MiG-29/ΜiG-35 Fulcrum: News #2

First of all, MiG-35 is not a light fighter. In the class of light fighters you have JF-17, Tejas, FA-50 and Gripen. Fighters as F-16 and J-10 are now more medium class, while MiG-35 and F/A-18E are heavier medium class. MiG-35 will not be much cheaper than Su-35 and its operational costs will not be that cheaper as well. Su-35 have new fifth generation AL-41F1S engines, while MiG-35 still have fourth generation RD-33MK engines, which are generation of AL-31 engines.

RuAF logicaly decide for Flankers instead of Fulcrums, because they are bigger with longer range and larger armament. USSR have thousands of short range point defense fighters to protect its large air space. RuAF have only few hundred fighters to portect its large air space, so the short range Fulcrums were not the best choise. Even today, large space over Arctic, Siberia and Far East will be protected with heavy long range fighters as Su-30, Su-35, Su-57 and MiG-31. MiG-35 will be usefull in european part of Russia, where distances are shorter.

MiG-35 is quite big jet, but still have short range. 2400 km with internal fuel and 3100 km with 3 external fuel tanks. Central external fuel tank have capacty of 2000 l of fuel, but only fule tank could be placed between engines and no instalations for weapons there. Underwing external fuel tanks have 1150 l of fuel or 860 kg, what mean hard point could carry 900 kg of armament, what means Kh-59M missile is a little to heavy and could not be used by MiG-29/35.

Up until 2008 they weren't multi role... the only multirole Flankers were exports... Russia AF Flankers for the most part have been single role and even the ones that got upgrades... they didn't start buying air to ground munitions till well after about 2012... only Su-24 and 34 units got guided air to ground weapons.

Basic Su-27 is fighter only, but upgraded Su-27SM is fully multirole fighter jet, which could use whole arsenal of bombs and missiles, including guided ones in RuAF. But they were stationed in Far East, where they do air defense job. This is why they never use air to ground and air to surface armament.

GarryB wrote:Prevents long range detection for aircraft carried radars, but ground based ones will detect and direct aircraft towards you anyway... and even long range missiles don't start looking for you till they are 20km or so away so planes like Rafales and Typhoons really wont be any safer than Flankers or Fulcrums.

The reduced radar return makes ECM more effective. And as you are saying, stealth or not, at least in the current technology, means little for OTH and VHF ground based radars. So even a very expensive VLO design is not a definitive solution. But not all confrontations are against top rivals so I see reduced RCS as a virtue.

Radar and IIR is developing all the time.... improvements in processing power and the use of much wider bands of frequencies combined together to fill gaps that stealth creates...

Yes, this is a reason why I say RCS reduction measures are here to saty. Radars get better and better, digital processing (by all accounts S-400 prowess relies in algorithms rather than anything else), interferometry and multiband techniques all make radar much more difficult to defeat, so reducing the radar return is one of many ways of keeping up with those advances. You will see no modern fighter that simply ignores RCS issues.

There is a video on this forum of an F-15 intercepting a plane and an Su-27 shooting it away... as they both recede into the distance the F-15 remains easily visible in its dark gray camo, while the Flanker rapidly disappears even at the same distance as the still clearly visible American plane... physical size is not the only factor they should be thinking about...

Yeah I remind it, very cool. Proves Russians were not just fooling around with their otherwise striking colour combinations...

This is true, but when in any time in history has any major air force only had one fighter type in service where that fighter type was the best they could produce?

I agree. What we need to consider is the increasing complexity of platforms, their variety is being substantially reduced for a number of reasons.

And when the Russian Air Force representative says they will have 16 delivered before the end of the year...

Let us wait for them to close state tests in 2021 as planed and get the plane deployed beyond the swifts... I am as eager as anyone to see MiG leave 90's and their consequences behind.

Because by then they were waiting for the Indians to pick the MiG-35 and pay for most of its development... and after a decade of pissing around they picked the Rafale instead.

That does not really sound as VKS having a strong need of the plane. As said, there can be many reasons for this, some sources say budget cuts affected planed MiG buys.

But in this case with the Su-30s with Su-35 level radar and avionics and comms these lighter fighters wont be filling less demanding roles.

Paradoxically that can have something to do with the apparent lack of interest of the VKS on the MiGs, this is what myself and many other guys here are saying. They already have tried and tested Sukhois they like a lot, and as you say they are not running out of fuel anytime soon. So the appeal of the MiG is not specially strong.

You get better coverage of your airspace by having more smaller shorter ranged aircraft... and that is a fact.

I perfectly agree on that. They don't need to put 5t fuel on a Flanker and spend operational life of a high value airframe to identify some NATO retards playing their absurd games. MiG-21 would be quite ok for that...

Strategically you will get less of a reaction when you station MiG-35s near a border than you would if stationing Su-35s or Su-57s.

Now you are making the case of a lesser plane being a good idea, and I agree, I just say this plane can be smaller than the MiG or a single engined one.

Egypts purchase of MiG-29M2s didn't make many headlines, but word they were also getting Su-35s led to talk of US sanctions...

Israeli are no idiots and they can make their numbers. A Su-35 is a major rival for any other fighter, any. It has very high TWR, very long legs and that means a lot of time on afterburner, many stations for many missiles guided by a very powerful radar, ECM which is challenging to defeat etc. They have theater range in the ME and are simply dangerous for Israel, more than MiGs.

We need to see how effective and indeed independent the AI can be... we don't want computers making decisions that start wars... do these AIs know the difference between real war and peace time and exercises?

Tell the gringos, they are going mad with AI and each time more autonomous platforms. If we think they are going to restrain themselves for some abstract moral reason we are screwed. I have it for a fact that Russian military makes no mistake about this. And as said, during the time that maturing these systems is going to take (a human intelligence takes 20-30 years in being formed and matured) the human oversight is obviously necessary.

During the cold war a US ship in the Black Sea decided it was going to test the rules of navigation where you can sail through another countries territorial waters (ie their 12 mile waters, not their EEZ), and a nearby much smaller Soviet ship was there to enforce the Soviet right to defend their territorial waters and basically sailed into the US ship. If it was put in that sort of situation would an AI logically open fire... These things need to be tested... until then human crew who are not busy flying the plane can make decisions using information available to them from their aircrafts sensors and also the sensors of the aircraft they are flying with and of course ground based assets and space based assets too.

Now you say it, it makes for a good excuse to take out some rival... it was the AI, not us   I am inclined to think US will use this excuse maybe not so far from now...

Without it an Su-33 could not realistically attack ground targets with bombs or rockets without serious risk of being shot down. With the system they can operate above trash fire and MANPADS and perform missions attacking point targets with reasonable chances of success... I would say money well spent.

It is indeed money well spent, but if you are never going to use the plane as a strike asset it would make no sense.

If they seriously wanted strike platforms...

Give them time to get their act together, VMF is still very far from where they need to be and last years they didn't even manage to spend their budget due to the naval industry being in shambles... the -33 has been neglected for 30 years, it is slowly getting modernized. The 29K is completely multirole from the start. They do need strike planes, I know you defend missiles taking care of that role but the flexibility of air power is something else, at least by now.

Su-30SM is pretty ordinary. Perhaps if they were talking about Su-35 level...

Oh c'mon!

As you say of MiG advertising... talk is cheap.

Sure, we will see. In any case what they say just making the case for placing Su-35's engines and radar on the -33. Until major expenses for its modernization are authorized I think the following needs to happen:

- TTZ for the carrier
- Decision about the future naval fighter

Only then they can know what they want, what they can do (and when) and how much do they want to invest in a temporary solution like the -33.

The Kuznetsov can't carry enough fighter planes to justify a fighter and a strike plane so they want a multirole fighter... big deal.

It is good that we can establish facts and that they show a solid underlying logic in the military planing isn't it?

Look back through my posts I have been suggesting the best choice is the Su-57.... but I rather doubt it will be used in the strike role very much at all.

Sure, the Su-57K would make USN scramble like never before. It has been already said many times that the Su-57 is a multirole plane, it has big bays, getting modern A2G weapons and will receive hypersonic strike ones too. If it is fearsome enough to deter conflicts then it will not be used in strike role at all...

If that were true then why does the MiG-35 exist? There would be no value at all in lighter planes, they should just buy all heavy planes if that were the case.... yet they don't.

How could the Su-35 be cheaper than a smaller lighter aircraft... unless they are fucking up the numbers by referring to Cold War Era MIG-29s and not the upgraded MiG-29SMT or MiG-29M2 which are 40% cheaper to operate and maintain than the older models...

I am seeing now that I did not make clear the cost reduction I mentioned referred to cost of flight hour. So the MiG is expected to be cheaper, only not way cheaper.

Where do you take this 40% cheaper value from? They said MiG-35 is 2.5 times cheaper to maintain, as already said this makes sense if you take the operational life of the engines, which was 1600 h and is now 4000, exactly 2.5 times more. That 40% cheaper figure is the first time I see it.

So the rules don't apply to the Russians and they can just have all Su-57s and not worry about cheaper lighter alternatives?

I would swear I have said this 200 times, VKS sees the advantage of a hi-lo mix as much as anyone else. My answer came to your statement that the MiG was working as lighter than the F-16, because it is cheaper to operate... I said there is no way to compare CPFH in USAF and VKS, since price levels on both countries and services are simply worlds apart. And besides, we have not even a remotely reliable figure for the CPFH of the MiGs in the VKS.

Which would count against them using old model MiG-29s, but actually count in favour of producing a lot of brand new MiG-35s...

I don't have data to determine that, not even remotely.

Fuel fraction is a design choice, and has nothing to do with how many engines an aircraft has.

Ok that is already some advance, originally the argument was that single engine have less fuel fraction.

The design choice argument is clear, what is not so clear is what the price of that choice is. When you see a number of existing designs you get a clearer picture of what sort of compromises are considered reasonable and which are not. Existing medium fighters have a very similar fuel fraction if you check the numbers.

But I would ask you why bother making the smallest lightest most enemic fighter you can make... it means limited payload and fuel capacity which reduces range and performance to a minimum.

> 10 tons is not small at all. In classical terms it would be a medium fighter. I consider it light only compared to heavy ones in the context of 5G standards, which are close to 20 t. A F-15C was little more than 12 t, now a F-35A (the lightest) is already way heavier. MiG-35 is probably heavier too, granted we don't have final data, but I doubt it is lighter for the reasons I exposed before.
> As you say yourself, the role of the smaller plane is not having a huge payload or range. But what great difference would you expect from the MiG compared to a plane that has the empty weight of a Rafale? Both my layout and Saab's study have more internal fuel than the MiG.
> The reason for making the plane as small as possible and single engined is economy, but obviously you need to balance that with the capacity you get. As said a plane with half the size and half the engine number should be reasonably close to costing half the money to operate and hence help the 2:1 proportion we have already discussed and air forces consider optimum. Unsurprisingly the medium fighter with weight half way between them has costs also in that proportion.

Before you say I am proposing a plane in the same size of the already existing MiG, please consider I am talking about a new 5G plane with corresponding requirements.

To get big plane performance from a little plane you need an extra expensive engine and an extra expensive radar and extra expensive electronics to pack in a much smaller space.

It is not intended to get big plane performance from a smaller plane.

Except the difference is that SAAB is not suggesting a mixed purchase of Gripens and Rafales or Typhoons.... in comparison the MiG-35 wont be on its own in a vaccuum... it will be operating with Su-30s and Su-35s and Su-57s and even MiG-31s... but you are having too much fun comparing the MiG-35 with Rafales.

If MiG participates in a competition they will not say "buy also the Sukhois or we will not sell you our planes"... I mean, Saab tries to sell as much as they can as anyone does... it is hardly their problem if the buying air force does not know what they need.

And in this example is the robinson helicopter played by the F-35... way too expensive, and probably wont work even if you could afford it.

The engine in the F-35 is more powerful than the engine in the F-22 so it is half of a plane bigger than an F-22... by your definition that makes it a light doesn't it?

Do you want me to admit I am a retard or something? F-35C is heavier than a Strike Eagle, it is a huge lumbering mega-turkey nobody in its right mind would call "light" in strict sense.

For launching BVR missile attacks acceleration and climb are more important but agility could easily exceed anything a human body could stand.... 20g or more...how would a human pilot deal with that?

Well, the fact is I have still not seen a fighter UCAV... I know they can fly circles around a manned plane, but they are still not being shown, maybe I missed some Chinese development

Ordering 126 aircraft would normally get at least a small discount in individual aircraft price surely...

In this case ordering only 36 brought the final price above the initial budget planed for the 126 units

When making a plane as small and light as possible then structurally it becomes tempting to reduce structure strength to a minimum which can effect fatigue performance and airframe life as well as the capacity to take more weight over time like conformal fuel tanks etc etc.

