Russian Civil Aviation: News #4

I was referring to international travel holiday destinations ...
most countries slavishly follow US and EU standards .... as they make the planes they mostly use

there is a chance they will try a stunt like that
Il-96 uses same engines .....

Russia needs something in the 30-45 seat class, as the TVRS-44 plans will certainly fall through now

At the moment An-24s/An-26s carry out this role but they won't last forever

An option would be the revival of An-140 production at Aviakor (Samara)

Gazputin wrote:I was referring to international travel holiday destinations ...
most countries slavishly follow US and EU standards  .... as they make the planes they mostly use

there is a chance they will try a stunt like that
Il-96 uses same engines .....

Of course they will try something like that

Russia's job, and China's and other countries - are to weave other countries away from their standards, or rather persuade them to adopt Russian and Chinese standards instead. In the interests of more tourism.

I found that article that I was 1/2 remembering

it does seem to me that the delay in this engine is a lot to do with this review by CIAM
where they said its a good engine but to make it better and simpler they should apply new tech before mass production

https://www.ciam.ru/press-center/news/small-engine-national-scale-nbsp-ciam-reviewed-the-prospects-for-vc-800s/

I'm not going nuts ... there was a woman talking about 3D printing technology

"For the further development of the VK-800 engine family, it is necessary to introduce new technical solutions and manufacturing technologies. It is these two components that will be able to improve the characteristics of the engine and its output to a new level. Specific proposals for the technological improvement of the engine at the NTS were voiced by CIAM and MAI specialists.

Vice-Rector for Research of MAI Yuri Ravikovich presented the university's developments in the field of creating promising gas supports that allow you to abandon the engine oil system and make a "dry" engine, in which "operators" are so interested. Also, the Vice-Rector of MAI presented works on brush seals and a built-in starter-generator. All May developments were tested on university stands and confirmed their quality and reliability.

In continuation of the topic, the head of the CIAM department Yuri Fokin in his speech analyzed the main trends and problems in the development of small-sized gas turbine engines, including the VK-800S, and offered his options for the layout of modifications of this engine. His colleague, head of the CIAM department Andrey Startsev spoke about the capabilities and competencies of CIAM in the design of high-performance single-stage centrifugal compressors for the VK-800S engine.

The scientific and technical seminar was completed by the report of the head of the CIAM sector Lyubov Maharramova. She briefly shared the advantages of technologies for creating bimetallic turbine wheels using hot isostatic pressing. She also showed by examples how widely 3D printing is used in the world and revealed the main advantages of additive manufacturing."

what has happened since then .... I assume most of the above ?
I have no idea what is going on now ....

they are using the fuselage of the An-140 at Aviakor as a basis
L-610 needed a door in front of the wing
and wing above the fuselage so it doesn't intrude in the cabin
next thing they knew .... it was the front end of an An-140 .... that Aviakor used to make

Aviakor are making 4x fuselages for the pilot TVRS-44
Mishustin named it Ladoga apparently

did a post on this a week or so ago

The largest contractor in the creation of the 44-seater aircraft "Ladoga" (TVRS-44), which by order of the Ministry of
Industry and Trade of the Russian Federation is developing the Ural Civil Aviation Plant, was the Samara plant
"Aviakor". This was announced on March 21, at a meeting of the headquarters for the sustainability of the economy in
the regional Government, the general director of the Samara aircraft manufacturing enterprise Alexei Gusev.
According to him, the contract with UWCA was signed in mid-March.
"We have to make four fuselages for testing andcertification of the new aircraft. We retained all competencies after we froze the Program for the An-140, now we will
begin to actively produce new equipment, "the press service of the Government of the Samara Region quotes the
words of the general director of Aviakor.

yeah TVRS-44 is a bit of a Frankenstein .... landing gear from another Antonov
engines detuned version as on Il-114 ..... why not ... if they fit .... and are tried and tested

guess that's the beauty of having a big industrial base .... lots of parts bins around

but yeah a slightly shortened An-140 with a T-tail .... bingo

I get what you are saying
a hell of a lot of balls in the air ...

