Russia is moving towards independence in civil aviation, by Olga Samofalova for VZGLYAD. 06.14.2023.
The timing of the creation of the Russian long-haul airliner has been announced.
Russia does not leave plans to create the entire line of civil aircraft of completely domestic production. The regional SSJ-100 New is on the way, followed by the latest medium-haul MS-21, and in the longer term, Russia will have its own long-haul airliner. Why do we need such a machine and when will it appear?
Russia will create its own long-haul aircraft no earlier than 2028, possibly between 2028-2030 or after 2030, said Deputy Prime Minister Denis Manturov, head of the Ministry of Industry and Trade. According to him, Russia intends to continue working on a joint project with China. But at the same time, the research center is conducting its own research. Zhukovsky.
According to him, changes will be made to the joint project with the PRC of a wide-body long-range aircraft in connection with Western sanctions. “We will continue to work with our partners, while we do not stand still in relation to our own developments,” Manturov explained. NRC "Institute im. Zhukovsky" is working on the study of new technologies and on the definition of "the appearance within the framework of the current research work" Integral ".
In the near future - in 2023-2025 - Russia will have two of its own import-substituting types of aircraft: the regional SSJ-100 New and the medium-haul MS-21, each with a domestic engine. But in order to close the entire line of aircraft, there is not enough of our own long-haul wide-body aircraft. And then Russia will become a completely independent aircraft-building power. And few reach such heights. Actually, only Boeing and Airbus can boast of such.
The most popular type of aircraft is, of course, medium-haul. Only in Russia, up to 700 such aircraft fly. Less regional and long-haul aircraft are initially required. However, this does not mean that they are not needed.
“We really need our own long-haul wide-body aircraft. All airlines will need at least 100-150 such aircraft,” says Roman Gusarov, CEO of the industry portal Avia.ru. According to the expert, the point is not even in flights to distant foreign countries without transfers, although this is important, but in the size of Russia itself.
“There are many airlines in the world that do not have long-haul aircraft in the fleet, and they are doing well, for example, European companies, because large aircraft are not needed to fly within Europe. But in Russia the situation is different, it cannot do without long-range aircraft. We have great distances. To fly from Moscow to Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky without transfers, you need a long-range aircraft with a large capacity. Not only the flight distance without refueling is important here, but also the transportation economy. It is unprofitable to fly far on a small plane, the cost of the seat will be very high. The more seats on board, the cheaper the ticket,” explains Gusarov.
In the end, such aircraft will allow non-stop flights to foreign countries, to China, with which economic and trade relations are going up even faster, or to other Asian countries. Such planes are also required for flights to Cuba, because now Russia cannot land anywhere along the road - neither in Canada, nor in the USA, nor in Greenland.
“The project of a long-range aircraft is important because it will keep the aircraft industry in Russia in good shape, promote its development, use intellectual potential and experience.
Secondly, the creation of a long-range aircraft is important from the point of view of the task set earlier to increase revenues from the export of high-tech complex products. Thirdly, the developments that will be created during the implementation of the long-range aircraft project can be used in other projects in the industry. This will help maintain Russia's position among the developed countries,” says Dmitry Baranov, a leading expert at Finam Management.
“As for the timing, I am ready to share Manturov’s optimism, but this is a large and complex project, and there are many “buts” here,” says Gusarov. On the one hand, the expert says, Russia knows how to make wide-body aircraft, it has experience, developments, and technologies. Russia has already created the Il-76 long-haul aircraft, as well as the Il-96-400. It is enough for Russia to take as a basis the design of the same Il-96 and create a new modern modification, with modern avionics, etc.
“The design of the IL-96 is very successful. In the West, wide-body aircraft have been flying for many decades, for example, the Boeing 747. Its first flight was made more than half a century ago.
Since then, the wing has been modernized, new avionics and new engines have been installed, but the basic design has been preserved. The IL-96's main problem is the old engine. The plane needs a new modern engine. Therefore, the timing of the implementation of this project depends on when such an engine appears. And then, I assure you, the matter will not rise for a new plane. It will take just a few years, and we will already be able to test a modern car, ”Gusarov believes.