Weight reduction is a necessity all the time with all types of planes, because it is a +++ critical parameter of anything that flies, much more if it needs to be fast and agile as a fighter is. In fact a heavier plane will be more affected by the weight increase than a smaller one, because the already explained cubic progression of weight with linear dimensions and that adversely affects wing load due to the quadratic increase of the wing surface. You can ask yourself how the McDonnell Douglas guys managed the F-15 with such incredibly light weight and still good overload, operational life and payload, or why the Rafale carries 9 t payload with less than 10 t empty weight... I cannot answer that, I just guess they did a very good job, though maybe there is some constraint related to tolerable operational conditions  

AFAIK they already supercruise and even just with an engine more powerful than the Su-35 the smaller lighter Su-57 with lower drag of no external weapons or equipment would probably perform better than the Su-35 does currently... which is probably already enough to make it the most capable dog fighter.

Supercruise is a wrongly used term IMHO, it means in strict sense > 1.5 M, otherwise there are and have been a lot of supercruisers. If used in the original sense of the term, the only one is the F-22, though the Eurofighter with 1.4 M comes close. Su-57 with current engines (which are relatively high bypass as a derivative of the AL-31F) cannot match that, there is huge thrust gap. Interpreting words of Marchukov leads me to think about an increase of maybe 1/3 in mil thrust, which goes well beyond some technological upgrade and demands deep layout / technological changes.

Fitting more powerful and lighter engines was always supposed to be a mid life upgrade to compensate for the inevitable weight increases... the so called delays and issues with getting it ready for the first production batch to use is bullshit... they never intended the first planes to use it... it was always a mid life upgrade so of course there will be delays in getting it into production and use because they are trying to get it into service early by several years.

Actually the more I read about the program, the more clear is that they went ahead with it simply because they had no other chance in order to save the industry. It gained shape and content as they were developing it. So at a certain moment they decided they wanted and actually were able to refine the plane further, that resulted in some delays and also in the second stage program. If you consider the numbers released, by the time they have the update ready, only one sqd. would have just been formed, so it will be upgraded at a later date with minor impact in budgets or capacities. In the meantime the updated Flankers can take care, no hurries.

medo wrote:First of all, MiG-35 is not a light fighter. In the class of light fighters you have JF-17, Tejas, FA-50 and Gripen. Fighters as F-16 and J-10 are now more medium class, while MiG-35 and F/A-18E are heavier medium class.

You are basically right. I would only point out that "light" can be used in a relative sense, as in "lighter than". Also what light or heavy mean needs to be adjusted to the different generations. A F-15 was 12+ something t, a F-22 is almost 20 t.

Su-35 have new fifth generation AL-41F1S engines, while MiG-35 still have fourth generation RD-33MK engines, which are generation of AL-31 engines.

The RD-33MK is roughly as advanced as the AL-41F-1S, you can check the increase in its parameters compared to the original models and they are broadly similar.

MiG-35 is quite big jet, but still have short range. 2400 km with internal fuel and 3100 km with 3 external fuel tanks.

Official data is 2000 km on internal fuel.

LMFS wrote:The RD-33MK is roughly as advanced as the AL-41F-1S, you can check the increase in its parameters compared to the original models and they are broadly similar.

No, AL-41 engines were made from the beginning as fifth generation engines for fifth generation fighters (MiG 1-44). Su-35 and Su-57 got upgraded ones. It is Russian counterpart for Pratt & Whitney F119-PW-100 in F-22. RD-33MK is on the level of AL-31FM1, which is used in Su-34. They are both deeply upgraded fourth generation engines.

Supercruise is a wrongly used term IMHO, it means in strict sense > 1.5 M, otherwise there are and have been a lot of supercruisers. If used in the original sense of the term, the only one is the F-22, though the Eurofighter with 1.4 M comes close. Su-57 with current engines (which are relatively high bypass as a derivative of the AL-31F) cannot match that, there is huge thrust gap. Interpreting words of Marchukov leads me to think about an increase of maybe 1/3 in mil thrust, which goes well beyond some technological upgrade and demands deep layout / technological changes.

Su-35 already have supercruise capabilities. Su-57 with AL-41F1 engines is already on the level of F-22, as it is lighter than F-22 and could supercruise at Mach 1,6. New engines will give SU-57 additional power, that, as Sukhoi said, it will be better prepared for sixth generation fighters.

medo wrote:No, AL-41 engines were made from the beginning as fifth generation engines for fifth generation fighters (MiG 1-44). Su-35 and Su-57 got upgraded ones. It is Russian counterpart for Pratt & Whitney F119-PW-100 in F-22. RD-33MK is on the level of AL-31FM1, which is used in Su-34. They are both deeply upgraded fourth generation engines.

The AL-41F (izd. 20) originally developed for the MFI was a bigger engine, with variable bypass and broadly the equivalent of F119 (or better, of YF120) as you say. The AL-41F-1S (izd. 117S) is an improved AL-31F with modern materials and technologies. The true continuation of the izd. 20 should be the izd. 30 for the second stage Su-57, which is also an engine specifically designed for supercruise.

Su-35 already have supercruise capabilities. Su-57 with AL-41F1 engines is already on the level of F-22, as it is lighter than F-22 and could supercruise at Mach 1,6. New engines will give SU-57 additional power, that, as Sukhoi said, it will be better prepared for sixth generation fighters.

In the Su-35 it would be supercruise in broad sense (M > 1) from what I know. Maybe you can source the M 1.6 figure for the Su-57? I have never seen that before. The AL-41F1, from the references known, should have ca. 9 tf of military thrust in uninstalled conditions, while the F119 is a 26,000 lbf class engine, which is almost 11.8 tf or > 30% more, which is logical when comparing different bypass ratios and technological basis as revealed by stage count... it comes close to reheat thrust of an AL-31F, so it is no wonder that the F-22 can cruise at 1.8-1.9 M. Marchukov said the izd. 30 would be the engine with the highest specific thrust of any equivalent, given its size comparable to F119 that should mean 12 tf mil thrust are thinkable. I personally think it is a VCE (two streams) and that would come with a whole new set of characteristics like reduced subsonic cruise SFC and spillage losses, better cooling etc, other people think it is fixed bypass... we will see.

First of all, MiG-35 is not a light fighter.

In the F-35/F-22 team the F-35 is the light fighter.

In the class of light fighters you have JF-17, Tejas, FA-50 and Gripen. Fighters as F-16 and J-10 are now more medium class, while MiG-35 and F/A-18E are heavier medium class.

An actual light fighter doesn't make sense in Russia, but the MiG is the light with the Flanker and Su-57 as the medium and the MiG-31 as the heavy...

MiG-35 will not be much cheaper than Su-35 and its operational costs will not be that cheaper as well. Su-35 have new fifth generation AL-41F1S engines, while MiG-35 still have fourth generation RD-33MK engines, which are generation of AL-31 engines.

A smaller fighter will always be cheaper to operate, and they are developing new engines for the new 5th gen light fighter that will match the MiG-35 conceptually the way the Su-35 matches the Su-57. Why do you assume there is no difference?

RuAF logicaly decide for Flankers instead of Fulcrums, because they are bigger with longer range and larger armament. USSR have thousands of short range point defense fighters to protect its large air space. RuAF have only few hundred fighters to portect its large air space, so the short range Fulcrums were not the best choise.

The longer the range of the fighter the worse its coverage. A Flanker might have a flight radius of 2,000km easy compared with perhaps 1,000 with a MiG-35, but both move at similar speeds, and a circle 2,000km has three times the actual volume of airspace of a circle 1,000km across... it is a false economy... to give the same level of coverage you need more Flankers which cost more to run.

Even today, large space over Arctic, Siberia and Far East will be protected with heavy long range fighters as Su-30, Su-35, Su-57 and MiG-31. MiG-35 will be usefull in european part of Russia, where distances are shorter.

And when your Flanker is 2,000km away and you need help here... now...

Shorter range means you can't be that far away or a closer formation will have you covered.

Underwing external fuel tanks have 1150 l of fuel or 860 kg, what mean hard point could carry 900 kg of armament, what means Kh-59M missile is a little to heavy and could not be used by MiG-29/35.

You are making a lot of assumptions, and ignoring inflight refuelling too... with one inflight refuelling topup and three external tanks the range for the MiG-35 is give as 5,000km which sounds pretty damn fine to me.

The range of the F-15 is better than the F-16 too... why does anyone bother with F-16s.... they must be shit.

So what you are basically arguing is that instead of buying MiG-35s, they should be buying lots of MiG-29M2s because they are much cheaper... to buy and operate...

Underwing external fuel tanks have 1150 l of fuel or 860 kg, what mean hard point could carry 900 kg of armament, what means Kh-59M missile is a little to heavy and could not be used by MiG-29/35.

Most models of the Kh-59M missile require aircraft with two crew because of their guidance options... that missile was optimised for the Su-30 and Su-24/34 aircraft. The MiG can't carry Kh-555s either... it is not a big deal.

A Tu-22M3M could carry it much further and in greater numbers than any Flanker.

Basic Su-27 is fighter only, but upgraded Su-27SM is fully multirole fighter jet, which could use whole arsenal of bombs and missiles, including guided ones in RuAF. But they were stationed in Far East, where they do air defense job. This is why they never use air to ground and air to surface armament.

Which makes the upgrade totally worthless.

And also why they didn't bother upgrading the MiG-29 fleet to SMT level.

The reduced radar return makes ECM more effective.

The F-22 didn't have any ECM did it... because ECM signals coming from empty space is suspicious...

And as you are saying, stealth or not, at least in the current technology, means little for OTH and VHF ground based radars. So even a very expensive VLO design is not a definitive solution. But not all confrontations are against top rivals so I see reduced RCS as a virtue.

So what you are saying it is important against Libya and third world countries, so why is it important to Russia?

Radars get better and better, digital processing (by all accounts S-400 prowess relies in algorithms rather than anything else), interferometry and multiband techniques all make radar much more difficult to defeat, so reducing the radar return is one of many ways of keeping up with those advances. You will see no modern fighter that simply ignores RCS issues.

S-400 has three large radars in totally different frequency ranges... called NEBO... each frequency has advantages and disadvantages but together with computer processing it gives more information than any of the radars give individually... even if put side by side and used together.

No modern fighter will rely only on reduced RCS for its survival... it will have chaff and flares and the most expensive ESM and ECM suite and towed decoys and support drones and any other advantage it can use including special paint that makes it hard to see...

Yeah I remind it, very cool. Proves Russians were not just fooling around with their otherwise striking colour combinations...

Yet I have had lots of arguments with westerners over the years that the gray is better.... and the flanker does not make sense with light blue underneath and white and blue on top... shouldn't it be green and brown on top to camouflage against the ground and blue and white underneath to hide amongst the clouds...

I agree. What we need to consider is the increasing complexity of platforms, their variety is being substantially reduced for a number of reasons.

They are reducing in numbers of platforms in the west because they are so expensive no one can afford more than one type most of the time.

Russia is different but Russia is not paying 120 million per plane.

As said, there can be many reasons for this, some sources say budget cuts affected planed MiG buys.

Some sources think Russia is poor so every change of plans is because of budget cuts.... wouldn't pay much attention to those myself... if the plane wont be ready till 2021 then what difference does budget issues have?

Paradoxically that can have something to do with the apparent lack of interest of the VKS on the MiGs, this is what myself and many other guys here are saying. They already have tried and tested Sukhois they like a lot, and as you say they are not running out of fuel anytime soon. So the appeal of the MiG is not specially strong.

If they don't use them how will they even know.... ignorance is not a good state to be in.

I perfectly agree on that. They don't need to put 5t fuel on a Flanker and spend operational life of a high value airframe to identify some NATO retards playing their absurd games. MiG-21 would be quite ok for that...

More importantly an intercept mission to go and see an american MPA does not require four Flankers armed with 48 AAMs either.

Missiles generally have a fairly short life span when actually carried around all the time... which is why when you see Flankers flying around most of the time they either don't carry that many missiles or have dummy missiles to simulate the real thing.

Now you are making the case of a lesser plane being a good idea, and I agree, I just say this plane can be smaller than the MiG or a single engined one.

They don't have one and are even less interested in making one.... or MiG would be making a single engined new plane... it is a Russian AF contract... they could stipulate a single.... but I suspect they are planning this new twin jet might be carrier capable too so a single engine is not an option...

They have theater range in the ME and are simply dangerous for Israel, more than MiGs.

Which means Israeli attention and likely interference till the flankers are gone... great... money well spent...

They should have just bought Iskander instead...

Tell the gringos, they are going mad with AI and each time more autonomous platforms. If we think they are going to restrain themselves for some abstract moral reason we are screwed. I have it for a fact that Russian military makes no mistake about this. And as said, during the time that maturing these systems is going to take (a human intelligence takes 20-30 years in being formed and matured) the human oversight is obviously necessary.

You really expect the earth to last much longer... if it isn't the AI it will be biological... a new monkey virus that wipes us all out...

Now you say it, it makes for a good excuse to take out some rival... it was the AI, not us angel I am inclined to think US will use this excuse maybe not so far from now...

Get agents into US airports and during routine maintenance fit a few bits of hardware to a few Boeings and Airbuses... and trigger them off with a signal...

It is indeed money well spent, but if you are never going to use the plane as a strike asset it would make no sense.

If you were going to use it as a strike asset then you would integrate the ability to use laser guided and tv guided weapons and fit a targeting/navigation pod... like Lantirn III or something.

Or as I said previously... approved the Su-33KUB.

The 29K is completely multirole from the start.

So was the MiG-33 but they weren't interested...

