About Su-57 Pak Fa

Su-57 (factory index T-50) is a promising fifth-generation Russian multi-purpose fighter, developed by the P.O. Sukhoi Design Bureau in the framework of the PAK FA project (I-21 program); until August 2017, the aircraft was known under the factory index T-50).

The aircraft was developed to replace the heavy Su-27 fighter in the Russian Air Force. Earlier, for export deliveries on the basis of Su-57, together with India, it was supposed to create an export modification of the aircraft with the designation “FGFA” (Fifth Generation Fighter Aircraft - the fifth generation fighter), but at the end of April 2018, India abandoned this project, citing a mismatch machines with specified requirements, while the lack of low-visibility technology was the main reason.

Cabin:

The cabin of the Su-57 is single, wider than the cabin of the Su-27 due to the design features of the aircraft. The equipment is largely unified with the Su-35S equipment. The cockpit is equipped with an oxygen generator.

Information is displayed by two multifunctional MFI-35 indicators with a diagonal of 15 inches, one smaller MFI smaller below, one backup indicator for displaying current flight information above the right, a wide-angle ShKS-5 collimation system and a speech informant. It is also known that part of the information will be displayed on the pilot's helmet glass.

Glider:

Su-57 has an integral airframe, made according to the normal aerodynamic scheme with a mid-trapezoidal wing in the plan, smoothly coupled with the fuselage. Almost half (visually about 46%) of the wing span is a wide fuselage. The sweep angle on the front and rear edges of the wing is 48 ° and −14 °, respectively.

Mechanization consists of wing socks, flaperons and aileron. The drives of the latter are located under the wing and protrude from its plane in small oblong fairings. At the ends of the wing there are bevels.

The wing has a developed influx with a swiveling front part - an analogue of CIP instead of a small turning edge - toe. When the engine is not running, the turning parts of the inrush are in the hanging position. More natural is their non-rejected non-working position - in case of failure in flight. On the previous aircraft (Su-30, Su-33, Su-34) PGO was used to improve maneuverability due to the lack of engines with UWT. The presence of PGO increases the maneuverability of the aircraft in the vertical plane, especially at the limiting angles of attack, increasing the range of critical regimes to stall the flow from the bearing and control planes. But the effectiveness of PGO as a whole is lower than the use of engines with UHT, the more deviating at once in two planes.

The tail plumage includes all-turning trapezoidal stabilizers and keels, installed with a camber of about 26 ° to reduce visibility. At the base of the keels are small air intakes for cooling the equipment of the aircraft. As an aerodynamic brake, the keels are turned to increase drag.

Engines have adjustable ventral air intakes. Motor-nacelles are widely spaced and separated by a flat bottom of the fuselage, about 1.3-1.4 m wide. There, one after another, with a small gap, there are two pairs of wings of the internal weapon compartments. From the rotary part of the influx of the wing, back a few meters, stretch 2 triangular in cross section of the ridge, installed under the mating points of the wing consoles and the fuselage. On the outer sides of these ridges are located the flaps of the internal weapon compartments.

In the tail section of the fuselage between the engine nozzles, there is a tail boom far behind the nozzles, as in the case of the Su-27, in which a retractable container with an aircraft parachute-braking system is installed. On the right side of the nose of the aircraft installed air cannon, on the left - retractable rod for refueling in the air.

The Su-57 chassis is three-post, similar in design to the Su-27 chassis. All racks are retracted in the opposite direction of the flight. The track of the chassis, due to the wide fuselage, is 5.5 m. The niche of the front pillar is closed with two pairs of flaps. The front flaps are longer than the rear flaps and open only at the time of harvesting / releasing the chassis, being in the closed position with the stand extended to reduce the impact of side wind. The main landing gear is single-wheeled (wheel diameter - 1 m) and equipped with brakes. Their niches are located at the outer sides of the air intakes. When cleaning the main rack make a rotation on two axes.

To a large extent, the shape of the Su-57 airframe is determined by the technologies of reducing visibility used in its design, which is typical of all fifth-generation fighter jets (see the section Stealth).

The weight of the airframe is reduced due to the wide use of composite materials - according to chief designer A. Davidenko, by mass composite materials make up 25% of the weight of an empty aircraft, and 70% by surface area. He also noted that, compared with the Su-27, the Su-57 glider has four times fewer parts. This reduces labor intensity and reduces production time, which affects the reduction in the price of the machine. To protect against damage by lightning discharge of CFRP structures facing the outer surface of the airframe, in the FSUE “VIAM” a new lightning-resistant coating was developed for the Su-57, which also provides for the reduction of aircraft mass.

