Il-112V/Il-212 light military transport

Is this the one with the initial weight issue?

Mir wrote:

mnztr wrote:

Hole wrote:

Your statement is contradictory. Would you have them churn out scores of these clearly unsafe planes before the issues are sorted out? That was a pretty serious fire,  likely took out the control surfaces. Looks like they deployed flaps, they deployed assymetrically and it was game over.

This is tragic yes - no doubt but need i remind you that shit happens. A few years back the Superjet 100 prototype crashed but that didn't stop the program from being a success. This is just one of many examples.

That one was flown into a mountain when the pilot ignored the planes warning he was about to die. Not the fault of the plane. It did its best to warn the crew.

I didn't say they should stop the program, but this plane and its engines are CLEARLY not ready for mass production. This kind of outcome from a single engine failure clearly indicates a need for a design safety review.

Russian_Patriot_ wrote:Video of the crash

The entire plane flipped!
There are obviously some engine issues and why would the plane flip?! Something is wrong with the design!

franco wrote:From watching the video, appears there is a balance problem as plane got inverted real fast and these planes have to be able to fly with just 1 engine while realizing that the fire was pretty intense with wing structure damage no doubt... however no aeronautic engineer so will leave it to others.

It is way too rapid for a balance problem. It looks like the control over the flaps was compromised. It also looks like the
pilot was unaware of the fire for a while, but I would think that there would be warning sensors so I could be wrong.
The reason it looks to me that way is because no attempt was made to do a controlled crash landing.

miketheterrible wrote:Is this the one with the initial weight issue?

Yes. The engine failure is rather catastrophic.

I would not exclude sabotage considering the significance of this program. I know shit happens, but we have had in the past rocket
missions failing because of rags "forgotten" in the right places. There is no innocent process on this planet.

The root cause is almost certanly an engine failure. The fire/heat may have caused a control surface malfunction, leading to a side banking and stall. In other situations the crew could be able to fly with single engine while extinguishes the fire. There are always few time between the first signals of a failure and to be aware of it and take the correct decisions.

Flying a prototype has the aditional factor of less time to practice, less knowledgment of potential problems (and how to deal with them), and even the lack of a simulator.

This crash must be studied in detail by the authorities and designers of the plane for improvement of the project.  Unfortunely this is how aviation becomes safer after each crash investigation.

RIP the crew. May God comfort their familiars.

mnztr wrote:

That one was flown into a mountain when the pilot ignored the planes warning he was about to die. Not the fault of the plane. It did its best to warn the crew.

I didn't say they should stop the program, but this plane and its engines are CLEARLY not ready for mass production. This kind of outcome from a single engine failure clearly indicates a need for a design safety review.

Good point there, but the point is many prototypes have crashed over the decades but in most cases the aircraft was developed further and eventually entered production. Clearly there was a problem with the engine in this case but they will have to determine the cause first to come to any conclusions regarding the engine.

Hero of Russia Nikolai Kuimov, test pilot of the 1st class Dmitry Komarov and flight engineer of the 1st class Nikolai Khludeev

RIP

Russian_Patriot_ wrote:Hero of Russia Nikolai Kuimov, test pilot of the 1st class Dmitry Komarov and flight engineer of the 1st class Nikolai Khludeev

RIP

RIP them all.

Just curiosity: is 1st class Dmitry Komarov descendant of the former Soyuz comander Vladimir Komarov?

kvs wrote:

miketheterrible wrote:Is this the one with the initial weight issue?

Yes.   The engine failure is rather catastrophic.  

I would not exclude sabotage considering the significance of this program.    I know shit happens, but we have had in the past rocket
missions failing because of rags "forgotten" in the right places.    There is no innocent process on this planet.

Klimov is the engine builder I believe and the same type of engine is to be used on the Il 114. A fire of that speed and magnitude looks like a fuel leak and one would think that on a prototype they would have gone over those fuel lines with a fine tooth comb. The engine could have been compromised during manufacture, during mating to the airframe, or during any routine maintenance. There should be multiple inspections made by different people and records of those inspections.

RT:

The Il-112 is an aircraft that took off not because, but in spite of. And the more painful today's tragedy is.

The Il-112 was created as a modern alternative to the An-26. Transport aircraft of the Antonov Design Bureau, which after the collapse of the USSR came under the control of Ukraine.

In addition to the moral and rapid deterioration of the An-26, which is still seriously used for various types of transportation in our troops, in 2014, the confrontation that Kiev entered into with Russia was added. Servicing our An-26s, which were on the balance sheet of the Ministry of Defense, in Ukraine has simply become dangerous.