They do need strike planes,

Want maybe.

Sure, we will see. In any case what they say just making the case for placing Su-35's engines and radar on the -33. Until major expenses for its modernization are authorized I think the following needs to happen:

Those new engines alone would make them cost rather more than the MiG-29KR they already operate.

Only then they can know what they want, what they can do (and when) and how much do they want to invest in a temporary solution like the -33.

The Su-33 is an old plane... it is a temporary solution.

It is good that we can establish facts and that they show a solid underlying logic in the military planing isn't it?

It was known in the early 1990s the Kuznetsov wasn't big enough... hence Ulyanovsk... and it was supposed to have cats for the Yak-44 they were developing.

Sure, the Su-57K would make USN scramble like never before. It has been already said many times that the Su-57 is a multirole plane, it has big bays, getting modern A2G weapons and will receive hypersonic strike ones too. If it is fearsome enough to deter conflicts then it will not be used in strike role at all...

When you have limited number of fighters then you want the best. Saving a few dollars makes no sense if if costs you some ships or subs.

Where do you take this 40% cheaper value from? They said MiG-35 is 2.5 times cheaper to maintain, as already said this makes sense if you take the operational life of the engines, which was 1600 h and is now 4000, exactly 2.5 times more. That 40% cheaper figure is the first time I see it.

It was used by MiG to describe the advantages of the different method of servicing the MiG-29... the original MiGs had fixed lives for parts that were replaced without inspection... it was expensive, but simpler because you didn't need to xray blades and parts for microcracks... for combat it was ideal because it minimised support hours and maximised time in the air. For peace time it was expensive because parts were perfectly good got thrown out and replaced without checking them. As technology and materials improved those parts got more expensive and it only got worse.

Diagnostic equipment and testing equipment for the SMT upgrade meant more time servicing but you only replaced parts that needed replacing... leading to a large saving in money on parts.

I would swear I have said this 200 times, VKS sees the advantage of a hi-lo mix as much as anyone else. My answer came to your statement that the MiG was working as lighter than the F-16, because it is cheaper to operate... I said there is no way to compare CPFH in USAF and VKS, since price levels on both countries and services are simply worlds apart. And besides, we have not even a remotely reliable figure for the CPFH of the MiGs in the VKS.

The Russian Air Force does not have the budget to fund two stealth fighter programmes and fly aircraft that cost anything like the cheap light American fighters.

Russia couldn't afford planes that cost as much as F-16s to buy or operate.

Its number of engines does not come in to it.

Ok that is already some advance, originally the argument was that single engine have less fuel fraction.

Smaller and lighter is the goal so lower fuel fraction is a design choice to achieve such a goal.

> As you say yourself, the role of the smaller plane is not having a huge payload or range. But what great difference would you expect from the MiG compared to a plane that has the empty weight of a Rafale? Both my layout and Saab's study have more internal fuel than the MiG.

Medo is complaining the MiG-35 can't carry super heavy weapons or fly half way across Russia without external tanks and you are bitching because it is too heavy and fat...

The MiG-35 isn't a Rafale because it does not need to be... I am not suggesting the MiG-35 replaces all Flankers...

> The reason for making the plane as small as possible and single engined is economy, but obviously you need to balance that with the capacity you get. As said a plane with half the size and half the engine number should be reasonably close to costing half the money to operate and hence help the 2:1 proportion we have already discussed and air forces consider optimum. Unsurprisingly the medium fighter with weight half way between them has costs also in that proportion.

But by making twice as many of them you are spending just as much anyway. Can't you see having a slightly bigger fighter that is not so useless so you don't need double to do the same job as the bigger fighter makes rather more sense?

It is like having a Rugby team... you think having 7 adults and 14 children will make your rugby team stronger... because you will have more hands to pass to... but those 14 kids will be crushed coming up against any of the opposing players so your 7 adults in your team will spend most of their time doing everything to protect those kids from being slaughtered... and those seven men are not going to last long doing that.

Unless those 14 kids run out and try to kick the opposition in the balls and incapacitate them for a few seconds while the seven adults run past and score... the problem is the next time you try to do it the other team will be ready and obliterate your kids and then it is 7 vs 15.

I agree that the player fees will be much cheaper with 14 kids though.

Before you say I am proposing a plane in the same size of the already existing MiG, please consider I am talking about a new 5G plane with corresponding requirements.

The Su-57 seems to be a rather smaller and lighter Su-35, so I don't see what is so far fetched about a new MiG being smaller and lighter than a MiG-35... but I really don't think they could have made the Su-57 smaller and lighter just by taking away one engine because that would require a complete redesign and been a total pain in the ass...

It is not intended to get big plane performance from a smaller plane.

Tell that to "can't fly half way round the world or carry two ton bombs Medo" then...

If MiG participates in a competition they will not say "buy also the Sukhois or we will not sell you our planes"... I mean, Saab tries to sell as much as they can as anyone does... it is hardly their problem if the buying air force does not know what they need.

What they need to do is do some studies and work out whether it would actually be cheaper for smaller countries to use a high low fighter mix... it is a shame someone didn't talk to India before the first MMRCA competition and pointed out that they can't afford 126 Rafales if they win, and if they are going to buy two types then the MiG-29M2 would make sense as it could replace the 60 MiG-29s they already use and is the same airframe as their navy is using on their carrier....

A force of 150 MiG-29M2s could probably be bought for way less than the 8 billion they spent on 36 Rafales...

But I am sure those 36 Rafales will be wonderful... and if they are not the Indians will surely let us know.

Do you want me to admit I am a retard or something? F-35C is heavier than a Strike Eagle, it is a huge lumbering mega-turkey nobody in its right mind would call "light" in strict sense.

But it is the light cheap single engine aircraft designed by the US to replace all others... it is the ultimate goal of your reasoning... why make a cheap simple light single engined plane when you can make a complex heavy single engined plane that even rich western countries can't afford...

In this case ordering only 36 brought the final price above the initial budget planed for the 126 units

The original budget was about 10.5 billion US dollars and the 36 they ended up buying was for 8 billion so they saved about 2.5 billion... they saved the price of the carrier the Russians built for them including the fighter aircraft and the helicopters....

Weight reduction is a necessity all the time with all types of planes, because it is a +++ critical parameter of anything that flies, much more if it needs to be fast and agile as a fighter is.

The fastest fighter is no fighter, and missiles make agility less critical...

In fact a heavier plane will be more affected by the weight increase than a smaller one, because the already explained cubic progression of weight with linear dimensions and that adversely affects wing load due to the quadratic increase of the wing surface. You can ask yourself how the McDonnell Douglas guys managed the F-15 with such incredibly light weight and still good overload, operational life and payload, or why the Rafale carries 9 t payload with less than 10 t empty weight... I cannot answer that, I just guess they did a very good job, though maybe there is some constraint related to tolerable operational conditions

Or a certain looseness with the truth...

Supercruise is a wrongly used term IMHO, it means in strict sense > 1.5 M, otherwise there are and have been a lot of supercruisers. If used in the original sense of the term, the only one is the F-22, though the Eurofighter with 1.4 M comes close.

The Tu-144 with the NK-32 engines could supercruise... so could the Concord.

I have watched a flight with a MiG-31 climbing and accelerating to high speed and the pilot temporarily engaged the AB to go supersonic but then went back to military thrust to accelerate and climb.

In the meantime the updated Flankers can take care, no hurries.

But as I point out the MiG-35 can do it cheaper.

Why are they developing it now that indians choosed the Rafale if they waited indians to pay for it and be the main buyer ?

The MiG-35 they are working on now is not the plane offered to the Indians.

Mig leaders are stupid dickheads. I woukdn't be surprised if Sukhoi develops a counterpart to mig-41 and sells it instead of Mig since there is a big chance that Mig proposes only a mig-31 updated with modern stuff.

The Su-57 is a stealthy Su-35... and an Su-35 is just a Su-27 updated and with modern stuff.

GarryB wrote:The F-22 didn't have any ECM did it... because ECM signals coming from empty space is suspicious...

One more proof of a flawed approach to stealth, assuming they can always remain passive and undetected taking enemy planes down at will...

So what you are saying it is important against Libya and third world countries, so why is it important to Russia?

8/8/2008

S-400 has three large radars in totally different frequency ranges... called NEBO... each frequency has advantages and disadvantages but together with computer processing it gives more information than any of the radars give individually... even if put side by side and used together.

Of course. Nevertheless S-400 and Nebo are two different systems, of course they work in the same IADS.

No modern fighter will rely only on reduced RCS for its survival... it will have chaff and flares and the most expensive ESM and ECM suite and towed decoys and support drones and any other advantage it can use including special paint that makes it hard to see...

Sure, all tactical resources must be used... and those resources include RCS reduction measures!

Yet I have had lots of arguments with westerners over the years that the gray is better.... and the flanker does not make sense with light blue underneath and white and blue on top... shouldn't it be green and brown on top to camouflage against the ground and blue and white underneath to hide amongst the clouds...

There is a thing called Rayleigh scattering and it causes any object seen from a certain distance within our atmosphere look blueish... Russians are perfectly right

They are reducing in numbers of platforms in the west because they are so expensive no one can afford more than one type most of the time.

Well I think it is a general trend, electronics make planes multirole on the one hand, on the other the increasing complexity increases the cost and time needed to create a platform. So they turn less, more flexible and longer lived than they were before.

if the plane wont be ready till 2021 then  what difference does budget issues have?

I hope they have moved the development goals a bit since then, if not they were just taking the whole world for idiots back in 2007. Dont ask me what has changed in the plane since then, I would not know what to answer  

You really expect the earth to last much longer... if it isn't the AI it will be biological... a new monkey virus that wipes us all out...

It is nice meeting someone who is even more pessimistic than myself  

Those new engines alone would make them cost rather more than the MiG-29KR they already operate.

If they didn't retire them when they got the MiGs and now they upgrade them is because they want to keep using them. Those airframes have relatively little use and will need re-engining, that is why the production line was restarted. If other Flankers are going to use the unified engines it means they are affordable, what do you mean the planes would cost more than the KRs because of being upgraded? The MiGs will not need change of engines after a while, as any other plane?

When you have limited number of fighters then you want the best. Saving a few dollars makes no sense if if costs you some ships or subs.

I agree that onboard a carrier the space is too expensive to waste it with lesser planes. There is one thing called exchange ratio, an eventual VMF CVN with three sqd 57K could arguably defend against 2 or eventually more CSGs with 4 sqd F-18/F-35 each. If you have way less planes and they are worse, well, you are screwed...

It was used by MiG to describe the advantages of the different method of servicing the MiG-29...

But do you have a link or at least some rough idea where did you read that?

Smaller and lighter is the goal so lower fuel fraction is a design choice to achieve such a goal.

Yes, as much as it is interesting for the service paying for it, that is like not saying anything.

Medo is complaining the MiG-35 can't carry super heavy weapons or fly half way across Russia without external tanks and you are bitching because it is too heavy and fat...

I understand medo perfectly, he says the difference in cost of the MiG does not truly compensate for its inferior characteristics vs. the Flanker... which is what basically everyone but you is saying here  

That is BTW perfectly compatible with my own position of it being in an awkward "nobody's land" in terms of cost or performance.

But by making twice as many of them you are spending just as much anyway.

Say budget is hundred, plane A is a heavy fighter that costs 2, B is a light plane that costs 1. You can compose the force:

1) 50 x A, high capability, low number of airframes, some of which end up doing NATO air policing missions, counterinsurgency and similar low demand missions at big cost
2) 100 x B, low cost of operation for mundane missions but too short of capability and worst even, deterring capability, for wartime.
3) 25 x A + 50 x B, with both capability for high-end fighting and numbers/economy.

You may spend the same, but get more in return.

Can't you see having a slightly bigger fighter that is not so useless so you don't need double to do the same job as the bigger fighter makes rather more sense?

No I don't agree there, I see more value in a reduced number of markedly different platforms than in a series of minimally different platforms. Logistics, development / sustainment effort and force organization are the reasons for this.

It is like having a Rugby team... you think having 7 adults and 14 children will make your rugby team stronger... because you will have more hands to pass to... but those 14 kids will be crushed coming up against any of the opposing players so your 7 adults in your team will spend most of their time doing everything to protect those kids from being slaughtered... and those seven men are not going to last long doing that.

Completely inapplicable, but hilarious nevertheless. Those "kids" you talk about in reality run like adults and have numbers to rip them apart... if you give a 1500 kg budget to a rugby team to spend on players, how do you think they will spend it: 6x 250 kg fullbacks and that's it, or rather leave something for more, lighter guys in other positions, that can actually run?

I agree that the player fees will be much cheaper with 14 kids though.

Yeah, some candy will do  

The Su-57 seems to be a rather smaller and lighter Su-35, so I don't see what is so far fetched about a new MiG being smaller and lighter than a MiG-35...

The Flanker was a huge plane and the systems advance have allowed Russians to make the Su-57 a bit smaller, while probably it is not lighter. That is a very special case and it is difficult to use it, because the cardinal parameters of the PAK-FA are still unknown, for instance something as crucial as fuel load. In general, there is a marked increase in internal volume and weight of the 5G planes, which is only logical if we consider that both EFTs and weapons are now carried internally. One very important reason that is not normally mentioned is the enormous weakening effect that weapon bays have in the plane's structure, creating holes that impede routing loads in a straight, optimized way and therefore increasing the overall weight.

but I really don't think they could have made the Su-57 smaller and lighter just by taking away one engine because that would require a complete redesign and been a total pain in the ass...

