Future russian aircraft carriers. #2

AlfaT8 wrote:

GunshipDemocracy wrote:
1) radius, ok if you prefer in kilometers:

F-35B:                   833km
F-18Super Hornet:  722 km
Su-33: ?
Rafale: ?

Whoa V/STOL with longer radius?

Is it stealth radius or non-stealth radius, that is the question.
Also it's 933km not 833km.


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It's all meaningless.

The stated F-18 E/F combat radius of 722 Km is referred specifically to an air to ground mission, with 4 x 1000 lbs bombs, 2 Aim-9, targeting pod, FLIR pod, two external tanks and a Hi-Lo-Lo-Hi mission profile.

Without any relations between configurations and mission profiles, the numbers about the other aircrafts are without any meaning.

Tsavo Lion wrote:From the economics angle, if France's 3x larger than Russia's & still at a loss of what/when 2nd CV/N to build, how can the latter build just 1, much less 2 or 3, CVNs?  Putin is not Stalin to force his country "to eat grass" but have 2-3 CVNs & all that goes with them! To defend it & its interests abroad, they r not essential. NATO, Japan, Israel & PRC can be deterred with nukes & the latest non-nukes; insurgents in ME, Afghanistan, C. Asia, Africa, & L. America can be dealt with by land based aircraft, ship based helicopters, STOVLs & A/SLCMs. Adm. K & its aiwing didn't make much of a dent in Syria, despite of what Russian propaganda may have implied.

France is in nominal GDP almost 2 x Russia, but in PPP terms Russia is 1.5 X France.

That gives a broad estimate about how much cheaper is to develop and build something in Russia compared to France, at least as long as all of the production cycle is 100% domestic.

Russian population is more than twice than french population, and that means that taxes levied to finance Govt. expenditures, military expenditures as well, are spread amongst a larger base.

Last but not least, it is far easier to not expand welfare and personal income, in order to drain resources for Govt. projects, than to reduce them.

The second way usually end with the people getting very angry in the long run, sometimes even in the short run.

France, better to say french government, has had and has a really hard time cutting any public expenditures at all, even if only to easier taxation, not to mention to get resources to increase military spending.

So within past, present and foreseeable future defense budget, France has almost zero chances to get the funds to build and operate a second carrier.

It is not that french economy wouldn't allow it, it is the social and political environment that bars any real chance.

They wont be importing many components for new CVNs, so building one puts Russians to work and also extends the reach and capability of the Russian Navy, which is good for exporting and importing material that does not go through europe.


Russia needs to boost its international trade... there are lots of countries the west has screwed who want someone else to trade with... who don't already have perfect economies like the west does, but doesn't want to be preached to either.

Markets in Africa and Asia and central and south america are new and offer huge potential to Russia to expand its trading partner base... they want to grow but also not to be stifled and controlled... the US likes investing in countries to produce goods for them cheaply... the west has been doing it for years big powerful companies that maximise profit by low wages workers in foreign countries with no worker rights... their problem is that when they shift work overseas their own populations can't afford to buy their cheaply made products no matter how cheap they can make them.

Russia and China have the potential to step in and make trade deals where everyone wins and not just the 1% in both countries.

GunshipDemocracy wrote:

AlfaT8 wrote:Yes, but these carriers aren't gonna be 100kT super-carriers.
Yes it is a waste of money, for Russia, since they need to develop not only a new carrier, but also new aircraft for it and new part/equipment to maintain it.
While they can just make the new carrier and use already developed and matured aircraft.

Actually Russian fleet mentioned only 2 cases so far

1) a light ~30k ?CV with newly developed V/STOL fighter. Will it be new MiG? who knows. Siulianov and Shoigu for sure
2) heavy 100t class with 90 pieces air-wing and navalized PAK-FA /Su-57

In case B I can hardly see that More then 40 Su-57 is displacement is to be not more than 100,000tons. Ford class is 100k and is ot have 70 fixed wing aircrafts.
Looks at size comparison Su-57 vs F-35. @x so much space needed?

Yes, it's very confusing.

The 30kT CV is obviously a modified Lavina class, the idea is probly to invest everything in Lavina to save money, but the justification the Russian MoD is using is that the STOVL aircraft can also fulfill a fighter role, which is just nonsense, clearly there are too many official who's heads are still in the 1970s.
There is also a problem that the Lavina doesn't have enough weaponry to defend itself, which also means more escorts.

The 100kT carrier is just the other end of the extreme, although most of the aircrafts are ready, but we got no idea what the actual cost will be.
Estimates, put its costs closer to the Nimitz carrier, not the Ford.

There is serious lack of a middle ground here.
Honestly, it seems like the traditional schizophrenia/phobia in the MoD for carriers is alive and well.

That depends on a lot of things most importantly the carrier's design.
And don't expect a Su-57 only carrier i see no more than 10 the rest will probly be Mig-29K.

AlfaT8 wrote:

radius, ok if you prefer in kilometers:

F-35B:                   833km
F-18Super Hornet:  722 km
Whoa V/STOL with longer radius?

Is it stealth radius or non-stealth radius, that is the question.
Also it's 933km not 833km.

https://www.f35.com

Lockheed Martins stubbornly says > 833 km on interneal fuel. But what is the difference stealth or non stealth? is there any CV based stealth plane? no there's not.
So why such worries if it will be stealth?

My point is: there are no major differences neither speed, radius or payload justify opinion that V/STOL is useless. But their carriers cost cheaper much cheaper. Both in construction and maintenance.  

That doesn't add up, Nmi->miles->km clearly add up to 933km, but if they say that, then fine.
The F-35 has 2 configs stealth with internal munitions only, and non-stealth with both internal and external munitions, the difference in weight/drag will effect the radius.

STOVL aircrafts are generally heavier and more critical points of failure, than conventional aircrafts, ergo their performance suffers with the extra weight as well as maintenance with extra components.
Their carriers cost nothing because they're already built.

Long term, it wont cost as much.

Catapult? it costs a lot when created. In Russian case in 1 max 2 pieces. For a billion! ok half billion if you prefer.  

Yes, the starting cost is always high.
But a billion, really?
Real problem is, we don't know what it will cost for Russia, or whether it will be built at all.

Only fools spend so much, Russia isn't the U.S.
To protect Russian Navy from hostile aircraft, and carry lots of long range missiles, plus AWACS.

In Midway style fight? 1 CVSG form Russian vs 10 from USA? I bet on yanks then.
Otherwise 20-30 V/STOL fighters is fair enough and many times cheaper (cost of carriers vs LHDs). Syria's experience IMHO proved no more then 30 fixed wing aircraft is enough to do the job in colonial style war,  40 Su-57 fighters in super carrier is never enough to fight against 300 form US CVSGs.

