Rahul9090
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Defence Minister A K Antony has said that the future of indigenous Basic Trainer HTT-40 has become uncertain with Indian Air Force’s renewed insistence on continued induction of Swiss-made Pilatus PC-7 aircraft as the mainstay of its budding pilots training program, as it cannot afford to operate two types of aircraft for the same stage of training.
Initially, IAF cited cost factor in favour of PC-7 Pilatus aircraft but after anticipating the mood of the Defence Minister, a strong votary of indigenisation, its officers have come up with operational issues to strengthen their case against home-grown Basic Trainer.IAF has already purchased 75 Pilatus aircraft and the first course on these new machines commenced on July 1 last year.
IAF projects a requirement of 181 basic trainers to meet the demand of pilots for armed forces. After off the shelf procurement of 75 trainers, rest of the 106 trainers were to be built by HAL, country’s only military aviation giant, which is in advance stage of developing basic trainer HTT-40.In a submission before a parliamentary panel, IAF has said having two types of trainer aircraft is not a ‘healthy situation’.
“The core issue is that the Air Force cannot afford to have two trainers for the same state of basic flying training because it will involve two sets of instructors, two sets of technical personnel, two sets of infrastructure, two sets of simulators and two supply and logistic chain management,” an IAF officer said while arguing for the case of PC-7.
Expressing ‘keenness’ to buy the PC-7, the senior officer said rest of the aircraft can be built by HAL under license through technology transfer route.Meanwhile, HAL has decided to go ahead with the development of indigenous BTA (Basic Trainer Aircraft), declining proposal for license manufacture of PC-7 MKII.
Without commenting on having two kinds of aircraft for basic training program, HAL in its response said it was making all efforts to bridge the gap between PC-7 and its own HTT-40.It has based the cockpit design of the HTT-40 around the architecture of the imported aircraft.
“The pilot-vehicle interface has a very high degree of commonality including that of the external vision angles,” an HAL officer said, adding that key aircraft systems such as power plant and escape system were also being aligned to maintain commonality.HAL has also claimed that the indigenous aircraft will prove to be cheaper if the life cycle cost is taken into account.
HAL has completed preliminary design, wind tunnel model design, and fabrication and full scale mock up. The first flight of prototype aircraft is likely to happen in the middle of next year.HAL has been supplying BTAs to IAF for more than five decades. The first trainer HT-2 was developed in the early 1950s and more than 160 aircraft were delivered followed by 143 HPT-32 aircraft that trained around 4000 pilots and logged 4,00,000 flying hours before being grounded in 2009 by the IAF citing safety reasons.
Incidentally, IAF, which is not willing to have two different types of trainers, have been flying more than half a dozen kinds of fighters and have been maintaining many types of technical and support systems, and instructors. It is also keen to add one more type of fighter, Rafale, for its MMRC requirements
Initially, IAF cited cost factor in favour of PC-7 Pilatus aircraft but after anticipating the mood of the Defence Minister, a strong votary of indigenisation, its officers have come up with operational issues to strengthen their case against home-grown Basic Trainer.IAF has already purchased 75 Pilatus aircraft and the first course on these new machines commenced on July 1 last year.
IAF projects a requirement of 181 basic trainers to meet the demand of pilots for armed forces. After off the shelf procurement of 75 trainers, rest of the 106 trainers were to be built by HAL, country’s only military aviation giant, which is in advance stage of developing basic trainer HTT-40.In a submission before a parliamentary panel, IAF has said having two types of trainer aircraft is not a ‘healthy situation’.
“The core issue is that the Air Force cannot afford to have two trainers for the same state of basic flying training because it will involve two sets of instructors, two sets of technical personnel, two sets of infrastructure, two sets of simulators and two supply and logistic chain management,” an IAF officer said while arguing for the case of PC-7.
Expressing ‘keenness’ to buy the PC-7, the senior officer said rest of the aircraft can be built by HAL under license through technology transfer route.Meanwhile, HAL has decided to go ahead with the development of indigenous BTA (Basic Trainer Aircraft), declining proposal for license manufacture of PC-7 MKII.
Without commenting on having two kinds of aircraft for basic training program, HAL in its response said it was making all efforts to bridge the gap between PC-7 and its own HTT-40.It has based the cockpit design of the HTT-40 around the architecture of the imported aircraft.
“The pilot-vehicle interface has a very high degree of commonality including that of the external vision angles,” an HAL officer said, adding that key aircraft systems such as power plant and escape system were also being aligned to maintain commonality.HAL has also claimed that the indigenous aircraft will prove to be cheaper if the life cycle cost is taken into account.
HAL has completed preliminary design, wind tunnel model design, and fabrication and full scale mock up. The first flight of prototype aircraft is likely to happen in the middle of next year.HAL has been supplying BTAs to IAF for more than five decades. The first trainer HT-2 was developed in the early 1950s and more than 160 aircraft were delivered followed by 143 HPT-32 aircraft that trained around 4000 pilots and logged 4,00,000 flying hours before being grounded in 2009 by the IAF citing safety reasons.
Incidentally, IAF, which is not willing to have two different types of trainers, have been flying more than half a dozen kinds of fighters and have been maintaining many types of technical and support systems, and instructors. It is also keen to add one more type of fighter, Rafale, for its MMRC requirements