Engines:

AL-41F1

On the prototype of the Su-57, as well as on the first production models that were supposed to come into service with the Russian Air Force in 2015, the engines of the first stage, the AL-41F1 (product 117), were installed. This is an aviation turbojet dual-circuit engine with an afterburner and thrust vector control, created by NPO Saturn on the order of the Sukhoi design bureau, it allows to develop supersonic speed without the use of afterburner, and also has a fully digital control system and a plasma ignition system. Unlike the Pratt & Whitney F119-PW-100 engines for the F-22 Raptor, it has a round rather than a rectangular nozzle.

It is distinguished from the engine for the Su-35S (product 117C) by increased thrust, a complex automation system, a fully digital control system, a new turbine, and improved flow characteristics.

Product 30:

Within the framework of the program “PAK FA”, the engine of the second stage is developed under the symbol “type 30” (product 30; in the opinion of NPO Saturn’s General Designer Viktor Chepkin, he can later get an AL index). The engine of the second stage is intended to be developed within 10-12 years from the date of the commencement of the tender of the RF Ministry of Defense, in which the United Engine Corporation (JDC) and Salyut Research and Development Center participated.

In December 2014, the UDC General Director Vladislav Masalov announced plans to bring it to be installed on airplanes and the first sorties by 2017. In June 2015, he also became aware of the readiness of the technical design of the engine, the development of design documentation for the manufacture of prototypes of the engine, and plans to produce two prototypes before the end of 2015, which fully complies with the government contract and schedule. On September 2, 2016 KnAAZ CEO Alexander Pekarsh reported that engine prototypes were built and are undergoing ground tests as planned.

The engine is completely new, not upgraded. He has a new fan, a “hot” part, a control system. According to the representative of "UEC", the engine introduced "a lot of innovations, which in some cases do not have a close analogue in the world." The first flight of the Su-57 with the engine "Product 30" took place on December 5, 2017.

Avionics

H036 Protein prototype - radar with AFAR for Su-57, presented by NIIP at MAKS-2009

AFAR in the slat. MAKS-2009

OLS for Su planes. MAKS-2009

According to the statements of Yuri Bely, Director General of the Scientific Research Institute of Radio and Electronics, the Su-57 radio-electronic system will be fundamentally new, differing from the airborne radar in the traditional sense. Thus, not only the main radar station with AFAR will be installed on the aircraft, but also a set of others, both active and passive radar and optical location stations, spaced across the entire surface of the aircraft, actually making up “smart trimming”. Konstantin Makienko, editor of the Moscow Defense Brief magazine (English), said that the integrated multifunctional T-50 radar system will contain 5 built-in antennas.

At the Su-57 it is planned to install an optical-electronic radar system (OLS) for detecting air targets of the front hemisphere - OLS-50M. It is installed like the Su-27 in front of the cockpit with an offset to the starboard, due to the peculiarities of the removal of the refueling rod. A special feature is the ability to rotate the active part in the direction of the rear hemisphere, which achieves the following properties: both protection from solar erosion in the parking position, and lowering of the EPR. The first property is achieved by physically isolating the working part from the rays of the sun, and the second is applied by radio-absorbing materials on the back side of the moving part.

At the Su-57 it is planned to install a new radar with an active phased antenna array (AFAR), the development of NIIP containing 1526 receiving and transmitting modules, which will provide the aircraft with a greater detection range, multi-channel target tracking and the use of guided missile weapons on them. The plane of the HEADLIGHTS is tilted, which somewhat reduces its power when working on ground targets, however, significantly reduces its contribution to the aircraft's EPR. The radar is built entirely on the Russian element base on the basis of nanoheterostructures of gallium arsenide (GaAs) and advanced technologies of antenna systems with electronically controlled beam. The new radar was first presented to the public at the MAKS 2009 air show, where a NIIP representative said that radar tests were started in November 2008, joint testing with other aircraft systems in the summer of 2009, and the release of the first fully operational radar is planned in the middle of 2010.

