Kaveri Engine

[Alok Arya]

BON PLAN can you tell what will be final thrust of this jv snecma Kaveri engine?

 

[lcafanboy]

You're not right.
under the present offset just for 36 planes, you will never have a assembly line. The assembly line is part of the MMI deal, not inked so far.

Rafale news will be out soon. Both for Make In India and a bigger surprise of Rafale M order from Merignac, huge order. India has chosen the upgraded (83KN) engine Rafale which is going to meet multiple requirements including deck ops at 14 degree ski jump. The upgraded engine will curtail the limitation of MTOW which is present in M88-4E for marine version operating from STOBAR carriers. The other competitor to this SH but it's not considered by IN owing to even less compatibility for STOBAR ops.

IAF need is now 400jets and IN need for deck ops is 80 and shore based is another 60+. No single engine requirement for now, except LCA. And most importantly the IAF and IN fighter must also be MII fighter and a substantial benefit in TOT in terms of manufacturing and repair & overhaul ecosystem. Good work done by DA, France and India.

And btw I forgot to mention for that 8 billion India is also getting one nuclear bomb proof air base (earlier there was negotiation for 2 base such bases but to lower the cost only 1 will be made by France the other will be made by L&T again technology transfer).

 

[BON PLAN]

And btw I forgot to mention for that 8 billion India is also getting one nuclear bomb proof air base (earlier there was negotiation for 2 base such bases but to lower the cost only 1 will be made by France the other will be made by L&T again technology transfer).

???
source please ?

 

[zebra7]

I have one doubt about Kaveri snecma jv to bring Kaveri project to life . This is because of core temperature aim for Kaveri is 1880 c . But core temperature of snecma m88 eco is 1570 c . Is French have capacity to full fill 1880 c target of Kaveri . As of now Kaveri has core temperature of 1450 c with directionally solidified blade with 80 kn wet thrust and based on single crystal blade technology from Russia and Indian nickel based superalloys single crystal blade of 1550 c durability is ready . So it is clear that metallurgy of m 88 eco level can not bring Kaveri into life . However blisk etc can bring weight reduction to target level of 1000 kg (1100-900 kg) . Cutting edge metallurgy, special plasma coating is needed . However specification of jv engine should be fixed as of now and ground testing should have been started if engine to be flight worthy by 2018 . If this jv engine able to come with thrust of 62/95-100 kn than a total order of 83 for 1 A , 83 for mark 2 , and 46 for N mark 2 total 212 confirmed .

Good.

But what I understand or make out with this development is something different.

1. Lets make it very clear that there is no problem in Kaveri core aka Kabini, and have already achieved its dry thrust target. And now no further improvement such as 95 KN is possible without changing the whole design substantially.

2. The problem with the GTRE or India is not the technology of the engine, rather the technology to manufacture the parts due to the lack of Industrial capabiity. SCB tech what you are talking about is imposible not due to the lack of designing the SCB blade or the material, rather the tech required to build them. At present Kaveri don't use SCB rather BLISK.

3. No OEMs whether Snerma, GE, Pratts&whitney or the Russians or Eurojet are going to give these tech. to anyone, because this is what they are earning and they have spend billions of dollors in research and decades of time in achieving it.

4. From Snecma what GTRE could learn is the Modular design of their M88 which have 13 modules as compared to the EJ200 which have 11 and G F404/414 which have 6 modules.

5. Kaveri engine have been superceaded with the K9+ and K10 which is now targetting the AMCA 110 KN requirement.

6. Kaveri in its present form could fly the LCA though subpotentially, thus the real target should be K9+ for the LCA trainer and K10 for the AMCA and declaring the turbofan engine development as the national project, with full comitment from the government from the funds to the national program to produce the engineers, scientists, graduates and researchers for labs such as GTRE.

7. Get the tech. and the industrial capabilities, machining tech, machines from japan to europe by hooks or crooks.

 

[Alok Arya]

Presently Kaveri have neither sub nor blisk .
No substantial Design change require for 95 kn wet thrust if we use scb able to tolerate 1850 c and achieve a pressure ratio of 27:1 Kaveri can easily generate > 95 kn . It is not Design change but better metallurgy required . Blisk , scb , ceramic coating , plasma coating etc are required for both to reduce weight and increase thrust .
If French not give us these technology than what they contribute to project and also to offset .