The question of alternatives has become more acute than ever. It was then that they remembered about the Il-112 project, which had already been gathering dust on the budget shelf for several years.

Knowing a little about the situation from the inside, we note that the plane, which was supposed to take off in the summer of 2017 (at least, so high-ranking officials promised the president), is designed with an overload of 3 tons. This was found out by the new management of the Design Bureau, which three years ago actually took up the Il-112 project from scratch.

The plane took off for the first time on April 3, 2019. Then, before the plane is sent to mass production, a decent period of various kinds of tests follows. In the case of the Il-112, it has not yet ended, which means that this flight can also be considered a test one way or another.

The most important thing now is to seriously understand the mistakes. Could this catastrophe have been prevented? Did it happen due to objective risks, or were there those that the current managers knew about, but preferred to forget for the sake of another beautiful demonstration for the big bosses?

We are talking primarily about engines. Were there any problems with them before? If this is not dealt with, the imitation of serious work in such serious areas as the aircraft industry can turn into a huge disaster. And a serious problem for our army, which in the current realities can not be allowed in any way.

The ingress of oil into the combustion chamber, according to preliminary data, caused a fire in the engine of the Il-112B aircraft that fell in the Moscow region, the source said.

There is also unverified information that they (Ilyushin Design Bureau) knew about the problem with heating the right engine, but decided to take a risk to arrange a show-off for the "big bosses" at the Army-2021. 

If this is true, then the heads will fly off the shoulders of those idiots who allowed it...

Russian_Patriot_ wrote:There is also unverified information that they (Ilyushin Design Bureau) knew about the problem with heating the right engine, but decided to take a risk to arrange a show-off for the "big bosses" at the Army-2021. 

If this is true, then the heads will fly off the shoulders of those idiots who allowed it...

Should be a massive prison sentence then.

Russian_Patriot_ wrote:There is also unverified information that they (Ilyushin Design Bureau) knew about the problem with heating the right engine, but decided to take a risk to arrange a show-off for the "big bosses" at the Army-2021. 

If this is true, then the heads will fly off the shoulders of those idiots who allowed it...

THat would be such a USSR kinda scenario.

Russian_Patriot_ wrote:The ingress of oil into the combustion chamber, according to preliminary data, caused a fire in the engine of the Il-112B aircraft that fell in the Moscow region, the source said.

Still a loss of the entire aircraft from this is not acceptable. Fire alarm>feather engine> pull fire handles> Trim plane for single engine flight> land safely.   THIS is what shoulda happened. Something happened with the control surfaces to cause this. Maybe they had flaps deployed and the fire burned through a hydraulic hose causing the right flap to retract or something of that nature. If that is the case the routing and protection of hydraulic lines will have to be reconsidered, or that can add jack screws for redundancy.

A demonstration of how it is often proceeded:
https://youtu.be/ltMFvT6YxAM

miketheterrible wrote:Ukrainians will be having a field day with this...

I am having a field day every day with Antonov wood stoves

https://vz.ru/society/2021/8/17/1114238.html

The main suspect appeared in the Il-112V crash
The last flight of the first Il-112V   August 17, 2021, 19:50
Photo: Dmitry Ovchinnikov / TASS
Text: Viktor Sokirko
A dramatic video went viral on social media on Tuesday - an eyewitness captured the engine fire and the fall of the new Il-112V military transport aircraft. The only flying copy of the car crashed, the crew of the famous test pilots was killed. Some circumstances already allow us to put forward versions of the causes of this tragedy - and the attention of specialists was attracted primarily by the engine.

First of all, let us pay tribute to the memory of the test pilots who nurtured the Il-112 as a family for many years, and eventually died with it. Among them is the chief pilot of PJSC "IL", Hero of Russia Nikolai Kuimov. It was he who first lifted the car into the air and repeatedly talked about the merits of the new transport aircraft. Both the 1st class test pilot Dmitry Komarov and the 1st class test flight engineer Nikolai Khludeev were killed.

These are the people who, as they say, knew this plane to the cog. They dreamed that their light "Ilyusha" would break through and become the best aircraft in its class not only in the Russian army, but also receive international recognition.


But why did one of the most promising Russian planes crash almost at the parade? The other day, the Il-112V flew from Voronezh, where it was tested at a manufacturing plant, to the Moscow region, where it was supposed to take part in the Army-2021 International Military-Technical Forum. On the video, made by an eyewitness of the tragedy, it can be seen that during the passage not far from the airfield, the right engine of the plane caught fire. The pilots made some maneuvers, but the car entered a spiral with an ever-increasing roll - and crashed.

