Russians replacing L-39 trainers with SR-10s?

The Russians are claiming that starting next year, they will be replacing the L-39 trainers with SR-10s. This will start next year. The SR-10 is notable because it has a forward swept wing.

The question is why? The new bird would be a poor trainer for anything in the Russian air force AFAIK. It honestly feels like a pork project, byr maybe zaph and others can tell me why I am wrong.

www.ruaviation.com...

a reply to: anzha

Couple of shots..

a reply to: Bigburgh

When I first joined ats after following all the links back, I had snagged and posted a video of the CP-10. I made the mistake of using my own youtube channel to make sure it didn't disappear and was scolded: not supposed to put links to our own things here like that. I was a n00b and felt properly chastised.

a reply to: anzha

The Albatross is a 50'ish year old design. It hasn't been produced in 21 yrs. That means the youngest one in service is 20+ years old. It's a basic trainer and it's expensive to update them to more modern standards.
It's a good trainer, but not anything special. It's very popular as a sport aircraft. I know of three locally.
If you're going to spend major coin, why wouldn't you spend it on a Russian design firm for a light (cheap, efficient) trainer with modern avionics and better performance instead of paying a Czech company to upgrade and extend the structural life of 20+ yr old planes designed 50 years ago?

a reply to: anzha

At this point the cockpit is as important as the trainer itself. One of the big things in T-X is the cockpit. With fifth gen becoming more common, they need a lead in trainer that allows pilots to get used to the displays and sensor picture that they're going to see flying the more advanced aircraft.

a reply to: Zaphod58

And we've seen the inside of the sr-10 cockpit. Its awful.

a reply to: anzha

The final production cockpit may change, but it's still somewhat an improvement over the L-39.

originally posted by: anzha
a reply to: Zaphod58

And we've seen the inside of the sr-10 cockpit. Its awful.

We saw a prototype proof of concept built by a private design bureau.

There are have been several options forwarded. Here are two extremes: cf.ppt-online.org...

a reply to: RadioRobert

alert5.com...

If the AT-4 is coming back, I'm wondering what the status of the SR-10 is...