What with this midway crap, carrier aircrafts are simply superior to STOVL, and cheaper.
And i bet on Kinzhal.
That is the question, which one is really cheaper, new LHD plus new STOVL or just new Carrier plus old fighters.
IMO, the carrier is the obvious choice, way more firepower than the LHD and you don't need to waste money on making new STOVL, but the MoD clearly has other plans.
Syria experience simply showed that Russia needs new carriers, that's it.
30 Kinzhals should be enough for all 10.

AlfaT8 wrote:

According to you logic Royal Navy is not a navy either? how great!

Right now, they are barely a Navy.
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Yes, it's very sad.

Sir, I second that. The only difference is - Russian IMHO  doesn't need 10blns $ a piece CVN  then one for 2$blns will do the same job. Any attack on Russian ship means war regardless on size, isnt it?

If you are going to spend a large amount of money on a camper van do you buy a ute (a light truck not much bigger than an SUV) and cram everyone in for summer holidays, or do you get a custom made bus.

That Ute is going to be 5 times cheaper than the custom made bus, but you are going to have to spend a minimum of 10 billion designing and building what will basically be an F-35 in the VSTOL version that will not be of any use anywhere else... the army and air force wont want them because there will always be 500m of motorway a conventional aircraft can take off from...

A helicopter carrier simply wont be big enough... even an enlarged Mistral.

If you are going somewhere to fight and you can only take 20-30 aircraft then you need the best... not some half assed wannabe.

They have worked out that to have any sort of surface fleet able to defend itself it needs long range vision and long range reach... that means AWACS and aircraft, so if you need AWACS and aircraft why piss around with a dinky little helicopter carrier?

If Russian doctrine is not based on massive fleet air-air battles then for 20-30 fighters i wll do the job perfectly.  

a) Syria like conflicts
b) fending off smaller predators

The current main threat to Russian surface vessels is wave after wave of hundred or thousands of subsonic anti ship missiles... the best defence against that is air borne radar and airborne interceptors with AAMs.... the more the better.

Pros:

a) light (V)/STOL fighter can be procured both by AF and Navy.
b) French Rafale was in 20 years or so made in 185 units, this size including exports should be easily attainable
c)  small = takes 1,5x less space as Su-57 (pls check F-35 vs Su-57n comparison) and requires much smaller ship

First of all a) is right off the money, the air force has no need for a VSTOL aircraft... the Yak-38 was tested in Afghanistan and rejected as too fragile, too short ranged, too low a payload.

Second the UAE are paying for a 5th gen light fighter to be designed and built... lets see what that looks like first, but otherwise the naval version of the Su-57 it is.

c) is not relevant... the Su-33 has a double folding main wing and actually takes up the same amount of space on the Kuznetsov as the much smaller MiG-29K does... they can be made as small as they need to be.

a) Su-57 can use kindzhal and THAT is the difference

It has already had structural strengthening... just add folding wings and a tail hook and it is ready to go as an already capable stealth fighter bomber.

b) of course heavy fighter with long range is always better but F-18 replaced F-14 for a  reason,  and its successor F-35 is also small by requirements.

The F-18 replaced the F-14 because at the time the F-14 was high maintainence and was an old aircraft design.

In the early 1990s the new improved D model F-14 was actually an enormous improvement over the A model... the new engines were so much more powerful the F-14D could take off without using afterburner as the engines in the D model were as powerful in dry thrust as the older engines were in full AB.

The F-14D could easily have been adapted to carry AMRAAM and the new model sidewinders and been every bit as capable as the F-18... the last model F-14Ds had an upgrade where the Tomcat could use LANTIRN to look for targets on the ground and transmit that image to the soldiers on the ground who could look at the airborne view... pick out the enemy and mark them so the aircraft they were linked to could then attack the targets...

An F-22 like heavy fighter could easily have been developed, but it would have needed external weapons to be useful and that would have made it nonstealthy... which was bad in the US.

Just like anywhere there are Tomcat supporters and there are Hornet supporters and the Hornet supporters won... some would say despite common sense suggesting the Tomcat Phoenix was not only needed but in need of an upgrade... now they know better.

Russia isn't likely to build more than 2 new nuclear powered aircraft carriers... they have the propulsion sorted, they are working on EMALS cats, and they have the Su-57, but also a programme of light 5th gen fighter with UAE... either way they have a choice.

The fact that they are talking about a 90 aircraft carrier suggests to me that they have looked at their experience with Kievs and Kuznetsovs and decided bigger is better.

Even if they went small and cheap I doubt they would build more than 2 anyway.

It is just my opinion, but I would expect the new CVNs to be in the 80-90K ton weight class, and that many of the 90 aircraft they talk about will be drones, including helicopter and fixed wing.

GunshipDemocracy wrote:

AlfaT8 wrote:
Yes, it's very confusing.

The 30kT CV is obviously a modified Lavina class, the idea is probly to invest everything in Lavina to save money, but the justification the Russian MoD is using is that the STOVL aircraft can also fulfill a fighter role, which is just nonsense, clearly there are too many official who's heads are still in the 1970s.
There is also a problem that the Lavina doesn't have enough weaponry to defend itself, which also means more escorts.

Nor Ford style carrier has.  I am a big fan of Russian TAKR concept as an asymmetric answer to large CVSG but more fitting to Russian doctrine.

It probly had more to do with cold water ports, extreme heat in a cold environment is just a recipe for trouble.

AlfaT8 wrote:
The 100kT carrier is just the other end of the extreme, although most of the aircrafts are ready, but we got no idea what the actual cost will be.
Estimates, put its costs closer to the Nimitz carrier, not the Ford.

True Russian costs are lower lest's say slash this by half. Still  I believe that price ratio of 100kt/30-40kt remains at the same level  ~1:4.
Saved cost can be used for development of V/STOL version of new light fighter.

1/4 so by this estimate the LHD will cost around $2Bill, considering the price of the Mistral and Wasp class, it should be within that cost range.
Now the STOVL is a little tricky, because of the development cost, now i don't have any solid numbers on the PAK-FA's development cost, but it's estimated somewhere  $10bill, let's assume the STOVL will be half that around $5bill.

So we are looking at and initial investment of at least $7bill, then we have to actually buy the new aircraft, which will cost around lets assume 2x the Mig29k, which is $32mill x 20 (Wasp class load out)= 650mill, so roughly $7.7bill minus choppers.

With these numbers, yes for the price of one super carrier we got an LHD with a full 20 STOVLs.
And after the initial cost the future LHD with full flights, will cost around $4bill.