Gazputin wrote:they are using the fuselage of the An-140 at Aviakor as a basis
L-610 needed a door in front of the wing
and wing above the fuselage so it doesn't intrude in the cabin
next thing they knew .... it was the front end of an An-140 .... that Aviakor used to make

Aviakor are making 4x fuselages for the pilot TVRS-44
Mishustin named it Ladoga apparently

did a post on this a week or so ago

The largest contractor in the creation of the 44-seater aircraft "Ladoga" (TVRS-44), which by order of the Ministry of
Industry and Trade of the Russian Federation is developing the Ural Civil Aviation Plant, was the Samara plant
"Aviakor". This was announced on March 21, at a meeting of the headquarters for the sustainability of the economy in
the regional Government, the general director of the Samara aircraft manufacturing enterprise Alexei Gusev.
According to him, the contract with UWCA was signed in mid-March.
"We have to make four fuselages for testing andcertification of the new aircraft. We retained all competencies after we froze the Program for the An-140, now we will
begin to actively produce new equipment, "the press service of the Government of the Samara Region quotes the
words of the general director of Aviakor.

yeah TVRS-44 is a bit of a Frankenstein .... landing gear from another Antonov
engines detuned version as on Il-114 ..... why not ... if they fit .... and are tried and tested

guess that's the beauty of having a big industrial base .... lots of parts bins around

but yeah a slightly shortened An-140 with a T-tail .... bingo

I get what you are saying
a hell of a lot of balls in the air  ...

From what I remember reading the Ladoga is mostly derived from the Let L610. Of course trying to use there some parts from a similar size aircraft and which the plant producing half of the aircraft has experience with is a positive thing. As long as they are working, safe, reliable and with a normal weight, why not?

From what I understand this aircraft should basically just be a much better an140 and complete quite well the regional turboprop niche together with the il114.

(Maybe in the future karkhov plant (if not totally destroyed, could also produce some parts for it)).

but I suspect the west will then try to introduce new "noise standards" that just happen to exclude the PS-90

With Russian airlines banned from their airspace their petty little rules really don't matter.

Russia is looking to the rest of the world and away from the west...

TVRS-44 (L-610), 44 seater passenger airliner, UWCA (Ekaterinburg), 2025

Is the TVRS-44 actually a Let-610, or is it a Let-610 size and type equivalent?

Russia needs something in the 30-45 seat class, as the TVRS-44 plans will certainly fall through now

Most of the articles I have read suggest the TVRS-44 is based on the Let-610 rather than just being an actual Let-610 they are licence producing.... which suggests an all Russian aircraft.

Mention of new engines being developed suggests it will be getting new engines soon and is intended to replace An-24 and An-26 aircraft as well as Yak-40s currently in service in Russia.

An option would be the revival of An-140 production at Aviakor (Samara

No chance, they will use the ones they have but it would be a total waste of time and money to produce more.

GarryB wrote:

TVRS-44 (L-610), 44 seater passenger airliner, UWCA (Ekaterinburg), 2025

Is the TVRS-44 actually a Let-610, or is it a Let-610 size and type equivalent?

Russia needs something in the 30-45 seat class, as the TVRS-44 plans will certainly fall through now

Most of the articles I have read suggest the TVRS-44 is based on the Let-610 rather than just being an actual Let-610 they are licence producing.... which suggests an all Russian aircraft.

Mention of new engines being developed suggests it will be getting new engines soon and is intended to replace An-24 and An-26 aircraft as well as Yak-40s currently in service in Russia.

It was supposed to be an actual L-610 license produced, like the agreement UWCA already has with Let to produce L-410s, AFAIK

In fact Let is Russian owned and has been for over a decade now. But I don't know how all this will work now, whether the company's Russian owners will be chucked out or not, as the headquarters are still in Prague. Regardless the Russian owners also have access to all the designs and so on; so it's probably not a problem to produce the L-610 as it is.

