AMCA - Advanced Medium Combat Aircraft (HAL)

[Superdefender]

I can't understand why they are planning to launch NAG ATGM from AMCA! How will that give us any advantage?

 

[Indx TechStyle]

Nirbhay is in development for land based variety. So unless this matures, talking of air-launched is needless.

AMCA gonna come only after 2025.
All versions of Nirbhay: GLCM, ALCM, SLCM will be fully mature and operational by then.

 

[Indx TechStyle]

I can't understand why they are planning to launch NAG ATGM from AMCA! How will that give us any advantage?

ATGM on fighter plane?
You must have made a mistake dude.
By the way, ATGM se yaad aaya, India must work on an aircraft like A-10 to bust enemy tanks. There are rumours that China is planning to study such an aircraft.

 

[Superdefender]

I am not sure even if we will have plans for an Air Launched Nirbhay. We simply don't have any requirement. It's having range more then 1000 Kms and by the time AMCA becomes reality range of Nirbhay might be cross 1500 km. So even land based variant will cover entire pakistan and almost entire Tibet. I don't see a requirement to use a cruise missile beyond these two lands.

Another sensible reason is that Nirbhaya will shoot down effortlessly. Missiles like Nirbhaya, which travels at 0.7-0.8 mach, donot pose threat to powerful countries having advanced radars and interception capability. Subsonic cruise missiles are helpful to bring down weak states. For e.g., Russia recently launched salvo of subsonic missiles from Frigates, that travel a long way to hit Syria. If you even managed to integrate a Nirbhaya-A, so what? Launching from MKI and again goes subsonic, only to hit Pak (1,000km range is no use)!

 

[tharun]

ATGM on fighter plane?
You must have made a mistake dude.
By the way, ATGM se yaad aaya, India must work on an aircraft like A-10 to bust enemy tanks. There are rumours that China is planning to study such an aircraft.

May be he is saying about brimstone like missiles..our iaf is also in process of integrating it to su-30mki
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brimstone_(missile)#Export_sales

 

[Superdefender]

That's why supersonic cruise missiles are useful and more deadly too. AMCA and FGFA top speed>mach 2.2. After releasing, Brohmos-NG will easily go hypersonic! We all know how destructive is Brohmos. So imagine the terror when it will hit at hypersonic speed. Its 290km range will not waste too, unlike 1,000km of Nirbhaya. It will be impossible to kill. So no subsonic cruise missile on AMCA, only supersonic or hypersonic.

 

[Superdefender]

ATGM on fighter plane?
You must have made a mistake dude.
By the way, ATGM se yaad aaya, India must work on an aircraft like A-10 to bust enemy tanks. There are rumours that China is planning to study such an aircraft.

Air-launched version of NAG, having range upto 10km, have been tested from upgraded Jaguar!

 

[smestarz]

I am not sure even if we will have plans for an Air Launched Nirbhay. We simply don't have any requirement. It's having range more then 1000 Kms and by the time AMCA becomes reality range of Nirbhay might be cross 1500 km. So even land based variant will cover entire pakistan and almost entire Tibet. I don't see a requirement to use a cruise missile beyond these two lands.

Missiles hitting southern cities like Guangzhou will alarm China, but being able to target Shanghai, will definitely be an achievement and ensure that Chinese maintain their army well within their borders

 

[HariPrasad-1]

I do not see any definitive shape of AMCA before 2022. Means when they would have the components and can actually design the plane. A prototype can be expected by 2027. AMCA will not join IAF before 2030.

The current timeline will see Russian FGFA starting to come from 2022.

For next 15 years, one should not expect AMCA in IAF.

see main impediment I see is engine. The proposed 120 KN 3D thrust victor engine exist no where. Actually we should use GE 414 uprated version (Which is proposed for navy) to be used in AMCA. We may use the thrust victor later on. 2 thrust victor on engines may add 1 ton weight to the plane.
They should be asked to freeze preliminary design in one year. review in next one year . and 2 more years for prototype. AMCA should fly by 2020. 5 years more for testing and it should join IAF by 2025. The time line is optimistic but we should work on it.

 

[tsunami]

Who cares about pakis. You have China. moreover, as Indian power expands, India gonna be involving in worldwide conflicts more.

I'm very disappointing to see that you are linking here pakis as well.

I can see on many forums, most of pakis have stopped comparison with us, Indians have to do troll wars with members of bigger players.

So, bringing them in scenario is useless and wastage of time.
Best way to discussing a clean thread is to totally ignore them.
Or if you want India to mess up with pakis always instead of global arena, then, we must decline our power.

Point is adding it to fighter will not increase the range too much. Let's say some 200 km of missile range will increase and extra 300 kms will be added by fighter. Then again you will reach to 1500 km range of the missile then.

Also Brahmos is a supersonic missile it will be used to destroy strategic targets. And it's speed will allow it to destroy highly secured targets without being fired in big numbers. Nirbhay can not do the same. So for example if you need to fire 4 Brahmos to destroy a target you will need only 2 fighters in case of Bramhos NG.

But for the same task you will need 12-14 Nirbhay to exhaust enemy air defenses. That would mean 6-7 fighter with lot of other escort fighters too.