This is all assuming the Lavina and it's modded variant will cost that much, overall this is guess work at best.

And the reason no one is in favor of Super carriers.

A medium carrier similar to the Kuz with flight wing would probly end up in the similar cost estimates of around $4-5billion.
You end up with more capable platform with more aircraft and a metric crap ton of missiles.

That depends on a lot of things most importantly the carrier's design. And don't expect a Su-57 only carrier i see no more than 10 the rest will probly be Mig-29K.

Not sure if in 2030-50ss a fighter with 1970s developed frame is the  best solution.

It's cheap and effective, and besides the frame is actually the renewed one from the late 90s.

The F-35 has 2 configs stealth with internal munitions only, and non-stealth with both internal and external munitions, the difference in weight/drag will effect the radius.

also different flight profile affects range. We can only assume 833km  was for lowest drag and profile combination

Then we got nothing, since we wont know their real ranges unless they're similarly fitted.

STOVL aircrafts are generally heavier and more critical points of failure, than conventional aircrafts, ergo their performance suffers with the extra weight as well as maintenance with extra components. Their carriers cost nothing because they're already built.

What with this midway crap, carrier aircrafts are simply superior to STOVL, and cheaper

Well F-35 is failed IMHO because 3 different fighter requirements were put in one plane. You cannot have a maneuverable fighter, stealth, VSTOL with carrier grade frame cheap, on time and without flaws    And yes it is complicated whts more all new gen fighters will be even more complicated. Biplanes were generally STOL and simple however were retired for a reason.

Superior in what? you saw radius speed or payload are not really different. So in what precisely? Than F35ccan sustain 7g instead of 9g? how many pilots can survive 9g? VSTOL fighters likely will be just a situational aware command center for swarms of drones in 20-30years or platform for stand-off missiles then dog fighters.


If Russia would focus on (V) STOL configuration maneuverable fighter with less emphasis on stealth perhaps you can have:
a) VSTOL fighter for own navy
b) V/STOL for AF
c) export for smaller countries


Pls note that Rafale was built in 180 units so far and Gripen 240 or so. So talking that 100-200 units is too little to build a fighter is really convincing.

Maneuverability, when your opponent is more maneuverable than you, you're dead.
No more dog fights, that's what they said in Vietnam.
If your opponent has similar technical capabilities enough to handle your missiles, then it'll come down to the gun, also if there are too many, and you don't have enough missiles, then it'll come down to the gun.
You are either ready or a target.

A) No idea whether the Navy actually wants these things.
B) The AF needs the best aircrafts to win, so STOVL is outta the question.
C) Who??
   Both India and China are investing in proper carriers, Iran is more a land power, and Cuba just doesn't have the money.

No idea what you're trying to say here???

But a billion, really?
Real problem is, we don't know what it will cost for Russia, or whether it will be built at all.

Meh Bloomberg said that 936 mln (I provided linke some psots earlier on in this thread) of so, but still cannot catapult/'arrest F-18 with full load :-) That's why Trump was pissed off.
EMALs was planned according to RuNavy for 100kt +Su-57      

Trump gets pissed at a lot of things.
To be expected if your gonna go big gotta put that EMALs in, who knows how much it will actually cost.

And i bet on Kinzhal.That is the question, which one is really cheaper, new LHD plus new STOVL or just new Carrier plus old fighters.
IMO, the carrier is the obvious choice, way more firepower than the LHD and you don't need to waste money on making new STOVL, but the MoD clearly has other plans.
Syria experience simply showed that Russia needs new carriers, that's it.
30 Kinzhals should be enough for all 10.

any aggression against Russian huydrograpic vessel is war. Not to mention light carrier( either TAKR or LHD) and for this there are Sarmats/Rubezh or orbital bombing. For securing humanitarian ops, colonial wars unversal ship with marines or fighters or ASW config seems to be the best fit.

War requires significant build up, whether one would happen just because of 1 or 2 LHDs sinking is anyone's best guess.
Best to make sure that doesn't happen, by investing in proper carriers.
Also for colonial missions these STOVLs will probly be overkill, Ka-52s would work fine.
And if the rumored VTOL drones are made, then the STOVL is just meaningless.

Well F-35 is failed IMHO because 3 different fighter requirements were put in one plane. You cannot have a maneuverable fighter, stealth, VSTOL with carrier grade frame cheap, on time and without flaws Smile And yes it is complicated whts more all new gen fighters will be even more complicated. Biplanes were generally STOL and simple however were retired for a reason.

It was the VSTOL requirement that killed it... that big internal fan thing is not a great idea and seriously reduces performance... of course extra lift engines is certainly no better.

VSTOL fighters likely will be just a situational aware command center for swarms of drones in 20-30years or platform for stand-off missiles then dog fighters.

To have decent situational awareness it needs AWACS support... to get AWACS support you need AWACS aircraft and also cats... if you are going to have cats anyway and support them only with fighters then why not one cat system and a ski jump ramp?

Fighters can start taking off while the AWACS aircraft is positioned and the cat is preped... when the AWACS is ready get it airborne and you will likely already have half a dozen fighters already in the air... as the AWACS climbs it scans for threats and directs those fighters already airborne while the new ones getting airborne form up too.

If Russia would focus on (V) STOL configuration maneuverable fighter with less emphasis on stealth perhaps you can have:
a) VSTOL fighter for own navy
b) V/STOL for AF
c) export for smaller countries

So all Russia has to do is design and build in less than 15 years a new 5th gen light fighter with VSTOL capabilities... that will only cost 10 billion.

With tiny helicopter carriers they wont need more than 12 per vessel, so we are talking about 48 aircraft at most.

The export customers that can afford 5th gen fighters seem to prefer bigger aircraft... have you not noticed the Su-30 is selling better than the MiG-29M most of the time.

any aggression against Russian huydrograpic vessel is war.

But what do you go to war with?

By your logic remove all weapons from all Russian vessels, because any aggression against them will bring the full military power of Russia upon them... any one attacks a small Russian ship and an anti ship missile pops up out of the water from a converted delta class sub and blows up the aggressor ship... and then a kalibr breaks surface and an hour later the home port of the aggressor is burning... really?

New high speed compound attack helos based on Mi-24/28s & Ka-52s could eliminate the need for STOVLs, or at least cut their #s:

Over the next 10-15 years we really don't have any idea what they have planned... skin surface radar antenna that allow all aircraft to scan enormous distances in 360 degrees so AWACS aircraft become redundant... airships with enormous arrays of antennas scanning in every frequency from visible light and IR through X rays and radio waves to gamma rays... combination aircraft... hovercraft airship... long range high altitude drones with nuclear powered turbojet engines that can stay aloft at 40km altitude for years on end...

