DRDO and PSU's

Vishnugupt said:
Just few months back IAF took delivery of Heron MK1. Means they still buying.

TAPAS development was started around 2014
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Not Mk1 but Mk2, show me the source otherwise ?
 
mist_consecutive said:
Not Mk1 but Mk2, show me the source otherwise ?
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Why did they buy Mk2 though?
When did the sudden realisation come that they would need expensive turboprop to be able to power SAR equipments? All of them started humping MQ9 and Eitan.
 
Nutcracker said:
Why did they buy Mk2 though?
When did the sudden realisation come that they would need expensive turboprop to be able to power SAR equipments? All of them started humping MQ9 and Eitan.
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Mk2 because our adversaries started operating MALE/HALE drones with similar capabilites and we were twiddling thumbs.

Also long-duration endurance adds signifcant capability enhancement. For e.g., on 18th July when Capt. Thapa & team was ambushed in Doda, a drone (probably Eitan) which was already flying for the last 12+ hours over entire Kashmir was re-routed to Doda to look for the terrorists. It continued to fly for the next 12 more hours and finally landed probably 24-26 hours later.

Practically, one single drone is able to cover an entire state & multiple operations in a single sortie. It might not sound particularly lucrative to us civvies (I mean we can just fly another one at the same cost right ?) but somehow military get a massive hard-on on the prospect of high sortie availability and low maintenance and operation cost.

Also SAR radars always required high-power, this is a no brainer.
 
fire starter said:

View: https://x.com/Defencematrix1/status/1835921146996273344?t=-CY_CgCK-YPdmDDw85DLGA&s=19
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Soft credit = Basically free.

Also I don't think LCH is a great choice for Nigeria. Light attack helicopters will get chewed up in MANPAD rich environments.

Heavier attack helicopters like Mi-35s are better which can take 50-cal bullets at face and survive. The advantage of LCH is not in attacking and tanking damage but in service-ceilling and mountain warfare scenarios where other heavier helicopters fail miserably.
 
mist_consecutive said:
Soft credit = Basically free.

Also I don't think LCH is a great choice for Nigeria. Light attack helicopters will get chewed up in MANPAD rich environments.

Heavier attack helicopters like Mi-35s are better which can take 50-cal bullets at face and survive. The advantage of LCH is not in attacking and tanking damage but in service-ceilling and mountain warfare scenarios where other heavier helicopters fail miserably.
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Not free but low intrest rate. We can import some crude oil from them anytime.
 
Nutcracker said:
I think thats Mk2 only. Heron mk1 has flatter nose.
My only gripe is when did IA jurnails learnt that they would need a turbo prop for better SAR coverage, And were they willing to shower the money for domestic replacement with a turbo prop engine as happily as they opened their bleeding butthole for the imported ones.
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Simply I wanted to say that Heron MK2 is not a IAI Eitan.

Heron MK2 is equivalent to TAPAS and Eitan is equivalent to MQ9
 
Ayan Barat said:
Weird flex Nigeria, but okay, I'm all in
View attachment 9699
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We operate Apache with T-90... Muricans must've felt the same 🥲

mist_consecutive said:
Also I don't think LCH is a great choice for Nigeria. Light attack helicopters will get chewed up in MANPAD rich environments.

Heavier attack helicopters like Mi-35s are better which can take 50-cal bullets at face and survive.
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LCH is better armoured that Mi-35 by being sleek & using ceramic plates to keep weight in check... It was stated multiple times here & there back then. Also got better EW & MAWS.

More on the Light Combat Helicopter (LCH)

www.ajaishukla.com www.ajaishukla.com
"The pilots’ area was designed to withstand a direct hit at 90 degrees from a 12.7 mm armour-piercing round. To put that in perspective (Perspex-tive… Ha! Ha!) some of the IAF Mi-35s, which were deployed in Congo, took hits from 12.7 mm AP rounds. They penetrated right through the armoured glass of the Mi-35. And that’s a much heavier machine."
 
