Russian Transport Aircraft fleet (VTA)

AMCXXL wrote:

Tsavo Lion wrote:So, it's possible to stretch the IL-76MD-90A by at least 6.6m to equal the IL-76MF in length, thus increasing its max. payload even more.

of course if you can carry more weight, in some cases you will need more space in the hold for certain things like soldiers and equipment, but the maximum possible payload to transport does not depend directly on the size(length) of the plane

Agreed. More volume = more space for cargo, be it people, vehicles, pallets, or other gear & their combinations. That's why the USAF had most of its C-141 fleet stretched instead of buying 90 new C-141s. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_C-141_Starlifter#C-141B
But, there's a trick to beat the MTOW limit: takeoff with less fuel, more cargo & top off in the air!

Russia also has ordered two Il-96-400TZ

See my prev. post on its cancellation.

How many An-124 will be in service after all aircraft in storage are upgraded?

AMCXXL wrote:It is likely that in the end the IL-96 will not be the airplane to play the role of MRTT and look for another plane as the basis for the project, but in the médium term Russia needs a plane similar to A-330-RTT. For the moment is in the stage of producing the Il478, the first should arrive in 2018

They can use the 2 IL-96-400TZs (if they r indeed completed & not re-modified again) for training &/ as transports; the new joint RF-PRC C-929 can be better used to develop A-330- like tanker:

the C929 could serve as a fuel efficient platform for large Chinese or Russian ..like airborne early warning command and control, aerial tankers, surveillance, electronic intelligence gathering, and VIP transport.
https://www.popsci.com/mega-planes-zhuhai-chinas-shows-off-its-next-generation-air-cargo-and-transportation

A C929 in PLAAF service could serve as a refueling tanker (the similarly sized A330 MRTT is already in Australian, British, Saudi and Singaporean service) for Chinese bombers and stealth fighters. The C929 would also be more fuel efficient than Y-20 and Il-76 cargo planes, making it a longer ranged aerial command center for Chinese air operations, as well as serving as an "Air Force One" for Chinese leaders, in addition to being an airborne nuclear command post.
https://www.popsci.com/china-and-russia-join-forces-build-new-jumbo-jet#page-4

Russia could also use it for those roles.

AMCXXL wrote:

PapaDragon wrote:How many An-124 will be in service after all aircraft in storage are upgraded?

Today RuAF has 11 An-124-100 in service and other 15 An-124 in reserve , at least 3 are in Ulyanovsk waiting the modernization
The number projected for modernization was 22 for 2020, but since 2015 the works seem frozen , in 2016 and 2107 no more modernized An-124 by the budget cuts. Is probable the work will continue for the period 2018-2025
With the 22 airplanes one regiment or two separate squadrons will work with the RuAF in the future

Thanks

If Russia would be in need of new military transport aircrafts, which would be the signs?

1.- Few aircrafts with many work loads, leasds to an early exhaustion of the aircrafts.
2.- Early exhausted units would be canibalized to keep other aircrafts active longer.
3.- Early exhausted and canibalized units would be decommissioned.

Do you see this? No.

In fact we see a good number of aged aircrafts far from exhaustion in the Russian Armed Forces, which means they have been far from saturation.

The exhaustion of aircrafts is an accumulative process. There is a moment where the limits are reached (the standard limits allowed by the Russian Armed Froces), and the aircrafts are retired, canibalized and decomissioned.

The question is that if there is a good amount, even big amount of aircrafts that are reaching over 50 years old without reaching mechanical exhaustion is because they had an entire life working with low level of loads and keep still a mechanical reserve to be used despite the age.

Russia has been working in agreement with this situation, it explains how many aircrafts have been in the reserve despite to be young, and returned later again to the active service after older aircrafts have been decommissioned. They worked effectively by this way in order to reach the total exhaustion of the models of aircrafts and helicopters which production finnished before 1985, including the An-22 and the Mi-6/10. that are almost totally retired. The alone exception is the An-10/12 that they wanted to keep longer.