If they delay CVN construction, it'll give more time for the economy to improve, build/modernize more escorts/fighters, icebrakers, subs, & save $.

If it is a CVN as opposed to a modified helicopter carrier/landing craft, then it wont get laid down until at least 2025... by then the support and infrastructure will be well on the way to being in place...

Now the STOVL is a little tricky, because of the development cost, now i don't have any solid numbers on the PAK-FA's development cost, but it's estimated somewhere $10bill, let's assume the STOVL will be half that around $5bill.

Less time and rather more complication with vertical take off and landing capability would make it more like 15 billion... especially in the time available.

It's cheap and effective, and besides the frame is actually the renewed one from the late 90s.

Lets face it the basic layout of the MiG-29 comes from the MiG-25... but then you could say the same about the Su-57 and the F-22.

Trump gets pissed at a lot of things.

Shame he does not get more pissed off at the orange man in his mirror...

Also for colonial missions these STOVLs will probly be overkill, Ka-52s would work fine.
And if the rumored VTOL drones are made, then the STOVL is just meaningless.

To be honest if you just want helicopter carriers then fitting Ka-52s with R-77s fitted with solid rocket boosters should be a fine replacement for a VSTOL fighter... the target really wont know the difference between an R-77 from a subsonic fighter or a helo launched from a hover ceiling of about 5km up most of the time.

A small solid rocket booster to make the missile climb to 10km altitude and accelerate it to 800km/h or more and it might as well have been fired by an F-35 equivalent.

Actually, an hybrid cat and ski jump carrier is perfectly possible, size and goemtry wise, in a Kuznetsov format.

The angled deck on Kuznetsov is used just for landings, but in a newly designed carrier, broadly the same size, it could host at least a single catapult.

At least, but if the AEW/AWACS requirement could be declined into a UAV platform, somewhat lighter and smaller than a combat aircraft, shorter catapults with a smaller general footprint could be the answer, making conceivable to install two catapults, for the sake of redundancy and fault tolerance.

Agreed. Not much changed since this was written last year:
https://taskandpurpose.com/russia-aircraft-carrier-pipe-dream/

“The Soviets weren’t dumb,” Holmes explained. “They wouldn’t spend themselves into oblivion to keep up with the Joneses, and as a great land power, they obviously had enormous claims on their resources to fund the army and air force. There was only so much to go around for ‘luxury fleet’ projects.”
“Bottom line, if you can’t afford to keep the existing fleet at sea, where are you going to get the money to complete your first nuclear-powered supercarrier, a vessel that will demand even more manpower that you can’t afford?” (This first appeared in 2015.)
..But Russia now seems willing to revive its supercarrier dream. “The navy will have an aircraft carrier,” Russian navy chief Adm. Viktor Chirkov recently said. “The research companies are working on it.”
Other Russian media reports indicate that designers are in the early phases of planning a new carrier class that would be slightly larger than the Nimitz class—and capable of holding an air wing of 100 planes. But economic problems — including a looming recession — and the expense of maintaining and modernizing the rest of the nation’s aging fleet makes it doubtful whether Russia can build such an expensive ship. Holmes estimates the cost of a new Russian carrier could be as much as $8.5 billion and take up to seven years to complete. But the professor also said the Russian quest for a carrier is serious.
Great nations have carriers, Russia considers itself a great nation, and therefore the ship would be a symbol of national revival and destiny. In other words, a new carrier would be one more reason to forget the bad old days when the Soviet Union disintegrated.
“We think of the Soviet Union as a dreary place, but Russians also remember that it wielded great power,” Holmes continued. “That’s a potent memory.” For Moscow’s navy, the failure of the Ulyanovsk project is one of the biggest, baddest memories of them all.
http://nationalinterest.org/blog/the-buzz/the-navys-nightmare-russias-almost-super-aircraft-carrier-24688?page=show

If the oil prices don't rise, all other things being equal to their present status, building CVNs may take a lot longer & prove to be detrimental to other more pressing needs. Even w/o involvement in Syria, the ME & FE, contingencies in the "post-Soviet space" may force them to cut funds for CVN construction. Selling Su-35s to PRC,etc. & FFGs to India won't help. Saudi Arabia could also order CV/Ns but she needs those B$ for the drive to reorient its economy from dependence on oil exports.

The angled deck on Kuznetsov is used just for landings, but in a newly designed carrier, broadly the same size, it could host at least a single catapult.

Actually there is a long run takeoff position on the angled deck for aircraft with a full fuel load and a full load of weapons... it is rarely used because to take off with full weapons means you have to use them or ditch them before landing... and for the aircraft on the carrier they never carry anything like a full load because their primary mission is air to air combat and AAMs are nothing like a full weapon load. Even with the Gefest & T upgrade with the Su-33s they would likely only be carrying a couple of R-73s and a couple of R-77s for self defence and a couple of 500kg bombs for the bombing mission they were on, which is nothing like their max capacity in weapons.

At least, but if the AEW/AWACS requirement could be declined into a UAV platform, somewhat lighter and smaller than a combat aircraft, shorter catapults with a smaller general footprint could be the answer, making conceivable to install two catapults, for the sake of redundancy and fault tolerance.

The point is that you compromise the design to make it smaller and lighter... it is better to use a bigger and heavier AWACS aircraft with better radar and better performance and just use a proper cat system to launch them. Two cats would be over kill as most of their fighters will be Su-57 based and therefore have a rather good thrust to weight ratio and almost no external drag issues with all their weapons being internal. The smaller lighter more powerfully engined Su-57 should easily be able to get airborne using a ski jump on a larger deck, if a larger heavier aircraft with less engine power and external weapons drag on the smaller deck of the Kuznetsov can already operate normally.

A cat can be used to launch AWACS platforms and perhaps an inflight refuelling aircraft based on the AWACS type so the fighters and the AWACS aircraft can stay airborne for longer over greater distances.

It doesn't matter - NOBODY is going to give you exact dat. If you have them be my guest please. Yet the point is THERE ARE no meaningful differences in payload, radius or speed between V/STOL and regular fighters if you use STOL take off . Yet this saves you a lots of costs and complications in shipbuilding.

Correction, they are going to give data that makes their product look good... if all your aircraft are going to be taking off in STOL mode then WTF is the point of developing a new 5th gen fighter that can land vertically?

Why add the complication and expense to something already complicated and not very cheap?

They add weight indeed there is always a trade off. You want short start and landing (ew vertical) you pay weight penalty.