“The video shows that the right engine caught fire, as well as that before the flame appeared, in about four seconds, there was a white exhaust. The plane took off to the right and down, possibly from a non-feathering propeller, or perhaps from damage to the controls as a result of a fire, ”says Dmitry Drozdenko, a columnist for the magazine“ Arsenal of the Fatherland ”, to the VZGLYAD newspaper.

It is worth making a little technical explanation here. “Feathering propellers on a turboprop aircraft is one of the most difficult and most vital tasks,” wrote  the famous civilian pilot Vasily Ershov at one time. “A lot of disasters happened when the engine failed after takeoff after takeoff and the enormous braking force on the non-feathering propeller turned over by the flow instantly turned the plane over.”


In other words, with such a failure of the engine, the propeller not only stops moving the car, but moreover, begins to actively interfere with it. Brakes and overturns. In order to prevent this from happening, special automatic feathering systems are installed on the aircraft, firstly. And secondly, right in front of the pilots on the dashboard there are buttons that allow manual feathering, if it did not happen automatically when the engines failed.

We will return to the versions about the causes of the disaster. Let's note the main thing for now - we are not just facing some ordinary plane crash. The very revival of the domestic military transport aviation of the light class is called into question.

Usually, after an aircraft accident or catastrophe with one or another type of aircraft, a temporary ban is imposed on its use. Until clarification of the circumstances and reasons that led to such consequences. After the fall of the Il-112V, such measures will not be required - the flight copy of this aircraft was the only one (there is one more for static tests).

The Il-112V became the first military transport aircraft developed from scratch and produced in Russia in the post-Soviet period for the needs of the Armed Forces. At one time, the Ukrainian An-140 produced by the Kharkov Aviation Enterprise was considered as a competitor to him, which in 2011 was "pushed" by the ex-Minister of Defense of the Russian Federation Anatoly Serdyukov.

The An-140 and Il-112 were developed in parallel in the first half of the 1990s. As a result, the An-140 moved faster, and already in 1999 its first serial representative took off. The promotion to the Russian market was also influenced by the fact that since 2003 the aircraft has been assembled at the Aviakor Aviation Plant in Samara. It was assumed that Aeroflot will purchase several dozen Antonovs, and the Russian Air Force announced its intention to purchase about ten An-140s, and then 15 more aircraft.

However, with the breakdown of military-technical cooperation between Ukraine and Russia, production was curtailed. As a result, the Il-112V remained the only option in this class to replace the outdated An-26. And dozens, if not hundreds, of such machines of the Russian Air Force are required. Therefore, the Il-112V program was resumed, and the first flight of this aircraft took place on March 30, 2019. So it can be called completely new only with some stretch.

“The need for a light military transport aircraft is also topical because this link has now practically dropped out of the Air Force,” aviation expert Vladimir Talanov says to the VZGLYAD newspaper. - The An-26 in service is no longer subject to modernization. Therefore, the only hope is for the almost ready-made Il-112V.

The Ministry of Defense also realized this, where they have already ordered 35 of these machines, and in total it is planned to assemble about 300 aircraft, including for the needs of the Ministry of Emergency Situations, the FSB and other services.

At the same time, oddly enough it sounds, the "newest" Il-112V for 20 years of development is already somewhat outdated. For example, they require replacement of its engines, which no longer "pull" the plane - the way it turned out. And now, as you can see, the Il-112V failed the engine, which went out of order at the most inopportune moment. "

But the engine for this car must be completely domestic. For many years, many Soviet (Russian) military transport aircraft, and engines for many of them were produced on the territory of the Ukrainian SSR. Again, after 2014, it was necessary to urgently establish the production of engines in Russia. Including - the TV7-117 engine, the successor of the famous TVZ-117 line produced by the Motor Sich plant. And these engines (their various modifications) should be used not only for the Il-112V, but also for numerous models of Russian helicopters, and for the new Il-114-300 civilian turboprop  airliners .

Claims against the engines installed on the Il-112V were also made by none other than the former chief designer of PJSC “Il” Nikolai Talikov. His emotional reaction is  quoted  by News.ru: “I expected. I've been yelling for years that engines are shit. That they will fail in the end. "

The publication "MK"  reminds : back in April 2019 Talikov reported that the first flight of the Il-112V was accompanied by a failure of automation. If the left engine worked in the specified range, then the right one switched to hydromechanics and worked in a slightly lower speed mode.