However the L-610 model dates back decades and never entered serial production as a serial model. I suppose that actual production realities may be which is what's leading to a change to the design and the usage of An-140 parts that Aviakor in Samara is familiar with building. There is also the requirement for Russian engines, so that may also require some changes. Hence, TVRS-44.

Here some interesting info
https://aviation21-ru.turbopages.org/aviation21.ru/s/tvrs-44-vs-il-114-300-vezdexod-protiv-parketnika/

https://aviation21-ru.turbopages.org/aviation21.ru/s/minpromtorg-planiruet-zapustit-v-serijnoe-proizvodstvo-novyj-regionalnyj-samolyot/

They planned to take the Czech L-610 as the basis of the new aircraft, refine it and put it into mass production at the Ural Civil Aviation Plant, where light twin-engine aircraft L-410 are already being built.
The cost of the modified aircraft was estimated at about $14 million. UZGA believes that the price of a production L-610 aircraft would not exceed $12 million. However, regional airlines consider the price too high and are not ready to take aircraft over $10 million. In 2019, Kommersant wrote , that for the profitability of operating this aircraft, additional state support is needed, for example, the trade-in program, under which it would be possible to obtain new aircraft by handing over the An-24, An-26 and Yak-40 for disposal. The finalization of the Czech project was estimated at 20-25 billion rubles.
On September 2, 2020, the Ministry of Industry and Trade approved the tactical and technical assignment for the development work "Development of a turboprop regional aircraft" (code "TVRS"), which summarized the requirements for an aircraft of local lines for 44-48 passengers. UZGA considered the L-610 as a TVRS prototype, but the Czech machine is not the basic design. As early as September 3, 2019, the head of the Ministry of Industry and Trade, Denis Manturov, stated that this was not about launching the production of this aircraft, but about creating a new turboprop based on the scientific and technical backlog of the L-610 program.

According to the chief designer of the TVRS project, Sergei Merenkov, in fact, a complete redesign of the prototype turned out, in fact, the creation of a new aircraft. “The equipment, materials and fasteners are 100% new and completely domestic. The fuselage is new, including the entire theory, cross-section, nose and tail sections, cockpit canopy contours, the entire structural power scheme, the entire layout and attachment of the wing and plumage, ”said Sergey Merenkov in an interview with AviaPort in April this year. .

The empennage, wing fairings with fuselage, fairings of the main landing gear, structural power scheme of the wing and its execution from long milled panels have been completely redesigned. The flaps, ailerons, spoilers and systems in the wing have also been completely re-arranged. A new feature of the design of the wing and plumage is the installation of heating elements of the electrothermal anti-icing system.

To meet the requirements of the Ministry of Industry and Trade, it was necessary to lengthen the fuselage by more than a meter, use the front location of the entrance door instead of the rear one, and increase the width of the fuselage along the floor by about 10 percent (from 2020 mm to 2250 mm). The capacities of the wing fuel tanks were almost doubled, the maximum takeoff weight increased from 15100 kg to 17000 kg (~ +20%). The latter required the use of new, more powerful engines and a new reinforced chassis. Common with the prototype remained the angle of the wing and the angle of the transverse V.

this is a lot easier to understand

I haven't been able to find out if the fuselage diameter is exactly the same as the An-140
but you can bet they tried to do that and use the existing jigs etc
Aviakor building the 4x prototypes seems to flag that ....

anyway the slide shows where all the "bits" of Frankenstein come from

https://bmpd.livejournal.com/4099048.html

( nose wheel is from the Sukhoi S-80 .... that's a rare beast )

image of the plane below shows the extended front fuselage to fit the front access door
and the high wing above the fuselage
so ended up quite similar to the An-140 in the front fuselage
general layout though is the same as the L-610 though with the T-tail .... an SUV as they call it

https://bmpd.livejournal.com/4495351.html

aaah

front door is not only for safety and access to get 44 people off in an emergency
but also an option they are proposing is 1/2 passenger and 1/2 cargo
so you need the front access door for that version ....

flamming_python wrote:Russia needs something in the 30-45 seat class, as the TVRS-44 plans will certainly fall through now

At the moment An-24s/An-26s carry out this role but they won't last forever

An option would be the revival of An-140 production at Aviakor (Samara)

il-114 ? bit bigger but with extra fuel ca have better range and yet 50 pssengers

anyway the slide shows where all the "bits" of Frankenstein come from

Frankenstein has negative connotations though as a shambling monster made of discarded or stolen bits.

