Russian VTOL fighter development

Do you think a productionline of yak141 is feesible? I think it would only be done if there were a need for it in the russian navy. But the navy laks carriers for these aircraft. Unfortunaly they were scraped or sold years ago. A foreign State order would have to be large to cover the cost. I don't think it Will happen. But i do love that plane.

EKS wrote:Do you think a productionline of yak141 is feesible? I think it would only be done if there were a need for it in the russian navy. But the navy laks carriers for these aircraft. Unfortunaly they were scraped or sold years ago. A foreign State order would have to be large to cover the cost. I don't think it Will happen. But i do love that plane.

China plan to develop VSTOL aircraft for their naval needs and Russia will also have LHDs similar to Mistral, where they could place them. Also those planes could operate from smaller islands in VTOL regime from helipads like Chinese islands in SCS or Russian bases in Arctic islands. On the other hand there is more and more LHDs and smaller carriers around which need VSTOL fighters. Harriers are no more in production and F-35 is extremely expensive. In current situation Yak-141 have export market and potential to be produced in hundreds. Point is, that if China want to develop VSTOL plane, they have to start from the beginning, on the other hand Russia only have to restart the project and finish it. Russia could save a lot of money and time with Yak-141. In other case, chinese plane will take this market.

medo wrote:

EKS wrote:Do you think a productionline of yak141 is feesible? I think it would only be done if there were a need for it in the russian navy. But the navy laks carriers for these aircraft. Unfortunaly they were scraped or sold years ago. A foreign State order would have to be large to cover the cost. I don't think it Will happen. But i do love that plane.

China plan to develop VSTOL aircraft for their naval needs and Russia will also have LHDs similar to Mistral, where they could place them. Also those planes could operate from smaller islands in VTOL regime from helipads like Chinese islands in SCS or Russian bases in Arctic islands. On the other hand there is more and more LHDs and smaller carriers around which need VSTOL fighters. Harriers are no more in production and F-35 is extremely expensive. In current situation Yak-141 have export market and potential to be produced in hundreds. Point is, that if China want to develop VSTOL plane, they have to start from the beginning, on the other hand Russia only have to restart the project and finish it. Russia could save a lot of money and time with Yak-141. In other case, chinese plane will take this market.

Well maby the Chinese want russian participation in the development of a vstol aircraft, but i don't see a deal Like the su30 likely in the future. Also, there isn't a productionline yet. So the costs are high. The point is the Chinese want selfsufficiency and they won't buy off the shelf aircraft. Although not in large numbers.

If the russian navy wants a plane Like yak141, and if there is a effective use for them, i guess it Will be in maby 10 to 20 years, then i think they Will develop a new aircraft based on yak141 tech, Like the USA did.

IMO a russian design of a LHD Will first of all serve as a helicopter carrier for ASW (in the bastion defence startegy as they lack the old LHD) and a limited coast attack role. The offshore airdefence role will be met by the naval landbased fighters. The future blue sea airdefence is for the new aircraftcarrier on the designboard.

But never say never. The vstol aircraft can operate from a large LHD.

They wont be selling the Kuznetsov to anyone... why would they?

It is rather unlikely they will reactivate the Yak-141 either... the number of aircraft they want on their carriers (ie talk of 100 in the most recent releases) means they wont be making small carriers, so it makes no sense to develop a VSTOL aircraft.

The whole point of VSTOL fighters for the navy is so they can operate fixed wing aircraft from smaller cheaper platforms... if they are building bigger platforms it makes rather more sense to use existing types like MiG-29K and PAK FA as they are fully developed or to be fully developed multirole fighter bombers already.

With full thrust vector control engines it is rather likely that the MiG-29k and PAK FA will be able to take off full loads anyway as they can optimise their angle of attack on takeoff to get maximum engine lift and maximum wing lift as they accelerate from the ship...

(note the corsair had a ram wing that could be lifted up to increase wing angle to increase lift with a lower angle of attack so the engines are more horizontal to increase acceleration... the MiG-29K and PAK FA could raise their noses and increase the wing angle with their engine nozzles angled up to create horizontal thrust for better acceleration....)