It is more than just a weight penalty... it makes the design fat... it means you need a fricken enormous engine just to get barely supersonic... it means most of the internal structure carries high pressure air to puffer jets in the nose, the tail and the wing tips... any of which is damaged in combat and you wont be landing vertically anywhere... except nose first into the sea.

True you need AWACS, but Russian already put low end AWACS on Ka-32. Such stuff you caneasily put on Fregat drones (VSTOL ones

The Ka-31 is not bad, but if they are talking about EM cats and a boat with a 330m deck I am pretty sure it is not so they can fit more VSTOL aircraft.

They want a decent sized long ranged AWACS platform... which also means quite a large aircraft operating from the carrier that could also be used as an inflight refuelling aircraft to extend range and operational times for all the fixed wing aircraft that operate from the carrier... sort of the opposite of making the planes VSTOL.

The better build carrier with unit cost 10billion and then add a new fighter to it? Smile Making 48 makes no sense . Better~200+ look ad Gripan or Rafale. Tiny means 20-30 small fighters in CV config. 6-8 in mixed ASW/Patrol role.

The new carriers are for air defence, odds are they will likely have 48 plus aircraft that are Su-57s, and of the remaining 42 aircraft they will likely have about 8 of the AWACS/Tanker aircraft type... 2-4 being AWACS and 4-6 being inflight refuelling aircraft that can also perform light transport roles.

They will probably have 4-6 Kamovs in the SAR role and likely a dozen or so in the anti sub role, and perhaps a dozen MiG-29KRs for training and multirole missions... so that leaves how many for drones?

48 + 8 + 6 + 12 + 12 = 86

They will probably carry more than 4 drones so some of my figures might be over estimates perhaps...

Of course for certain missions they might carry extra aircraft like Ka-29 transports or Ka-52K attack types.

Perhaps because MiG-29 is not sold neither produced at all. Old and not used by Russian AF. No wonder.
Why they re-vive MiG-35 ? to export it because of niche an dto work on small fighter too.

Take head out of sand and shake for a bit... MiG-29 in use in Russian AF. Export contracts for MiG-29KR to India. Upgrade contracts to India for MiG-29. Egypt buying MiG-29 family aircraft. Russian Navy already has MiG-29KR aircraft and will not be disappearing in 10 years... and wont have had that many hours on the airframes by then either.

Previously the trainer for the admiral K was the Su-25, which in that capacity had no weapons on it.., it was not ground attack... it was purely training. Now they have two seat MiG-29s they can use for training and also other roles too...

Lets talk about actual example how many Russian planes operated in 3 years in Syria and how many ships were armed and sunk?

Considering the direct opposition to Russia in Syria had no means to sink ships there was only one purpose for armed ships in that conflict... ie Show.

If the conflict had been further afield and the situation more contested, then the need for armed support of a supply line becomes more important.

Carriers and other ships take a long time to build so you need to decide you need them well before you ever actually need them... otherwise it is too late.

A d how those numebrs relate do 20-24 fighters in small carrier.

You wouldn't get 24 fighters on a small carrier... it would not have enough fuel for 24 aircraft for very long...

And airwing was actually auxiliary. Soviets were smart and knwe they have no chance in confrontation midway style.

When the Soviets were building the Kievs there were all sorts of promises about VSTOL aircraft... they would be the only things flying in WWIII because all other aircraft would not be able to take off because all the airfield would be destroyed and all that shit.

Also they would make awesome ground attack aircraft... able to hide behind cover and pop up and attack and then roar off at high speed like a plane... except that experience in afghanistan showed it was all bullshit... VSTOL aircraft have no endurance even with STOL takeoffs, and they are fragile and vulnerable to ground fire... and the arrangement of their engine nozzles means they attract IR guided missiles from any angle... the air coming out of the side nozzles on a Harrier would make it an easy target for most IR guided MANPADS...

BTW In case large medium carriers will be chosen VSTOL still can be used on lighter LHD as extra fighter support.

Fighter support for LHDs would be more sensible in the form of the already developed Ka-52K and Ka-31...

Great then new Russian fighter wont be base don 70 year sold frame but only 50 year soled one!

Wow... because the US who spends 700 billion a year on defence is so much better off with their F-35s and F-18s.

Exactly what makes a mix of Su-57s and MiG-29KRs... well actually MiG-35s... so bad?

We know: their performance is comparable

You mean the super stealth brand new F-35 only has comparable performance to the F-18... an ancient aircraft... really?

Is that what VSTOL does to an aircrafts performance... makes it as good as a previous generation aircraft?

You mean maneuverability against adversary and adversary is what? ah F-35C or F-35B? or you are going to attack mainland America with 40 MiG-29 based fighters ?

Of course... that is what we have been saying all this time... these CVNs are for the invasion of the United States of America...

The aircraft on these carriers are airborne eyes and teeth and they will be used to defend the ships operating with the carrier.

a) Navy requested in according to Bndaryev

The same navy that requested and then rejected the Yak-41.

Today they want to see what can be made... and if they can perform a miracle they might buy some, but I rather suspect they wont and they will end up going for the Su-57.

Remember when the Kuznetsov was being developed in the 1970s all the mockups had MiG-23s on the carriers because that is what they thought would be operating from them... when these carriers are ready their might be a new plane we know nothing about that is ready for the job... whether it is all Russian or paid for by the UAE... or just a modification of the Su-57.

You compare Chinese or Indian size of economy with Russian? or you believe there is no relation between size of economy and military capabilities?

Big heavy planes don't always win... look at the F-4 and then F-15 and then F-16, or F-4, F-14, and then F-18. In both cases they got heavier and more expensive and then they ended up going smaller and slower and more expensive... the next step in both cases is stealthy which is super expensive, but they went big and low numbers and small and big numbers in the F-22 and F-35 respectively...

Do you think why Russia neither build carriers nor AMD?

Russia did build AMD... what do you think those missiles around Moscow were?

What do you think S-400 and S-500 are?

What is the Kuznetsov?

What are the plans for a 330m long CVN?

VSTOL is actually STVOL as living example proves (F-35B) . Example of Syrian campaign proves also that limited fighter continent is enough is such situation. That is surprisingly close to size of small carier airwing.

The example of Syria is a poor example of the navy testing their aircraft in a realistic environment.

The Navy is not going to be supporting the Russian Air Force or the Russian Army around the world in various hot spots... well it will if needed but its primary role is its own operations and its own defence... it will be protecting its surface ships and its subs and indeed things like oil rigs and other assets at sea from direct threats like pirates but also against active enemy forces potentially supported by powerful allies.

Its role wont be to send 4 Su-33s into enemy airspace to drop some dumb bombs from 10,000m on some terrorist HQ or Comms centre... or ammo dump.