This was a case of taking things that were available and suitable and merging them together to get something Russian that suits them better than existing options and I would see it as a good thing.

A bit like Subway where you get to pick everything from the bread right through all the ingredients to whether it is cold or toasted...

I also think taking extra time to get the engine right is well worth it because once they have gotten it just right they need to get it into serious mass production along with the aircraft the engines are going in to... right now it is mostly the engines holding things up but if you can make them more efficient and simpler to maintain and support and cheaper and easier to make then the extra time is worth it in my opinion.

The Russian pattern for most things was a massive upgrade of existing stuff that could be put into service or existing equipment could be upgraded to during overhauls and upgrades, but to also be working on a next generation significant improvement that might take 5-10 years to get into service but would be a radical improvement and something that can upgrade performance significantly... elements of the new generation things could be used to upgrade existing models...

So for example in a T-90AM tank upgrade it will have things designed for Armata T-14 that are ready for production now like the battle management computers and systems, but when T-14 is ready for service the equipment will be a second stage upgrade of the stuff that went into the T-90AM because it wasn't ready for the older vehicle or couldn't fit.

It is the same in aircraft, the Su-35 probably wouldn't fit the nose radar of the Su-57 and certainly couldn't fit the side facing arrays, but both had IRSTs and wing mounted AESA antenna and so a lot of the capabilities of the Su-57 could go into the Su-35 to make it useful and effective, but the Su-57 will just be even better.

In a sense the next generation jet engines will be the PD series they are making which seem scalable and therefore able to be made in suitable power thrust levels for a variety of aircraft programmes that will make different aircraft in different weight classes competitive at world standards because of the efficiency and hopefully standardisation of parts and design meaning simplified support and maintenance.

This is exciting because Russian airlines now essentially have to support the Russian civil aviation industry, which should help the military as well because as in the west a lot of military types are based on modern and capable civilian types which shares development funding between the private sector and the military... rather than what was happening, which was the military having to subsidise the civilian aircraft industry of Russia which was being neglected by their own airlines.

I do remember a comment from an ex-designer who worked on the original Il-114
he said the aircraft has quite a big wingspan and range
as the military at the time said that would interest them a lot
for long range patrol - maritime etc

he basically said the Il-114 doesn't need such a big wingspan or range as a civil commuter airliner
because then you are getting into ranges that make more sense for a jet aircraft

could be a lot of truth in that - when you see the Il-114 flying next to an Il-112 .... the wingspan difference is quite noticeable

just looking here at the wingspans

Saab 2000 25m
ATR-72 27m
Dash 8 28m
Il-114 30m
Il-112 27.5m

it seems the guy is correct .... Il-114 always had a longer-range military variant in mind ...

Saab do quite a few electronic patrol variants

https://aero-space.eu/2022/04/27/the-company-aircraft-industries-let-kunovice-passes-into-the-hands-of-the-czech-group-omnipol/

THE COMPANY AIRCRAFT INDUSTRIES – LET KUNOVICE PASSES INTO THE HANDS OF THE CZECH GROUP OMNIPOL
Date 27.4.2022
The largest manufacturer of civilian transport aircraft in the Czech Republic, Aircraft Industries, is returning to Czech ownership after 14 years. On April 21st, 2022, the Russian owner and the OMNIPOL Group agreed to sell 100% of Aircraft Industries shares to the Czech company OMPO Holding.

For the Ladoga/ TVRS no problems, but what about the let L410 that was produced in Russia?

