PAK-FA Being Manufactured

After some of my usual internet trolling, favorite pastime, I've found some more news on the PAK-FA.

The Novosibirsk Chkalov Aviation Production Association (NAPO) has begun construction of the fifth generation multirole fighter. This work is being performed at Komsomol’sk-on-Amur together with the aircraft plant at Komsomol’sk-on-Amur, the enterprise’s general director, Fedor Zhdanov, reported today during a visit to NAPO by Novosibirsk Oblast’ governor Viktor Tolokonskiy.

“Final assembly will take place at Komsomol’sk-on-Amur, and we will be carrying out assembly of the fore body of this airplane,” Zhdanov specified. The fifth generation fighter which will replace the MiG-29 and Su-27 airplanes of the previous generation, was developed by the Sukhoy design bureau.

Original Article, Wikipedia

Found this on Wikipedia. I didn't find a direct siting for the information, but it seems to coincide with the type of things Sukhoi would be using to complete the aircraft. It appears that the assembly has begun, always a good sign for an aircraft. Also of possible interest, is this.

NPO Saturn Concept Photo

It's a rear-view concept photo, true, but since Saturn-Lyulka is involved with the aircraft I'd say it's probably acceptably close to reality. The text above the picture translates as "News.Military Aviation. 5th Generation Military Aircraft Layout" more or less, my Russian is a bit rusty.

The aircraft itself seems to be a mating of the Mikoyan Project 1.42/1.44 as well as the Su-27. More of the 1.44, however. It's significantly wider-looking than Sukhoi's previous offerings, and appears almost stubby. I doubt, however, that the aircraft will be that wide because it would be massively heavy; not a good trait in an aircraft. Just by appearances, I would wager that the roll rates would be abysmal because the wide engine spacing and overall width.

However, this is still a concept photo so I'll reserve final judgement until I see the official Sukhoi papers and prototype.

Edit: Look what else I found.

"Medium fighter fifth generation created, all deadlines met. All of the financial issues this year settled completely, "said Mikhailov.

He said that "in parallel, we are working to build a light fighter fifth generation."

The translation was rough, I had to use Google Language tools for this, but you get the idea. A light fifth generation fighter? Does this mean that PAK-FA was meant to counter the F-22, while the still unknown light variant would match the F-35? Interesting.

Original Article
Translated Page, Courtesy Of Google

[edit on 4/10/2007 by Darkpr0]

This is all very confusing..
I thought MiG was designing a light fighter called MiG2000i which India had shown more interest in initially; but then India finally signed onto the PAK-FA program this January.
So now ...??


Time to do a bit of reading!

Here is my take on it, the russians in the 1980s offered a tender to counter the American ATF and CALF designs which turned into the F-22 and F-35 fighters. The

LFI - Lightweight tactical fighter
MFI - Multifunctional Frontline Fighter

The LFI lead to "Project-33", which was a more advanced F-16ski type of fighter which was scrapped following the trend towards multi-role fighters. The larger MFI program was won by MiG and turned into the MiG-MFI design which lead to the technology demonstrators the MiG-1.44.

This was later scrapped because of funding problems and the tender replaced by the

PAK-FA - Future Air Complex for Tactical Air Forces

Which was won by the Sukhoi aircraft company and is apparently undergoing testing.


The MiG-I2000 program does not seem to have been a real project


The proposed PAK-FA is very similar to the proposal from Chengdu

Interesting news. I have always been the one on these forums saying I'll wait till I see the plane and it stops being just a paper "idea" plane. Personally though I'd need to see it in a picture on the assembly line etc to really believe it.

The possiblity of a 2nd plane being developed to counter the F-35 is an interesting one. Mig or who ever would really need to pull out some interesting engineering and testing though considering the price tag of the F-35.

Well the very fact that they're going ahed with the program mens that they have the funding.
And yes you can safely say that the PAK-FA is an inevitability now.
Whether it gets media access or not is another matter altogether.

I wonder how the J-XX is doing though. I wasn't too sure if that was a surety or not, but now I'm more inclined to think that the J-XX program is also in full swing, but completely shielded from media access.
These countries have the money and the motivation to build 5th gen fighters. There's no stopping that.

Europe never got down to building a 5th gen manned fighter because of divided goals and motives.Also the funding that goes into such an undertaking is mammoth.

I'm glad to see that the plane is going into construction, I just wish there was a source for that piece of info to confirm it.

Does anyone know how long it will be until we see some sort of official roll-out if production has just begun?

Just some observations about the Aritistic depiction.