In addition to the main radar, the MAKS-2009 also presented an additional radar for the Su-57 L-band, structurally placed in the slat. The use of additional radar, separated from the main both in position and frequency range, will not only increase the noise immunity and combat survivability of the structure, but also largely neutralizes technologies of reducing the visibility of enemy aircraft that can reduce visibility only in a certain range of radio wavelengths. It is assumed that such radars can also be placed in any structural elements of the airframe.

The W-121 radar complex consists of: Antenna Front View System H036-1-01, L-Band Antenna System H036L-1-01, and Side View Antenna Systems - H036B-1-01L and H036B-1-01B.

Projected radar - H036 Squirrel with AFAR. The use of the H035 Irbis planned at the early stages of the radar is impossible due to the inconsistency of dimensions, however, in the H036 Belka being developed, some of the technologies used on this radar are used (according to some data, a large part of the technologies used on the H035 Irbis some characteristics are still unknown). In 2009, the prototype H036 Protein was first shown at MAKS-2009.

Characteristics of H036 Squirrel radar

The number of PPM: 1526 pcs

The size of the antenna web: 700 × 900 mm

As of 2015: The radar station consists of a perspective X-band AFAR in the nose compartment, two side-view radars, and an L-band AFAR along the flaps. Presented for the first time publicly at MAKS-2015.

Low visibility

Stealth is one of the basic requirements for the fifth generation fighter and means a set of measures taken to reduce the possibility of detecting an aircraft in the radio, infrared and visible light wavelength ranges, as well as acoustically. This will be one of the factors for increased combat survival of the fighter.

Reducing the visibility of the Su-57 in the radio range is provided as a form, absorbing and reflecting radio waves materials in the design and coating of the airframe of the aircraft, and the EW. In particular, the edges of the wing and other elements of the airframe are oriented in several strictly limited directions, and the surfaces are inclined in a clearly defined range of angles. Also in the design, the mutual arrangement of the surfaces at an angle of 90 ° is avoided in order to avoid the effect of an angled reflector. Radar absorbing materials of construction and airframe coating significantly reduce the strength of the reflected signals. In some cases (for example, in the cabin glazing) reflective materials are used.

In addition, to reduce radio-visibility, part of the weapons was hidden in the internal compartments of the aircraft [54]. Thanks to these measures, the reflected signal is significantly attenuated and is directed away from the source. As a result, the enemy’s radar does not receive information about the spatial position and velocity of the aircraft. Since it is impossible to achieve absolute stealth, there is always a signal that, reflected from the aircraft, still returns to the source. Its characteristic is expressed by the value of the effective area of ​​scattering (ESR), the reduction of which, in fact, is the main goal of measures to reduce radio-visibility. The value of the effective area of ​​dispersion of the aircraft significantly depends on the direction from which the radiation comes. This measure is most effective against radar with combined receivers and transmitters. It is such radars that fighters and other combat aircraft of any enemy are equipped with. The same radar equipped and air defense systems and short-range air defense systems.

Reducing visibility in the visible range is provided by camouflage coloring of the airframe. Camouflage paint can be protective (merging with the background) and deforming (distorting the visual perception of the shape of the aircraft). The latter is achieved by staining the distinguished parts and edges of the airframe in darker color tones and, on the contrary, by staining in lighter tones of non-distinguished, central parts. The color of the first flight of the Su-57 - winter, distorting.

The decrease in thermal (infrared) and acoustic (sound) visibility is largely determined by the design of the aircraft's engines (see Engines section).

Also an important role in the invisibility of the fighter plays his ability to quickly obtain information about the enemy without revealing himself. To do this, the aircraft must have a system of passive sensors and sensors and reliable channels of information exchange (see the Radio and Optoelectronic Equipment section).

Armament

The fighter is equipped with a 30-mm air cannon 9-A1-4071K, first tested in 2014. The gun was developed by experts of the Tula KBP. The new gun is a modernized version of the 30-mm GS-30-1 aviation cannon (9-A-4071K), produced since the 1980s. for the MiG-29, Su-27 fighters and their modifications. Also, the Su-57 will receive all the latest models of Russian-made URVV and URVP.

The Peru air force plans to acquire fifth-generation Russian fighter aircraft Su-57. According to the calculations of the Peruvian military, three such fighters would be enough for them to contain a potential enemy. According to military analysts of Peru, “given the state of Peru’s defense capability, it is necessary to adopt the latest powerful weapon of deterrence.