Most of the time the 330m long carrier wont have 90 aircraft on board... it will more likely have 40-50 aircraft on board... possibly even less.

If the oil prices don't rise, all other things being equal to their present status, building CVNs may take a lot longer & prove to be detrimental to other more pressing needs. Even w/o involvement in Syria, the ME & FE, contingencies in the "post-Soviet space" may force them to cut funds for CVN construction. Selling Su-35s to PRC,etc. & FFGs to India won't help. Saudi Arabia could also order CV/Ns but she needs those B$ for the drive to reorient its economy from dependence on oil exports.

The billions they will spend in infrastructure and support vessels and shipyards/docks is already being spent... and the cost wont come out of one years budget... it will come out of 15-20 years of the budget... they will have already started it... including investment in EM cats and most likely new AWACS platforms with different radar antenna options.

Oil prices really don't come in to it, because the Russian government isn't an oil dependant nation any more... wake up and smell the roses.

Saying Russia can't afford it is like saying relax Russia... you don't need all those expensive nuclear weapons either... a carrier is not about becoming an imperial nation that invades and batters small countries into submitting to their will... it is the best level of defence a navy can offer its capital and other ships of its surface fleet as well as its submarines.

GarryB wrote:

The angled deck on Kuznetsov is used just for landings, but in a newly designed carrier, broadly the same size, it could host at least a single catapult.

Actually there is a long run takeoff position on the angled deck for aircraft with a full fuel load and a full load of weapons... it is rarely used because to take off with full weapons means you have to use them or ditch them before landing... and for the aircraft on the carrier they never carry anything like a full load because their primary mission is air to air combat and AAMs are nothing like a full weapon load. Even with the Gefest & T upgrade with the Su-33s they would likely only be carrying  a couple of R-73s and a couple of R-77s for self defence and a couple of 500kg bombs for the bombing mission they were on, which is nothing like their max capacity in weapons.

At least, but if the AEW/AWACS requirement could be declined into a UAV platform, somewhat lighter and smaller than a combat aircraft, shorter catapults with a smaller general footprint could be the answer, making conceivable to install two catapults, for the sake of redundancy and fault tolerance.

The point is that you compromise the design to make it smaller and lighter... it is better to use a bigger and heavier AWACS aircraft with better radar and better performance and just use a proper cat system to launch them. Two cats would be over kill as most of their fighters will be Su-57 based and therefore have a rather good thrust to weight ratio and almost no external drag issues with all their weapons being internal. The smaller lighter more powerfully engined Su-57 should easily be able to get airborne using a ski jump on a larger deck, if a larger heavier aircraft with less engine power and external weapons drag on the smaller deck of the Kuznetsov can already operate normally.

A cat can be used to launch AWACS platforms and perhaps an inflight refuelling aircraft based on the AWACS type so the fighters and the AWACS aircraft can stay airborne for longer over greater distances.

.

To be more precise, both the aft take off position and any angled deck catapult would be amidst of the landing path..

Compromises are inescapable, unless you design a 400 meters long carrier to totally separate landing path and all of the take off positions.

About AWACS, first take we the E-2C/D under the lenses.

Of its 26 tons MTOW, more than 2 tons are made of crew, crew seats, life supporting equipment and so on.

Leaving most of the performances the same, it is reasonable to think an unmanned, purpose built AEW aircraft could reduce its required MTOW to around 20 tons, increasing power to weight ratio and reducing accordingly the take off run and and acceleration requirement from the catapult.

Again, let's have a look at real world catapults: the present day steam catapults from US carriers are around 95 meters long, the french carrier Charles de Gaulle uses a couple of modified US catapults shortened to around 75 meters, still able to grant not only Rafales, but E-2C take offs too.

Having EM catapults, theoretically more efficient than steam ones, a lighter and with better power to weight unmanned AEW could grant the chance to shorten a little more the cats, giving a smaller footprint in the flight bridge.

And having a single catapult is quite unacceptable: the slightest jam or trouble with your single catapult, and for hours or days you will loose your AEW overwatch.

Two catapults along the angled deck, more or less as in the US carriers, won't disrupt a lot other bridge operations, granting fault tolerance.

To be more precise, both the aft take off position and any angled deck catapult would be amidst of the landing path..

So?

The angled deck landing run means the short deck ski jump takeoff runs can both be used, so while one aircraft is landing two can be taking off... once that aircraft has landed an AWACS aircraft can be positioned on the cat launcher while two more aircraft roll up and take off from the ski jump... when those two take off the AWACS aircraft should be ready to take off... and when it does any plane waiting to land can land... it is not rocket science.

Compromises are inescapable, unless you design a 400 meters long carrier to totally separate landing path and all of the take off positions.

the whole point behind the angled deck design is so that if a plane fails to land it can apply AB and stay airborne and not crash into aircraft on the front of the ship about to take off and go around and have another go at landing.

With the angled deck aircraft can take off from the front of the carrier... either by ski jump on a Russian carrier or by cat on a US carrier.

In some situations there are lots of aircraft waiting to land and you don't need to launch many... in other cases you need to get as many aircraft airborne as you can as quickly as you can so you operate all takeoff methods at the same time... and landing aircraft is less important.

Leaving most of the performances the same, it is reasonable to think an unmanned, purpose built AEW aircraft could reduce its required MTOW to around 20 tons, increasing power to weight ratio and reducing accordingly the take off run and and acceleration requirement from the catapult.

Agreed but then you could argue if you have a catapult on board specifically for getting heavy aircraft operational on a carrier so you benefit from a large radar antenna and lots of fuel so it has excellent range, and it can have onboard processing so it is not broadcasting lots and lots of unprocessed data to nearby ships for processing, so it can instead send short bursts of important processed information and actually command the aircraft in the air itself instead of requiring a ship to transmit information to the planes and therefore giving away its position why bother?

Sure, save 6 tons in the design by removing the crew... and then add 6 tons of fuel so it can fly longer, or a bigger radar antenna so it can see further and clearer.

Having EM catapults, theoretically more efficient than steam ones, a lighter and with better power to weight unmanned AEW could grant the chance to shorten a little more the cats, giving a smaller footprint in the flight bridge.

On a 330m long carrier deck why does it need to be shorter?

And having a single catapult is quite unacceptable: the slightest jam or trouble with your single catapult, and for hours or days you will loose your AEW overwatch.

Two catapults along the angled deck, more or less as in the US carriers, won't disrupt a lot other bridge operations, granting fault tolerance.

You could have as many as you wanted... you could have two that go right to the rear end of the ship, right down the angled landing run... this is a Russian carrier... there are only going to be about 8-10 aircraft that actually need it to get airborne... the rest of the time most of the other aircraft will be taking off on the ski jump.