Will they still continue to produce it under another name?
Will they make a new aircraft derived from it as they have done for the let 610 prototype?

saw that too
last I heard L-410 they buy the engines from Czechs - soon to be replaced by VK-800
and "body kits" for the fuselage - the larger panels
everything else is in-house including avionics

generally I think they were only sourcing those larger body panels from the Czechs to keep them in work
as most L-410s were being made in Russia not Czech Republic

I don't think it's a big deal

L-610 ... it has morphed into a different aircraft already

It's actually part of a much broader issue
in Soviet times Czech and Poland were the centre for production of light aviation
and when the Soviet Union collapsed they lost all of that expertise overnight - including the Walter turboprops (now "GE")
and that is the major reason Russia was a bit slow with UAVs and even cruise missiles ....
(why if you want to go for a joyride in a jet trainer it will be a L-39 Albatross made in Czech as it was the Soviet standard jet trainer)
also explains Rus weakness in light helicopters too ..... they were made in Poland

interestingly UWCA/UZGA is filling that niche that Czech and Poland used to fill
they even license build light helicopters .....

slightly off topic - but also part of this history
Ukraine was the centre of excellence for large transport aircraft
large gas turbines for planes and ships
and ship gearboxes
(why the US staged the coup in the first place - to damage Russia's surface Navy .... and Mil transport aviation)
Ukraine also did a lot of rocket engine bits .... and all the helicopter engines too
everything happening in Ukraine is the US .... 150%

so you can see why the US (and the EU zombies) are so angry with Russia
they thought they had crippled them
but now there are UAVs everywhere -cruise missiles whizzing around

and now big gas turbines are going into the 22350 big frigates
they even have massive gas turbines for powerstations coming into production GTD-110M

Basically Russia has been paying the price for the Soviets being so egalitarian ....
spreading the work around the Soviet Union instead of keeping it all in Russia.
( they did keep all the fast jet stuff inside Russia though .... fighters, bombers and their engines .... why they are in good shape)

(and also paying the price for Gorbachov leaving 10-15mil Russians stranded outside Russia in Ukraine
and there are another 5 mil in Kazhakstan btw ..... more "coups" coming there )

UWCA is in effect replacing everything that done in Soviet "Czech and Poland" .... in civil stuff
doing a great job too .... it has to be said

DA-42 trainers .... L-410 .... Baikal 9-seater design .... L-610 derivative ..... UTS-800 proposed basic trainer .... Altius-R UAV
Forpost-R UAV ..... even taking the VK-800S in-house .....

and that is the major reason Russia was a bit slow with UAVs and even cruise missiles ....
(why if you want to go for a joyride in a jet trainer it will be a L-39 Albatross made in Czech as it was the Soviet standard jet trainer)
also explains Rus weakness in light helicopters too ..... they were made in Poland

It was a political decision to produce jet trainer aircraft like the L39 and L29 in Czechoslovakia, and the Mi-2 in Poland, while the engines for cruise missiles and drones were generally made in the Ukraine for similar reason... to distribute some work...

Since the end of the cold war and the split with the Ukraine most of the gaps have been filled... of course they didn't have to be... Belarus still sell trucks and optics to the Russian market.

The core issue was engines as the engines were also made in these countries too and while you can pump out light helicopter designs and cruise missile designs and light jet aircraft easily enough getting the engines right is expensive and takes time and money.

The end of the cold war and disruption of the 1990s meant lots of other problems were being solved while issues like engines from Ukraine and Poland et all could be delayed. Well the situation in the Ukraine brought everything to a head in 2014 and so all of a sudden most of the transport fleet which was based on Antonovs, and of course engine and propulsion systems in the shipping industry and of course the most widely used helicopter engines all needed to be re developed and produced in Russia... they would have really struggled to deal with this in 2000 but with other things sorted out and working by 2014 these problems were able to be sorted out at a time when they also shifted from importing most of their food to exporting food now too.

More importantly when they are finished they will have light helicopters and drones and transport aircraft of all sizes as well as corvettes and frigates they can sell to the rest of the world that have all Russian components that are sanction proof and don't need any third party approval for sales.

