[Sutripta]

^^^
90 seconds (I think) for evacuation does not give one the luxury of such protocols.
But do the French believe in it/ practice it. (Relevant question in light of less than acceptable crew behaviour in some recent seafaring accidents. Not French though).

Regards
Sutripta

[V.Narayan]

The ejection seats for the flight crew in the Tu-144 were installed mainly for use in an emergency during prototype and pre-production stage flights. It was not meant for use if and when full commercial operations started. The Tu-144 in the event flew mainly non-passenger flights and it's engineering challenges proved too difficult to resolve to a point where it could pass muster even with the lower standards of the Soviets. It was not the intention of Tupolev or Aeroflot that the flight crew do a reverse Birkenhead on their hapless passengers. The aircraft flew only 103 times after entering service of which 55 were passenger carrying flights. The rest were mail carrying flights or route proving flights. In these 103 flights there were 226 system failures including 80 while inflight. Clearly those ejection seats were needed.

[Sutripta]

^^^
Now this is knowledge talking!

Regards
Sutripta

[Sutripta]

Is there anyone who has gone supersonic in both the TU 144 and the Concorde?

[saket77]

Originally Posted by Sutripta

Is there anyone who has gone supersonic in both the TU 144 and the Concorde?

I believe Concorde even had a supersonic passenger aircraft back in the day. But you probably asked if someone had done it in both the fighters.

[V.Narayan]

Originally Posted by Sutripta

Is there anyone who has gone supersonic in both the TU 144 and the Concorde?

Very interesting question with a unique answer. Makes me wonder if you know the answers already. In the late 1990s NASA needed a large aircraft capable of sustained supersonic Mach 2.0 flight for some experiments mainly gathering deep data for future use if they ever had to build something similar. They were unsuccessful in getting a Concorde out of the fleet from Air France and British Airways. So they approached Tupolev who leased them one Tu-144. A NASA pilot Rob Rivers flew twice in the jump seat of the Concorde and did a few simulator runs and later flew as co-pilot in the Tu-144. I believe he was the only one to fly in the cockpit of both albeit in case of the Concorde he was on a note taking, self-education flight.

Interestingly the wing design of the Tupolev was more advanced than that of the Concorde including the canard surfaces upfront. It lost out on the engines which needed to be in reheat mode for supersonic flight to be sustained. Concorde needed reheat to get to Mach 2.0 but then could cruise supersonically on full dry thrust of its 4 Olympus engines. Of course the Tu-144 had many other design deficiencies including the skin cracking quite seriously after just a few flights. <Dear Air hostess isn't it getting windy in the cabin>

[Gansan]

How many Tejas aircraft are in service with the IAF? For a long time their Wikipedia page shows 16 in service. No further deliveries made after March?

I read in an article that wen the second sixteen aircraft begin to come in, a fresh Tejas squadron will be formed and the current one from Sulur will be moved to forward areas.

[Sutripta]

Originally Posted by V.Narayan

Very interesting question with a unique answer. Makes me wonder if you know the answers already.

I thought both the NASA test pilots who flew the TU 144 also (properly) flew the Concorde. Thanks for the correction.

If they are still around, maybe they can wangle their way onto the X-59!

Also did the Russians send any 'commercial espionage' people as paying customers on Concorde flights. And vice versa. Files should have been declassified by now.

Regards
Sutripta

[V.Narayan]

Originally Posted by Sutripta

Also did the Russians send any 'commercial espionage' people as paying customers on Concorde flights. And vice versa. Files should have been declassified by now.

I think espionage took place in both directions. Only with a Western dominated media we get to hear of the 'bad' Soviets but rarely the other way around. There were three incidents. First in 1963 a British named Grenville Wyne was caught trying to sell the conceptual outline blue prints of the Concorde to the Soviets in France. But those were too basic to be of any help to Tupolev. Then in the late 1970s Sergei Pavlov, a Russian, was caught with the detailed designs of the Concorde landing gear and carbon fibre brakes. This was an area Tupolev was struggling a lot with ie finding a way for the Tu-144 to stop with its landing speed of ~ 330 kmph. On the other hand at the Paris airshow in 1973 when the Tu-144 did its two demo flights the French flew a Mirage chase plane along side to film the exact way the canard surfaces worked. On the second demo that particular aircraft crashed in full view of the spectators.

