Let
@p2prada reply to the first half of your point. It will be better for him to comment.
Gripen NG has been in service since 1997 and till date has produced almost 240 aircraft and is in the service of 2-3 nations. So please do not compare LCA with it.
How many different world class fighters have Sukhoi Bureau, Mikhoyan, or LM or Boeing have made in the last 4-5 decades. When they offer a new aircraft then the reliability and performance of those 4 decades backs their offering. The same is not the case with HAL. Maybe in 2020 or in 2025 they may have the same credibility or capacity.
I once again repeat that you cannot say that a aircraft on the design stage is better than a aircraft which is being used in active service. At best you can say that based on the specs our offering will be better. Actual performance and specs on the drawing sheets are two different things and in my limited experience the divergence can be pretty steep.
If I want to buy a Formula 1 car I would rather go to a Ferrari or a Mercedes rather than go to Honda or Suzuki or even Volvo.
What is the reply of
@p2prada is not the point,
I know very well what he will reply , when cornered,
I asked your views on the statements made by
@p2prada
The one that entered service with Sweedish airforce in 1997 is not grippen NG. It is Grippen C/D .
Not a single production version Grippen NG fighter exists, forget about IOC, FOC, there is only one demo version exists.
Yet IAF saw the wisdom in allowing Grippen NG to participate in MMRCA tender, In case it won , Indian tax payer would have paid through their nose for the development of this NG version, which would have been sold to export markets with huge revenues.
First the PAKFA is supposed to be an answer for F-22 and it was supposed to be delivered with two seater version. Now the clean config RCS of FGFA will be bigger than the clean config RCS of Tejas at 0.5 sq meter according to russian sources themselves..
if we add stealth external weapon bays to tejas mk-2 , then both may carry the same number of air to air missiles with matching RCS , now compare the prices.
Also two seater version won't be coming along and now it is cancelled.Still no one says it is not right for IAF to have backed the fighter without seeing full production version, Why?
An aircraft will exceed or match another aircraft in operational stage, only if the corresponding design principle is applied at design stage itself. Fighter design nowadays is not about lets see what comes at the end of the design process.
If your super rich you can buy forever from Ferrari, but with your currency busting we can not afford to bankroll the Ferrari and Mercedes of the world forever.
What about our Himalayan neighbor about whom we are mortally afraid forever, Does he also stand in the Q before the ferrari firm?
And why did the top speed of russian ferrari (FGFA ) has been reduced from Mach 2.5 to Mach 2?
And dd IAF know all the finished fighter specs of FGFA before they entered into the program before they backed it with firm orders of 200 ?
Did they know what is the final clean config RCS of FGFA when they gave a commitment of 200 to Sukhoi?
No is the answer to all the questions.
Do you think IAF would have accepted a stealth fighter with primitive radar blocker (employed in Super hornets of yore)for exposed engine blades from ADA in AMCA?
A big No is the answer.They would have taken ADA to the cleaners for this single inept solution which will definitely lead to detection and tracking by future highly sensitve ASEA radar.
Even the chinese J-20 and J-31 does not employ this exposed engine blades with radar blocker solution. So Sukhoi too is not ferrari or mercedes when it comes to 5th gen fighters.
The Sukhoi has just evolved the Su-30 design to 5th gen stealth with no thoughts about serpentine intakes for stealth.even Chinese introduced serpentine intake for better stealth compliance. Why has IAf not insisted on this feature in FGFA from Sukhoi?
Then why a different yardstick needs to be applied for tejas mk-2 for bulk orders?
Isn't it a common fact that all fighters will fall short of the top 5 or ten percent extreme design specs as we are witnessing on FGFA?
So did the IAF went ahead with Su-30 MKI after throughly satisfying itself with the first production version fully developed by the Russians. No. 40 Russian SU-30 series fighters spent their teething time in IAF stables not in the paid for configuration and they were recently returned to Rusia in exchange for the Full SU-30 MKI version. It is not something you would not have known I think.
Even Russian airforce has now ordered the SU-30 MKI in the name of SU-30 SM for their fleet all thanks to combined hardwork by various Indian agencies including the much maligned HAL.
SO when IAF was ready to pay for SU-30 MKI with specs only in their ASR sheets making a song and dance over tejas is not fair to the young pilots whose fate is being tied with Mig-21s.
If at all IAF wanted it would have given orders for 50 or so tejas mk-1 6 or 7 years before
with needed modifications done after the FOC
like they did with the initial SU-30 batch which did not conform to their specs.
Even sweedish airforce did not insist on 2 or 3 IOCs and one FOC along with 2300 test flights for their 1997 induction of grippen, it gave immediate orders a few years after the prototype flew. thats why grippen program is in an advanced stage compared to tejas,
Since IAF did not give a firm committed order of 50 or 80 Tejas mk-1 production of LSPs has become a low priority job for HAL.That was one of the reasons tejas was delayed as well because why do you expect HAL invest in a brand new production line for tejas with no firm commitments from IAF?
So we can see the rudimentary shapings on tejas prototype wings all due to the obsolete production line through which tejas is being produced. Only now HAL has asked money for investing in modern production tech for tejas from MOD and it is still not cleared by MOD. All of this is going on because of the lack of interest shown by IAF from the start.
Even AM Rajkumar in his Tejas story book has written that IAF came on board tejas only after 2006 and raised many requests for action numbering around 200 which further delayed the program.
If IAF gives a bigger order and asks for urgent deliveries HAL can set up a higher capacity production line along with firm orders for engines for speedy deliveries. So making 400 Tejas fighters in ten years at 40 an year is no rocket science,
Why if IAF give orders in the vicinity of 400 many domestic firms too will be willing to jump in , Remember reliance tying up with Dassault and TATAs tying up with Boeing in MMRCA. Because then it is sure to have even export orders.
Why is IAF not insisting on it? If it wants faster deliveries. They are still setting their eyes on RAFALE , FGFA only with just lip service for tejas. But the reality in the form of dwindling forex reserves and falling Rupee will bite them soon.
Lets see how things fare then.
Purely from air defence perspective tejas mk-2 will be on par with the Grippen NG as both carry the same engine and same empty weight , and even the same air to air missiles in the form of Meteor. Why tejas mk-2 will have a slightly bigger radome dia than the grippen NG too.So there is nothing wrong in IAF chiefs remarks that tejas mk-2 will be on par with grippen NG.
