What fighter plane do you think Romania should use?

[88mm]

[Der Maresal wrotte:][/quote]Let's stick to the upgraded Mig21 for now - i prefer that over any future Yankee Import - [/quote]
There is an article in The Hindu where a russian official is quoted about the modernization package that India want's to implement on it's MiG 27. They to wanted to sign the contract with an Israeli company. The russian pointed the fact that an incorect implementation of modern avionics on one of their planes could leed to catastrofic events such as the lost of 14 upgraded MiG 21 from FAR!

[Victor]

Only 7 were lost, not 14.
It is normal for the Russians to want to do the upgrading themselves and get the money. What else did you expect them to say?

[Dénes]

"The Czech cabinet decided Wednesday to select new SAAB/BAe JAS 39C
Gripen 4th Generation Multirole jetfighters as replacement over
their MIG-21 fleet.
The Swedish offer outbid 4 other contenders, with the US offer of
used F-16's ending in last place, the Belgian F-16 offer came 2nd.

http://www.gripen.com
http://www.saab.se

Gripen have now been selected by the four nations;
Sweden, South Africa, Hungary and the Czech Republic.

What definitively gave Sweden the order was the fact it was brand new
high-tech jets with very low operational cost, plus offsets that
totally cover the lease period. The manufacturer will not be making
money from this special deal, this is the Swedish State offering 14
jets from the 204 pre-ordered for the Swedish Airforce. After the
5-10 year loan period, the Czech will again decide which jets to
equip their airforce with. Continue with the Gripen + add more of them,
or find something else."

[Dan Po]

QUOTE

QUOTE hmmmmm.... What about this one (Chinese J-10) ? http://www.aeronautics.ru/news/news002/news095.htm This is China's most modern military plane - It is similar to the Israeli 'Lavi', which in turn was a copy of the F-16 (with foreplanes). I find it interesting that america's best Friend Israel is cooperating with China (and sold the design plus alot more this this 'potential ennemy of the United States) :shock: :? ..(loyalty and friendship is not so important in this world where profit is everything.) *If I remeber correctly the first Prototype J-10 crashed and killed the pilot. The problem linked to the flight controll system. This has been corrected, and the plane is making progress. There are a few reason why the plane has not attracted international attention - I think it's because China is not regarded as a country with Airforce tradition (and also the oppinion that everything Made in China is not so good), plus the fact the plane was kept secret for a long time. It is a very good aircraft however - It can carry plenty of Armanent - It is better then the F-16, being more maneuvrable because of it's canard wings. Romania however cannot buy this aircraft (nor will it ever) since doing so will anger the United States with which it is trying to improve relations. If relation with the States continue to improve probably the F-16 will become the next plane for the Airforce (which I hope It wont!) I don't mind buying C-130's , transport planes from America but Fighter aircraft - no! It's very much a political decision as to which plane we will have in the future. My oppinion is that the bulk of the Airforce should have second hand, 2nd or 3rd Generation planes (Mig 21, Mig 29, IAR) ...and only a few "Crack" pilots - the Elite should be flying a small number of 4th Generation very Modern aircraft. (Eurofighter, Grippen, Mirage2000-5) - We should use the rest of the budget to build up our air defence System. Instead of buying Fighters worth millions of dollars - we could buy a great number of air defence units and missiles. These things are very lethal today. 8)

Herr mareshal :cheers: im agree with you again. But you know, the pilots are the proud of air forces not a few "rabbits" with a deadly aa missile. A kind of cooperation with France (we have tradition with them) to build some Mirage 2000 or (better) Rafale will be by far the best choice for our aa defence.

[Victor]

Spending that kind of money for the sake of emotional ties with France is not "the best choice" IMO. Need I mention all the other "good" aviation deals with French equipment during the inter-war era?

So far the Rafale has failed to find other customers than the Armee de l'Air, while the Mirage 2000 has much larger operating costs than the JAS-39.

The best choice is the JAS-39 Gripen. But it will be a political decision eventually.

[Dan Po]

QUOTE

The best choice is the JAS-39 Gripen. But it will be a political decision eventually.

I don t know why i forgot to think at JAS 39 :oops: . It s true - by far - that Gripen is the best choice. But ... the money for this are not in FAR hands .. i bet that our politicians will buy an amercan plane (F-16?) or Eurofighter. I read in a magazine that a romanian official said about Gripen is not in conformity with romanian air deffence doctrine :guns:

A russian one is out of discussion. Americans or europeans will be very angry if we will not buy something from them ... I think that the chose will be first a political one ... :cry:

[Radu]

At the end of ?60s, in the same time with the re-creation of the Romanian aviation industry, three major milestones were established in the field of design of military jets ? the design and production of a subsonic close-air support aircraft, which became IAR-93 -the first postwar combat aircraft built in Romania, a combat ? capable jet trainer - the IAR-99, and finally a supersonic fighter.

