Pakistan Army Aviation Corps - Updated

[Moon]

IMO ... if we want to do something, we'll need to:

• scope the end-product for 15-years from now
• work with a trusted partner to design the platform
• work with a trusted partner to develop the critical inputs
• incrementally work on it for 15 years from scratch

I personally like the idea of developing a 7-ton attack helicopter and 8-ton utility/transport helicopter using the same rotor, transmission and engine platform. However, if we start today, we're going to have to set our vision to at least 15 years out before we're ready for serial production.

This is the best case scenario.

Otherwise, we'll look to import.

An isolated South Africa in 90s built an attack helicopter, yet we can't? We have modern designing tools, more access to off-the-shelf parts, yet we can't build something like a Rooivalk? It doesn't have to be bleeding edge, just needs to be a bit better in terms of sensors than a Rooivalk?

 

[Reichmarshal]

Since turkey and US agree to secure Kabul airport by Hungry and Turkish forces with Pakistan collaboration good chance US allow 3rd party export T129 engines for Pakistan. Lets see how this pans out

T

Since turkey and US agree to secure Kabul airport by Hungry and Turkish forces with Pakistan collaboration good chance US allow 3rd party export T129 engines for Pakistan. Lets see how this pans out

Taliban have already told Turkey in a very firm way, to not to get involved in any such undertaking as it would not be looked very kindly by them.
In simple terms they have told to f@#k off.

 

[Sifar zero]

What are the Cessna's used for?

 

[Raja Porus]

What are the Cessna's used for?

Light transporter, casualty evacuation qndr may also be for recce

 

[mingle]

T

Taliban have already told Turkey in a very firm way, to not to get involved in any such undertaking as it would not be looked very kindly by them.
In simple terms they have told to f@#k off.

Airport is Important especially for diplomats so security will done by turks and hungry

 

[Incog_nito]

Is Pak Army evaluating any Helicopters from the USA/EU like BlackHawks or EH-101s or NH-90s to add in support for the Mi-17s?

 

[araz]

Or they start using Ukraine, Russian or even Chinese engine for the helicopters then these own engines mature

Ukraine seems to have what they want and current fiscal trouble might make it easier for the Turks to gain TOT. They are at the right stage in their developmental cycle to absorb the tech and use it to make and then mature/their own tech. How this will equate to their western roots is difficult to say. Russia and China will not collaborate as they need to prevent another competitor entering the market.
These remain my thoughts on the matter
Regards
A

 

[araz]

An isolated South Africa in 90s built an attack helicopter, yet we can't? We have modern designing tools, more access to off-the-shelf parts, yet we can't build something like a Rooivalk? It doesn't have to be bleeding edge, just needs to be a bit better in terms of sensors than a Rooivalk?

Bhai we do not have the metallurgical base to take this further. One of our main problems is the investment in metallurgy and research. Iam not certain but if ypu investigate this was not the case with SA.
People here are jimping up and down about our own this or that without realizing the economies of scale requored for these twchnologies to be financially viable. Our need is probably 200 choppers at best in the defence sector with a MAXIMUMof 60-80 ( at a great stretch) attack helicoptors and the rest commercial helos. We just do not have the necessary need to invest in thisi industry.
Pakistani strategists have looked at Turkey and a couple of other countries to form a base to develop key note technologies. The problem remains Turkish efforts in engine tech have NOT YET borne fruit. It seems our Turk brothers seem to have the same mindset of joint collaboration and are not vary of-sharing work load for mutual gain. If we can rope in either Malaysia or another country we will have the economies of scale to be able to make forrays into this field.
I need not emphasise that in this regard the Chinese cannot be our partners-as they have the necessary industrial base to want to export rather than take Pakistan along with them.
I could be totally wrong but this remains my assessment. I suspect we will see significant moves and collaboration in this direction post 2025 or a bit earlier as key note projects mature in Turkey.
A

 

[ACE OF HEARTS]

Pakistan Steel Mills in Karachi is ready to become an industrial base for Metallurgical and Material Sciences, if bought / Run by Fauji Foundation / DHA, as it's success is going to help our armed forces develop the necessary R & D base, for future in house projects.

If you follow the Turkish Model, then, Ataer Holdings, a division of Turkish army pension fund Oyak, is also heavily involved in the Steel Industry in Turkey because such amount of money / investment is not possible from the private sector if you want to own the IP of High Tech Steel products.