According to the expert, when creating a new aircraft, taking the Il-96 design as a basis is a more optimal and faster way than creating a new aircraft completely from scratch. Although the details of the project are not yet available, so it is difficult to talk about which path will be chosen in the end.
The engine is the most complex structure in an aircraft, and, again, only a few people in the world can make aircraft engines. Russia is among them. However, creating something new takes time. It is not necessary to wait for help in aviation technologies, and even more so in engine building, from China. “I think that China is up to us in the field of aircraft technology as up to the moon. China aircraft engine will not be able to make at least the next twenty years. No one can help us here, only we ourselves can create the PD-35 engine. It is already being developed, and its huge model of three meters in diameter was presented at MAKS,” says Gusarov.
At the end of last year, it became known that the development timeline for this engine, which was supposed to be presented before 2027-2028, was shifted by a couple of years. This was officially announced by the managing director of the Perm "UEC-Aviadvigatel" Alexander Inozemtsev. The reason is the redistribution of funds to increase the volume of PD-14, PD-8 and PS-90A engines for existing vehicles.
“I think that a new Russian long-haul aircraft with a domestic engine will appear after 2030, and when exactly, time will tell,” the expert believes.
“The creation of aviation technology is a complex and time-consuming process, so it is not unusual if the deadlines are shifted, the main thing is that a modern safe airliner be created that will fly perfectly and carry passengers,” says Baranov.
The experience of Western aircraft manufacturing companies also shows that shifting deadlines is a common practice when creating an aircraft from scratch or its new modification.
It is worth noting that we are talking about two separate projects of long-haul liners. One CR929 aircraft is being created together with China for the Chinese market, the other for the Russian market, for our personal use. In the first case, we are talking about the fact that Russia will teach China to produce such aircraft on its territory, will supply its components and engines from Russia for the assembly of finished aircraft at Chinese factories. This is an extremely profitable export project, because the Chinese market is huge, where the demand for wide-body aircraft will no longer be limited to a hundred pieces. In addition, the Chinese can take on part of the costs of the project, and building aircraft from scratch is also a very expensive pleasure. According to the expert, these two projects will not necessarily be identical, they may differ: for example, these may be different segments of long-haul liners for individual market niches. Both projects do not cancel each other, but rather complement each other.
Are there risks that Russia will be left without “working” Western counterparts before its first long-range aircraft of its own takes off in 2030-2035? Under the current sanctions conditions, there is no access to new aircraft from Western companies.
However, Gusarov says that Russia has mostly new aircraft from Western companies in its hands, which fly well until 2030 and even 2035, the main thing is that there are spare parts for them. Spare parts are delivered to Russia using parallel imports, that is, unofficially through third countries, for example, through China. We mostly know how to repair Western aircraft ourselves. In addition, Iran helps us in this, which has been under sanctions for a long time and has learned to “illegally” fly and repair aircraft of Western companies. “Iran has mastered the repair of individual models, of which we have few, so we have never repaired them ourselves,” the source explains.
Just the other day, Minister of Transport of the Russian Federation Vitaly Savelyev said that Russian companies have now partially dismantled only seven passenger aircraft out of 1162 aircraft. Moreover, in the near future these aircraft will be restored, just, probably, spare parts are expected.
In addition, while a new long-haul aircraft is being created, a new experimental Il-96-400 with an extended fuselage is being prepared for flight in Voronezh. The machine was created as part of the program for the modernization of aircraft of the Il-96 family.
https://vz.ru/economy/2023/6/14/1216474.html
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"It was a comprehensive approach, the effect was calculated in many parameters at once," says Technical Director – Director of the Department of Production System Development and Quality Management of UAC Yuri Tarasov. – After studying the full range of existing technologies, stages of mathematical modeling and full-scale testing of structural elements, obtaining expert assessments of institutes, and economic calculations, the final choice was made in favor of a carbon-fiber wing manufactured by vacuum infusion, without the use of autoclaves."
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