Il-276 (SVTS) Medium Transport

Well apparently there is quite a bit of commonality between the tu204/214 and the tu330, and as far as I remember they were already ready in setting up production in Kazan, where they'll continue producing tu214 for special military roles, even if at low rate production.

The argument you made for the il276 make sense as well.

I would almost hope to see both projects going forward, even if it is unrealistic.

Anyway, I thought they would have by now already announced which project will be selected... did they communicate anything?

Hahaha... that report:

Hello! Your post was included in the top 25 most popular LiveJournal posts for Ukraine.

The Il-272 was never considered a replacement for the An-70 that is just moronic... this is Orc Shit.

GarryB wrote:Hahaha... that report:

Hello! Your post was included in the top 25 most popular LiveJournal posts for Ukraine.

The Il-272 was never considered a replacement for the An-70 that is just moronic... this is Orc Shit.

Gods above, but the Ukropi dung-eaters are becoming more retarded with every mouthful...  Il-276 was selected just a year ago as the new medium-sized military transport...

Hello, are there news on this topic?
I was not able to find any new article or post about the il-276 or the Tu-330.

Personally I very much like the Tu-330.
And on paper it had good specs.
It could either go with the PS-90 or with the new PD-16 that should also be used on the MS-21-400 (the larger brother of the MC-21 family, a bit bigger than the Airbus A321).

Should the Il-276 not be continued, the larger Tu-330 could temporarily partially cover for it until a new cargo airplane would be ready on the 15-20 tons payload class that could fill the lower segment.

And it could be powered by a turboprop or propfan derivative of the PD-8 (a turboshaft derivative of the PD-8 is already in development for the Mi-26 helicopter).

That way there would be

5 tons payload aircraft
New 15-20 tons payload turboprop
Tu-330 (30-35 tons payload with wider cargo area)
Il-(4)76 (50-60 tons)
Etc.

The whole reason the Il-276 was suggested was because of commonality with the Il-476, so the upgraded cockpit and other improvements including the new engines could just be the new systems fitted to the Il-476 and the main difference being a shorter wing with two engines instead of four and a shorter fuselage.

The relatively simple nature of the modification (the An-124 had more modification to create the An-225... two extra engines, larger wings, longer body and an H tail structure and revised back for external loads.... other types have had fuselage and wing extensions as midlife upgrades to increase capacity for passengers or payload... it is pretty normal.)

Now that the Tu-214/204 aircraft are going to go into production then the transport aircraft based on its design makes sense as well... it has a larger body shape for larger more bulky loads and would be another useful addition to the fleet... military and civil.

In fact I would say a turboprop model of the Il-276 might be valuable too as an An-12 replacement for countries that want turboprops rather than jets.

It wouldn't cost a lot more and could be a replacement for the An-72 in some roles as well.

The stated goals of the Russian military is to phase out cold war soviet equipment, first with upgrades of that Soviet equipment to iron out as many problems or faults as possible while in parallel also working on the longer term task of creating a next generation from scratch design that is all new and solves all the major problems of the previous generation equipment.

This is across the board and includes dramatic changes in approach like the Ratnik scheme where all the equipment a soldier has is treated as a set, instead of as separate items of equipment. This allows overlap and multifunction equipment replacing multiple items previously used.

Instead of a compass and map and pencil for navigation and a radio for communication as well as a helmet and hearing protection, you might have a new helmet with better protection with a radio and satellite navigation system built in with a head up display in the visor etc etc.

A rifle scope with built in rangefinder, thermal camera, navigation system so on a recon mission you can take photos of enemy positions that are marked on a map and uploaded to HQ. The scope could be detachable to use on the helmet for navigation in the dark or the image from the scope displayed in your visor so you can shoot round corners with a ballistics computer showing where your rounds will hit in real time.

The same development could be applied to transport planes with sophisticated avionics and equipment for automatic landing and terrain avoidance etc etc.