They don't just zerox copy the old stuff either... they do improve it as well.

everything happening in Ukraine is the US .... 150%

Yeah, they got a hard on for war there because they really think privately that these are all Russians anyway so casualties on both sides don't bother them in the slightest... the more destruction the better as far as they are concerned... and they can donate all sorts of shit that would sit in warehouses for decades, which means new contracts for expensive new weapons and ammo to fill those warehouses back up again.

Money and damaging Russia... mop in isle three please...

( they did keep all the fast jet stuff inside Russia though .... fighters, bombers and their engines .... why they are in good shape)

Good shape is an understatement... the EU in comparison doesn't have their own 5th gen fighter operational while in perhaps 5 years Russia will have an affordable high tech light 5th gen fighter entering production and possibly service so it will have two stealth fighters operating together.

UWCA is in effect replacing everything that done in Soviet "Czech and Poland" .... in civil stuff
doing a great job too .... it has to be said

Quite true and in a sense Ilyusion will be stepping up to fill the gap in the Russian aircraft manufactuing position left by the collapse and destruction of Antonov... maybe Tupolev as well.

Amusing that the Czech and Polish companies were happy to give up such a market and customer... but that is politics and the price of being the bitch of both Brussels and Washington.

The Ukraine paid an even higher price and didn't get very much in return... no HATO membership or EU membership, and loans that have to be paid back...

not to mention the current war.

did any you follow what the USA did to Bombardier in Canada and Embraer in Brazil
and Mitsubishi in Japan ?

all tried to encroach on the 737 ..... all got violently attacked

Bombadier was slapped with massive US tariffs
to the point it was bankrupted and sold to Airbus and it is now the Airbus A220
Bombadier was so devastated it sold its railway business to the French too .... Alstrom

Mitsubishi .... exited the airliner business ..... again

Embraer .... "decided" to stick to regional jets

the only threat to Boeing and Airbus oligopoly
is Rus/China co-operation
as China can give the production line critical mass
and Rus can provide the tech to make world class stuff
(ok ... maybe India too ... later)

nobody else can break the oligopoly
and that will only happen geographically ....

but it is not just the planes .... it's a lot more than that

you have to realise that the plane is only the vehicle for the airline business
they make their money filling planes
and flying the wings off them

that means a massive spares and service network geographically to keep the planes in the air
so you have to break that down geographically
there is no other option ...

Boeing and Airbus are so entrenched .... you are talking decades
in any case Rus production will be domestic for at least 5x years

but
dominating Eurasia would do enormous damage to Boeing and Airbus .... no doubt their greatest fear

"We are considering the issue of creating an aviation cluster in the city of Kazan as part of the implementation of import substitution plans. The anchor resident can be the project of the mechanical processing center "United Aircraft Corporation" with a capacity of 1 million products per year.
The implementation of this project will replace the import of components for the aviation industry," Rustam Minnikhanov suggested.

Alabuga is where they setup the carbon fibre factory - Rosatom subsidiary - that supplies material for the MC-21 wings etc
apparently about to double in size

now they are talking of a big aircraft components factory complex
apparently Vlad has already signed off on it

(Tartarstan has been a big economic success as in Soviet times it was the primary gateway for interaction with the Central Asian countries via same language. And that continues to this day apparently .... Turkey does a lot of business through there too now .... so Tartarstan has lots of money and lots of leverage )

https://www.aviaport.ru/digest/2022/04/29/717453.html

1 million machined parts p.a. ..... 80k per month .... pretty big building needed for that .... they had better order the steel and concrete asap

It is not a huge amount if it includes fasteners and other small things...

But the west is making it necessary and while for the next few years Russia needs to meet its own needs it wont be long before they are exporting the stuff they use to the rest of the world and that is a rather large market that will require a lot more parts to be made and I am sure Russia can make them cheaper than the west can.

it does seem to me the focus was more on the long lead time machined items
the big spars and frames etc -

apparently Boeing order them 12 months ahead
I think in general civil airlines order planes 2x years ahead as a result - re leadtimes

it would explain why the Tu-214 will need until 2024 to crank up
and Superjet guys say they have enough parts to build for the next 12 months

this is a pattern there ...

it may well be that they end up in the "future"
the parts warehouse actually has very few smaller "parts" in it .... just a bank of 3D printers instead ?