A 35 tf supercruising engine would be something to behold...

What they need to do is do some studies and work out whether it would actually be cheaper for smaller countries to use a high low fighter mix... it is a shame someone didn't talk to India before the first MMRCA competition and pointed out that they can't afford 126 Rafales if they win, and if they are going to buy two types then the MiG-29M2 would make sense as it could replace the 60 MiG-29s they already use and is the same airframe as their navy is using on their carrier....

India actually uses all possible categories of fighters, light, medium and heavy in different flavours and colours... I don't think any reasonable Indian questions their AF's planing is simply disastrous.

But it is the light cheap single engine aircraft designed by the US to replace all others... it is the ultimate goal of your reasoning... why make a cheap simple light single engined plane when you can make a complex heavy single engined plane that even rich western countries can't afford...

F-35 is the actual opposite of my reasoning. They conflated every possible requirement not even a heavy fighter could fulfil, mixed them together and then, when it was already a complete disaster, they managed to make it worse by adding STOVL requirements on top... I think we have already discussed this and agreed a LO F-16 would have been the right approach, that is broadly what I tried to analyse and propose.

The fastest fighter is no fighter, and missiles make agility less critical...

I was not expecting this from you  

The Su-57 is a stealthy Su-35...

In the documentary I linked at the Su-57 thread you can hear Strelets saying the opposite.[/quote]

Isos wrote:They offered nothing to indians but an idea of what they could offer.

That's correct. What was displayed by Rosoboronexport in the AeroIndia expos leading upto the MMRCA deal was a Mig 29 SMT. The Mig 35 was not even ready.

Isos wrote:The mig35 they are testing is just the plane they said they could make for the indians.

The Indian Navy's Mig 29K is basically a naval version of the Mig 35. Already it has run into a whole lot of technical problems and Russian MRO here in India is not great. That's why even the Indian Navy is looking for another carrier based aircraft. Now that Rafale has been purchased by the AF maybe the Navy will be interested in the Rafale- M though Boeing with the F 18 Super Hornet also fancy their chances.

The Indian Navy's Mig 29K is basically a naval version of the Mig 35. Already it has run into a whole lot of technical problems and Russian MRO here in India is not great. That's why even the Indian Navy is looking for another carrier based aircraft. Now that Rafale has been purchased by the AF maybe the Navy will be interested in the Rafale- M though Boeing with the F 18 Super Hornet also fancy their chances.

MiG-29 mess in India is mostly due to fact, that Klimov was konstruction biro, while main production facility was Motor Sich in Ukraine. Now, when Klimov become full producer and servicer of engines, MiG-29 will become normaly operational and regularly serviced jet.

Indian carriers Vikramaditya and Vikrant have ski jumps and no catapults. There is a good chance, that Indian NAVY will have the same problem with Rafale-M or Super Hornet as RuNAVY, when they want to use Su-33 as bomb truck from carrier. More fuel or more weapon load, you could not have both.

Which makes the upgrade totally worthless.

And also why they didn't bother upgrading the MiG-29 fleet to SMT level.

No it's not. In peace time they ar doing air patrols with few AAMs. But if needed, Su-27SM have all weapons integrated and they could simply attach them on hardpoints and send to combat mission.

It wasn't that good and in Syria MiG-29SMT was the only jet in RuAF, which didn't achieve expected results. RuAF simply retire MiG-29 fleet and replace them with Su-30.

medo wrote: MiG-29 mess in India is mostly due to fact, that Klimov was konstruction biro, while main production facility was Motor Sich in Ukraine. Now, when Klimov become full producer and servicer of engines, MiG-29 will become normaly operational and regularly serviced jet.

Indian Navy's Mig 29K continues to face operational deficiencies due to defects in engines, airframe and fly-by wire. Carrier compatibility of the aircraft during deck operations is yet to be fully proved and multiple modifications are being carried out to liquidate defects. Moreover, the Mig 29K fleet has surprisingly low availability. Availability rate ranged from 40 - 45 per cent till 2019.

Given that Mig 29K is the naval version of the Mig 35, doesn't it mean that the Mig 35 too suffers from most of these issues?

medo wrote:Indian carriers Vikramaditya and Vikrant have ski jumps and no catapults. There is a good chance, that Indian NAVY will have the same problem with Rafale-M or Super Hornet as RuNAVY, when they want to use Su-33 as bomb truck from carrier. More fuel or more weapon load, you could not have both.

Boeing has carried out test of the F-18 Super Hornet taking off from a ski jump. Dassault has also said that Rafale-M can take off from India's aircraft carrier.

Sujoy wrote:

medo wrote: MiG-29 mess in India is mostly due to fact, that Klimov was konstruction biro, while main production facility was Motor Sich in Ukraine. Now, when Klimov become full producer and servicer of engines, MiG-29 will become normaly operational and regularly serviced jet.

Indian Navy's Mig 29K continues to face operational deficiencies due to defects in engines, airframe and fly-by wire. Carrier compatibility of the aircraft during deck operations is yet to be fully proved and multiple modifications are being carried out to liquidate defects. Moreover, the Mig 29K fleet has surprisingly low availability. Availability rate ranged from 40 - 45 per cent till 2019.

Given that Mig 29K is the naval version of the Mig 35, doesn't it mean that the Mig 35 too suffers from most of these issues?

medo wrote:Indian carriers Vikramaditya and Vikrant have ski jumps and no catapults. There is a good chance, that Indian NAVY will have the same problem with Rafale-M or Super Hornet as RuNAVY, when they want to use Su-33 as bomb truck from carrier. More fuel or more weapon load, you could not have both.

Boeing has carried out test of the F-18 Super Hornet taking off from a ski jump. Dassault has also said that Rafale-M can take off from India's aircraft carrier.

The mig 29 engines were never built in the Ukraine. They were built in Moscow, at the Chernyshev Machine-Building Enterprise.

The problems with the mig 29 and mig29K in indian air force and in indian navy is mainly due of lack of availability of spares and lower quality of parts produced in India. If I am not mistaken also several indian mig 29 were assembled in India.

And after 2007 they even started assembling Klimov RD-33 engines in India

https://web.archive.org/web/20081202094504/http://en.klimov.ru/media/news/2007-01-24/

Dassault instead never found an agreement for Rafale production in India, and the contract includes the spares and maintenance for those 24 aircrafts.

Rodion_Romanovic wrote:The problems with the mig 29 and mig29K in indian air force and in indian navy is mainly due of lack of availability of spares and lower quality of parts produced in India. If I am not mistaken also several indian mig 29 were assembled in India.

Which parts of the Mig 29K, Mig 29UPG are produced in India? None of them are. India never had any permission to produce parts. Parts are always imported. Mig 29Ks arrive in India in CKD state. They are simply assembled here.

Rodion_Romanovic wrote:Dassault instead never found an agreement for Rafale production in India, and the contract includes the spares and maintenance for those 24 aircrafts.

They were not asked to produce Rafales in India either. They were simply asked to provide guarantees of regular supply of parts and regular MRO.

Some thing'just didn't happen in a vacuum, you should know.
It's not that airplanes comes out of thin air, so one cannot make programs saying that given a certain sum you can freely choose between buying one item or another.
You need to put on an assembly line before actually producing something: Mig assembly planthas one still functioning to produce Mig-29M2 for Egypt and it was renovated to produce Mig-35.

Now, what they would do? Put it under a blanket for twelve years and wait until the LFMS is ready?
We are talking there about a MINIMAL part of the russian fighter force, compared to the numbers of Flanker family, Felons and the same Mig produced Foxhounds.

A regiment for each Military Region or even less plus the training units, not something that would dramatically change VKS forces imbalance in any way, while you will have a production plant working and ready to be converted to LFMS, when the time will come, instead of starting from scratch.

Let's put those regiments as point defence interceptors over major russian ports and you will have the perfect role for them we are searching for.

Sujoy wrote:

Rodion_Romanovic wrote:The problems with the mig 29 and mig29K in indian air force and in indian navy is mainly due of lack of availability of spares and lower quality of parts produced in India. If I am not mistaken also several indian mig 29 were assembled in India.

Which parts of the Mig 29K, Mig 29UPG are produced in India? None of them are. India never had any permission to produce parts. Parts are always imported. Mig 29Ks arrive in India in CKD state. They are simply assembled

Well they can also have damaged the parts due to poor handling before assembly. If I am not mistaken the availability of the same aircrafts in the Russian air force is considerably higher.


Anyway, are we sure that Indians have always only bought spare parts from the Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM)? Already in 2002 there were issues with the indian mig 21 fleet because of faulty second hand spares bought from dubious sources. Maybe they have done the same with mig 29 spares...

http://m.timesofindia.com/articleshow/20395007.cms

Questions about the quality of MiG 21 spares have been raised by the Russians in the past. Belyaninov was, however, unsparing in his criticism of the system for purchasing parts. He was speaking to visiting Indian correspondents here.
"When India knows very well that there is only one source for  genuine spares, why does it call for tenders?" he asked.

He said that just 10 per cent of the spares came from fresh production in Russia. The rest were supplied by companies which were sourcing the spares from outdated stocks in Ukraine, Kazakhstan and other constituents of the former Soviet Union.
Till the Soviet Union was in existence, these constituents depended on integrated weapon systems and supplies. After the breakup, the situation had changed. As independent countries, they continued to have stocks weapons and spares, but Russia could not be held responsible for their quality.
Beliyaninov said arms suppliers had opened companies in these countries and were bidding for Indian orders.

As he held forth on the problem, Belyaninov became increasingly graphic on the quality of what was being accepted by India. "Many of these spares are merely painted over and spruced up".
Asked whether Russia regarded substandard spares as the only reason for MiG 21 aircraft crashing in India, Belyaninov said he had no evidence to say so. But he was emphatic that poor quality spares should be regarded as one possible reason for the fighter aircraft crashing.
An official of the Indian embassy in Moscow, who happened to be present at the meeting, joined issue with Belyaninov and asked him whether he had hard proof that substandard parts were being purchased.  Belyaninov shot back that he would show him the evidence he was looking for if he provided the records of purchases made in the past five years.

On the other issue, I agree with Marcello. You cannot stop production and do nothing for 5 years and then hope you can magically restart again when you want.

You will lose capabilities of people, and you will also destroy the supply chain.

Fuethermore in the aerospace world (at least for civil aviation, but I believe there are similar processes also for defense) if you stop producing a certain part for several months, you need then to restart almost from scratches a lot of quality processes needed for the airwortiness of the parts themselves.

They offered nothing to indians but an idea of what they could offer.

The modified MiG-29OVT was essentially what the MiG-29M2/KR/35 is anyway... the only thing not ready is the AESA radar.

The mig35 they are testing is just the plane they said they could make for the indians.

No it isn't, the parameters have been changed to meet Russian AF requirements and there is no foreign equipment in this design.

That's another proof the program is shitty. They didn't made it when they were trying to win indian contracts but make it now that India is switching for western planes and that all potential buyers are buying similar aircraft or better.

The aircraft used for the tender was essentially a custom made MiG-35.

India was never going to select the MiG anyway they should not have bothered.

Only thing su-35 shares with su-27 is design. Everything else is different. Materials, avionics, electronics, engines... everything. Hardly the same aircraft.

Wow... you could substitute MiG for Su and change 27 for 29 and exactly the same comment would apply...

Su-57 shares nothing with su-35. Not even a line of its design is the same as su35.

The Su-57 is an Su-35 redesigned from the perspective of stealth. The F-22 is a stealthy F-15, which was a MiG-25 copy anyway. The F-35 is a poor stealthy F-16, but the VSTOL requirement screwed up its basic shape and the design balance.

The F-35 would actually be a much better product if it was more like the F-16 and less like the Harrier...

You are totally biased. Would it kill you to at least admit once that russians are not perfect.

I am saying the Flanker family are not perfect and would not be good to have as the only fighter in Russian military use... and of course I am biased... you only just noticing now?

One more proof of a flawed approach to stealth, assuming they can always remain passive and undetected taking enemy planes down at will...

Actually a sensible design choice if you are going all for stealth... it actually makes sense... what does not make sense is to expect your shiny technicolour rainbow magic shirt will keep you invisible forever and that that is all you will need.

Soviets and Russians recognise the advantage but they still make their planes manouverable because when you run out of missiles and it comes to guns then he who points and shoots first wins.

8/8/2008

Low RCS of fighters and other aircraft was meaningless in Georgia... what they needed was better SEAD or DEAD equipment and aircraft...

The differences between the Su-25s that were shot down with MANPADS and the new models with self defence avionics suites was not a chance in aircraft RCS... and once they got their ECM Mi-9 helicopter there the BUK ceased to be a problem.

Of course. Nevertheless S-400 and Nebo are two different systems, of course they work in the same IADS.

NEBO often works with S-400 batteries to find small and elusive targets...

Sure, all tactical resources must be used... and those resources include RCS reduction measures!