 

[AnantS]

Presently Kaveri have neither sub nor blisk .
No substantial Design change require for 95 kn wet thrust if we use scb able to tolerate 1850 c and achieve a pressure ratio of 27:1 Kaveri can easily generate > 95 kn . It is not Design change but better metallurgy required . Blisk , scb , ceramic coating , plasma coating etc are required for both to reduce weight and increase thrust .
If French not give us these technology than what they contribute to project and also to offset .

Please go through some components: http://www.livefistdefence.com/2010/08/photos-kaveri-turbine-components-early.html
Also India has made gen 2 SCB blades in lab, however productionizing them is another challenge. They havent been introduced in kaveri yet http://doc.assofond.it/13th_World_C.../lectures/TechnicalEngineeringLecture/T17.pdf

 

[BON PLAN]

I have one doubt about Kaveri snecma jv to bring Kaveri project to life . This is because of core temperature aim for Kaveri is 1880 c

I have a doubt. Is it 1880 °C or 1880 °K !!!
I think it's in K. the difference is 273° ....

 

[BON PLAN]

BON PLAN can you tell what will be final thrust of this jv snecma Kaveri engine?

absolutely no idea .

 

[Alok Arya]

I have a doubt. Is it 1880 °C or 1880 °K !!!
I think it's in K. the difference is 273° ....

I think it is c .
Kaveri in its present form have core temperature of 1470 c means 1470 + 270 = 1740 k .
And later it is 2 generation scb develop by Indian institute on the basis of Sukhoi tot are able to tolerate 100 c more than 1740 k of ds blade of Kaveri. So 1840 k is achievable already so I think it is 1880 c . Same information also available on net .

 

[lcafanboy]

source please ?

Not all things are put in public domain.

When the deal is signed formally in Jan several things will be made public but again a few strategic things again will be confidential.

Kaveri engine or jet engine technology alone will save India about 25 to 30 billion dollars in forex which will be used to buy more Rafales (over a period of 20 to 25 years, since India needs around 2000 engines), so practically Rafales are free for India.

 

[lcafanboy]

BON PLAN can you tell what will be final thrust of this jv snecma Kaveri engine?

Kaveri will be flat rated to atleast ISA+15*C or may be +20*C. That will make it the only military engine used in a fighter which will be flat rated. If the engine delivers 98Kn with flat rating with 13% margin, it means that it has a rated thrust of 112.6KN using the normal jargon for military engines.
The present 72KN of Kaveri is equivalent to 83KN of engines like F414/M88 etc as none of them is flat rated with a margin of 13% thrust.

 

[airtel]

Kaveri will be flat rated to atleast ISA+15*C or may be +20*C. That will make it the only military engine used in a fighter which will be flat rated. If the engine delivers 98Kn with flat rating with 13% margin, it means that it has a rated thrust of 112.6KN using the normal jargon for military engines.
The present 72KN of Kaveri is equivalent to 83KN of engines like F414/M88 etc as none of them is flat rated with a margin of 13% thrust.

and why they are using a Flat rated Engine ?? kaveri is also a variable cycle Engine .


@StealthFlanker

 

[airtel]

IAF need is now 400jets and IN need for deck ops is 80 and shore based is another 60+. No single engine requirement for now, except LCA. And most importantly the IAF and IN fighter must also be MII fighter and a substantial benefit in TOT in terms of manufacturing and repair & overhaul ecosystem. Good work done by DA, France and India.

how many rafals ??
what about AMCA ??
we got GE414 for AMCA prototype ??

 

[lcafanboy]

how many rafals ??
what about AMCA ??
we got GE414 for AMCA prototype ??

Total fighters required for IAF is more than 400 and INavy more than 150 in next 10 years of which 300 plus will be Rafales. While LCA and another single engine Fighter will fill the rest.