Thirdly, State owned enterprises in China, still hold a majority share in the Steel industry in China e.g. Wuhan Iron and Steel Corporation

Wuhan Iron and Steel Corporation - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

 

[Moon]

Bhai we do not have the metallurgical base to take this further. One of our main problems is the investment in metallurgy and research. Iam not certain but if ypu investigate this was not the case with SA.
People here are jimping up and down about our own this or that without realizing the economies of scale requored for these twchnologies to be financially viable. Our need is probably 200 choppers at best in the defence sector with a MAXIMUMof 60-80 ( at a great stretch) attack helicoptors and the rest commercial helos. We just do not have the necessary need to invest in thisi industry.
Pakistani strategists have looked at Turkey and a couple of other countries to form a base to develop key note technologies. The problem remains Turkish efforts in engine tech have NOT YET borne fruit. It seems our Turk brothers seem to have the same mindset of joint collaboration and are not vary of-sharing work load for mutual gain. If we can rope in either Malaysia or another country we will have the economies of scale to be able to make forrays into this field.
I need not emphasise that in this regard the Chinese cannot be our partners-as they have the necessary industrial base to want to export rather than take Pakistan along with them.
I could be totally wrong but this remains my assessment. I suspect we will see significant moves and collaboration in this direction post 2025 or a bit earlier as key note projects mature in Turkey.
A

I'm not saying to manufacture equipment such as engines or gearboxes, I'm saying we take the South African approach and use existing engines and resources and use them to build a new platform.
Rooivalk uses Puma internals, and is framed around a South African body. We can easily do it. Off the shelf components such as sights and communication equipment can be purchased.
We already fabricate the airframe for Thunder, it's not like we can't build one for our own homemade Rooivalk.

 

[Bilal Khan (Quwa)]

I'm not saying to manufacture equipment such as engines or gearboxes, I'm saying we take the South African approach and use existing engines and resources and use them to build a new platform.
Rooivalk uses Puma internals, and is framed around a South African body. We can easily do it. Off the shelf components such as sights and communication equipment can be purchased.
We already fabricate the airframe for Thunder, it's not like we can't build one for our own homemade Rooivalk.

You're on the right track, 100%.

I'm not too worried about economies-of-scale. Yes, our immediate need may top off at 200 utility helicopters, but we shouldn't forget about generations. Thus far, helicopter designs are resilient, so we can replace older domestic helicopters with newer ones. If we account for two generational cycles, we're looking at easily 400 utility helicopters over 40-50 years. We can keep a steady production rate of 10-12 per year.

However, there's no quick roadmap for helicopter development. If we want to do this, we need to start now, and we'll need to wait 10-15 years before we have a serviceable product. Personally, I think that's fine as we can use that design for 40-50 years, if not longer (especially if we design it for the future).

Working with the Turks and Ukrainians is a good idea. Yes, their tech hasn't borne fruit today, but we are not thinking about today (it's too late for that), but again, what we're going to do in 10-15 years.

 

[araz]

I'm not saying to manufacture equipment such as engines or gearboxes, I'm saying we take the South African approach and use existing engines and resources and use them to build a new platform.
Rooivalk uses Puma internals, and is framed around a South African body. We can easily do it. Off the shelf components such as sights and communication equipment can be purchased.
We already fabricate the airframe for Thunder, it's not like we can't build one for our own homemade Rooivalk.

You did not read my post in full. What about the considerations of economy of scale? You are looking at 4-500 units of JFT in its life cycle( including exports) can you say the same about a helicopter?
A

 

[Bilal Khan (Quwa)]

You did not read my post in full. What about the considerations of economy of scale? You are looking at 4-500 units of JFT in its life cycle( including exports) can you say the same about a helicopter?
A

A helicopter isn't a one-and-done . One helicopter design can scale across multiple generations. For example, there's the Gen 1 UH-60 which flew in 1974, and today, we have the latest MH-60R. Ditto for UH-1, Mi-8/17, and almost all others. Helicopters are relatively resilient designs.

In Pakistan's case, its 'gen 1' requirements may top off at 200 helicopters, but it can transition into gen 2 so as to replace gen 1, and so on. You can potentially get 2-3 generations out of a single helicopter design, so that 200 could become 400 or even 600 over a 40-50 year period. Moreover, our output will likely average out to 10-12 helicopters per year, so maintaining that over many decades is tenable.

The other aspect is that the subsystems and technologies involved are scalable too. For example, you can reuse the gas turbine tech that goes into the turboshaft in other areas (e.g., a turbofan for UCAVs). Ditto for composite materials, avionics, and so on.

Even in terms of attack helicopters, you don't need to create too much of a separation from the transport helicopter. You can re-use the same rotor and transmission tech, and engine (e.g., the same principle with AH-1Z/UH-1Y, AW149/AW249, etc).

 

[araz]

Yep.