Capabilities for advanced research were created during the '70s within the former INCREST (now inherited by INCAS), and these included a Mach 3 capable wind tunnel.

In late '70s, the initial studies for the IAR-95 supersonic fighter were started, under the leadership of Dipl.Eng. Dumitru Badea. IAR-95 was a lightweight aircraft, with a single-engine configuration. The design required an engine thrust of 54 kN dry and 91 kN with afterburner, respectively.

The aircraft was a high wing monoplane with side air intakes. One of the proposed designs featured two fins.

Although the structural design of IAR-95 was in a quite advanced stage, the lack of availability of a suitable powerplant led to the cancellation of the initial IAR-95 project in 1981.



IAR-95 technical data:

Length overall: 14.75 m

Height overall: 4.95 m

Wing Span: 8.7 m

Wing area, gross: 26 m²

Wing sweep at quarter chord: 35 deg.

Empty weight: 6800 kg

Maximum take-off weight: 10000 kg

The supersonic fighter program was restarted in early '80s under the leadership of CoI.Eng. Constantin Rosca. The first layout of the new design was named IAR-101 and had the general layout similar to the early iAR-95, but had a thicker fuselage, four hardpoints under the wings.

The next step was IAR-S, several models were built and tested in the wind tunnel. Those were either with a single engine or with single fin, two engines and two fins, single and two-seater. The single engine two-seater was presented as a multirole aircraft. The model of this last IAR-S layout is still kept today in the entry hall of INCAS.

The programme was very ambitious and posed a real challenge for the Romanian aviation industry. In order to test the capabilities to produce such an aircraft, the decision was taken to build first the IAR-95ME technology demonstrator

The demonstrator had to be built in I.Av. Bucharest in Bãneasa (today Romaero S.A.), and a special branch of INCREST was moved to new facilities created in the neighbourhood of the factory. This time the aircraft reached the detailed design stage, but in 1988, due to financial reasons the whole programme was definitively cancelled.

IAR-95 ME technical data

Length: 16.0 m

Wing span: 9.3 m

Height: 5.45 m

Wing area: 27.9 m²

Empty weight: 7,880 kg

Max T-O weight: 15,200 kg

Weapons max. load: 3,200 kg

Powerplant: One Tumansky R-29-300 turbojet rated at 122kN with afterburner

For more informations:
E-mail: incas@aero.incas.ro

http://www.incas.ro/romanian/departamente/...%20Projects.htm

This seems to have quite a promising project. It is a shame that they didn't follow through. Since the project was in such a late stage of development I wonder if it wouldn't have been much better to build this one instead of spending the 300 million dollars on upgrading those ancient MiG-21's. Funds for the development if not sufficient could have been atracted from other countries most notably from the Middle East, Africa or even South America. Too bad for all the hard work and resources spent and for the lack of vision, it seems to be endemic in Romania.

[Dan Po]

Severals days ago I saw a TV reportage about the Romanian Air Forces ... they talk about the necesity of a new aircraft after 2010 and they still said something about F-16 :mad: :guns: :smg: .....

I don t want to say that F-16 is a not good one but after 2010 ..... must be a new aircraft not american 2nd hands

[Radu]

I found pictures for the two fins model and as you can see it looks great.






You're right. By 2010 the F-16 wont be a top notch airplane. However the first thing we should ask ourselves when buying any weapon is who do we expect to use it against. I mean are those few F-16's going to give us air supremacy over any of our neighbours? Will these airplanes be able to be serviced in Romania? Will we have the right/technology to manufacture some of the components we need to service the aircraft?

The great thing about this IAR-95 is not only that it would have been made in great part in Romania with all the inherent advantages but also if done right, it could have saved the Romanian defence industry. It could have marked the vital transition from mass low tech production to smaller, high tech projects.

Furthermore the export market for fairly cheap and dependable jets, not necesarily super high tech has huge. For example Russian arms sales for this year are expected to top 8 billion dollars, out of which 50% is aircraft sales. Even if we were to take only 10% of Russia's market the profit would have been 10 times larger than the profit made by the entire Romanian defence industry last year.

Anyway that's just my two cents.

[Victor]

You need a powerplant for the airplane. The Romanian industry cannot offer one.

[mabadesc]

QUOTE

By 2010 the F-16 wont be a top notch airplane

In my opinion, the F-16 is no longer a top notch airplane even now, in the present.

With the production rollout of the F-22 Raptor and the JSF (Joint Strike Fighter) fighter jets, the F-16 has clearly fallen to a second-tier jet.