AMCA will come only by 2035, only design is frozen till now, So much work is pending TD, Proto types, LSP, SP check how much time it took from first flight to sp for LCA (2001 to 2015 still not up to mark and no production capacity). Even if some how TDs are made by 2020 and first flight by 2021 add 12 years for testing (optimistically) and then production you get 2035.

AMCA will be flown on GE F 414 first since unproven airframe is always flown with proven engines and then Kaveri K-10 (rated at around 112 to 115KN flat rating again military thrust will be around 128KN).

 

[lcafanboy]

and why they are using a Flat rated Engine ?? kaveri is also a variable cycle Engine .


@StealthFlanker

Jet engine's performance deteriorates at high temperatures like it is in Indian climatic conditions and Increases at lower temperatures like in Europe so a GE F404 rated at 85KN in Europe churns out around 76 kN in India and likewise for other engines too.

To circumvent this a flat rated engine was mulled for Kaveri which is highly advance even USA is only now trying with Pratt & Whitney F-135 for F-35, Even Pratt and Whitney experts when they looked at Kaveri were surprised and did acknowledged that engine is highly advanced. The only area where we lacked were metallurgy, SCB, Blisks and tooling machines. Design wise engine is good and path breaking.

Snecma will provide expertise where we lack and make engine work and in return will gain knowledge for a flat rated engine design.

 

[Alok Arya]

Total fighters required for IAF is more than 400 and INavy more than 150 in next 10 years of which 300 plus will be Rafales. While LCA and another single engine Fighter will fill the rest.

AMCA will come only by 2035, only design is frozen till now, So much work is pending TD, Proto types, LSP, SP check how much time it took from first flight to sp for LCA (2001 to 2015 still not up to mark and no production capacity). Even if some how TDs are made by 2020 and first flight by 2021 add 12 years for testing (optimistically) and then production you get 2035.

AMCA will be flown on GE F 414 first since unproven airframe is always flown with proven engines and then Kaveri K-10 (rated at around 112 to 115KN flat rating again military thrust will be around 128KN).

This is my question. A 1100 kg engine if producing > 110 kn means thrust to weight ratio of 10:1 . While snecma m88 2 is 8.5 . Is French have technology of 10:1 and scb durable for > 1900 c ? Because if scb of > 1900 c durability is available this engine going to have > 110 kn thrust and order book include Tejas 1A , Tejas mark 2 and Tejas mark 2 navy , and finally AMCA after fine tuning.

 

[StealthFlanker]

and why they are using a Flat rated Engine ?? kaveri is also a variable cycle Engine .


@StealthFlanker

Apologize for the delay reply, i has been traveling around in Christmas .
First of all, all jet engine are " air breathing engine" in layman term this mean more air flow lead to more thrust.You may already know that when you heat air up they will expand, when you cool air down they will condense( shrink)=> at the same altitude, air density will be lower in hot weather than in cold weather. So as you could have guessed: at the same altitude, thrust produced by the same engine in cold climate will be higher than in hot climate, and this go for all jet engines.
A flat rated engine is an engine that has its max thrust level always able to reach a certain value up until a specific temperature or altitude . For example if Kaveri is flat rated until ISA+15*C with thrust level of 81 kN that mean its static thrust will be 81kN when the ambient air temperature is equal or lower than ISA +15*C , and only reduce when temperature get higher. But what LCAfanboy said about increase thrust level is actually wrong. Lower ambient air temperature than the rated value WILL NOT increase thrust level of a flat rated engine. This may sound contradict to what i said earlier about thrust vs air temperature, and you may ask yourself " what the point of a flat rated engine then if its thrust level will not increase in cold air ? why would anyone want to reduce the engine performance". Hold on for a second and i will explain, it happened for a good reason. Contrast to what the internet forums may tell you, higher thrust is not always desirable. There are two main limiting lines that if you cross them, you will fuck up your engine big time:
1) internal operating temperature
2) internal pressure
when the ambient air temperature is lower than the rating limit , you will have thicker air going in the engine. Technically speaking, thicker air mean you can burn more fuel ( or burn fuel more efficiently) to generate more thrust. But, generate more thrust mean you will generate higher internal pressure.The rise in pressure than what your engine can sustain will melt your turbine/vanes if you do not limit them.So while you can potentially generate more thrust, you are at very big risk of trashing your engine or even the aircraft. To prevent such catastrophe event from happening, in a flat rated engine, the FADEC ( aka full authority digital engine control ) will reduce fuel flow or turbine rotation speed when a certain thrust level is reached.In short , if your engine is flat-rated at X amount of thrust then its thrust will not go higher than that no matter how low is ambient temperature. Another point to remember : a Flat rated engine is not the same as a Derated engine eventhough their name sound very similar . A derated engine is an engine that can produce more thrust than required but has been reduced to lower thrust level so that it fit with airframe structure integrity or to improve engine life or reduce fuel consumption