GunshipDemocracy wrote:

AlfaT8 wrote:

Nor Ford style carrier has.  I am a big fan of Russian TAVKR concept as an asymmetric answer to large CVSG but more fitting to Russian doctrine.

It probly had more to do with cold water ports, extreme heat in a cold environment is just a recipe for trouble.

No it was great designed ship for purpose. Same ac CVs are. CVs are to intimidate, support invasions or fight large sea-air battles.  Russian TAVKR were desinged for ASW. Antiship weapons were Bazalp P-500 misisles. And airwing was actually auxiliary.  Soviets were smart and knwe they have no chance in confrontation midway style.

My bad, i though you were just talking about the catapult system
As for ASW, that's (PKR) "ASW cruiser" not (TAVKR) "Heavy aircraft carrying cruiser".
As for the mission, the Kuz was made to handle most of them, very Multi-role.

More like they tried to circumvent the Midway nonsense by investing in missiles.

nobody so far proposed such thing though BTW In case large medium carriers will be chosen  VSTOL still can be used on lighter LHD as extra fighter support.

Yes, it's very confusing that such proposals were not made.
Too expensive.
All i can do is hope that once the problems with S/VTOL present themselves, ....again, that the Navy go's back to the Kuz concept.

Not sure if in 2030-50ss a fighter with 1970s developed frame is the  best solution.

It's cheap and effective, and besides the frame is actually the renewed one from the late 90s.

Great then new Russian fighter wont be base don 70 year sold frame but only 50 year soled one!

If it can do the job, it can do it.

 Then we got nothing, since we wont know their real ranges unless they're similarly fitted.

We know: their performance is comparable  

Let's hope.

Maneuverability, when your opponent is more maneuverable than you, you're dead.
No more dog fights, that's what they said in Vietnam.
If your opponent has similar technical capabilities enough to handle your missiles, then it'll come down to the gun, also if there are too many, and you don't have enough missiles, then it'll come down to the gun.
You are either ready or a target.

You mean maneuverability against adversary and adversary is what? ah F-35C or F-35B? or you are going to attack mainland America with 40 MiG-29 based fighters ?

Yap, and J-31/20, plus Legacy fighters.
You are either ready or a target.

a) Navy requested in according to Bndaryev  


b) RuAF too according to him - Short lane in war times is priceless


c) STOL fight on half price of Su-30? any African, Asian or Latin country wanting to have a good fighter cheap in maintenance.
You compare Chinese or Indian size of economy with Russian? or you believe there is no relation between size of economy  and military capabilities?

A) Who???....... The head of the RuNavy is Vladimir Ivanovich Korolev

B) The head of the Aerospace forces is Sergey Surovikin, and they've bee doing a lot of highway take-off exercises.

C) The Su-30 cost around $40mill the Mig-29 cost around $20mill, and you think a new S/VTOL is gonna cost as much as the Mig-29, really?    
   Even the Mig-35 is around $40mill, and that's just an upgraded variant.
   And a brand new S/VTOL to have cheaper maintenance too, really?
   This isn't some multi-platform solution like the F-35.
They are investing in real Carriers, so i doubt they are interested in some S/VTOL compromise.

War requires significant build up, whether one would happen just because of 1 or 2 LHDs sinking is anyone's best guess.
Best to make sure that doesn't happen, by investing in proper carriers.

and go bankrupt because of their costs? then you lost war without and shooting. Do you think why Russia  neither build carriers nor AMD?

Investing in a platform that can actually survive will save more than a platform that can hardly defend itself.
Why, fear, incompetence, financial restraints, Stalin's words about Carriers only being a weapon of aggression, who knows.
AMD???

Also for colonial missions these STOVLs will probly be overkill, Ka-52s would work fine.
And if the rumored VTOL drones are made, then the STOVL is just meaningless.

VSTOL is actually STVOL as living example proves (F-35B) . Example of Syrian campaign proves also that limited fighter continent is enough is such situation. That is surprisingly close to size of small carier airwing.

So can Drones.
Or even Monoplane.

GarryB wrote:

To be more precise, both the aft take off position and any angled deck catapult would be amidst of the landing path..

So?

The angled deck landing run means the short deck ski jump takeoff runs can both be used, so while one aircraft is landing two can be taking off... once that aircraft has landed an AWACS aircraft can be positioned on the cat launcher while two more aircraft roll up and take off from the ski jump... when those two take off the AWACS aircraft should be ready to take off... and when it does any plane waiting to land can land... it is not rocket science.

Compromises are inescapable, unless you design a 400 meters long carrier to totally separate landing path and all of the take off positions.

the whole point behind the angled deck design is so that if a plane fails to land it can apply AB and stay airborne and not crash into aircraft on the front of the ship about to take off and go around and have another go at landing.

With the angled deck aircraft can take off from the front of the carrier... either by ski jump on a Russian carrier or by cat on a US carrier.

In some situations there are lots of aircraft waiting to land and you don't need to launch many... in other cases you need to get as many aircraft airborne as you can as quickly as you can so you operate all takeoff methods at the same time... and landing aircraft is less important.

Leaving most of the performances the same, it is reasonable to think an unmanned, purpose built AEW aircraft could reduce its required MTOW to around 20 tons, increasing power to weight ratio and reducing accordingly the take off run and and acceleration requirement from the catapult.

Agreed but then you could argue if you have a catapult on board specifically for getting heavy aircraft operational on a carrier so you benefit from a large radar antenna and lots of fuel so it has excellent range, and it can have onboard processing so it is not broadcasting lots and lots of unprocessed data to nearby ships for processing, so it can instead send short bursts of important processed information and actually command the aircraft in the air itself instead of requiring a ship to transmit information to the planes and therefore giving away its position why bother?

Sure, save 6 tons in the design by removing the crew... and then add 6 tons of fuel so it can fly longer, or a bigger radar antenna so it can see further and clearer.

Having EM catapults, theoretically more efficient than steam ones, a lighter and with better power to weight unmanned AEW could grant the chance to shorten a little more the cats, giving a smaller footprint in the flight bridge.

On a 330m long carrier deck why does it need to be shorter?

And having a single catapult is quite unacceptable: the slightest jam or trouble with your single catapult, and for hours or days you will loose your AEW overwatch.

Two catapults along the angled deck, more or less as in the US carriers, won't disrupt a lot other bridge operations, granting fault tolerance.

You could have as many as you wanted... you could have two that go right to the rear end of the ship, right down the angled landing run... this is a Russian carrier... there are only going to be about 8-10 aircraft that actually need it to get airborne... the rest of the time most of the other aircraft will be taking off on the ski jump.