Rudders seem to be built as the entire vertical stablizer and quite small.
Wing has a slight Sukhoi feel to it with it being pulled towards the rear of the fuselage
A very Suknoi tail with norm noozles that would probably be TVC

It almost feels like the russian version of the F-22. I suppose similarities are inevitable but this is almost un-canny.

Originally posted by Canada_EH
Just some observations about the Aritistic depiction.

Rudders seem to be built as the entire vertical stablizer and quite small.
Wing has a slight Sukhoi feel to it with it being pulled towards the rear of the fuselage
A very Suknoi tail with norm noozles that would probably be TVC

It almost feels like the russian version of the F-22. I suppose similarities are inevitable but this is almost un-canny.

Personally I think that the wing was a Sukhoi-ified version of that on the MiG 1.44 Flatpack, as I already voiced. It does, however, have some obvious Sukhoi nuances though. The wing has a lead-in very much like the inside front edge of a Su-27. Also, it's been modified to work with rear stabilizers rather than canards. I will admit that I was very much looking forward to a Raptor with canards, but it isn't in this picture. Disappointing, but still a possibility.

I agree with the tail thought. It's a bit of a step towards the MiG 1.44 again, though, the slant and overall positioning relative to the engines, a very wide berth. You are correct, they are very small. Also, your observation that it could be an entire moving surface, basically a vertical stabilator, is actually quite likely. It's a step away from Sukhoi's latest designs though, the vertical stabilizers on the Su-27 (and variants) as well as the Su-47 are quite large.

The tail nozzles, as you also said, are very much a Sukhoi design. The engines look almost like the RD-33 OVTs used in the MiG-35, though, and yet I had always thought that Saturn-Lyulka would be doing the engines. Perhaps a new design?

I touched upon this a little bit, but I am very surprised to see that the aircraft does not look to sport canards. The concept photo is difficult to interpret due to the viewpoint and dimensions, but it appears that the front leading edge is not long enough to sport a proper canard, nor is the nose long enough to accommodate the modifications a la Su-35 to the wing to allow for it. I'm really hoping that the aircraft is longer or thinner than it appears in the picture because otherwise the aircraft will simply not have the Flanker's or Firkin's sex appeal .

Still, looks promising as well as fairly close to what was expected. The Mikoyan Flatpack influence is obvious. I still wish it had canards though.

Originally posted by Darkpr0
I agree with the tail thought. It's a bit of a step towards the MiG 1.44 again, though, the slant and overall positioning relative to the engines, a very wide berth. You are correct, they are very small. Also, your observation that it could be an entire moving surface, basically a vertical stabilator, is actually quite likely. It's a step away from Sukhoi's latest designs though, the vertical stabilizers on the Su-27 (and variants) as well as the Su-47 are quite large.

Now here is the thing. The completely moveable surface has run into problems before on the 71 the 22 and others. The stresses envolved etc are too much for the rudders and stress breaks them or faituge cracks appear. Now horizontail stabliers that are completely moveable "elevons" are much more prevalent so I assume that there is some differents in load factors right.

just some rambling thoughts eh


[edit on 22/08/06 by Canada_EH]

Originally posted by Canada_EH
Now here is the thing. The completely moveable surface has run into problems before on the 71 the 22 and others. The stresses envolved etc are too much for the rudders and stress breaks them or faituge cracks appear. Now horizontail stabliers that are completely moveable "elevons" are much more prevalent so I assume that there is some differents in load factors right.

True, although considering that the Russians have gotten 360 degree TVC downpat, they might just forgo a rudder control altogether since the engines are better at it .

Originally posted by Darkpr0

True, although considering that the Russians have gotten 360 degree TVC downpat, they might just forgo a rudder control altogether since the engines are better at it

.

Not sure how true this is. In order for TVC to be fully effective I'm pretty sure they need to work with the controls of the Aircraft in order to recover from TVC manuveres. How far can they really shift the exhuast of aircraft on the vertical axis. I dont think a plane with pure TVC would turn as quick as a plane that uses a combination of the 2.

[edit on 22/08/06 by Canada_EH]

Originally posted by Canada_EH
Not sure how true this is. In order for TVC to be fully effective I'm pretty sure they need to work with the controls of the Aircraft in order to recover from TVC manuveres. How far can they really shift the exhuast of aircraft on the vertical axis. I dont think a plane with pure TVC would turn as quick as a plane that uses a combination of the 2.

Rudders are, IMHO, the least useful control surface. They aren't nearly as effective at changing the orientation of the aircraft as are the elevators or ailerons. Heck, any yaw is usually undone the moment you release the rudder (at least when I was flying. This may not be true for jets, but if the current sims are any indication then this hasn't changed). The only time I ever used the rudder was to correct for crosswind on landing, which is a maneuver not usually used in BVR or WVR combat.