 

[rudresh]

I have one doubt about Kaveri snecma jv to bring Kaveri project to life . This is because of core temperature aim for Kaveri is 1880 c . But core temperature of snecma m88 eco is 1570 c . Is French have capacity to full fill 1880 c target of Kaveri . As of now Kaveri has core temperature of 1450 c with directionally solidified blade with 80 kn wet thrust and based on single crystal blade technology from Russia and Indian nickel based superalloys single crystal blade of 1550 c durability is ready . So it is clear that metallurgy of m 88 eco level can not bring Kaveri into life . However blisk etc can bring weight reduction to target level of 1000 kg (1100-900 kg) . Cutting edge metallurgy, special plasma coating is needed . However specification of jv engine should be fixed as of now and ground testing should have been started if engine to be flight worthy by 2018 . If this jv engine able to come with thrust of 62/95-100 kn than a total order of 83 for 1 A , 83 for mark 2 , and 46 for N mark 2 total 212 confirmed .

Good.

But what I understand or make out with this development is something different.

1. Lets make it very clear that there is no problem in Kaveri core aka Kabini, and have already achieved its dry thrust target. And now no further improvement such as 95 KN is possible without changing the whole design substantially.

2. The problem with the GTRE or India is not the technology of the engine, rather the technology to manufacture the parts due to the lack of Industrial capabiity. SCB tech what you are talking about is imposible not due to the lack of designing the SCB blade or the material, rather the tech required to build them. At present Kaveri don't use SCB rather BLISK.

3. No OEMs whether Snerma, GE, Pratts&whitney or the Russians or Eurojet are going to give these tech. to anyone, because this is what they are earning and they have spend billions of dollors in research and decades of time in achieving it.

4. From Snecma what GTRE could learn is the Modular design of their M88 which have 13 modules as compared to the EJ200 which have 11 and G F404/414 which have 6 modules.

5. Kaveri engine have been superceaded with the K9+ and K10 which is now targetting the AMCA 110 KN requirement.

6. Kaveri in its present form could fly the LCA though subpotentially, thus the real target should be K9+ for the LCA trainer and K10 for the AMCA and declaring the turbofan engine development as the national project, with full comitment from the government from the funds to the national program to produce the engineers, scientists, graduates and researchers for labs such as GTRE.

7. Get the tech. and the industrial capabilities, machining tech, machines from japan to europe by hooks or crooks.

After a long time i am replying in this form I predicted these things long back in 2011 it may be on the 27 th page or so .I agree with all of your views and few things let me clear up........

1. kaveri cant achive more than 81 kn which is its design limitation ...When the kaveri design was envisioned it was to have less internal core temperature ....now they have achived near to it and metals which can sustain higher temperature are available. So the thrust can be enhanced to 85kn or more with no changes. With some modifications to engine ( which could take some more time ) it could be 90+Kn.

2. Since M88 eco has internal temp of 1570 C and dosent achieve 90Kn and hence kaveri cannot achieve more than 90 kn this is absolutely false.....because the dimensions of kaveri engine is different than that of the M88 eco. Al 31FP may have less internal temp han that of M88 but even the base line model is able to provide 125Kn since the demensions are completely different.In my openion the French can bring the Kaveri to 120 kn if they provide the necesssary alloys and some consultancy but ... 90Kn will be in easy reach.