Also, personally I believe the F/A-18 jet surpasses the F-16 in terms of overall versatility and maneuverability.

Actually, I'm a little surprised the F/A-18 wasn't included in the poll.

In terms of Romania's fleet, my vote goes for Saab because of its price and new technology. The Mirage and Rafale haven't proven themselves and don't show any impressive capabilities.

[Radu]

QUOTE

Powerplant: One Tumansky R-29-300 turbojet rated at 122kN with afterburner

and I'm guessing two for the twin engine version. If the project would not have been canceled the first planes could have come out of the production line by 1993, just in time to save our defence industry. If the project would have been revived say, 3-4 years ago, when the need for a solution to the aging/obsolete fleet became apparent because of NATO intergration the IAR-95 could have been available by the time the MiGs retire. We already spent 300 million dollars on those MiGs and maybe someone here knows how much more Romania is planning to spend on importing new planes in the next 5 years. Whatever the total a lack of financial resources cannot be an excuse. To bad the fat comissions from imports are just too good to pass for influential people. :mad:

QUOTE

With the production rollout of the F-22 Raptor and the JSF (Joint Strike Fighter) fighter jets, the F-16 has clearly fallen to a second-tier jet.   Also, personally I believe the F/A-18 jet surpasses the F-16 in terms of overall versatility and maneuverability.

What I was saying in my previous post and maybe I didn't make myself clear was that the tech. level of whatever plane we're getting should only be just one thing to consider. More importantly we should really think about who do we expect to use the planes against and make a decision on the capability of potential adversaries while making the best use of our finite resources.

Another factor that we should consider and that has been ignored in the discussion so far, is how much do we can/need to invest in pilot training and what's the learning curve for the aircraft?

For example I read in Adevarul last year that Romania has 13 pilots trained to NATO standards so it's pretty stupid for us to have upgraded 100 MiGs. At the same time as advanced as a F-22 Raptor or a JSF is, would 13 of them be enough to defeat the hundreds of MiG 29's that Ukraine has?

[mabadesc]

I wasn't disagreeing with your post, Radu. I simply pointed out that in my opinion, the F-16 is already 2nd-tier, not that it will only be 2nd tier by 2010, as you mentioned.

And regarding my comments about the F/A-18, F-22, and JSF, they were not directed at you. I was just making a general statement because these planes haven't been mentioned at all (to my knowledge) in this thread. But I'm certainly not suggesting Romania can afford to buy a large-enough fleet of F-22's. It's not realistic.
In this case, both quality and quantity play an equally important role.

[Victor]

The initial project of the IAR-95 was for the Rolls-Royce Spey engine. After they came to the conclusion that they won't be able to get it, they turned to the Soviet powerplant (with which was equipped the MiG-21). However, the Soviets did not want to sell the license and neither did the Chinese. So, lacking an engine, the project was eventually abandoned.

The cost of designing a new super-sonic warplane these days is very high and only the rich powers can afford it. The decision to restart the IAR-95 program in case a proper engine is a political one, though. It would give an important boost to the Romanian economy. We certainly have the possibility to manufacture the structure of the airplane at IAv Craiova or at Aerostar Bacau, the engines could be made at Turbomecanica in Bucharest, onboard systems can be imported and even partially built here (like in the case of the avionics for the MiG-21 Lancer and the IAR-99 Soim) etc, etc. Being under the NATO umbrella, we could afford to lengthen the service of the MiG-21s until the IAR-95 could replace it. But, like I said, there are 2 main problems:
1. the engine
2. political will

In case of the latter it should be noted that only recently the first four IAR-99 Soim out of 24 ordered several years ago were delivered to the RoAF. This was because of the delays in the payments, IAv Craiova badly needing the funds to buy the necessary materials and parts. But for useless public festivities (the circus on 9 May this year for example, when 400000 USD were spent) it seems that there are.

[Dan Po]

In my oppinion the "to be or not to be" matter of IAR 95 is in political hands ... and I m almost sure that the romanian politicians don t have enough "balls" :oops: :oops: :oops: to develop a national jetfighter when the americans and others want to sell us something ...

Was a story with Bell Textron Inc. to produce the AH 1 W Super Cobra at Brasov ... I never heared about any AH 1 produced at Brasov ...

Our deffence industry is just a shadow of what it was just 15 years ago ... and nobody have any interes to resuscitate ... for this we need money and modern technologies ... Who want to sell us a jet engine when they can sell us an entire aircraft ?

As a conclussion ... its very very expensive to produce a modern jetfighter ... can we do more than France with Rafale ? Im just wondering ... :question: about this ...