Neither the total exhaustion of the An-22 (today only 4 in active service and 5 in the reserve which canibalization is being done) or the Mi-6/10 (today 0 in active service and 19 in the reserve which canibalization has been done in favor of the units to remain as monuments) means a problem for the Russian Armed Forces, because the Russian Armed Forces have a reserve of aircrafts and helicopters of close size cathegories, more than enough to absorb the loads moved today by the last units of these models working. And the total exhaustion of both will be very likely finnished under the 2018-2025 State Armament Program. Both will have a replacement because are in some of the most useful effective and profitable size cathegories of transport aircrafts and helicopters looking at the future, but the succession is not something forced because of lack of alternative to move the loads of the An-22 and the Mi-6/10.

Between the aircrafts in active service or reserve from 1967 or before (that will have 50 years old by the begin of 2018) I counted:

69 An-2

37 (9 active 28 reserve) An-10/12
07 (5 active 2 reserve) Il-18/20/22

Russia obviously has been keeping units of the An-10/12 and the Il-18/20/22 with low use in order to use other aircrafts. And this has been possible only thanks to have a fleet bigger than the real needs all these years. With this situation of delay in the exhaustion of units of the An-10/12 and the Il-18/20/22 because of low use, it is obvious that Russia is not in a hurry to build new transport aircrafts at this point and for some years, because the same effect is also observed for other younger models of aircrafts and helicopters. As consequence we will see low production under the 2018-2025 State Armament Program. The work in this timeline will be focused in the development of transport aircrafts and helicopters for the current new generation.

But even in these two cases, it is possible to see in the structure of active/reserve aircrafts (specially evident in the case of the Il-18/20/22), how Russia has been working and is working right on it. Now after the exhaustion of older models of small airliners, the use of the Il-18/20/22 is intense, with almost all the remaining units in active service, while the use of the Tu-134 remains lower, waiting still.

Even more significative is the delay in the exhaustion of the An-2. At the current rythm a good number of aircrafts will reach 60 years old remaining in active service. Surely here Russia needs to do a planning for a faster total exhaustion of this aircraft, likely directing loads from helicopters to this aircraft. The presence of the An-2 still makes the Russian military air fleet to look older and less advanced than it is in reality. Almost all the remaining An-2 are from the 1958-1970 period with only 1 older and 6 younger. With this prospect, to think about military orders of some aircraft of the same type is fairly out of touch. Not even of the L-410 (the company that have been producing them declared bankruptcy after to try to move the production to Russia).

GarryB wrote:Ideally the VDV should have its own fleet of transports... they are the elite and need to have their own transports... you can't have a fire department that needs to phone a fire engine hire service to borrow fire engines when a house catches fire... you can't risk that someone already has not hired a fire engine for a party and the result is a burned down house.

To be truly independent and capable they need their own fleet of planes ready to move when they are.

I do not agree, they do not need to be independent, they need to do they job right. They are experts on their own warfare and fighting tactics. That is all.

Transport aircrafts need air escorts, need pilots well trained,... I expect you be not thinking about a fleet of own fighters or their own pilot training school for the VDV.

In fact independence is not a good thing for a military branch.

Im not between the people that thinks that small airliner and transport aircrafts have a good prospect in the future. I do not advise to bet on them in overall terms.

Now there is a project, the Il-112, that is being justified as replacement of the An-24/26/30/32, more concretely the transport variants.

Before to bet on this aircraft I would recommend to look at the exhaustion model followed by the An-24 and its impact in the orders by the ministery of defense of the Il-114.

The An-24 is the earliest variant of the An-24/26/30/32 and as consequence the most aged and the first being retired. In fact, today the process of retirement of the An-24 is so advanced like we can see here:

https://russianplanes.net/planelist/Antonov/An-24

Between the aircrafts owned by the Russian Aerospace Force and the Russian Naval Aviation, only one remains in active service:

https://russianplanes.net/reginfo/8412

The number of aircrafts listed as present in the reserve would be bigger still, with 29 in the Russian Aerospace Force and 3 in the Russian Naval Aviation. Surely it would be possible to make to fly to some unit else, but it seems that these aircrafts will be canibalized by the transport variants of the An-24/26/30/32.
Today a majority of the An-24 are listed as monuments and as decommissioned (by different reasons), 40 in the Russian Aerospace Force and 2 in the Russian Naval Aviation.