 

[tsunami]

Missiles hitting southern cities like Guangzhou will alarm China, but being able to target Shanghai, will definitely be an achievement and ensure that Chinese maintain their army well within their borders

That is a real case but to scare china would need to fire 1000s of such missiles within the first few hours of war. So how many fighters can we send in China to this job.

My point is I don't see a realistic use of an air launched Nirbhay. We should make a missile with at least 2000 NM range for the role you are mentioning. Otherwise sending fighters 500 KM inside enemy territory with 2, 1.5 tons missile is not a good idea. And for rest of the world I think after Project 15B we should enter in a new project with at least 12K tons displacement destroyer. Each of these will be able to carry 100+ subsonic cruise missiles. That will be a real game changer.

 

[salute]

I can't understand why they are planning to launch NAG ATGM from AMCA! How will that give us any advantage?

maybe because its a missile specifically designed to destroy tanks,

other missiles of air force are either too expensive to use on individual tanks,

or at war scenario to valuable that cannot be wasted on an individual tanks.

 

[tharun]

maybe because its a missile specifically designed to destroy tanks,

other missiles of air force are either too expensive to use on individual tanks,

or at war scenario to valuable that cannot be wasted on an individual tanks.

Anti tank guided missiles are cheap and AMCA can carry more at a time

 

[tharun]

F-22 weapons bay is 3.9 meters long and 0.9 meters wide and depth of 500 mm(19.7 incch)
0.9 meters wide is 0.45(450 mm) meters for each bay
that mean 3 AIM-120c AMRAAM with a width of 180 mm(this width is when wings are not folded with folded it could be small) can be fitted in bay

 

[Superdefender]

maybe because its a missile specifically designed to destroy tanks,

other missiles of air force are either too expensive to use on individual tanks,

or at war scenario to valuable that cannot be wasted on an individual tanks.

But we have our LCH to do that job (HELINA) and It is only chopper in the world which can fly above 21,000ft!!! If enemy tank fires any anti-aircraft missile too, it will not reach LCH. It can easily take care of tanks. So why in AMCA?

 

[Superdefender]

F-22 weapons bay is 3.9 meters long and 0.9 meters wide and depth of 500 mm(19.7 incch)
0.9 meters wide is 0.45(450 mm) meters for each bay
that mean 3 AIM-120c AMRAAM with a width of 180 mm(this width is when wings are not folded with folded it could be small) can be fitted in bay

Hmm, no. Breadth of each bay is 0.9m, so total breadth is 1.8m. Width is 180mm (0.18m) for 120C. But it has 450mm (0.45m) wings too. So total width of AIM-120C becomes 0.18+0.45=0.63m. 0.63x3=1.89m, which is more than double of breadth each bay (0.9m). So they developed AIM-120C-8 (AIM-120D) which has folded wings. By folding wings, 120D's diameter decreases to 0.35m. But again 3 120Ds to fit in each bay. But again problem arose as 0.35x3=1.05m, again more than breadth of each bay. Finally, LM developed a technique to attach missiles in up-down straight fashion (not one by one straight), in a way that, one missiles's wing will not touch other missile's body. Now it works.

 

[tharun]

But we have our LCH to do that job (HELINA) and It is only chopper in the world which can fly above 21,000ft!!! If enemy tank fires any anti-aircraft missile too, it will not reach LCH. It can easily take care of tanks. So why in AMCA?

Choppers can escape from hand held anti aircraft missiles but from bigger once's like akash it's not that easy...

 

[tharun]

Hmm, no. Breadth of each bay is 0.9m, so total breadth is 1.8m. Width is 180mm (0.18m) for 120C. But it has 450mm (0.45m) wings too. So total width of AIM-120C becomes 0.18+0.45=0.63m. 0.63x3=1.89m, which is more than double of breadth each bay (0.9m). So they developed AIM-120C-8 (AIM-120D) which has folded wings. By folding wings, 120D's diameter decreases to 0.35m. But again 3 120Ds to fit in each bay. But again problem arose as 0.35x3=1.05m, again more than breadth of each bay. Finally, LM developed a technique to attach missiles in up-down straight fashion (not one by one straight), in a way that, one missiles's wing will not touch other missile's body. Now it works.

There is some thing wrong in your calculations 0.9 meters is the total width of two bays,that mean 0.45 meters of each bay....Missiles are not placed side by side there should a method like hanging like these shown below

1 2
3
OR
1
2 3

 

[Superdefender]

Choppers can escape from hand held anti aircraft missiles but from bigger once's like akash it's not that easy...

Akash is fitted on a Tatra truck. But these types of SAMs are too heavy and the truck will not move so much. In typical battlefield, you have basically two type of armors, viz., Tanks and ICV/BMP. LCH does not need to go near SAMs. It will fire NAG from above 21,000ft. And also SAMs system like Akash are stationed inside border to defend. The trucks do not move inside enemy land if I am correct. So if I assume that only Armoured vehicles moves inside our border, LCH and Apache will take care of them.

 

[tharun]

Akash is fitted on a Tatra truck. But these types of SAMs are too heavy and the truck will not move so much. In typical battlefield, you have basically two type of armors, viz., Tanks and ICV/BMP. LCH does not need to go near SAMs. It will fire NAG from above 21,000ft. And also SAMs system like Akash are stationed inside border to defend. The trucks do not move inside enemy land if I am correct. So if I assume that only Armoured vehicles moves inside our border, LCH and Apache will take care of them.

What if a long range SAM...................