Yes ok, everyone knows the USA's F-35 is shite.

BUT what about a Russian plane. VTOL or perhaps STOL that wouldn't need a runway. It would have a level of stealth.
It could be carried on heli carriers or perhaps even large destroyers. It wouldn't need huge aircraft carriers.

IN other words, it could be used instead of choppers but would be far superior.

The old Yak VTOL was considered better than its rivals but development ended with the cessation of the Soviet Union.

Perhaps this project could be restarted. OK it wouldn't be cheap. But you might save money on choppers, on aircraft carriers, on runways and other things. You'd also save on the number of ships need to protect a battle group.

Mix it with some cutting edge drones and hypersonic missiles and you have the punch of an aircraft carrier battle group. WITHOUT even needing an aircraft carrier.

Afaik, STOL and VTOL aircrafts have many limitations. On a ship, the vertical landing could be more attractive than the short takeoff, for saving space, but an airplane that has to carry around the weight of the vertical thrust is too limited in performances All Navy aircrafts of the world can operate also with an engine out, the thrust is enough. The problem is the space for the onboard landing and the space for maintenance, storage, weapons, jet fuel and spare parts. So are the ship's dimensions who are important, not the VTOL performances of the aircrafts. Without big onboard hangars and stores you can not have enough aircrafts onboard and you can not make them to do a sufficient number of missions in the time's unit. Above all you need to launch, recover and resupply a sufficient number of aircrafts, otherwise the whole thing is not convenient, so you need a very big ship, not V/STOL aircrafts. It may be not pleasant, but also the Kuznetsov seems to me a bit 'small.
A different issue is the close air support for landing troops.

BUT what about a Russian plane. VTOL or perhaps STOL that wouldn't need a runway. It would have a level of stealth.
It could be carried on heli carriers or perhaps even large destroyers. It wouldn't need huge aircraft carriers.

IN other words, it could be used instead of choppers but would be far superior.

The old Yak VTOL was considered better than its rivals but development ended with the cessation of the Soviet Union.

VSTOL aircraft are fragile and expensive and not high performance aircraft.

It is not just vectored thrust engines... they need puffer fans to blow air out their noses and tails and wingtips to allow for controlability in the hover.

Remember a conventional fixed wing aircraft is controlled in flight by deflecting the slipstream of air flowing over the wing and tail surfaces... in a hover there is no air flowing over the wings and tail so all lift comes from the engines and high pressure air blown from the engines to the wing tips, nose and tail... all adding weight and points of vulnerability to battle damage or simple malfunction.

Mix it with some cutting edge drones and hypersonic missiles and you have the punch of an aircraft carrier battle group. WITHOUT even needing an aircraft carrier.

The thing is that the choice of building a 20K ton helicopter carrier to carry VSTOL aircraft is not actually that much cheaper than building a decent 50-60K ton carrier carrying aircraft you have already developed for your ground based air fleet.

The Su-33 and MiG-29KR are vastly superior to anything the Yak-141 could have evolved into and the naval PAK FA will make the difference even greater.

They claimed the Harrier could take off from anywhere but in reality it had to operate from special PSP (pierced steel planking) surfaces that have been cleared of debris. The idea of taking off from a shopping mall carpark was just bullshit... one high fibre McDonalds burger packet and that plane crashes and burns...

The MiG and Su-27 get around the issue of debris on the ground with intake covers that prevent material entering the intakes on takeoff and landing. The US has regular flight line marches where personel line up and pick up any small bits and pieces that might damage an aircraft engine... in war time who has time for that crap?

To take out a US airfield just spread a few tons of old bits of non magnetic metal like washers and bolts and shit... no need for explosives or mines...

Another aspect that is not often considered is that most VSTOL aircraft have thrust vectored engine nozzles often mounted at the side of the fuselage making for an excellent IR target from most angles including the front...

A Harrier would be extremely vulnerable to even old model MANPADS... the engine nozzle is an ideal target for such a weapon and because of the position it is visible from almost any angle...