Not saying RCS is unimportant... just saying that for 4th gen fighters it cannot be the most important because of its devastating effect on cost and performance... and the ease with which all those efforts and money can be undermined.

Well I think it is a general trend, electronics make planes multirole on the one hand, on the other the increasing complexity increases the cost and time needed to create a platform. So they turn less, more flexible and longer lived than they were before.

But that creates obvious problems... look at India... they start out with a light fighter... the MiG-21, two light strike jets, MiG-27, and Jaguar, and two medium fighter jets... Mirage 2000 and MiG-29. Now on the face of it you would think a few upgrades of the MiG-29 to make it fully multi role and the Mirage 2000 is already multirole but a few upgrades for that too and your medium multirole fighters could really do most of the jobs the upgraded MiG-27s and Jaguars can do... and probably do them better.

They end up getting told by France they can't upgrade or produce more M2000s and they have to buy the Rafale and that massively ups the cost... there is no way they could afford to even just replace the new medium fighter they selected all by themselves to replace the existing medium fighters let alone the light fighters as well.

The point I am trying to make is as the numbers get smaller making them multirole makes it worse not better... with single role early model MiG-29s you had however many fighters. With the M2000 being multirole and having MiG-29 fighters you could use your M2Ks as strike aircraft.

If you have 100 MiG-29 fighters and 100 M2K strike fighters... how is 36 Rafales going to replace them? Multirole or not it is a problem.

Even if the Rafales are gold plated wonderful and worth every rupee, they are not going to be able to replace anything like their numbers of old aircraft with them, so they need a new light fighter. Tegas has been suggested with however number of numbers after it.... personally I would think another medium fighter would be the better solution... with an aircraft that doesn't have state of the art new equipment... no AESA, but give it good self defence avionics and new missiles and make it in large numbers to fill the gaps left by the lack of Rafales.

For Finland the solution could be something similar but with Rafales and Gripens, though I would think Rafales and MiG-29M2s would be cheaper.... politically that would not be acceptable I suspect.

Well I think it is a general trend, electronics make planes multirole on the one hand, on the other the increasing complexity increases the cost and time needed to create a platform. So they turn less, more flexible and longer lived than they were before.

It will be some research facility in new mexico... the Black Mesa facility... probably a resonance cascade...

If they didn't retire them when they got the MiGs and now they upgrade them is because they want to keep using them.

They are not going to do anything crazy like put the Su-33s back into production so if they lose a few because a cable breaks, then it does not make sense to base an air wing on them... too flaky.

Those airframes have relatively little use and will need re-engining, that is why the production line was restarted.

If the airframes have had little use then so have the engines... just replace the hot sections and they should be good to go... in fact they probably don't need anything replaced.

If other Flankers are going to use the unified engines it means they are affordable, what do you mean the planes would cost more than the KRs because of being upgraded? The MiGs will not need change of engines after a while, as any other plane?

The Su-33s don't need new engines AFAIK... a minor increase in performance and range isn't worth the cost of new generation engines...

There is one thing called exchange ratio, an eventual VMF CVN with three sqd 57K could arguably defend against 2 or eventually more CSGs with 4 sqd F-18/F-35 each. If you have way less planes and they are worse, well, you are screwed...

When you can use a sneaky sub attack to knock a carrier out from under those squadrons of US Navy aircraft the exchange ratio can change quite dramatically too.

In fact considering what they are going to be able to put on cruisers and destroyers and their carriers in terms of radar and SAMs in types and numbers... I would think adding an AWACS platform and Su-57 fighters would make a Russian carrier group some of the safest airspace on the planet... especially with 57mm auto cannons that could be mounted on a ship with water cooled barrels and enormous ammo stores... mounted on carriers instead of 30mm gatlings... or just next to them...

But do you have a link or at least some rough idea where did you read that?

It was more than 20 years ago when the SMT was a new idea... it was explaining how they managed to reduce maintenance costs so dramatically without a fundamental change in design. (An example would be teh F/A-18 hornet was modular and computerised with modern multifunction computer chips instead of the previously used custom designed chips that were hard wired to do things like in a calculator. The new systems in the Hornet meant upgrades could involve just software upgrades and new hardware being attached to a weapon pylon).

I understand medo perfectly, he says the difference in cost of the MiG does not truly compensate for its inferior characteristics vs. the Flanker... which is what basically everyone but you is saying here

They are not designed to do the same role, they were never supposed to compete.... they were supposed to work together.

That is BTW perfectly compatible with my own position of it being in an awkward "nobody's land" in terms of cost or performance.

Most flankers are used as interceptors and will never drop a bomb let alone use an air to surface missile.

This is not video games where you load up with all sorts of weapons and just wander around the war zone looking for targets of opportunity to hit, so the Flanker is cool because you can carry all sorts of air to ground shit as well as air to air missiles, but if your mission is CAP in the middle of the arctic WTF are you going to do with those four Kh-59MK guided 900kg plus air to ground weapons when all that is showing up on the ground is friendly forces and in the air are US bombers and cruise missiles... those 1,500kg guided bombs are going to be awesome... but only if you are in an Su-34... or Tu-22M3M.

But I am sure those Ethiopian Flankers kicked the arses of the smaller lighter MiG-29s because they had full fuel tanks and 8 tons of external weapons loaded...

Say budget is hundred, plane A is a heavy fighter that costs 2, B is a light plane that costs 1. You can compose the force:

1) 50 x A, high capability, low number of airframes, some of which end up doing NATO air policing missions, counterinsurgency and similar low demand missions at big cost
2) 100 x B, low cost of operation for mundane missions but too short of capability and worst even, deterring capability, for wartime.
3) 25 x A + 50 x B, with both capability for high-end fighting and numbers/economy.

You may spend the same, but get more in return.

Nice theory, but in the real world India buys 36 medium fighters when at the start of the programme they determined they needed 126, the US just spends more, so it is not an issue.

Russia is no where near overspending and seems to not only want to continue production of those useless obsolete 4th gen fighters, but is also producing a medium 5th gen fighter (su57) a heavy new generation interceptor (MiG-41 bit not 5th gen I suspect) and a new generation light fighter by MiG... and still manages to keep its budget to less than 10% of Americas budget... I am not including all of HATOs budget... just American... and they are kicking your arse.

Instead of this single engine is best bullshit you should be doing exactly what Russia is doing...

But you wont even if you could because deep down Europe is just as corrupt as its pupil... turned master... the US.

Those "kids" you talk about in reality run like adults and have numbers to rip them apart...

I am talking half size kids, so 90-120kg adults = 45-60kg kids... All Black adults...

if you give a 1500 kg budget to a rugby team to spend on players, how do you think they will spend it: 6x 250 kg fullbacks and that's it, or rather leave something for more, lighter guys in other positions, that can actually run?

You must have interestingly shaped people where you come from... 250kg fullbacks... only in the US.

Yeah, some candy will do

Probably more suitable healthcare vouchers...

The Flanker was a huge plane and the systems advance have allowed Russians to make the Su-57 a bit smaller, while probably it is not lighter.

Why do you assume it would not be lighter? The Flanker didn't have much in the way of composites in its structure... would expect much more extensive use of composites in the PAK FA.

That is a very special case and it is difficult to use it, because the cardinal parameters of the PAK-FA are still unknown, for instance something as crucial as fuel load.

You guessed the empty weight of the MiG-35 based on the empty weight of the F-16A for goodness sake....

In general, there is a marked increase in internal volume and weight of the 5G planes, which is only logical if we consider that both EFTs and weapons are now carried internally.

But if it is smaller and there are no external wing pylons fitted it should already have lower drag and better range for the same fuel levels... the EFT didn't exist for the Flanker anyway... or were practically never used.

India actually uses all possible categories of fighters, light, medium and heavy in different flavours and colours... I don't think any reasonable Indian questions their AF's planing is simply disastrous.

So does Russia... MiG-15/21 light, MiG-23/29 medium Su-27/Su-21 heavy, Tu-128, MiG-31 superheavy.

I was not expecting this from you

The fastest fighter is the MiG-31 and it is an interceptor only really, and nobody is going to dodge a mach 6 missile... even with warning it is coming...

Not saying Airliners should be fitted with radar and thousands of AAMs, but for many countries around the world including New Zealand a medium sized business jet with a nice big nose mounted radar and a dozen medium range AAMs and a few potent WVR missiles would be much cheaper and much more sensible to operate than even the cheapest lightest fighter like an F-5. We could have one that could fly to Australia and back.... be bloody comfortable inside too...

In the documentary I linked at the Su-57 thread you can hear Strelets saying the opposite

Well they are hardly going to say that is what they did, but look at the aircraft...some fundamental reshaping but everything is basically the same... new wing shape... normal wing and horizontal tail surface arrangement, blended wing and fuselage design twin all moving vertical tails and two engines in pods... the main difference is the internal weapon bays and from the front it looks a bit more flattened and less upright than the Flanker models.

Not something to be ashamed of the MiG-25 is a good choice for a layout for bits on a fighter plane... the blended wing and fuselage and the podded engine bays make better use of air flow over the body of the aircraft, and the horizontal and vertical tails point the engines vigorously and the engine nozzles do the rest.

The Indian Navy's Mig 29K is basically a naval version of the Mig 35.

The MiG-29KR is a naval version of the MiG-29M2. If it was a naval version of the MiG-35 there would be no point in the MiG-29KR.

There were a few differences between the Indian MiG-29K and the Russian MiG-29KR but mostly to do with replacing foreign components India wanted.

Now that Rafale has been purchased by the AF maybe the Navy will be interested in the Rafale- M though Boeing with the F 18 Super Hornet also fancy their chances.

There were complaints about the Gorshkov ending up 1 billion over budget at 2.4 billion... what are they going to say about a plane that costs 8 billion to buy 36 aircraft... that would be three more aircraft carriers...

All those options would require catapults to operate from the carriers you are making so add 10 billion to those prices to buy that technology... I can't see the US or the French giving that away for free.

There is a good chance, that Indian NAVY will have the same problem with Rafale-M or Super Hornet as RuNAVY, when they want to use Su-33 as bomb truck from carrier. More fuel or more weapon load, you could not have both.

The Su-33 would need a serious self defence ESM/ECM suite upgrade before it could be used in contested airspace as a bomber...

No it's not. In peace time they ar doing air patrols with few AAMs. But if needed, Su-27SM have all weapons integrated and they could simply attach them on hardpoints and send to combat mission.

They are not going to send Su-27s on planned combat missions against ground targets... that is why they have hundreds of Su-34s.

They are also not going to send Su-27s out into a combat environment with million dollar missiles to "see what you can find"...

RuAF simply retire MiG-29 fleet and replace them with Su-30.

So you keep pushing, but MiG is the only group keeping Sukhoi honest... their next product might be an F-35 honey trap... with no competition or alternative... why not?

Given that Mig 29K is the naval version of the Mig 35, doesn't it mean that the Mig 35 too suffers from most of these issues?

How can the MiG-29K be based on the MiG-35 when the MiG-29K was produced half a decade ago and the MiG-35s are not in production yet?

Boeing has carried out test of the F-18 Super Hornet taking off from a ski jump. Dassault has also said that Rafale-M can take off from India's aircraft carrier.

Both aircraft rely on a cat system to get airborne with both lots of fuel and also lots of payload.

Take away the catapult assist and I rather suspect you will find the payload drops by more than 2 thirds, and the fuel capacity also drops dramatically, and the direct hit to their operational range and useful payloads will drop performance below that of the MiG-29K... but they wont be any cheaper.

I say go for it... I would suggest the French plane... they are probably slightly less likely to fuck you over... except they already have by closing Mirage 2000 production and demanding you buy Rafales at a much higher price and not budging during the entire MMRCA competition that was supposed to get them to drop their price... and they actually raised it.

A regiment for each Military Region or even less plus the training units, not something that would dramatically change VKS forces imbalance in any way, while you will have a production plant working and ready to be converted to LFMS, when the time will come, instead of starting from scratch.

Equally with MiG-35s in service and low rate production the navy could produce extra Ks if they need them because they use basically the same airframe... the M2 production line making planes for Egypt probably made Indias Ks and Russias Ks too.

More importantly the work on the new gen fighter can be speeded up with testing and installation of technology and equipment on the MiG-35s and MiG-29Ks, so by the time the new plane is ready to fly more of its systems are tested, and the Russian air force gets improvements to its existing fleet too... commonality with the new stealthy jet would be a good thing too in terms of production numbers.

Getting it into production and service means it can mature into a good solid platform making it a much more viable choice than it is at the moment, though I would say having the MiG-29M2 as a cheaper simpler medium fighter compliments a Flanker better than the Su-30 does because I simply can't see how an upgraded Su-30 with all the bits of the Su-35 could be cheaper to operate, so a MiG-29M2 would make more sense to compliment Su-35s...

Maybe they have done the same with mig 29 spares...

They are not adverse to buying cheaper parts from places like the Ukraine who have no vested interest in offering the highest quality parts... they just want money...

So you keep pushing, but MiG is the only group keeping Sukhoi honest... their next product might be an F-35 honey trap... with no competition or alternative... why not?