 

[zebra7]

After a long time i am replying in this form I predicted these things long back in 2011 it may be on the 27 th page or so .I agree with all of your views and few things let me clear up........

1. kaveri cant achive more than 81 kn which is its design limitation ...When the kaveri design was envisioned it was to have less internal core temperature ....now they have achived near to it and metals which can sustain higher temperature are available. So the thrust can be enhanced to 85kn or more with no changes. With some modifications to engine ( which could take some more time ) it could be 90+Kn.

2. Since M88 eco has internal temp of 1570 C and dosent achieve 90Kn and hence kaveri cannot achieve more than 90 kn this is absolutely false.....because the dimensions of kaveri engine is different than that of the M88 eco. Al 31FP may have less internal temp han that of M88 but even the base line model is able to provide 125Kn since the demensions are completely different.In my openion the French can bring the Kaveri to 120 kn if they provide the necesssary alloys and some consultancy but ... 90Kn will be in easy reach.

I am not a turbofan engine expert but few points

1. Kaveri is flat rated engine, which means that all the parameter or values are achieved with the indian/sub tropical conditions. Thus if we compare it with another engine such as RD33 the TWR is 6.1 compare to 7. On paper it looks lot of difference, but in reality there is not of much difference because in the indian condition the RD 33 is not going to produce the max thrust rated by its OEM's.

2. You are confusing yourself with the max internal temperature and the thrust. First of all there is no such material or alloy that could with stand such high temperature and sustain the strength and stress at such temperature. It is the technique or the special design that help attaining them such as SCB and the thermal coating. The blades are design in such a way that they are hollow from inside and have small vents that allow the air to flow from, which distribute the air in such a manner that allow the proper heat distribution and the removal of the heat quickly at such high temp and speed, which sustain the strength of the structure. The following picture will give you an idea.

Problem is the capability to manufacture such structure, because you cannot make a die to build it or machine it plus the grains structure of such material should be uniform to give them the max strength thus the SCB in which each layes are build from the powder and adhessive thus grow the whole structure slowly. Question is do we have, yes we have developed such capability but it is of early stage or few generation behind than the leading leaders. Second is the thermal barrier coating paint, which protects these blades, but we don't have it at all confirm by the GTRE director himself. There is no problem with the core of the Kaveri, rather its the compressor stages needs to be refined.

3. Let me again state myself, no OEM is going to give this capability to India, and thinking that Snerma is going to help GTRE to get this capability is no where close to the reality. Max they will supply such parts and will not share this secret. So if India wants to get all this tech. that they have to get it themself, thus I stated that from hooks to crooks, from cheat to copy do whatever to achieve it, and when I say develop the tech. than it means to develop the machining, anufacturing, design and r&d database and knowledge and this is not possible by only one entity aka GTRE rather the national effort is needed.

 

[Alok Arya]

Kaveri has 52/81 kn because of temperature and pressure ratio achieved is suboptimal. Temperature achieved is 1470 c while goal is 1880 c . Pressure ratio achieved 21:1 while goal is 27:1 . 52/81 kn thrust achievement are because of metallurgy limitation not because of degine limitation . Later reports come of scb of 100 c temperature better durability are ready . These blade definitely has gone into Kaveri with better thrust than 52/81 but exact figure not come in public domain but it definitely more and may be between 85 to 90 kn . Actually if original objective of Kaveri is achieved it is a engine of f414 class with dry thrust of 62~65 kn and wet thrust of 95~100 kn . A interesting facts is that f414 has 890 mm diameter while Kaveri has 910 mm mean more surface area for air flow . If same level of metallurgy come to Kaveri with achievement of 1900 c and 30:1 total pressure ratio Kaveri generate more thrust than f414 . If thrust to weight ratio of 10:1 achieved for Kaveri it definitely has more thrust that f414 epe .
My question is very simple .......
Is Kaveri snecma engine going to achieve ~ 100 kn goal with a thrust to weight ratio of 9:1 or ~115 kn with thrust to weight ratio of > 10:1 ?