[Sutripta]

Originally Posted by V.Narayan

On the second demo that particular aircraft crashed in full view of the spectators.

I think the Russians claimed that the chase plane caused the crash.

Just realised that Paris has the dubious distinction of being the site of two SST crashes.

Regards
Sutripta

[Jeroen]

Originally Posted by Sutripta

Is there anyone who has gone supersonic in both the TU 144 and the Concorde?

No idea. I flew on a short demo flight on Concorde in the early 80’s, but we did not go supersonic. I flew the last remaining Concorde Simulator in 2016 and we did not go supersonic either.



But I did get a chance to post in the cabin during a Mach 2.0 simulation!



I seem to recall that the Concorde design team at some point supported the Concorski team on certain design issues.

Jeroen

[AlphaKilo]

Originally Posted by Gansan

How many Tejas aircraft are in service with the IAF? For a long time their Wikipedia page shows 16 in service. No further deliveries made after March?

I read in an article that wen the second sixteen aircraft begin to come in, a fresh Tejas squadron will be formed and the current one from Sulur will be moved to forward areas.

Already, the first squadron is in place about 16 + some trainers. For now, this squadron will establish FOPs (flight operating procedures and standard operating procedures), always what a induction squadron does. Also, they form the operational tactics and test out maintenance and other stuff related to the aircraft. After this is standardized they might soon move over to Bangalore or to forward bases, paving way for the second squadron. Plan is to station a squadron of Tejas and Sukhoi (already station in Tanjore) in the south.

A good read on Tejas mk.1 and mk.1A and mk.2 and a NLCA based twin-engine fighter for future:

http://delhidefencereview.com/2019/0...ighter-part-i/

http://delhidefencereview.com/2019/1...craft-project/

http://delhidefencereview.com/2019/0...eight-fighter/


http://delhidefencereview.com/2019/1...fighter-tedbf/

[V.Narayan]

Like skanchan95 I too did not know that the wing sweep could be manually set to any degree or to several settings and not just 3. Western books always wrote of the gatling gun firing causing cracks in the airframe etc. Clearly that is not the case. The later engine maintenance troubles were a function of inadequate support from Russia and shortfall of spares. This was not an inherently unreliable engine as some articles have stated - over 6500 were built for the MiG-23, MiG-27 and the export versions of the Su-17.

[skanchan95]

Originally Posted by V.Narayan

Like skanchan95 I too did not know that the wing sweep could be manually set to any degree or to several settings and not just 3. Western books always wrote of the gatling gun firing causing cracks in the airframe etc.

Yes, there is absolutely nothing written about the manual wingsweep in the Aerofax MiG-23/27 book. Can you believe that? Nothing beats hearing from the men who actually flew the machine.

Originally Posted by V.Narayan

Clearly that is not the case. The later engine maintenance troubles were a function of inadequate support from Russia and shortfall of spares. This was not an inherently unreliable engine as some articles have stated - over 6500 were built for the MiG-23, MiG-27 and the export versions of the Su-17.

I clearly remember reading an article rebuking the unfair criticism of HAL regarding HAL built MiG-27's R-29 engine track record. It showed that atleast one such type of engine failure was not because of poor quality spares or the engine's inherent design flaw, but because of incorrect SOPs. Let me see if I can dig that up.

EDIT: Here it is, from the article titled "In Defence of HAL", Vayu Aerospace & Defence Review, I/2019.

Failure of the 4th stage compressor disc of R-29 engine of the MiG-27 : Bursting of 4th stage compressor disc on ground was yet another case where shadows were cast on quality of discs manufactured at HAL. Russian experts gave 'clean chit' to the quality of discs manufactured at HAL, established that the failure was because of skipping on an operational drill during taxiing. The problem was eliminated after pilots followed the prescribed SOP.

[skanchan95]

Originally Posted by Redline6800

The Pakistan Air Force never got anything similar.

The only aircraft that came close was the PAF's Nanchang A-5C Fantan, a dedicated low level strike evolution of the MiG-19/J-6. PAF used A-5s to intrude into the defenceless Afghanistan of the 90s and bomb Northern Alliance positions in support of Taliban forces.