Because a helicopter isn't necessarily a one-and-done . One helicopter design can scale across multiple generations. For example, there's the Gen 1 UH-60 which flew in 1974, and today, we have the latest MH-60R. Ditto for UH-1, Mi-8/17, and almost all others. Helicopters are relatively resilient designs.

In Pakistan's case, its 'gen 1' requirements may top off at 200 helicopters, but it can transition into gen 2 so as to replace gen 1, and so on. You can potentially get 2-3 generations out of a single helicopter design, so that 200 could become 400 or even 600 over a 40-50 year period. Moreover, our output will likely average out to 10-12 helicopters per year, so maintaining that over many decades is tenable.

Have you looked at the outlay, the risk where will you procure engines from and who will supply avionics? You have laid down a requirement of 200 units. With different variants the-dezigns will have to differ even though the base may be the-same. Lastly having had no input into any design and venturing out on one's own without any building experience is asking for failure. Do we really have the 2-4 billion required to set up and mature a design. So it is not only time , finance and labour intensive project, it is a potentially high risk with high sink in costs. Even after all is-said and done we have a project 15 to 20 years down the line do you think we have the staying power to sustain the risk, the financial sink in costs.
What I am proposing instead is a mulyinational collaboration along with Turkey and one other nation to share the cost and the risk and-get a sustainable project with the economy of scale as is warranted. We can have 30-40%work coming down our way and the cost could be down to 500 million to a billion $ but have a doable 0roject at the end of it.
You really seem to have taken up the cause of indegenization without considering the cost implications which we cannot-sustain, the lack of any prior experience,no upto date platform of any significance to take bearings from ( Like the F16s) and at least to me it screams failure ( or at least highly risky). I think we enter one such project in collaboration and then look at going our own way
Regards
A

Pakistan Steel Mills in Karachi is ready to become an industrial base for Metallurgical and Material Sciences, if bought / Run by Fauji Foundation / DHA, as it's success is going to help our armed forces develop the necessary R & D base, for future in house projects.

If you follow the Turkish Model, then, Ataer Holdings, a division of Turkish army pension fund Oyak, is also heavily involved in the Steel Industry in Turkey because such amount of money / investment is not possible from the private sector if you want to own the IP of High Tech Steel products.

Thirdly, State owned enterprises in China, still hold a majority share in the Steel industry in China e.g. Wuhan Iron and Steel Corporation

Wuhan Iron and Steel Corporation - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

Birader.
There is a-world of difference between a steel mill and a specialized steel mill. I consulted someone once and asked him why we cannot manufacture the required steel at the steel mills. He laughed me out of the room. Later he said we need apecialized steel plants-which are much different and also research into metallurgy which we were just starting at the GIK.
Honestly speaking I do not know enough about this but someone more knowledgeable should be-able to-shed more light
A

 

[Moon]

You did not read my post in full. What about the considerations of economy of scale? You are looking at 4-500 units of JFT in its life cycle( including exports) can you say the same about a helicopter?
A

Well the original Rooivalk was panned to break even at 36 units, so I guess more than that? Furthermore, since many parts would be similar, we'd save a lot of many on maintenance, crew training and what not.

You're on the right track, 100%.

I'm not too worried about economies-of-scale. Yes, our immediate need may top off at 200 utility helicopters, but we shouldn't forget about generations. Thus far, helicopter designs are resilient, so we can replace older domestic helicopters with newer ones. If we account for two generational cycles, we're looking at easily 400 utility helicopters over 40-50 years. We can keep a steady production rate of 10-12 per year.

However, there's no quick roadmap for helicopter development. If we want to do this, we need to start now, and we'll need to wait 10-15 years before we have a serviceable product. Personally, I think that's fine as we can use that design for 40-50 years, if not longer (especially if we design it for the future).

Working with the Turks and Ukrainians is a good idea. Yes, their tech hasn't borne fruit today, but we are not thinking about today (it's too late for that), but again, what we're going to do in 10-15 years.

I think for helicopter development, we can make do with what others have done, I'm sure with the technology we have today, we can easily "reverse engineer" a Rooivalk without even needing to get our hands on one, we know what's inside the bird, we know it's outer dimensions, we also know that the flight characteristics of the Rooivalk are based on the Puma (the length of both the helis are nearly the same, the Rooivalk is a bit longer due to tandem seating). Basically we have the external design and dimensions and the inside components, we only need to come up with a frame to hold it together, for which we have modern design tools, CAD etc...
Maybe I'm being too optimistic but something like this can be done in 5 years max. We can then replace French engines with Z-9 engines from China (which is the same engine being license produced).
Maybe someone more knowledgeable than me in the field could explain this.