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mist_consecutive said:
Soft credit = Basically free.

Also I don't think LCH is a great choice for Nigeria. Light attack helicopters will get chewed up in MANPAD rich environments.

Heavier attack helicopters like Mi-35s are better which can take 50-cal bullets at face and survive. The advantage of LCH is not in attacking and tanking damage but in service-ceilling and mountain warfare scenarios where other heavier helicopters fail miserably.
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Nah, if you are talking about MANPADs, then even heavy attack choppers like the Hinds and Apaches wouldn't be of much use. We've seen this many times in the Russo-Ukrainian war already.
 
Bleh said:
We operate Apache with T-90... Muricans must've felt the same 🥲



LCH is better armoured that Mi-35 by being sleek & using ceramic plates to keep weight in check... It was stated multiple times here & there back then. Also got better EW & MAWS.

More on the Light Combat Helicopter (LCH)

www.ajaishukla.com www.ajaishukla.com
"The pilots’ area was designed to withstand a direct hit at 90 degrees from a 12.7 mm armour-piercing round. To put that in perspective (Perspex-tive… Ha! Ha!) some of the IAF Mi-35s, which were deployed in Congo, took hits from 12.7 mm AP rounds. They penetrated right through the armoured glass of the Mi-35. And that’s a much heavier machine."
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People often times make the mistake of thinking heavier weight would automatically translate to thicker armor. What they fail to account for is the relative size of the weapon platforms they are comparing, and that sometimes includes the 'professionals' as well.
 
mist_consecutive said:
Soft credit = Basically free.

Also I don't think LCH is a great choice for Nigeria. Light attack helicopters will get chewed up in MANPAD rich environments.

Heavier attack helicopters like Mi-35s are better which can take 50-cal bullets at face and survive. The advantage of LCH is not in attacking and tanking damage but in service-ceilling and mountain warfare scenarios where other heavier helicopters fail miserably.
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That's actually opposite for manpad threat. When it comes light vs heavy.
Most important thing terrorist don't have air defence which could have forced combat hellos to fly low. So even mi35 is safe there remember it had very high ir signature. In afganistan they were falling alot coz of stinger.
If aircrafts are flying at high altitude manpads can't track them most of, while engaging enemy they will be in the manpad cover. As of now no mi35 has bing shot down in Nigeria by manpad.

Now lch prachand is best choice if the threat perception is manpad.

The more heavier the hello is the more powerfull engines are used and the more exhaust is released which increases ir signatur making aircraft prone to manpads. In heavy hellos this is huge. Modern mi35 comes with ir suppressor which does reduce but isn't enough they have been targetted in Ukraine too.

While lch being the lightest will have least exhaust among this hellos reducing it's ir signature. If that wasn't enough they have put a powerfull IR suppressor which suppresses IR signature very significantly so much that beyond 1 km manpads can't lock on it.

That's huge

While heavy hellos like Apache do come with suppressors too but they will not have as much ir stealth lch has.
Kargil taught us well what we need.
While hellos like t129 don't have any ir suppressors as they were never originally designed (a129).
Hellos do posses maws to counter manpads
As soon as a missile launch is detected it tiggers flares release many time saving the aircraft.
However this doesnt guarantee In Ukraine many such hellos were shot down missile launch can't be detected all the time and even manpad will go for flare can't be guaranteed all the times.

lch prachand is the best attack helicopters in its category.
And serves well everywhere. It just lacks maws & radar warning receivers for now. Earlier they had put the same saab's suit which was also used in rudra but drdo came in and serial aircrafts will have them. Ig it should perform better than existing sensor on rudra.

Prachand won't be delivered without it to Nigeria so thats another layer of safety.

Here is the video of chief test pilot wing cmdr unni pillai listen from 49:40
' u have to be very close to get a lock under a km'
This is something which generally gets neglected.


View: https://youtu.be/0V-2ZoBC7GE?feature=shared
 
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