RuAF don't like MiG-29 and they have their own reason for that, but they greatly love MiG-31 and are modernizing them to MiG-31BM in big numbers. RuAF also want, that MiG develop replacement for MiG-31BM. MiG-29 is not successful model, but this is not the end for the MiG company. There is a big possibility, that MiG will not sell MiG-35 in any significant numbers neither to RuAF neither to foreign customers. MiG shouls rather more concentrate resources to MiG-31 modernizations, specially now, when it become important launching platform for Kinzhal missiles and anti-satelitte missiles. RuAF have far more interest in them, than in MiG-35.

medo wrote:

So you keep pushing, but MiG is the only group keeping Sukhoi honest... their next product might be an F-35 honey trap... with no competition or alternative... why not?

RuAF don't like MiG-29 and they have their own reason for that, but they greatly love MiG-31 and are modernizing them to MiG-31BM in big numbers. RuAF also want, that MiG develop replacement for MiG-31BM. MiG-29 is not successful model, but this is not the end for the MiG company. There is a big possibility, that MiG will not sell MiG-35 in any significant numbers neither to RuAF neither to foreign customers. MiG shouls rather more concentrate resources to MiG-31 modernizations, specially now, when it become important launching platform for Kinzhal missiles and anti-satelitte missiles. RuAF have far more interest in them, than in MiG-35.

Modernization of existing planes is not made through an assembly line: after a check about structural integrity. they put them on benches, remove old equipments and put new ones.

Assembly line made the initial assemblage much more rapid but once the plane basic structure is completed they go on the bench the same and are completed there with adding of electronics, radars, seats and so on.
So modernizing a plane could not be a substitute for producing new ones as e the assembly line would be stopped the same.

That's is what make the production plants different from the design bureaus in which the prototypes are assembled manually, taking much more time and cost.

And even if it is absolutely clear that VKS didn't want Mig-29/Mig-35 as their main plane family they were absolutely eager to produce and buy Mig-29K for their own needs as soon as the assembly line was already working on them for a foreign buyer.

At the same time they were absolutely eager to update Mig-29 at SMT standard also if that needed a way larger modification process, involving also structural modifications that others deep modernizations didn't needed instead.

LMFS wrote:

Su-35 already have supercruise capabilities. Su-57 with AL-41F1 engines is already on the level of F-22, as it is lighter than F-22 and could supercruise at Mach 1,6. New engines will give SU-57 additional power, that, as Sukhoi said, it will be better prepared for sixth generation fighters.

In the Su-35 it would be supercruise in broad sense (M > 1) from what I know. Maybe you can source the M 1.6 figure for the Su-57? I have never seen that before. The AL-41F1, from the references known, should have ca. 9 tf of military thrust in uninstalled conditions, while the F119 is a 26,000 lbf class engine, which is almost 11.8 tf or > 30% more, which is logical when comparing different bypass ratios and technological basis as revealed by stage count... it comes close to reheat thrust of an AL-31F, so it is no wonder that the F-22 can cruise at 1.8-1.9 M. Marchukov said the izd. 30 would be the engine with the highest specific thrust of any equivalent, given its size comparable to F119 that should mean 12 tf mil thrust are thinkable. I personally think it is a VCE (two streams) and that would come with a whole new set of characteristics like reduced subsonic cruise SFC and spillage losses, better cooling etc, other people think it is fixed bypass... we will see.

According to an interview (naukatehnika.com/novyj-dvigatel-dlya-su-57.html) in March 2019 with the head designer of ОКБ it will be a variable bypass engine:

Еще одним важным новшеством «Изделия 30» является изменяемая степень двухконтурности.
Another important novelty of "Izdelie 30" is the variable bypass ratio.

GarryB wrote:Soviets and Russians recognise the advantage but they still make their planes manouverable because when you run out of missiles and it comes to guns then he who points and shoots first wins.

Yes, paradoxically the advances in VLO design and self defence weapons / ECM / DIRCM countermeasures may end up with fighters solving engagements in a cannon fight... seems absurd I know, but there is a possibility to end up there, and if you have locked yourself in an airframe that is  incapable of doing that properly you will have ruined your planing. I agree Russians do not renounce to being strong in that type of combat.

Low RCS of fighters and other aircraft was meaningless in Georgia... what they needed was better SEAD or DEAD equipment and aircraft...

There were many lessons from Georgia. My point was that a direct conventional confrontation between US and Russia is very unlikely and may well be the last war we live, whereas lower intensity conflicts with US proxies and specially hostile neighbours is rather very likely. In case of need, Russia needs means to put those countries in their place fast and with minimum attrition, that is the best way of discouraging the responsible officials and their patrons abroad of trying silly things.

Not saying RCS is unimportant... just saying that for 4th gen fighters it cannot be the most important because of its devastating effect on cost and performance... and the ease with which all those efforts and money can be undermined.

Yes of course. Radars like Rezonans-NE can be bought by almost everyone. But keep in mind I was not appreciating RCS reduction as a way of staying undetected, this is not the point for 4G platforms, but to make easier to disrupt the kill chain.

The point I am trying to make is as the numbers get smaller making them multirole makes it worse not better... with single role early model MiG-29s you had however many fighters. With the M2000 being multirole and having MiG-29 fighters you could use your M2Ks as strike aircraft.

I have the sensation that there is a political aspect in services wanting highly sophisticated multirole fighters as a way of concentrating prestige and power, even when they don't exactly know what to do with them or when other more crucial parts of the force structure is being neglected, many examples also from India come to mind. Nevertheless, if there is something modern fighters cannot do without is modern avionics, the disadvantage of a plane that cannot be networked effectively is simply too high. Once such sophisticated and flexible computer platforms are integrated in a plane, to make it multirole (at least to a certain degree) is trivial in comparison. So I guess the single role fighter nowadays is not advantageous anymore, and would not avoid the increase in cost of air forces. So, the reduction in AFs fleets was started by the increasing sophistication necessary to keep them capable in front of the level of perceived threats, and that has resulted in the need to make the planes multirole. Not even Russia is escaping this trend, even when they are practically the only ones still keeping some highly specialised and effective platforms in some critical roles.

It will be some research facility in new mexico... the Black Mesa facility... probably a resonance cascade...

Sorry, I dont understand that.

If the airframes have had little use then so have the engines... just replace the hot sections and they should be good to go... in fact they probably don't need anything replaced.

Garry, they restarted the engine production line, no point in arguing they don't need the engines...

The Su-33s don't need new engines AFAIK... a minor increase in performance and range isn't worth the cost of new generation engines...

STOBAR operations are critically dependent on thrust. If any of the Flankers would need the new engine, it is the Su-33. That does not mean they will be re-engined now, or ever, there are enough non-technical reasons to justify that. But once the engines are created, the only additional development needed would be to increase their resistance to maritime environment. Given engines are already manufactured with alloys and materials that are highly resistant to corrosion, I don't exactly know how deep changes would need to be. To me it would make full sense, but it is perfectly possible that VMF-MA has no budget for something like that, just to name a possible reason to stay like today, or maybe they already paid for the restart of the production line and cannot backtrack now... we just don't know.

When you can use a sneaky sub attack to knock a carrier out from under those squadrons of US Navy aircraft the exchange ratio can change quite dramatically too.

Let us keep in mind that subs also have a dependency on air superiority at sea... so the possibility of using them will depend on VMF's ability to prevent the operation of airborne and sea based enemy ASW assets.

It was more than 20 years ago when the SMT was a new idea... it was explaining how they managed to reduce maintenance costs so dramatically without a fundamental change in design. (An example would be teh F/A-18 hornet was modular and computerised with modern multifunction computer chips instead of the previously used custom designed chips that were hard wired to do things like in a calculator. The new systems in the Hornet meant upgrades could involve just software upgrades and new hardware being attached to a weapon pylon).

Ok, so this happened before the MiG-35 was born.

They are not designed to do the same role, they were never supposed to compete.... they were supposed to work together.

The original idea aged badly it seems. Currently there is a certain overlapping of their functions and the MiG got marginalized by the Flanker due to (in our opinion) higher capabilities and not so different costs. The VKS had also to concentrate in as few platforms and planes as possible to keep their costs low during the difficult years, now it is possible that a new window will open for the MiG or another medium o light fighter, as they increase their aircraft numbers and reopen airbases.

Most flankers are used as interceptors and will never drop a bomb let alone use an air to surface missile.

One would think a Su-30 with AAMs on the exterior stations and A2G ordnance can carry an strike without escort, that sounds interesting to me, at least when the targets do not demand extreme amounts of payload to take care of them.

Russia is no where near overspending and seems to not only want to continue production of those useless obsolete 4th gen fighters, but is also producing a medium 5th gen fighter  (su57) a heavy new generation interceptor (MiG-41 bit not 5th gen I suspect) and a new generation light fighter by MiG... and still manages to keep its budget to less than 10% of Americas budget... I am not including all of HATOs budget... just American... and they are kicking your arse.

I would not mix MiG-31 in the lot, also would not consider Su-57 medium fighter.

Instead of this single engine is best bullshit you should be doing exactly what Russia is doing...

They had the LFI program with several single engine proposals, they had the S-37 too. As I said, the current situation proves nothing about the Russian doctrinal posture in that regard.

Why do you assume it would not be lighter? The Flanker didn't have much in the way of composites in its structure... would expect much more extensive use of composites in the PAK FA.

Increased internal volume, increased lifting surface and inferior structural characteristics, due to the presence of big holes in the fuselage. Hopefully we get to know the truth in a not so distant future, but it seems unlikely, given empty weight is not even available for the Su-35, which is an export plane.

You guessed the empty weight of the MiG-35 based on the empty weight of the F-16A for goodness sake....

I find your lack of faith disturbing, Garry  

These properly translated chapters of Combat Approved are being very useful. In the MiG-35's chapter they confirm it is heavier than the -29, with 1600 ft lower ceiling and without TVC... the explanation to this by Tarasenko is a rather awkward moment

But if it is smaller and there are no external wing pylons fitted it should already have lower drag and better range for the same fuel levels... the EFT didn't exist for the Flanker anyway... or were practically never used.

I do think it has less drag, but the wetted area does not seem to be clearly inferior, the plane is very flat with big lifting surfaces. It may have less space available for fuel than a Su-35, maybe, but interestingly their tanks are not filled with foam now, the fire prevention system is based on gas instead.

and nobody is going to dodge a mach 6 missile... even with warning it is coming...

You know it is not that simple. We already discussed that nobody is "dodging" missiles in high energy state, rather the maneouvering is kinematic and based in getting the missile in an inferior energy state vs. the fighter. Fast acceleration, good turning, climbing and similar elements of the fighter's dynamic capabilities are demanded for such tasks.

Not saying Airliners should be fitted with radar and thousands of AAMs, but for many countries around the world including New Zealand a medium sized business jet with a nice big nose mounted radar and a dozen medium range AAMs and a few potent WVR missiles would be much cheaper and much more sensible to operate than even the cheapest lightest fighter like an F-5. We could have one that could fly to Australia and back.... be bloody comfortable inside too...

Quite possibly you are right, I already said myself that countries with less resources / threats are rather buying medium fighters than the hi-lo mix of bigger air forces.

Well they are hardly going to say that is what they did, but look at the aircraft...some fundamental reshaping but everything is basically the same... new wing  shape... normal wing and horizontal tail surface arrangement, blended wing and fuselage design twin all moving vertical tails and two engines in pods... the main difference is the internal weapon bays and from the front it looks a bit more flattened and less upright than the Flanker models.

It also looks like a YF-23, a bit like a F-22 and so on. This is a non-solvable discussion, I can say, and it will be true too, that the only element clearly reminiscent of the Flanker in the Su-57 is the podded engine layout. The relevant fact from a design point of view you have it directly from the current chief designer: it is a design they started from scratch, it is nice to have inspiration sources but that is of little help when the actual development demands doing everything from zero.

Begome wrote:According to an interview (naukatehnika.com/novyj-dvigatel-dlya-su-57.html) in March 2019 with the head designer of ОКБ it will be a variable bypass engine:

Еще одним важным новшеством «Изделия 30» является изменяемая степень двухконтурности.
Another important novelty of "Izdelie 30" is the variable bypass ratio.

This goes directly to the PAK-FA thread I guess...

Thanks for reminding this, I think I already saw it. The statement about the variable bypass nature of the engine comes from the journo or at least is left unsourced, therefore it cannot be taken at face value, specially when other figures provided in the piece are clearly off. The true interview with Marchukov appeared in other magazine around those dates. There he does not confirm it to be a VCE (he does confirm it is not a three stream VCE) but provides a couple of data that strongly support the assumption that it is a 2 stream VCE follower of the izd. 20, namely claims about highest specific thrust and low SFC at the same time. Reviewing the Combat Approved Su-57 special, program 2, Marchukov himself repeats again that the engine will have the highest specific thrust. If they do this with a fixed bypass ratio engine, then they need to have left US 5G engine technology far behind in critical aspects like OPR and TIT (3600ºF for the F135 or like 600K more than AL-31F!), and even then it is very questionable that a low bypass engine can have the SFC of an AL-31F. I find it more likely that they have totally closed the gap with F119 and almost with F135 in those mentioned technological parameters but have applied that to an inherently superior VCE design that is the proper one to power a supercruising plane. Strelets confirmed it is perfectly normal within plans that the Su-57 will perform missions completely in supersonic regime from take-off to landing, therefore serious importance is placed in the technologies that enable supercruising.