I suspect the entire transport aviation sector is either busy with ongoing programs like the Tu-214 and Il-76 orders or retooling to fulfill the vast gap in civilian transport aircraft with the Russified Superjet and MC-21. Once the Superjet and MC-21 are taken care of I see no reason why they cannot make military transport aircraft with similar engines. These would be aircraft in the An-72 and An-12 weight and payload class.

I think they should start designing the new airframes sooner rather than later. This would be the "cancelled" Il-276 on the An-12 class and some other aircraft in the An-72 class. If you have the PD-14 and PD-8 engines in production, together with all the avionics and other systems of the MC-21 and Superjet, then it would be relatively trivial to design a military transport aircraft airframe with these components. These aircraft would be optimized for cargo transport and rough field capable.

As is with the PD-8 engine still in flight tests on an Il-76 airborne test laboratory and PD-14 still in limited serial production it is still kind of early for those programs to be able to happen. But I think the Russian government should push for it since it can easily take 4 years to design just the airframe, 2 years to build a new production facility, 1 year to tool it up. There are existing buildings at Aviakor for example which can be repurposed so those are not the problem. The problem is manufacture of required components at the necessary volume and the new airframes.

I think Russia should consider buying the design of the KC-390 from Brazil if possible and Russifying it with PD-14 engines and electronics. After the debacle with the Il-112V I am not that certain I trust that design bureau's team with creating a whole new airframe. They certainly need surpervision from whoever was in control of the Superjet and MC-21 at the very least. But designing a military transport airframe is not exactly the same as a civilian airframe to begin with.

The government probably is trying to conserve monetary resources at this point in time. Even the air and space forces will require a substantial amount of investment just to replace the strategic bomber force so I wonder how much will be left for military transport aviation.

The problem is that after many years of neglect (and loss of many capable personnel ) when they never completed a successful design, there was almost immediately the necessary of new projects in all the niches.

Some design bureau were helped from the influx of capital and investments for new high priority civil projects:the MC-21 (Yak design bureau, part of the Irkusk group), and the SSJ100 (sukhoi, civil sector, which I believe now has been integrated in Irkusk.

Ilyushin until at least 2010 (but probably later) was in a situation similar to what was Antonov in Kiev until 2021.
It has been saved by the re-establishment of production in Russia (Ulyanovsk) of the Il-76 in the modernised version (t civil version of the Il-76 with 4 PS90 engines were already introduced several years before and assembled in Tashkent.

Probably the presence of many projects at once (modernisation of the il-114 and organisation of production in Russia, il-112v (an-26 replacement), Il276(an-12 replacement), projects for modernisation and upgrade of an-124, il-106 and Slon, il-96-400M) was not feasible, especially since the salary on Ilyushin (according to some interviews in 2015) were the lowest in the industry in Russia (and many engineers, designers and technicians left to work for Irkusk or even to go abroad (or like some Ukrainian ex Antonov changed completely sectors (I know of some ex Antonov engineers in Kiev (before 2021 that left Antonov (which was paying something around the equivalent of 400 dollar a month and went to work in t IT sector (still in Kiev) and were able to earn something like 2500 dollars a month.

Probably the situation in Ilyushin (especially after 2015) was better than in Antonov, but they started with a team mainly composed by people close to retirement and young trainees or inexperienced persons (as most of the experienced and capable workforce between 30 and 50 years old left to work elsewhere, and before 2015 also many of the former apprentices left the company to go to Irkusk after learning the basis).

So there has been the need to select which project prioritize and which delay, and in addition also Russia need to give some of the projects to other groups.

It is good that Ural civil aviation is now working on Baikal and Ladoga (an-2 and an-24 replacement).

Possibly they could even do a military transport derivative of the TVRS-44 Ladoga (as the an-26 was a military cargo derivative of the an-24).
This would still take a few years, but the il-112v requires anyway a lot of redesign.

Possibly the best would be a cooperation between Ilyushin and Ural civil aviation to work on the project and take into account all the lesson learnt from the il-112v.