As for the exhaust shift, the TVC vanes on the Flanker series move 30 degrees vertical or horizontal (or both), a hearty sum. And, to be sure, the aircraft would still have ailerons and elevators, but the rudder is a somewhat more expendable resource.

Hmm... Another thing I found.

Found this on Wikipedia. I didn't find a direct siting for the information, but it seems to coincide with the type of things Sukhoi would be using to complete the aircraft. The assembly has begun, always a good sign for an aircraft

Look familiar? Just a bit. Except that I found it here.

DefenceTalk.com

Anyone know who posted that? Not like I'm getting mad or anything, I'm just wondering who it is.

You have a cyber stalker!!

Definitely a ctrl-C + ctrl-V though, esp since both of you have used/spelt 'citing' as 'siting'!

But its surprising how you found it!
Are you sure its not you?

That drawing posted is (yet) another amateur drawing by some random on the internet - I wouldn't fuss too much over it.


Both the vertical fins and the elevators are far too small. Those fins would be completely blanked at high AoA, and might as well not be there - even when not blanked, the lateral stabilising force they would impart would be puny compared to what is required.

As for the elevators - whats the point if they are that small? You may as well just extend the wing back and use it.


DarkPR - I'm somewhat surprised you aren't aware of the extremely important function that a vertical fin has in keeping the aircraft flying true - when in a cross wind, what turns the aircraft into the cross wind? When banking and turning the aircraft (in a coordinated turn), what turns the aircraft into the bank? When at high AoA, what keeps the nose pointed straight?

The F-22 went through alot of design work on fin placement, and compromises were made to put the fin where it is.

Originally posted by kilcoo316
DarkPR - I'm somewhat surprised you aren't aware of the extremely important function that a vertical fin has in keeping the aircraft flying true - when in a cross wind, what turns the aircraft into the cross wind? When banking and turning the aircraft (in a coordinated turn), what turns the aircraft into the bank? When at high AoA, what keeps the nose pointed straight?

True, but I did say that it wasn't as important as the elevators or ailerons. That's not to say it isn't useful, merely that it isn't as effective as the other two control surfaces. If I accidentally made it out to appear that the rudder was a completely useless control surface, my bad. Feel free to argue the idea that rudders are needed for certain things, but IMHO with modern thrust vectoring the control surfaces no longer need to be as large as previous models.

Also, with reference to the picture, it is supposedly an NPO Saturn "official" concept drawing. It should be fairly close to reality, although there are some faults. As you've already observed, the rear control surfaces are very small. Although I've argued that control surfaces don't need to be as large as they used to, that won't stop me from saying that: Yeah, they need to be bigger. The MiG 1.44 MFI proved that the use of many large control surfaces could produce agility on even the largest fighter aircraft. Still, the main fault I see is that the engines are too widely spaced. This is very bad for roll rates, which we know are somewhat... Mmm... Handy in combat?

I'll wait til the rollout to pass full judgement on the jet, but this concept does appear to have some validity to it.

Having the engines widely spaced is not a problem for roll rates now - you can use assymetric TVC to greatly augment the authority of the ailerons.

I would argue that having TVC makes the elevators less important than the vertical fins. After all, things like the Mirage2000 survived without any independant elevators. But at higher angles of attack, the vertical fins are crucial to the stability of the aircraft.


LM looked at it for the F-22, and really wanted to incorporate it, but the benefits weren't worth it - the engines were too close together.



Going off at a little tangent, stumbled across these alleged drawings of a proposed MiG-39.









Which I gotta say, looks swwweeeeeettttt.


[edit on 19/4/07 by kilcoo316]

[edit on 19/4/07 by kilcoo316]

Originally posted by kilcoo316
Which I gotta say, looks swwweeeeeettttt.

Ohhhhhh, yeah . Here's a somewhat different take on what PAK-FA is supposedly going to be. Sorry, I can't do embedded pictures.

Image

An interesting pic of the proposed (although yet unknown) bird. Still, I can't wait to see the rollout .

Looks like the PAK-FA passed mock-up testing, so the picture we've currently got could be exactly what we'll be seeing.

Earlier this month the T-50 passed its technical mock-up inspection, says deputy commander of the Russian air force and chief for aviation, Gen Aleksandr Zelin.

Original Link

Goody =)

You know what?
I reaaaaally like the MiG-39 pics..
Way better than the PAK-FA designs!
They've even got a radical canard design for a lower canard RCS too..
I like!