Wrong. The 2006 offer was 14 years ago. They ask new parameters because technology has improved.

I said the parameters the Russian Air Force wanted in a new plane were different... how can that be wrong.... are you suggesting that Russian Air Force parameters now for a MiG-35 fighter are exactly the same as the parameters for the 2006 Indian MRCA competition?

Also a MiG built in 2006 would include quite a few western electronic components that they can no longer buy so how is that wrong too?

The new Mig35 is mainly for export. Russia will buy 6 or so for its aerobatic team if they are lucky.

The MiG-29M2 is for export.... most of Russias export customers who can afford 35s will be lured away by Sukhois snake oil salesmen...

Why do they make it now then ?

Because they are a Russian company and they make money selling planes... if India doesn't want their new planes they can keep upgrading and supporting the MiGs they do have, in the mean time new planes for the Russian Air Force is what they are concentrating on.

Exactly. Mig-35 is a new fighter but it's made on the basis of mig-29.

They are still making Su-35s and putting them into service... if they still have use for upgraded Su-27s why do you think there is no use for upgraded MiG-29s.

Given the choice I am sure India would have been much happier with local production of Mirage 2000s and the potential to keep upgrading them.

Mig-35 is being made now in 2020 when sukhoi has finished the su-57.

Making Su-35s was an important part of developing its stealthy counterpart, and the MiG-35 will be important in that regard too.

By putting things into service and using them they are mature by the time the new fighter is ready for service. There will still be problems to solve and deal with but you wont have problems from everything all at once because everything is brand new and only tested in a lab... like Ford and Zumwalt.

Mig should have done it before 2010 and moved on on a the LMFS. They are like 15 years late on the other.

MiG were not allowed to start paid official work on LMFS until the Su-57 is ready for serial production... which is now. If the MiG-35 was produced in 2010 they still would not have received funding for LMFS development till now.

A light fighter is also needed but mig-35 doesn't fit in that role.

It fits a light fighter role much better than a light fighter.

You guys have been bitching and moaning because the MiG-35 is not better than a Rafale or an Su-35... but it was never meant to be those fighters in the Russian Air Force... what it is supposed to be is a longer ranged better armed and equipped Tegas 9, or one of those chinese copies of the MiG-21.

For that it is fine.

They need one with stealth caracteristics, 1 engine and be cheap enough. Not something like f35 however.

Why would it need to be stealthy?... whose airspace will a short range light fighter be trying to penetrate?

It is cheap enough and developing a new big engine and making it stealthy is exactly what you need to do to make it an F-35...

You clearly need to check your eyes. None of them have anything in common with the others.

Nothing wrong with my eyes... the layout and planform are identical... both the Su-35 and Su-57 have widely spaced podded engines, they both have main wings and horizontal tail surfaces. They both have blended wing fuselage designs and two vertical tails. The stealthy one has a flattened from the top nose and its neck is shorter and of course its engines are more widely spaced and it has two weapon bays down its centreline and has fewer external weapon pylons.

Put 3 angle plan form line drawings of an Su-35, a MiG-35, an Su-57 side by side and then a 3 angle planform line drawing of a Rafale and play which of these things is not like the other with your average 8 year old kid and tell me they will pick out the Su-57 because it is the only fully stealthy 5th gen fighter.

They will pick the Rafale because it is the different one... the others look almost the same... even I find myself checking the tail area to see if it is a Fulcrum or a Flanker when I see a Russian plane flying... nothing new...35 years ago I was looking for wing root guns to see if that plane is an Su-17 or a MiG-21... the Su-9 and Su-11 looked even more like the MiG-21 but were much less often seen...

MiG-29 is not successful model, but this is not the end for the MiG company.

It has been in service for 50 years and is now their most numerous and modern carrier based fighter...

There is a big possibility, that MiG will not sell MiG-35 in any significant numbers neither to RuAF neither to foreign customers.

There is always that risk with any product... you can lead a horse to water...

MiG shouls rather more concentrate resources to MiG-31 modernizations, specially now, when it become important launching platform for Kinzhal missiles and anti-satelitte missiles. RuAF have far more interest in them, than in MiG-35.

Except that now that they have the job of making a new 5th gen fighter they will be looking at all the components of their best fighter and will be trying to move a generation ahead... but they should forget the MiG-35 and just pretend it never existed... perhaps they can look at the systems in the MiG-29 or even MiG-23 and make them two generations better....  I mean they make planes so why should they waste their time making planes for the Russian Air Force that has ordered some.... they should just forget about it...    

According to an interview (naukatehnika.com/novyj-dvigatel-dlya-su-57.html) in March 2019 with the head designer of ОКБ it will be a variable bypass engine:

Variable bypass engines will actually be rather critical for a MiG-41 design... high bypass turbo fans are know for airliners and are excellent for subsonic cruise, but at very high flight speeds turbojets and turbofan engines become inefficient because the rotational speed of the blades risks them shearing off and failing, but obviously a ramjet with no turbine blades can go much faster without problems.

If they could take the existing engines and work out how to modify their intakes so that at speeds above mach 2 the amount of bypass air dramatically increases and that bypass air can in fact be used as a ramjet so the turbine engine can actually be run down to idle or even shut down then speeds like mach 4.2 as mentioned could be easily achieveable... assuming heat issues with the airframe and engine inlet can be dealt with...

Being able to change bypass levels would be an excellent way to make a modern jet engine more efficient... high bypass for low speed fuel efficient cruising... low bypass for supercruising, and all bypass ramjet mode for really high speeds...  

Yes, paradoxically the advances in VLO design and self defence weapons / ECM / DIRCM countermeasures may end up with fighters solving engagements in a cannon fight... seems absurd I know, but there is a possibility to end up there,

Missiles are not hittiles yet... the AIM-9X that failed to hit an Su-22 in Syria was supposed to be a super missile you could not escape... the Americans bought it because it is supposed to be better than ASRAAM... though most likely better because it is American...

In case of need, Russia needs means to put those countries in their place fast and with minimum attrition, that is the best way of discouraging the responsible officials and their patrons abroad of trying silly things.

Even if we assume that is true... why do you think a much more expensive stealth light fighter like an F-35 would be more use than a MiG-35 or Su-35?

Yes of course. Radars like Rezonans-NE can be bought by almost everyone. But keep in mind I was not appreciating RCS reduction as a way of staying undetected, this is not the point for 4G platforms, but to make easier to disrupt the kill chain.

The kill chain for Russia includes all sorts of radar sources that are not effected by RCS the way fighter radars are and I rather suspect taht amongst the new air to air missiles the Russians show for the Su-57 will be the 9M100 IIR lock on after launch air to air missile with an IIR seeker and a two way datalink so it can find its own targets... that sort of seeker could just as easily be put on an R-37M missile and be launched at B-2s 200km away... what makes you think a eurocanard with a RCS is going to have a huge advantage in such a situation?

The point is that decreasing RCS is very expensive, but radars are getting more powerful and capable and alternatives to radar detection and tracking are also there and can be used to make all those expensive changes pointless.

I have the sensation that there is a political aspect in services wanting highly sophisticated multirole fighters as a way of concentrating prestige and power, even when they don't exactly know what to do with them or when other more crucial parts of the force structure is being neglected, many examples also from India come to mind.

Every single country in HATO buys a fighter plane, but how many of them contribute useful things like transports... instead of wasting money on shiny fast fighter jets, they could better use their funds to buy things that are more useful to the organisation instead of selfish petty little fighters they never really need.

It really does not matter what the mission is, every country seems to want to take their fighter planes, when it is all the other types that the US or France or the UK supplies that actually make the difference.

So I guess the single role fighter nowadays is not advantageous anymore, and would not avoid the increase in cost of air forces.

Considering all the other types they are buying, India could replace the 60 odd old model MiG-29s with 500 MiG-29M2s for the price of 100 Rafales that they could make in India and just use them as short range interceptors to compliment their Flankers and while they have air to ground capability they need never use it...

So, the reduction in AFs fleets was started by the increasing sophistication necessary to keep them capable in front of the level of perceived threats, and that has resulted in the need to make the planes multirole. Not even Russia is escaping this trend, even when they are practically the only ones still keeping some highly specialised and effective platforms in some critical roles.

The electronics in old planes was very slow clock speed stuff... with the MiG-23 the avionics were dedicated to that platform... to the extent that the radar used was the Sapphire-23, and the BVR AAMs used were the R-23R and R-23T... later upgraded to R-24s, the air to ground missile its BN ground attack version used was the Kh-23, HATO codename AS-7 Kerry... the point was that when the processor is very simple and very slow then everything is hard wired and fixed and an upgrade means physically rewiring new hardware in.

The new modern multirole fighters and aircraft you are talking about have much more powerful processors, which means instead of being a hand held calculator, where to upgrade it with new functions you would need to physically redesign the case and add a few buttons, which would be enormously expensive... the calculator programme on your Operating System is all software and uses the functions of the complex central processing chip in your computer... to add a function you just alter the software to perform the new calculation and add rules on how the result is displayed.

Just because modern computers and networks allow multi function design and use does not mean you have to use it that way...

The MiG-23 was an interceptor/fighter, the MiG-27 was a light strike aircraft with self defence capacity in air to air only.

A MiG-29M2 would be a better interceptor/fighter than any model MiG-23, and a better light strike aircraft than any model MiG-27 including the M and the K models, but that does not mean you can replace 50 MiG-23s and 50 MIG-27s with 50 MiG-29M2s.

The MiG-29M2 might be 5 times more capable than the MiG-23, but that does not mean you can get away with only using 10 to replace 50.

If you have 6 x 8 plane squadrons and you had two planes spare then you will still need 6 x 8 plane squadrons, and it wouldn't hurt to have spare aircraft too.

The new MiGs will cost more than the old MiGs but that is the price of progress.

The MiG-23 probably had better flight range than the early MiG-29s but the MiG-23 was replaced by the Su-27...

Sorry, I dont understand that.

Computer game called Half Life, where a lab in the US opens up portals for an alien invasion and ends the world as we know it...

Garry, they restarted the engine production line, no point in arguing they don't need the engines...

So they restarted the engine production lines... we know from information we have that there are no engine production lines that produce everything for any one particular engine and that engines are enormously complex things that contain a lot of components that are made all over the place, and that many of the engines we consider Ukrainian have parts made in the Ukraine and perhaps are assembled there but equally have parts made in Russia too... are you suggesting they are setting up a new assembly line for jet engines to support the dozen or so Su-33s that exist?

I rather suspect they would go into the Su-30s and Su-27s and indeed Su-34s first, and Su-33s if there is any left over and they are still operating.

STOBAR operations are critically dependent on thrust. If any of the Flankers would need the new engine, it is the Su-33.

Yes, of course... it needs brand new new generation engines because they just gave it an avionics upgrade that probably reduced its dry weight by a ton by swapping out enormous old boxes of 286 generation electronics to replace it with the electronics in your cell phone...

To me it would make full sense, but it is perfectly possible that VMF-MA has no budget for something like that, just to name a possible reason to stay like today, or maybe they already paid for the restart of the production line and cannot backtrack now... we just don't know.

I would think they would give them the minimum upgrades as they are doing and when their replacement is ready spend the money on that instead... whether it is the LMFS or a naval Su-57... personally I hope the latter.

Let us keep in mind that subs also have a dependency on air superiority at sea... so the possibility of using them will depend on VMF's ability to prevent the operation of airborne and sea based enemy ASW assets.

the ocean is huge and having ASW assets around your carrier groups makes sense but the range of the weapons these subs will be carrying will make that search area huge and the action of searching for subs is not quiet so they should be able to tell where they are at any one time... to find new subs you need to use active sonar.... which is very noisy.

Ok, so this happened before the MiG-35 was born.

The 286 in the late 1980s really made it possible, and most of the people I used to chat with in the late 1990s on the interweb were shocked when I told them the new F-22 would be using a 486 processor... they all demanded the latest Pentiums would be used at the very least, but the newer chips were not rugged and dust proof enough... look at the latest computer chips in computers now... the latest fighters in service right now have nothing like them in their little computer networks...

The first MiG-29M flew in 1988... I believe at that time I had an Amiga 500... a 16 bit computer with 512K of RAM and I spent $250 dollars to get the 512K RAM expansion card, so I had a 1MB computer... I was the envy of all my friends... spent another $250 and got an external 3 1/2 inch floppy disk drive as well... luxury... previous computers like the Commodore 64 used an audio cassette tape drive, and my Sinclair Spectrum ZX-81... well you typed the programme out before you could run it through your TV...

The original idea aged badly it seems. Currently there is a certain overlapping of their functions and the MiG got marginalized by the Flanker due to (in our opinion) higher capabilities and not so different costs.

You could say the same with the F-15 and F-16... the latter ended up being just as expensive but never quite as capable as the F-15, of course the difference is that the F-15C model was never really adapted to multirole use... perhaps that was the mistake the Soviets and Russians made... both aircraft have grown towards each other and now cover too many areas.  Too many overlaps.

