What has Pakistan got to do with over 1.4 billions indians not being able to make fighter jets that are comparable let alone better than the fighter jets made by 145 million Russians?
if you read HAL report
https://www.livefistdefence.com/202...-indian-navys-1st-dhruv-flight-commander.html
As a solution about fifteen years back, HAL had made the suggestion that the Navy should accept the method where one blade remains forward and other three go back. For this, HAL actually suggested that the Navy should cut holes in the helicopter hangar for the front facing blade – classic case of making the hand fit the glove.
During acceptances at HAL, we would find that individual components would have been switched from other helicopters. In other words, the log card would state that for eg, the fuel pump serial no 12345 was installed, but the actual item on the aircraft would be serial no 98765. Once we realised this, then it became de-rigueur to physically inspect each and every component to check that the component is correct. HAL were concerned about this, and would say, why are you so fussy? Why is this so important, you may ask. It’s important because each component has certain flying hours and a defect history that is recorded in the log card, and ensures that nothing which is defective or with more flying hours on it than recorded is installed.
The Final assembly line of the helicopter used to be very bad. There was no proper hygiene maintained. For eg, all the metal filings from the drilled holes would fall to the aircraft floor, never to be cleared. There was no template being used for the drilling of holes, so each panel had to be hand-crafted because there was nothing standardised. I have personally seen people working on the open Main Gearbox / IDS with tools and pens sticking out of pockets.
A very dangerous incident was when we had sparking and melting of the alternator cables. Never heard of. The HAL solution was to replace the cables. All was well, and the team that had come with the cable, told our engineer, that the cable was too long, and they wanted to use tiewraps (or tie-wire) to secure it. Fortunately for us, the designer also came by that day to find out what was wrong. He was horrified to find that the persons installing the new cable did not have a wiring diagram, and had routed the cables incorrectly. This was the reason there was ‘extra’ cable. We were saved a repeat of this. There were so many places all over the aircraft where cable bundles were secured with a tiewrap due to which the cables got cut. This was because of the vibrations on the aircraft, and the cables likely not being routed correctly. It is likely that many of these are corrected, so I will not dwell too long on these points, but such lack of basic engineering hygiene and procedures invariably led to many failures. This is completely unacceptable from any standpoint in a manufacturing company that specialises in Aerospace components and aircraft.
ne day we came back from a sortie during which we noticed the GPS position not showing. On return, we found that both the GPS antennae had flown off. When I called HAL, I was horrified when I was told that we were not the only ones – so why didn’t they tell us in time? This meant that they knew this was happening. It was a faulty design of the antenna mounting bracket and we found cracks on all of them on other helicopters.
Coming back to the ALH, the moot question is – how much of the ALH is actually Indian? The engines are ‘manufactured’ at the HAL Engine Division, a euphemism for assembled. The Avionics are Israeli. Crew seats are imported, as are passenger seats for VIP. The material used to make the airframe and blade comes from various sources abroad. There is enough literature about the weapons that are going to be imported. Floation gear is imported. The Rotor brake was made in India with quality control by HAL. These brakes used to suddenly get jammed while flying, and so HAL said to us, fly without the brakes. Sadly with this aircraft, the Sum is less than the Total of the parts.