I think 3D printing will make life much easier for Rus industry in general - a gamechanger
I would be pouring Rubles into it ...

Supposedly from Sputnik Uzbekistan

Russia wants to help revive aircraft production in Uzbekistan.

This statement was made by Deputy Minister of Industry and Trade of the
Russian Federation Oleg Bocharov at the recent INNOPROM-2022 exhibition.

Now there are good opportunities in Uzbekistan for the revival of the aircraft
industry.

The remaining production facilities in Tashkent need to be reorganized.

Russian specialists will come to Tashkent and help combine the design
solutions of the two countries.

The upgraded facilities will become a good basis for cooperation between
Russian and Uzbek enterprises.

Tashkent Aviation Production Association named after V.P. Chkalov created
not only IL-76 aircraft, but also participated in the construction of the spacecraft.

Tashkent factory used to be very big in SU, but I'm not sure if this is better than building more capacity in Russia. It is questionable how many qualified workforce is still around after 30+ years. Also, new Uzbekistan gov is pretty pro Western. Better build new capacity in Russia and try to bring over whatever workforce is left in Uzbekistan. Same thing should be happening with Ukraine, especially MotorSich

What will happen to the KA-226 and KA-60? Both are specced with French engines. How long will it take for Russia to develop turbines for these considering all the other priority projects. When the war is over I assume Zaporizhzhia will be in Russian hands. Will they revive Motor Sich?

I think 3D printing will make life much easier for Rus industry in general - a gamechanger
I would be pouring Rubles into it ...

They do seem to be, from 3D printed houses, through to making all sorts of other things with mixed metal 3D printers that can print very complex structures that would be almost impossible to machine... some of the images of the structures they came up with for the Su-57 look organic and not at all like the backbone and ribs design of aircraft and ships previously used.

It is the sort of thing you could send to the moon and it could start grinding up dust and moon rock and adding liquid ahesives and building shelters for cosmonauts so there are shelters on the ground when they get there that they could seek shelter from radiation once they arrive... even more so on Mars...

Being able to keep designs in memory on computers and make any replacement parts enroute rather than having to carry spare parts around with you all the time would be handy too.

Tashkent factory used to be very big in SU, but I'm not sure if this is better than building more capacity in Russia.

Helping them is a good way of making them friendly... we have seen how the US has done nothing to protect and help grow Antonov or Motor Sich... so this would be a good way to boost production numbers of Russian designs that they can help produce but if they screw Russia then cutting off ties will only reduce production capacity, and their new US friends wont do anything to save them anyway.

It is questionable how many qualified workforce is still around after 30+ years.

There will be a generation of grandparents with fond memories of good paying jobs they will want their grandchildren to get... a good potential future for their kids and their kids kids.

Also, new Uzbekistan gov is pretty pro Western. Better build new capacity in Russia and try to bring over whatever workforce is left in Uzbekistan.

Might sway them towards better relations with Russia... and will bring out the pro west 5th column who will try to sabotage good relations with Russia too.

Same thing should be happening with Ukraine, especially MotorSich

Most have likely already left and I suspect the future is looking rather bleak for military related industry there because Russia will want it to be largely demilitarised for obvious reasons... (so it can't be weaponised against them again with only 5 billion dollars and some cookies.).

There will be plenty of things they can make that wont represent a threat to Russia that Russia can help them with and moving forward Russia is going to be investing in countries around the rest of the world to promote trade... that is going to include licence production and cooperation too.

As for Motor Sich, I hope they will transfer the staff who want to be transferred to facilities in Russia, and dump what's leftover including IP to the Chinese. Good riddance.
There are some good people there. But all their projects have been nothing but trouble. Not that Klimov has been perfect either b

At best set them up making simple parts and spares for their old products that could be sold to various operators, but anything more would just be competition for Russian companies.