Ministry of Defense is considering creation of a vertical takeoff aircraft

Zhukovsky (Moscow Region), July 18 - RIA Novosti. Russia's Defense Ministry is discussing the creation of a vertical takeoff aircraft for aircraft carriers on the basis of "Yak", he told reporters on Tuesday, Deputy Minister Yuri Borisov.
"Defense is discussing with our aircraft manufacturers the creation of aircraft with short takeoff and landing, possibly VTOL this development." Yakovskoy "line" - Borisov said.

РИА Новости https://ria.ru/arms/20170718/1498711735.html
https://ria.ru/arms/20170718/1498711735.html

https://vz.ru/news/2017/7/18/879188.html


Well I was always a big fan of Yak 141 and I am convinced  that you can pack this on "Mistral" like LHS or use old good Aircraft Carrying Cruiser concepts to protect own fleet on far away operations. LHS with 12-16 fighters is not that bad support after all.

PS is this needs to me moved pls advise where

GunshipDemocracy wrote:Ministry of Defense is considering creation of a vertical takeoff aircraft......................

Yeah, ''totally'' MoD idea...

I said before that United Arab Emirates have ordered new 5th gen fighter and that in usual Arab extravaganza they will want all the fancy stuff that looks cool even if they have no use for it.

VTOL system looks cool and Arabs are loaded with cash....

A MiG and Yakovlev jv fighter jet will make me cream my pants.

Russia is developing hypersonic weapons and vertical takeoff aircraft


https://iz.ru/674713/2017-11-23/rossiia-razrabatyvaet-giperzvukovoe-oruzhie-i-samolet-vertikalnogo-vzleta

Russia is developing hypersonic weapons, this issue was discussed at meetings with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Also, work is underway to create a vertical takeoff aircraft.

This was reported by Deputy Defense Minister Yuri Borisov, noting that these developments are taken into account in the draft new state arms program.

So VTOL and aircraft carrying cruisers ?

The article seems a little odd, but that could just be the translation.
But if true, then F, what a waist, looks like we're going back to the Kiev-class.

Garry is gonna be pissed.

Total waste of money and time.... VSTOL jet fixed wing aircraft as we know them are total pieces of rubbish.

Limited performance, super fragile, super expensive, high loss rate for no real return except being able to make cheaper limited aircraft carriers that don't really stack up against decent modern aircraft.

Total waste of time and money.

The hope they might develop a design that fixes all the problems is tiny because their problems are enormous.... high pressure piping of air to the wing tips, nose and tail to enable a stable hover means lots of extra weight and complexity and of course vulnerability to damage or failure.

The best thing they ever did was scale up to the K with conventional fixed wing aircraft also used by the Air Force.

The Russian AF has no use for crappy short range expensive slow VSTOL aircraft.... even a basic generic MiG-29 shaped airframe with the radar and engine you put into the VSTOL aircraft will have better performance and be much cheaper and much safer.

There was a famous photographer of aircraft a while back... he unfortunately died and I can't remember his name but the two seater of theYak-38M is the one aircraft he refused to fly in.... It did not have a high kill rate for its pilots but it had a high crash rate the pilots being saved by the automatic ejection system...

Isos wrote:The most weird is that a longer flight deck with a ski jump isn t expensive to build and they can upgrade easily mig 29k or design a new 5th generation mig based on mig 29k.

I don t understand what they really want. They say they are planing a 100 kt supercarrier but also a vstol fighter which are made for really small carrier. They want one thing and its opposite.

It's really a mystery to me as well.

First they said that they're going to develop a naval PAK-FA with the MiG-29K used as a stopgap in the meantime and Su-33s to be withdrawn.
Then they wanted to put the Kuznetsov into deep modernization.
Then they said they wanted to build some new carriers with catapults and all the rest of it.
Then they said they'll keep the Su-33s after all and upgrade them, to provide a long-range air defence envelope.
It's nearly 2018 and the Kuznetsov is still not undergoing that deep modernization.
Somewhere in the midst of all this they developed the Ka-52K and started talking about helicopter carriers to replace the lost Mistrals, and about how versatile the Ka-52K can be including for anti-ship duties.
And now they're talking about VTOL aircraft and carriers.