Perhaps the solution is to change the Su-35 into the Su-35C air to air fighter and interceptor with no air to ground features. The Su-34E can be air to ground strike aircraft replacing the Su-24, and the MiG-29M2 could be the short range strike and light fighterbomber.

You say the feature of the Su-35 and the MiG-35 overlap so they don't need the MiG, but in actual fact a short range fighter is more important than having a separate and rather expensive rather heavy strike Su-34 when the Su-35 could do that role too... hell it would make more sense to get rid of the 300 Su-34s and increase the numbers and capabilities of the Tu-22M3Ms instead... better range, better payload, larger sized aircraft so more potential...

The VKS had also to concentrate in as few platforms and planes as possible to keep their costs low during the difficult years, now it is possible that a new window will open for the MiG or another medium o light fighter, as they increase their aircraft numbers and reopen airbases.

If they want to expand into the far east and arctic then a smaller and lighter aircraft could do it cheaper... they don't need to cover the entire arctic... the air bases will be near military bases and areas of strategic interest so a shorter range fighter to protect that is all they really need.

Ferry flights between bases can be done with three external tanks and an inflight topup... 5,000km range would be plenty even in such a large region...

One would think a Su-30 with AAMs on the exterior stations and A2G ordnance can carry an strike without escort, that sounds interesting to me, at least when the targets do not demand extreme amounts of payload to take care of them.

The exterior weapon pylons on Flankers only carry R-73 AAMs, and targets attacked by a non dedicated ground attack aircraft like Su-30 would probably need to be standoff weapons... ie rather heavier than the Kh-38s the MiG-35s would be using...

I would not mix MiG-31 in the lot, also would not consider Su-57 medium fighter.

Why would they ignore it just because you do?

Su-57s empty weight is most likely lighter than Su-27s isn't it?

They had the LFI program with several single engine proposals, they had the S-37 too. As I said, the current situation proves nothing about the Russian doctrinal posture in that regard.

Yes, and mention the new LMFS programme aircraft will have two engines suggest those single engine suggestions failed.

Increased internal volume, increased lifting surface and inferior structural characteristics, due to the presence of big holes in the fuselage.

Wouldn't that all reduce dry weight rather than increase it? Increased internal volume for fuel and weapons suggests larger weapons and fuel capacity, but also lower dry weight.

Hopefully we get to know the truth in a not so distant future, but it seems unlikely, given empty weight is not even available for the Su-35, which is an export plane.

They have no reason to make it easy for us...  

These properly translated chapters of Combat Approved are being very useful. In the MiG-35's chapter they confirm it is heavier than the -29, with 1600 ft lower ceiling and without TVC... the explanation to this by Tarasenko is a rather awkward moment

They unified the design structurally with the MiG-29KR carrier aircraft... what carriers can the F-16 operate from?

1,600ft? From a Russian source? can you confirm they were not talking in arshins?

I do think it has less drag, but the wetted area does not seem to be clearly inferior, the plane is very flat with big lifting surfaces. It may have less space available for fuel than a Su-35, maybe, but interestingly their tanks are not filled with foam now, the fire prevention system is based on gas instead.

Flat is not the same as thick.... in terms of drag flat is better than tall isn't it?

You know it is not that simple. We already discussed that nobody is "dodging" missiles in high energy state, rather the maneouvering is kinematic and based in getting the missile in an inferior energy state vs. the fighter. Fast acceleration, good turning, climbing and similar elements of the fighter's dynamic capabilities are demanded for such tasks.

Not happy with your view that smaller lighter agile planes are somehow safer... maybe from a missile at the edge of its envelope, but when a missile turns on its ARH seeker and the target is right in the centre of its view no amount of dodging or dancing is going to save it... smaller lighter also means fragile and no empty spaces for fragments to pass through without damaging something critical to keeping the plane flying.

Quite possibly you are right, I already said myself that countries with less resources / threats are rather buying medium fighters than the hi-lo mix of bigger air forces.

I am saying it is the sensible thing to do... I would also say no country in the world would even consider it... that sort of thing isn't done... New Zealand is considered weird because it didn't want to buy worn out second hand F-16s from the US to replace our obsolete Skyhawks... any country with the navy to come all the way down here to invade is not going to be bothered by two dozen F-16s and I doubt we could afford that many anyway, and with all the peacekeeping ops with do with the UN there is never going to be a situation where we turn up with a half dozen F-16s and they say... WOW thanks for bringing those... nobody else thought to bring old obsolete fighters to this party... take them round the back and park them with the 500 F-16s that everyone else brought... yours should be easy to find when you leave because everone else brought much newer more capable models and the bad guys in this dust up don't have an air force... so park them up and come back and see us... BTW you didn't bring any transport planes we are actually desperately short of those...

[quote]It also looks like a YF-23,-/quote]

Only in the sense that the YF-23 looks like an F-22 and a MiG-25 that is made a little bit stealthy and has had either the vertical or horizontal tail surfaces ripped off and then the remaining surface rotated to the 45 degree position to do the job of both... probably not as well...

Otherwise different shaped wing and engines pushed together and the cockpit canopy different.

GarryB wrote:Missiles are not hittiles yet...

Hahaha true, BVR misses are too many to be accounted for... WVR is under great threat by DIRCM

Even if we assume that is true... why do you think a much more expensive stealth light fighter like an F-35 would be more use than a MiG-35 or Su-35?

We have dealt with the issue in depth, a modern IADS can take care of VLO planes because of the redundant, multiband, multilayered detection and destruction means. But isolated SAM batteries, unless very modern, are vulnerable or at least their performance will be degraded by smart, low RCS targets using modern weapons and targeting information. Average countries have enough with buying a few tanks, BMPS, some few fighters, helos and SAMs, that's it. They cannot create huge IADS with all the technology, infraestructure and expertise needed. Against such countries RCS reduction is indeed very interesting.

The point is that decreasing RCS is very expensive, but radars are getting more powerful and capable and alternatives to radar detection and tracking are also there and can be used to make all those expensive changes pointless.

Signature reduction is a fact today and applies to radar, IR, visual, sound and any other way of detecting the plane. Literally all current fighters apply it, no point in discussing whether RCS reduction pays off IMHO.

Every single country in HATO buys a fighter plane, but how many of them contribute useful things like transports... instead of wasting money on shiny fast fighter jets, they could better use their funds to buy things that are more useful to the organisation instead of selfish petty little fighters they never really need.

Fully agree with that...

Considering all the other types they are buying, India could replace the 60 odd old model MiG-29s with 500 MiG-29M2s for the price of 100 Rafales that they could make in India and just use them as short range interceptors to compliment their Flankers and while they have air to ground capability they need never use it...

When pilots are not needed anymore that is going to make even more sense.

to add a function you just alter the software to perform the new calculation and add rules on how the result is displayed.

My point is that implementing such system on a plane requires a huge amount of effort and money... Sukhoi today is as much a computer system design firm as a plane design one, they have grown huge competencies in that regard. The systems that make all that flexibility are of course much more expensive and complex than the older ones, all subsystems and computers need to communicate through hi-speed buses and modern protocols, be redundant, with very high processing power etc. etc... they are not cheap.

Just because modern computers and networks allow multi function design and use does not mean you have to use it that way...

If the multirole capability is one FW update away, having extra planes to cover for specific roles makes no sense, unless we talk about highly specialised ones where the platform's capabilities are critical.

The new MiGs will cost more than the old MiGs but that is the price of progress.

Sure, the threat evolves

So they restarted the engine production lines... we know from information we have that there are no engine production lines that produce everything for any one particular engine and that engines are enormously complex things that contain a lot of components that are made all over the place, and that many of the engines we consider Ukrainian have parts made in the Ukraine and perhaps are assembled there but equally have parts made in Russia too... are you suggesting they are setting up a new assembly line for jet engines to support the dozen or so Su-33s that exist?

That is exactly what they said, yes... I have no further details but I can imagine they assembly and test them, I don't know if they produce everything in house but it may well be the case, UMPO manufactures the AL-31F and AL-41F-1S

I rather suspect they would go into the Su-30s and Su-27s and indeed Su-34s first, and Su-33s if there is any left over and they are still operating.

Certainly the contribution of the -33s to the defence of the motherland is not the biggest, so I can understand budgetary priorities being somewhere else.

Yes, of course... it needs brand new new generation engines because they just gave it an avionics upgrade that probably reduced its dry weight by a ton by swapping out enormous old boxes of 286 generation electronics to replace it with the electronics in your cell phone...

Normally more functionality means more weight, not the other way around...

I would think they would give them the minimum upgrades as they are doing and when their replacement is ready spend the money on that instead... whether it is the LMFS or a naval Su-57... personally I hope the latter.

That is perfectly possible yes... without a carrier to even use them there are no arguments to be made about what is needed in real world operations, maybe after the K is back they get things moving a bit more in terms of naval aviation.

the ocean is huge and having ASW assets around your carrier groups makes sense but the range of the weapons these subs will be carrying will make that search area huge and the action of searching for subs is not quiet so they should be able to tell where they are at any one time... to find new subs you need to use active sonar.... which is very noisy.

All kinds of UAVs and USVs will be used to increase the density of the ASW mesh, and they will need to be defended too. If you release them only to get them destroyed by enemy air power in a matter of minutes, you are not getting anything in terms of ASW and instead loosing a lot of money.

perhaps that was the mistake the Soviets and Russians made... both aircraft have grown towards each other and now cover too many areas.  Too many overlaps.

IMHO the error was to make the MiG too specialised, the airframe was too optimized for a role necessary at that time and overlooked making it cheap enough for a general purpose fighter.

You say the feature of the Su-35 and the MiG-35 overlap so they don't need the MiG, but in actual fact a short range fighter is more important than having a separate and rather expensive rather heavy strike Su-34 when the Su-35 could do that role too... hell it would make more sense to get rid of the 300 Su-34s and increase the numbers and capabilities of the Tu-22M3Ms instead... better range, better payload, larger sized aircraft so more potential...

The Su-34 is a highly specialised platform that can do things Su-35 cannot. They need a smaller cheaper fighter than the Su-35, we agree on that.

If they want to expand into the far east and arctic then a smaller and lighter aircraft could do it cheaper... they don't need to cover the entire arctic... the air bases will be near military bases and areas of strategic interest so a shorter range fighter to protect that is all they really need.

The Arctic and Siberia / Far East are the places where long range planes actually make sense, in order to get the theater mobility needed to reinforce the directions needed at each time without depending on tankers.

Su-57s empty weight is most likely lighter than Su-27s isn't it?

F-22 is said to weight 19.7 t, Su-35 is heavier than 18 t, Su-27 is 16.5 or something similar IIRC. Estimations for PAK-FA are 18-18.5 t, remember it needed structural reinforcements during testing. Makes sense to me, given the size of the plane, RAM/RAS and all the issues that I mentioned.

Yes, and mention the new LMFS programme aircraft will have two engines suggest those single engine suggestions failed.

Failed in what regard?

Wouldn't that all reduce dry weight rather than increase it? Increased internal volume for fuel and weapons suggests larger weapons and fuel capacity, but also lower dry weight.

No, more volume means a bigger plane...

They have no reason to make it easy for us...  

Indeed, and they are only making it each time more and more complicated. Recently we got some data about Su-57 production that managed to be figured out from public contracts, they recently said military related information is going to be state secret so I guess such loopholes are going to be closed and we are going to know each time less... bad news for us but the reason for all that is much more concerning... before any war two things happen: fast rearmament and obscuring of its nature. I already see signs in Russian military procurement of fast tracking certain programs and finally bringing the most capable systems and weapons online in numbers, VKS purchases among them.

They unified the design structurally with the MiG-29KR carrier aircraft... what carriers can the F-16 operate from?

Worse for them, if they have to burden all VKS planes with CV relevant structural reinforcements that only apply to a few VMF units... that is like screwing the F-35 with the STOVL requirements the Marines needed, simply a bad idea.

1,600ft? From a Russian source? can you confirm they were not talking in arshins?

It is a proper translation with imperial units. They could have spared themselves that, agreed, since US and UK are not likely to buy their planes anytime soon.

Flat is not the same as thick.... in terms of drag flat is better than tall isn't it?

Certainly, but friction due to surface is always a source of drag.

Not happy with your view that smaller lighter agile planes are somehow safer... maybe from a missile at the edge of its envelope, but when a missile turns on its ARH seeker and the target is right in the centre of its view no amount of dodging or dancing is going to save it... smaller lighter also means fragile and no empty spaces for fragments to pass through without damaging something critical to keeping the plane flying.

I did not say a smaller fighter is safer if a missile hits it, I honestly don't think a Flanker is safer either... twin or single engine does not make a huge difference for a blast from a warhead that is going to rain fragments everywhere around it... the smaller plane may be marginally more difficult to detect for the ARH seeker of the missile, the big twin engine jet may be marginally more survivable when hit.

Only in the sense that the YF-23 looks like an F-22 and a MiG-25 that is made a little bit stealthy and has had either the vertical or horizontal tail surfaces ripped off and then the remaining surface rotated to the 45 degree position to do the job of both... probably not as well...

Otherwise different shaped wing and engines pushed together and the cockpit canopy different.

Tell me they don't look similar...