Of course, this is just the expert opinion of specialists, albeit reputable ones. “There are no grounds to say that the problem lies precisely in the TV7-117S engine. Let's wait for the results of the investigation, - said the air expert Oleg Panteleev to the VZGLYAD newspaper. - In the frames that we have all seen, a fire is noticeable in the area of ​​the engine. Now we cannot say for sure what exactly burned and for what reason. Data on the possible causes of fire and on the actuation of the fire extinguishing system can be obtained after analyzing the flight recorders. "

Nevertheless, there are too many signs of which particular element of the Il-112V design will be the first thing that specialists will have to pay attention to. Repeatedly there were leaks and that the airframe of the aircraft turned out to be too heavy - at least several tons higher than the calculated mass. And this greatly impairs the tactical and technical characteristics of the vehicle, primarily the carrying capacity and flight range.

If you follow the practice of both Soviet and current, Russian times, accidents during testing of air equipment often put an end to it. Has the project of the new MiG gone unsuccessfully into the sky? Let's move "Su" forward! Well, or whatever else was lying around in the development. However, in light military transport aviation, the choice is not so great now - “only old men go into battle” who need to be replaced. And there is no replacement for this, except for the Il-112V.

There is no doubt that a heavy blow has been dealt to the program of the new light military transport aircraft itself. Panteleev believes that now there will be an obvious shift in the timing of flight tests, since there is no second flight copy of the Il-112V aircraft so far. However, he also recalled the high demand for aircraft of this class in Russia, so the implementation of the program will be somewhat delayed, but in no case will it be terminated.

There is no other way out - despite all the difficulties, the engine, the glider, and the car as a whole will have to be refined. Despite all the setbacks. At least, if we want the Russian Armed Forces to have a new military transport aircraft.

That same engine is supposed to be used on Il-114 which is a civilian airliner so that's a bigger problem than it looks

mnztr wrote:

Russian_Patriot_ wrote:The ingress of oil into the combustion chamber, according to preliminary data, caused a fire in the engine of the Il-112B aircraft that fell in the Moscow region, the source said.

Still a loss of the entire aircraft from this is not acceptable. Fire alarm>feather engine> pull fire handles> Trim plane for single engine flight> land safely.   THIS is what shoulda happened. Something happened with the control surfaces to cause this. Maybe they had flaps deployed and the fire burned through a hydraulic hose causing the right flap to retract or something of that nature. If that is the case the routing and protection of hydraulic lines will have to be reconsidered, or that can add jack screws for redundancy.

Actually, it's way more common to prop engine than you think. Most probably the engine that caught fire was the plane's critical engine. In other words, losing that engine would usually have the worst effect in terms of controllability than losing others.

And by the way, the steps that you listed were exactly what happened. Just look at how the aircraft turn (direction, rate of turn) when the pilots saw the engine was on fire. Except trimming the plane for single-engine flight isnt that easy, and remember, the pilots were steering away from residential areas.

Also if the right flap retracted, the plane should have banked to the left. Pulling fire handle doesnt always work either. It depends on how the fire started

PapaDragon wrote:
That same engine is supposed to be used on Il-114 which is a civilian airliner so that's a bigger problem than it looks

The engines are different. The Il-112B uses a forced version of the engine from the Il-114-300

calripson wrote:

kvs wrote:

miketheterrible wrote:Is this the one with the initial weight issue?

Yes.   The engine failure is rather catastrophic.  

I would not exclude sabotage considering the significance of this program.    I know shit happens, but we have had in the past rocket
missions failing because of rags "forgotten" in the right places.    There is no innocent process on this planet.

Klimov is the engine builder I believe and the same type of engine is to be used on the Il 114. A fire of that speed and magnitude looks like a fuel leak and one would think that on a prototype they would have gone over those fuel lines with a fine tooth comb. The engine could have been compromised during manufacture, during mating to the airframe, or during any routine maintenance. There should be multiple inspections made by different people and records of those inspections.

Right you are. If it indeed is an avoidable disaster from such silly mistakes as a loose fuel line, a thorough investigation should be in order, concluding in the rolling of heads.

On the bright side though, if it indeed is the case, it would mean the engine didn't suffer core failure and that the problem was not systemic. From following the previous discussions regarding the size of the engines relative to the plane, I was beginning to think that the plane was in fact underpowered and that they were overthrottling the 117. Sometimes such design 'flaws' are deliberately overlooked by development managers and the client as the cost saving opportunities are just too handy in using off-the-shelf engines. If it indeed is a fuel or hydraulic line failure, the impact on the whole program should be minimal.

May the souls of the crew rest in peace.

RIP to the crew, but this might mean it gets the attention and funding needed to sort out the problems.

No point in speculating till they have recovered the boxes and found what actually happened and why and can take steps to solve problems and get development back on track.

The first prototype had problems and those problems were fixed, perhaps now a couple of prototypes can be built with problems fixed to speed up development and preparation because they need to get to serial production as quickly as possible because those AN-26s and Yak-40s and L-410s are not getting any younger....