The only way this VTOL stuff would make sense is if they bin the navalization of the PAK-FA, bin the modernization of the Kuznetsov (let it serve out 10 more years and then withdraw it), bin the idea of the helicopter carriers - and just use the VTOL aircraft and carriers to fulfill all these functions instead whether air-defence for the fleet, land-assault operations or anti-ship missions.
In this way it would actually be a cost effective move.
Different question is whether a VTOL aircraft would be able to fulfill all those functions acceptably. That's the engineering challenge.

Or maybe it's all just a ploy to confuse NATO analysts.

flamming_python wrote:...............

The only way this VTOL stuff would make sense is if they bin the navalization of the PAK-FA, bin the modernization of the Kuznetsov (let it serve out 10 more years and then withdraw it), bin the idea of the helicopter carriers - and just use the VTOL aircraft and carriers to fulfill all these functions instead whether air-defence for the fleet, land-assault operations or anti-ship missions.
In this way it would actually be a cost effective move.
Different question is whether a VTOL aircraft would be able to fulfill all those functions acceptably. That's the engineering challenge.
...................

I think that is precisely what they are going for. USS Wasp/America-class style ship that will do both jobs depending on aircraft complement at the time.

PapaDragon wrote:

flamming_python wrote:...............

The only way this VTOL stuff would make sense is if they bin the navalization of the PAK-FA, bin the modernization of the Kuznetsov (let it serve out 10 more years and then withdraw it), bin the idea of the helicopter carriers - and just use the VTOL aircraft and carriers to fulfill all these functions instead whether air-defence for the fleet, land-assault operations or anti-ship missions.
In this way it would actually be a cost effective move.
Different question is whether a VTOL aircraft would be able to fulfill all those functions acceptably. That's the engineering challenge.
...................

I think that is precisely what they are going for. USS Wasp/America-class style ship that will do both jobs depending on aircraft complement at the time.

Looks like US Marines/Spanish/UK and Italian navies opted for as Garry says mediocre expensive, fighters F-35 in STOVL version... Russian as well. Looks like some advantages are there.



Chronologically there were announced by Russian top brass:

1. We consider big AC 100,000 displacement and small about 30,000 tons displacement. Possibly unified with Liders (ekhm I guess this was referring to power reactors...)

2. We restart vertical start fighter production for navy

3. There could be Vgen fighter project coo-financed by UAE

4. We are gonna build Aircraft Cruisers but by end of new program (i.e. ~2025) because first we need to have vertical take off fighter. (very recent interview with Bondarev)


On Yak-43 (land based version -Efim Gordon as source in Wiki) they considered NK-32... and now surprise NK-32 is alive and kicking in new version.

5. If you look at Ulyanovsk class drawings you can see then all missile launchers are vertical. If RuN is going for Aircraft Cruiser option my educated guess would be they use UKSK-M embedded in deck.



BTW schema of group start for Yak-141s.
http://www.airwar.ru/enc/fighter/yak141.html







But of course life will tell . Only speculations.

NK-32 would be ideal engine for the the jump jet. Huge engine though.

miketheterrible wrote:NK-32 would be ideal engine for the the jump jet.  Huge engine though.

If you compare F-35 STOVL engine PW with KH there are not so much differences...IMHO goo dsignt Kh-32 can go to Tu-160M2, PAK DA, Tu-22M3M and new ?Yak ))



Specifications (F135-PW-600)[edit]
Data from F135engine.com[44]
General characteristics
Type: Afterburning Turbofan with shaft driven remote lift fan
Length: 369 in (937.3 cm)
Diameter: 46 in (116.8 cm) maximum, 43 in (109.2 cm) fan inlet, 53 in (134.6 cm) lift fan inlet
Dry weight:

Performance
Maximum thrust: 41,000 lbf (182 kN) max, 27,000 lbf (120 kN) intermediate, 40,650 lbf (180.8 kN) hover


