitement and more in terms of curiosity. AMCA has been a VERY loudly talked about fighter project for half a decade now and drawings/models are all they have produced. The Jai Hind fanboys insist and hold tightly the belief there is much more than vaporware here and of course there certainly is since this project has plenty of backing and serious commitment if the noise is anything to go by. The saner Indians talk about potential suppliers and smaller details like going with DSI or not etc but the fanboys were only a few years ago claiming that Uttam radar was not only going to be ready in months (years ago) but also more capable than second and third generation Chinese fighter AESA radars. Okay.
My personal (and worthless) prediction on this AMCA project is that it gets talked about with MUCH fanfare and fanboy hype/fake news for years and years until government and military updates hint at issues, delays, production woes, financing obstacles and so on. Then these fanboys will blame anyone that they can (mostly foreigners and DRDO and whatnot) and attribute any small to large failure of the delivery as a failure of systems combined with sinister interference, foreign bribery, corruption etc etc but they will never think perhaps it is India's industry. India's human talent. Maybe how these organisations are structured and you know... organised and run. Of course they don't have the benefit of F-35 factory USB sticks that Chinese engineers magically gotten millions of gigabytes worth of data throughout the years. So that's another reason for their failures.
Watch this space. AMCA at best will be a F414 powered semi stealthy 2020s level 5th gen fighter with small internal bays, if that is even achieved delivered sometime in the 2040s if it ever gets to service. It'll be a LCA project of the 5th generation.
India can choose to leapfrog or catch up at a faster rate, or it will be stuck in the LCA cycle. Except the rate of catch up is actually negative when it comes to military aviation. People and fanboys can choose to believe whatever delusion they like. Narratives are played all around us and thought manipulation dominate this sphere but reality and truth is there back in the depths behind every refusal to recognise it.
My personal (and worthless) prediction on this AMCA project is that it gets talked about with MUCH fanfare and fanboy hype/fake news for years and years until government and military updates hint at issues, delays, production woes, financing obstacles and so on. Then these fanboys will blame anyone that they can (mostly foreigners and DRDO and whatnot) and attribute any small to large failure of the delivery as a failure of systems combined with sinister interference, foreign bribery, corruption etc etc but they will never think perhaps it is India's industry. India's human talent. Maybe how these organisations are structured and you know... organised and run. Of course they don't have the benefit of F-35 factory USB sticks that Chinese engineers magically gotten millions of gigabytes worth of data throughout the years. So that's another reason for their failures.
Watch this space. AMCA at best will be a F414 powered semi stealthy 2020s level 5th gen fighter with small internal bays, if that is even achieved delivered sometime in the 2040s if it ever gets to service. It'll be a LCA project of the 5th generation.
India can choose to leapfrog or catch up at a faster rate, or it will be stuck in the LCA cycle. Except the rate of catch up is actually negative when it comes to military aviation. People and fanboys can choose to believe whatever delusion they like. Narratives are played all around us and thought manipulation dominate this sphere but reality and truth is there back in the depths behind every refusal to recognise it.
And AMCA Radome with serrated Joint. Second set of serrated joint may be side looking radar or DAS.