As far as the An-12 replacement actually I would like to see 2 aircraft.
One would be a brand twin turboprop in the 15-20 tons payload range, powered by a turboprop/propfan derivative of the PD-8 but that would be only possible after 2030, considering all the other projects, and the other would be the (30-35 tons of payload) Tu-330 (powered by either PS-90 or later the PD-16 of the MC-21-400M.


So Ilyushin could concentrate now on the serial production establishment of the il-114, on the twin version of the il-96 (together with the team working on CR929), on the superheavy military transport (and later on the 15-20 tons turboprop ).

The whole point of the Il-276 programme and concept was it is a safer bet than a new design.

Essentially they are taking an already designed aircraft... the Il-476, and shortening its fuselage and reducing its wing size and removing two engines.

Fitting brand new engines makes no sense unless you are also going to fit four of the same engines to the Il-476 for serial production.

In the interests of commonality keeping the Il-276 as similar to the Il-476 should allow it to be built in the same factories, so any extra factories built for the Il-276 can be used to increase capacity for the Il-476 or vice versa if needed which creates a flexibility that no other aircraft type could offer.

A set of slightly more powerful engines could be fitted to the Il-276 to increase the payload capacity or range or both, but getting it into production should be the first priority.

The Tu-330 is based on the Tu-214 design and has something like 70% commonality so after production of those new airliner types gets into full swing and airlines start returning Tu-204s et al so they can put Superjets and MS-21s into service then the Russian military can start using those ex airliners as military types to replace their other obsolete planes like the Tu-154Ms and Tu-135s and Il-20, 22, and 38 types still in service as well as their Yak-40s etc.

They could even make an AWACS version with radar antennas down its fuselage sides, though a twin engined Il-96 AWACS would be awesome and tankers for that type would be ideal for long range aviation as it could keep up with Tu-160s till they get to the north pole and then refuel them there to extend their range further than just topping them up after takeoff...

Once they have lots of Tupolevs in military service then the transport version Tu-330 would make sense with all that production capacity now sitting idle that the Superjet and MS-21 are meeting the needs of airliners.... they can make or modify military types and build 35 ton transports... the factories will already be built and workforce already in place ready to build new aircraft.

You could start by making some flying prototypes now in amongst the airliners perhaps so the move to producing transports is more seamless.

What broke everything was the Orcs and their pushing the An-70 and pissing over the Il-76 and Tupolev that might threaten their white elephant.

The only happy customer of the An-70 could be the VDV who liked the capacity and range and appreciated the lower flight speed...

I know the reasons of commonalities you mentioned, but the problem is that the il-276 has (already on paper) poor specs in comparison to aircraft of similar size, mass and engine thrust (.e.g. embraer C-390). Considering the experience with il-112v it is not a good premise.

Furthermore while stretching the fuselage of an aircraft is relatively  easy and feasible, scaling down one is often not as easy (at least if you want good characteristics).

If we consider the plant currently building Il-76(Aviastar on Ulyanovsk) it is is now fully loaded with Il-76, and will later probably be responsible for il-106 and other superheavy aircrafts.

If you have to build new equipment, in that case it could be worth to do something new.

As far as the Tu-330 due to commonalities with tu204 probably some of the equipment for tu-214 and tu-204 can be reused. Since Kazan is already busy at the same time with tu-214 orders for civilian use, maybe the equipment in Ulyanovsk (Aviastar) for the Tu-204 (and Tu-204SM) could be used as well. So either a new production line there or moving the equipment and the assembly line to VASO (Voronezh) or Aviakor (Samara).

Setting up production of the Tu-330 will absolutely not take more time than production of the il-276, and since at the end the available factories are the same (Aviastar, VASO and Aviakor)  having both when they are not yet fully developed project could be counterproductive.

I know the reasons of commonalities you mentioned, but the problem is that the il-276 has (already on paper) poor specs in comparison to aircraft of similar size, mass and engine thrust (.e.g. embraer C-390). Considering the experience with il-112v it is not a good premise.

Beating the specs of other countries aircraft doesn't come in to it, the point is to develop a replacement for the An-12 as quickly and efficiently as possible, having an aircraft with the same internal cross section as the Il-476 is a good thing.