So any aircraft carrier's design is a compromise.

If one or two catapults are worrying because interferring with the aft take off spot, you would be better going full cats, giving away the ski jump.

But catapults have two strong requirements, they have quite a large footprint and require a lot of energy.

In addition to that, if Russian Navy is so satisfied with present short take offs through ski jump up to the point to keep the ski jump even in a future carrier design, it is likely no catapult would be installed on the fore flying bridge.

Provided that catapults are required anyway for AEWs and maybe long endurance UAVs, the next logical place where to install them is the angled deck.

And if you rely on catapults to get your AEWs airborne, you want to have at least two catapults.

Obviously a 330 meters long flying bridge got far more available space for any kind of equipment, but it still has to be seen whether russian navy will opt for such a large design.

I would bet on a relatively smaller design, topping maybe the 80.000 tons mark, nuclear powered, with a standard air wing made of around 40 combat aircrafts, 3 AEW, a SAR detachment, some ASW helicopters, with the capability to step up the air wing for shorter, high intensity operations.

At around 60 aircrafts, between fixed wing and rotary, as a stamdard loadout, and more than 70 for shorter missions, it would be a really credible tool.

In a all out war it would fight in defensive operations, cohordinating itself with land based assets, making it able to withstand forces nominally stronger than its air wing.

On the other hand, while operating in Syria like scenarios, an air wing of around 60 aircrafts deployable anywhere in the world would be a really powerfull tool.

And the reduced costs on building, operating and providing the related air wing compared to a more than 100.000 tons carrier with 90 or more aircrafts could open the chance to build a third one.

So any aircraft carrier's design is a compromise.

Very true.

If one or two catapults are worrying because interferring with the aft take off spot, you would be better going full cats, giving away the ski jump.

And here we depart again...

If you were designing a US carrier then, yes, getting rid of the ski jump is a necessity because none of their aircraft can get airborne without the use of a cat... I am talking about their fixed wing full sized carriers with the cat launched F-35 and F-18 and other larger aircraft.

The Cat system on the new Russian carrier will only be used for AWACS platforms and inflight refuelling tanker aircraft and occasionally a light transport... all three the same aircraft size and type with different weights depending on the role... ie empty transport being lightest config, AWACS being next and full tanker or full transport being likely the heaviest config.

Ski jump means all the fighters can get airborne rapidly... you could have two short run takeoff positions and two long takeoff positions using the ski jump... odds are at least one and possibly two of the long runs will preclude using the cats and also landing, but in an emergency when an attack is detected being able to set up four fighters for take off rapidly one after the other is more valuable than taking rather more time to get an aircraft airborne on a cat that could have taken off via the ski jump.

In the time it takes to set up the two aircraft on the short takeoff ski jump run they can be setting up two more on the long take off run for the ski jump too, so that when the front two have each taken off then the next two can take off almost immediately after them and then four more fighters can be moved to launch positions... see how that is better than getting rid of the ski jump and only being able to launch two aircraft at a time on cats that each have to be set up individually...

But catapults have two strong requirements, they have quite a large footprint and require a lot of energy.

By 2025 their new CVN will be nuclear powered but likely electric drive so electrical supply should not be a problem... and the large footprint only applies to steam cats with high pressure steam piping.

The EM cats will need substantial shielding, but otherwise wont be any where near as problematic as steam.

In addition to that, if Russian Navy is so satisfied with present short take offs through ski jump up to the point to keep the ski jump even in a future carrier design, it is likely no catapult would be installed on the fore flying bridge.

They have stated there will be two ski jump launches and one cat... I assume they are referring to launch positions meaning one ski jump with two launch positions and a cat launcher that presumably does not use the ski jump.

Provided that catapults are required anyway for AEWs and maybe long endurance UAVs, the next logical place where to install them is the angled deck.

A 330m long deck suggests plenty of launch options.

Most long endurance UAVs have very big wingspans... storage and launch issues there...

And if you rely on catapults to get your AEWs airborne, you want to have at least two catapults.

Or carry UAV, airship, and Ka-31 alternatives...

I would bet on a relatively smaller design, topping maybe the 80.000 tons mark, nuclear powered, with a standard air wing made of around 40 combat aircrafts, 3 AEW, a SAR detachment, some ASW helicopters, with the capability to step up the air wing for shorter, high intensity operations.

I personally am thinking 80-90K ton vessel with a large for its size deck... lots of on deck storage space... for 90 aircraft if you need them but most of the time rather less... just like the K almost never has a full aircraft compliment...

And the reduced costs on building, operating and providing the related air wing compared to a more than 100.000 tons carrier with 90 or more aircrafts could open the chance to build a third one.

Reduced costs would be fine, but I think more than two is unnecessary... upgrade the Kuznetsov... use things that will go in the new carrier design including replacing the propulsion with NPPs for a start and give it electric drive propulsion so the big long screw shafts and transmission can be removed, the NPPs can be placed anywhere you want... even one where the Granits are located... it will already be well protected and firewalled off.. electric motor pods at the front and rear so it wont need tugs to manouver in tight places.

Note that for a ski jump take off you position the aircraft so its wheels are held by chocks built into the deck and a large shield is raised behind the aircraft to deflect its engine blast so it does not effect other aircraft on the deck... positioning four aircraft does not take an enormous amount of time and once ready the pilot gives the thumbs up and selects full AB... the chocks drop and the aircraft takes off... the next three pilots do the same... when the front two planes have taken off the ramp shields are lowered into the deck and they are no longer in the way of the rear two aircraft which can then take off. Once they have all taken off you move four more aircraft out to the takeoff positions, raise the chocks and blast shields and do it again.

With a cat you still raise a blast shield but instead of chocks you fit the nose gear to the sled attached to the cat. The person controlling the cat then sets the power for the type of aircraft and its current weight (ie fuel levels, ordinance level etc) and then pushes a button to launch the aircraft... obviously warning the pilot he is about to be launched first... the sled then retracts to the start and the next aircraft is brought out and attached...

Russia has, and it will always have the problem of having its two main fleets thousand of miles apart.

Even if the northern route would become 365 days a year available, whenever one carrier will need any serious maintenance cycle, tipically requiring many months to be completed. there would be just one carrier left.

At mid-life overhaul, easily taking years for ships of such complexity, it would be even worse.

Three carriers would grant a seamless transition between the typical three phases of any navy ship: training period, active duty period, maintenance/overhaul period, without any risk of having times with no carriers available and 100% operative, and having most of the time actually two carriers on active duty.

The real gold standard would be to have two carriers in each fleet, but three shared between the Northern and the Pacific fleets could be a good compromise if well managed.