Featured Russia Teases 'Fundamentally New' Military Aircraft to Be Unveiled

[Paul2]

It will be around 7.4 thousand kg

Almost featherweight in comparison to their fighters.

Two seat Su 35 variant weights almost as much as American F-111 bomber.

 

[vostok]

It is confirmed - new jet will use 2nd stage engine from Su-57, "Isdelie-30".

Almost featherweight in comparison to their fighters.

Two seat Su 35 variant weights almost as much as American F-111 bomber.

I think 7 tons is about payload, not jet weight.

 

[Piotr]

The Checkmate at МАКС-2021

 

[vostok]

Official presentation, in English.

 

[Amavous]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1417556003235717124

 

[sahureka2]

https://topwar.ru/185144-nazvany-po...ssijskogo-legkogo-istrebitelja-checkmate.html
<<As part of the international air show MAKS-2021, Borisov, answering a question about a potential foreign buyer of a new fighter, said that there was already a reference customer for the plane, for which the fighter was created.

We already have it, for him we do it

- said the deputy premier, adding that it is a foreign air force, but did not indicate the customer.>>

United Arab Emirates (UAE)
2017
https://militarywatchmagazine.com/a...a-uae-next-generation-stealth-fighter-program

 

[obj 705A]

Interview with the head of Rostec

He says that it can carry 7 tonnes worth of weapons, it's speed is 1.8 mach, it has combat radius of 1500km and the total range is 3000 km, and also it has a cannon.
He is also asked why they named it "Checkmate" he says that is because in chess terminology if the Su-57 would be considered the queen (ie: powerfull but not many of it) then this new fighter is the knight because the knight is the lighter piece that is used for offense at the beginning.

 

[Gomig-21]

Official presentation, in English.

The more I learn about this aircraft, the more I like it and the entire strategy by Sukhoi with the way they've brought it out and are trying to market it and most of all, the way they've managed to use certain parts already tested on the Su-57 and proven to work to cut down on the eventual testing coming up.

Also the fact that they named it "Checkmate" is really outstanding. If you go back into the storied history of Soviet aircraft building with giants like Mikoyan and Sukhoi and Yak etc. and into the new era post-communism Soviet Union of the late 80's all the way into current Russia, they never named their aircraft with a particular name. It was always a classification related to the type, followed by a number, like MiG-XX or Su-XX or even Yak-XX.

But never a name like the Mirage, or the Fighting Falcon or Eagle or Gripen or Phantom or Rafale etc. That actually drove NATO into pulling that BS NATO designations like Fishbed and Flogger and the worst of all, the insulting and denigrating Felon for the absolute deadly beauty and powerful Su-57. To call it the Felon is a disgrace and now I'm looking at the next creation after the Su-57 which is this aircraft here and before they even gave it a designation with a number, they've already given it a name for the first time in Soviet/Russian history, in hopes that now it gives NATO a useless task in coming up with one of it's own silly and defunct names that start with "F" for fighters but have asinine and cryptic intentions like Fagot, or Frogfoot, but especially Felon.

Maybe now that it HAS a RUSSIAN given name to it in the CHECKMATE, NATO will be forced to shut the heII up and not come up with a stupid and insulting name, but we know that won't happen. They'll still give it a "stick it in your face" name except now it'll be challenged as many -- if not most -- people out there will ignore the given NATO name and stick with the Checkmate. Brilliant strategy.

Also, the lack of horizontal stabilizers was a little perplexing to me at first since I'm sure others who watch a lot of fighters flying as well can notice how much the H-stabs are used to control pitch, even rolls and banking turns etc. The H-stabs are super valuable and play a huge role in an aircraft's maneuverability. Just on takeoffs alone, once the aircraft reaches rotating speed, the ever so slight pull back of the stick lifts the H-stabs just a tad bit and that's enough to raise the nose, bring more airspeed under the wing and immediately creates lift allowing the plane to instantaneously take off.

Suddenly we have an aircraft with essentially the same wing pattern as the Su-57 but sans the H-stabs which is conflicting TBH.

But then I thought of mostly delta aircraft (not delta/canards, just delta) like Mirages or Delta Dagger etc. They had no issues whatsoever essentially using their ailerons only on their delta wings to substitute for the function of the H-stabs and they did them very well. Looking at the two pics above, one can't help but think the Checkmate is missing something without the H-stabs and will take a while to get used to even when we saw the YF-23 perform incredibly well with essentially the same layout. However, in the YF-23, the canted stabilators were set at a much steeper angle than what we see here on the Checkmate. It was almost like they took the flat 180 degree of a standard H-stab and a standard pitched or canted vertical stabilizer (like what it would be on the F-18 or Su-57) and then split the difference and set them right in the middle middle angle of those two to compensate for the most of both angles. But it doesn't look like we see that here on the Checkmate and that the angle of the V-stabs is that of a normally pitched or canted vertical stabilizer. Strange that they didn't pitch those stabs a bit more but they should work just fine if the ailerons are large enough to compensate for the lack of H-stabs and the current angle of the V-stabs.