Obviously except the alone aircraft in active service, no-one more keeps a load of work. The loads of the rest of the aircrafts have been assumed by other aircrafts present today in the Russian Armed Forces. But these aircrafts are not of a model of airliner aircraft of the size cathegory of the An-24. Newer airliners of this size cathegory like the Il-114 never were procured:

https://russianplanes.net/planelist/Ilushin/Il-114
https://www.russiadefence.net/t4312p75-russian-transport-aircraft-fleet-vta#189143

The main reason for the lack of orders and procurement of airliner aircrafts of this size has been the disadvantage in costs per person and Km, and the presence of big number of more profitable airliner aircrafts of bigger size, like the Il-18/20/22 or the Tu-134.

Looking at the transport variants of the An-24/26/30/32, the things can go by the same way. I do not advise to bet on the Il-112. The main problem is in the structural disadvantage of small aircrafts on costs per Kg and Km.

GarryB wrote:

I do not agree, they do not need to be independent, they need to do they job right. They are experts on their own warfare and fighting tactics. That is all.

They rely on DA (Transport aviation) to have enough aircraft available for them to do their job.... the DA don't always keep enough aircraft available.

Cancelling an exercise is a problem, but for operations not having aircraft would be critical.

Like I said.... there is no point in having a fire department that does not have its own fire engines and just hires them when it needs them.

There is not reason to think that the Airborne Troops would manage better the transport aircrafts. In fact transport aircrafts are not the speciality of the VDV, while they are the speciality of the BTA. As consequence it is right to think that the BTA can manage better the air transport fleet than the VDV.

Taking your example:

Fire engine, firefighting aircrafts <=> BMDs, 2S9, 2S25,... (directly used to solve the mission)

land road <=> Transport aircraft, land road (way to reach the location of the mission)

Like a fire departament owns not the roads used to reach the fire and care not about their construction or maintenance, the VDV owns not the transport aircrafts to reach the location of their missions, and neither owns the roads when they move on land instead than on air. Transport aircrafts are for the VDV like air roads where they travel to reach the location of their mission.

GarryB wrote:

DA= Дальняя авиация = Long-Range Aviation (Strategic bombers)
BTA= Военная транспортная авиация = Military Transport Aviation

Thanks for the correction....

There is not reason to think that the Airborne Troops would manage better the transport aircrafts. In fact transport aircrafts are not the speciality of the VDV, while they are the speciality of the BTA. As consequence it is right to think that the BTA can manage better the air transport fleet than the VDV.

The BTA can't make aircraft appear from thin air.

I have read an article where a high up official in the VDV complained that exercises didn't take place in the 1990s because fuel was no available and aircraft were not available.

Imagine if they needed them in an emergency... there was little to no warning regarding the Georgian invasion of South Ossetia, so zero chance the VDV could intervene immediately from the air... there was simply no available air transport.

It is not about managing aircraft, it is allocating resources that are needed to the forces that need them.

complaining of the 1990s? this sounds weak

GarryB wrote:

I do not agree, they do not need to be independent, they need to do they job right. They are experts on their own warfare and fighting tactics. That is all.

They rely on DA (Transport aviation) to have enough aircraft available for them to do their job.... the DA don't always keep enough aircraft available.

Cancelling an exercise is a problem, but for operations not having aircraft would be critical.

Like I said.... there is no point in having a fire department that does not have its own fire engines and just hires them when it needs them.

This is actually correct if an airborne force does not have the ability to get planes when they need them, then that force is doomed to fail.

VDV should own their own transports to ensure they can do their job when needed and not hope they can do it.

I always wondered why they do not and really it makes no sense that they don't.

George1 wrote:

 According to available information, currently VC Russia has 26 An-124 aircraft, of which ten are in a flying condition (the RA-82011 will be the eleventh airplane).

https://bmpd.livejournal.com/2984111.html

That's pretty low, 11 Condors for a country with size of Russia.

KiloGolf wrote:

George1 wrote:

 According to available information, currently VC Russia has 26 An-124 aircraft, of which ten are in a flying condition (the RA-82011 will be the eleventh airplane).

https://bmpd.livejournal.com/2984111.html

That's pretty low, 11 Condors for a country with size of Russia.

An-124 seldom flies. They aren't used even to transport equipment to Syria, preferring the cheaper option of using ships. For transportation inside Russia, or even for exercises with China, the well-developed railway system is the most used.