NK-32
General characteristics
Type: Three-spool low-bypass afterburning turbofan
Length: 6,000 mm (20 ft)[4]
Diameter: 1,460 mm (4.79 ft)[4]
Dry weight: 3,400 kg (7,500 lb)[4]
Components
Compressor: 3-stage LP (fan), 5-stage IP, 7-stage HP
Combustors: annular
Turbine: 1-stage HP, 1-stage IP, 2-stage LP
Performance
Maximum thrust: Cruise thrust: 14 000 kgf (31,000 lbf, 137 kN)[5] Afterburning thrust: 25 000 kgf (55,000 lbf, 245 kN) [5]

The obvious problems are its length... it is 6 metres long... so six metres behind where its front fans are there is 25 tons of thrust pushing down... what are you going to put up the front to balance that sort of force? Another one?

The engine itself weigh 3.5 tons... what are they going to mount in the front that can match its lift and doesn't add another 3.5 tons of weight?

The Tu-160 is an expensive aircraft to run... it burns through a lot of fuel per hour... even if the fuel consumption is dramatically reduced it is still going to need a huge amount of fuel to get any decent flight range...

In comparison a cat assisted takeoff and arrested landing and you put this engine into an aircraft and it is going to be a very fast medium to heavy fighter.

GarryB wrote:The obvious problems are its length... it is 6 metres long... so six metres behind where its front fans are there is 25 tons of thrust pushing down... what are you going to put up the front to balance that sort of force? Another one?

similar to F-35 with one engine ? after wiki

" The Lift System is composed of a lift fan, drive shaft, two roll posts and a "Three Bearing Swivel Module" (3BSM).[66] The 3BSM is a thrust vectoring nozzle which allows the main engine exhaust to be deflected downward at the tail of the aircraft. The lift fan is near the front of the aircraft and provides a counterbalancing thrust using two counter-rotating blisks.[67] It is powered by the engine's low-pressure (LP) turbine via a drive shaft and gearbox. Roll control during slow flight is achieved by diverting unheated engine bypass air through wing-mounted thrust nozzles called Roll Posts.[68][69]"

GarryB wrote:

The Tu-160 is an expensive aircraft to run... it burns through a lot of fuel per hour... even if the fuel consumption is dramatically reduced it is still going to need a huge amount of fuel to get any decent flight range...

Garry Garry Garry, you're such a pessimist

NK-32 (before update model)
Specific fuel consumption: (supersonic) 48g/kN/hour[6](subsonic): 0.72-0.73 kg/kgf/hour[6]

For F-35 I've found something like 0,88 lb/lbf/hr but at thgsi time I am not going to calculate this

GarryB wrote:
In comparison a cat assisted takeoff and arrested landing and you put this engine into an aircraft and it is going to be a very fast medium to heavy fighter.

Heh I am not saying thet CATOBAR is bad but so fat I am still big fan of VTOL/STOVL fighters

The VSTOL fighter is a one trick pony that creates more problems than it solves.

You end up with carriers that are too small to be useful for anything, with light weak aircraft that are as fragile as anything and not really more useful than a much simpler conventional aircraft.

CATOBAR means normal aircraft but also much more capable AWACS support which is worth is weight in gold.

BTW with 14 tons of dry thrust and 25 tons of max thrust that means at these power settings the aircraft.. even with no other lift engines as such will be burning

0.72kgs of fuel per kg of thrust per hour... so at 14 tons dry thrust that is 10 tons of fuel per hour of flight in dry thrust.

Use that afterburner and 18 tons of fuel get burned every single hour... how big is this fighter going to be?

How do you feel about VSTOL elephants?

GarryB wrote:The VSTOL fighter is a one trick pony that creates more problems than it solves.
How do you feel about VSTOL elephants?

F-35 engine/ NK 32 length comparison

NK-32
Length: 6,000 mm (20 ft)[4]

F-35STVOL/CATOBAR
Length: 369 in (937.3 cm) / Length: 220 in (559 cm)

If F-35 is an elephant then yes I am talking about one.

Still a dog.