If they want better performance down the track they could put PD-16 engines or PD-18 engines if they want to boost its performance but the point of it is commonality with the Il-476 and ability to make one or the other or both in the same factory at the same time without needing to retool, they can scale production to boost production of one type or the other for domestic demand and for export.

In 5 years or so when the superjet and MS-21 are at full production rate an they start replacing Tu-204/214 etc then the factories making the Tupolevs can start modifying them to replace existing military types that need replacement as mentioned before while at the same time they could make a few prototypes for the Tu-330 as well which as you know is in a heavier payload class to the Il-276 which might be more useful for transporting the Boomerang family of vehicles which might be slightly too heavy for the Il-276s.

The Tu-330 share about 70% commonality of parts with the Tu-204/214 which will also enter military service to replace other obsolete types and could possibly be added as a inflight refuelling tanker for front line aircraft that operates near friendly air bases so aircraft can refuel without needing to land if they still have unused ordinance... operating over the friendly base would take advantage of local air defences to make the tanker safer.

Furthermore while stretching the fuselage of an aircraft is relatively easy and feasible, scaling down one is often not as easy (at least if you want good characteristics).

They normally add sections in front of and behind the wing to enlarge a fuselage... I expect the reverse would work too.

If we consider the plant currently building Il-76(Aviastar on Ulyanovsk) it is is now fully loaded with Il-76, and will later probably be responsible for il-106 and other superheavy aircrafts.

The point is that the new plants for building the Il-276 could also add production capacity for building extra Il-476s as needed, so say the Il-276 is a flop and only Russia wants them... say 250 to replace the An-12 but would also replace the An-32 for hot and high and of course being a jet it could also replace the An-72 as well, then they could make their 250 and then change production to Il-476s to get them out faster and to feed any export demand, which I think will be pretty good but they need to expand their production capacity to fill that need.

There are quite a few countries around the place who need replacements for An-12s who might want Il-276s and if they also want Il-476s then local production might suit them too... say India in Asia and Brazil in South America... and both countries can be a support and maintenance hub for Russian types.

South Africa might want to be the African hub.

If you have to build new equipment, in that case it could be worth to do something new.

Build new factories to make foreign designs you don't currently use... sounds rather risky to me... and what is the payoff... no commonality with anything else in your fleet... do they even have engines and what about all the avionics and equipment you wont be able to import because it will be European.

As far as the Tu-330 due to commonalities with tu204 probably some of the equipment for tu-214 and tu-204 can be reused. Since Kazan is already busy at the same time with tu-214 orders for civilian use, maybe the equipment in Ulyanovsk (Aviastar) for the Tu-204 (and Tu-204SM) could be used as well. So either a new production line there or moving the equipment and the assembly line to VASO (Voronezh) or Aviakor (Samara).

I was thinking the Tu production lines would be better used meeting the needs of civilian airlines first and then they can convert those planes to military use once Super jet and MS-21 production has gotten to the point where they have enough aircraft for the job the extra tupolevs could be converted into military types to allow obsolete types to be retired and replaced with one or two types instead... once it starts converting planes to military it can start making prototypes for the Tu-330 for testing and production.

By then more suitable engines can be used on the military Tupolevs to improve their performance... and by then better engines could be fitted to the Il-276 to improve its performance if needed.

Setting up production of the Tu-330 will absolutely not take more time than production of the il-276, and since at the end the available factories are the same (Aviastar, VASO and Aviakor) having both when they are not yet fully developed project could be counterproductive.

Both types would need prototypes built and tested before serial production can start and I think making both would actually be a good idea but I think the Il-276 could be ready first and being a smaller lighter aircraft it could be made fairly quickly in comparison to the Il-476, and once it has made enough to replace the An-12s that are still in use it could revert to making Il-476s to get them produced faster and once they have enough of them for the Russian military they can start on export models including Il-276 if there is interest.

It seems India wants a light transport with lots of engine power to replace its An-12s and An-32s and an Il-276 would be able to do that job just fine... if only they had stuck with the project and not bailed.