So those few items (albeit in great detail lol) are what I have taken from this great new inception for the Russian aviation industry and Sukhoi in particular. Looking forward to more pics of this fighter outside of all the crazy fancy lighting so we can see better and less distorted details.

 

[Gomig-21]

Gaggle of pics including the nicely shaped rear end!

 

[Whizzack]

The radiation signs.... does this indicate wingtip radars..?

 

[The SC]

The more I learn about this aircraft, the more I like it and the entire strategy by Sukhoi with the way they've brought it out and are trying to market it and most of all, the way they've managed to use certain parts already tested on the Su-57 and proven to work to cut down on the eventual testing coming up.

Also the fact that they named it "Checkmate" is really outstanding. If you go back into the storied history of Soviet aircraft building with giants like Mikoyan and Sukhoi and Yak etc. and into the new era post-communism Soviet Union of the late 80's all the way into current Russia, they never named their aircraft with a particular name. It was always a classification related to the type, followed by a number, like MiG-XX or Su-XX or even Yak-XX.

But never a name like the Mirage, or the Fighting Falcon or Eagle or Gripen or Phantom or Rafale etc. That actually drove NATO into pulling that BS NATO designations like Fishbed and Flogger and the worst of all, the insulting and denigrating Felon for the absolute deadly beauty and powerful Su-57. To call it the Felon is a disgrace and now I'm looking at the next creation after the Su-57 which is this aircraft here and before they even gave it a designation with a number, they've already given it a name for the first time in Soviet/Russian history, in hopes that now it gives NATO a useless task in coming up with one of it's own silly and defunct names that start with "F" for fighters but have asinine and cryptic intentions like Fagot, or Frogfoot, but especially Felon.

Maybe now that it HAS a RUSSIAN given name to it in the CHECKMATE, NATO will be forced to shut the heII up and not come up with a stupid and insulting name, but we know that won't happen. They'll still give it a "stick it in your face" name except now it'll be challenged as many -- if not most -- people out there will ignore the given NATO name and stick with the Checkmate. Brilliant strategy.

Also, the lack of horizontal stabilizers was a little perplexing to me at first since I'm sure others who watch a lot of fighters flying as well can notice how much the H-stabs are used to control pitch, even rolls and banking turns etc. The H-stabs are super valuable and play a huge role in an aircraft's maneuverability. Just on takeoffs alone, once the aircraft reaches rotating speed, the ever so slight pull back of the stick lifts the H-stabs just a tad bit and that's enough to raise the nose, bring more airspeed under the wing and immediately creates lift allowing the plane to instantaneously take off.

Suddenly we have an aircraft with essentially the same wing pattern as the Su-57 but sans the H-stabs which is conflicting TBH.

View attachment 763940

View attachment 763941

But then I thought of mostly delta aircraft (not delta/canards, just delta) like Mirages or Delta Dagger etc. They had no issues whatsoever essentially using their ailerons only on their delta wings to substitute for the function of the H-stabs and they did them very well. Looking at the two pics above, one can't help but think the Checkmate is missing something without the H-stabs and will take a while to get used to even when we saw the YF-23 perform incredibly well with essentially the same layout. However, in the YF-23, the canted stabilators were set at a much steeper angle than what we see here on the Checkmate. It was almost like they took the flat 180 degree of a standard H-stab and a standard pitched or canted vertical stabilizer (like what it would be on the F-18 or Su-57) and then split the difference and set them right in the middle middle angle of those two to compensate for the most of both angles. But it doesn't look like we see that here on the Checkmate and that the angle of the V-stabs is that of a normally pitched or canted vertical stabilizer. Strange that they didn't pitch those stabs a bit more but they should work just fine if the ailerons are large enough to compensate for the lack of H-stabs and the current angle of the V-stabs.

So those few items (albeit in great detail lol) are what I have taken from this great new inception for the Russian aviation industry and Sukhoi in particular. Looking forward to more pics of this fighter outside of all the crazy fancy lighting so we can see better and less distorted details.

The specialist accompanying the head of state added that “ Support algorithms based on artificial intelligence have been applied, which eases the burden on pilots from routine operations and allows them to focus on key tasks.”

So the H-stabs role might have been dealt with through AI..

 

[Frostbite]

 

[The Raven]

The radiation signs.... does this indicate wingtip radars..?

View attachment 763966

Certainly looks that way, taking a cue from the Su-57 distributed radar sensors.

In my view, the intake is the most interesting design aspect of this fighter, although from a stealth point of view it looks compromised given the multiple acute angles and points of radar energy reflection.

 

[Crimson Blue]

Agreed ... A few years ago at Zhuhai 2018 during a small "private" lecture, Piotr Butowski talked about the fading away into insignificance of the Russian military aviation industry and predicted something like a swansong! Maybe this is one last final rearing up to prevent the inevitable end?

Or may be Russian defence aviation is moving back into simpler, more affordance designs ( think Mig 21) rather than trying to compete with top fighters of the day (F-15, EF200, F22 etc).

 

[Proud 2 Be a Pakistani]