TAI TF-X / Milli Muharip Uçak MMU Kaan

Examples of RAM/radar absorber materials and their applications developed by Aselsan.
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https://x.com/Catfishtheblues/status/1734532317408846202?s=20


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Proportions said:
Taxi tests have not started yet. And there is no news. I think it will be postponed.
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Just because they didn't share any footage so far doesn't mean that the tests haven't started yet. TAI's approach is to usually make progress in silence, they haven't shared any taxiing footage before Hürjet's FF either. We only had a short video of it and it was a leak instead of an official video. They're more discreet with Kaan/MMU given the nature of the project.

And silence is good, it means they're focusing on making progress instead of PR.

Sure, there is still a possibility that the maiden flight might get postponed but they had months to work out any problems that may arise and according to the CEO everything's been ready for a month now. It might get delayed a couple of days due to weather, runway conditions, etc. but my educated guess is that it'll fly either before the end of the year or within the first couple of days in 2024. A couple of days doesn't make any difference in this case.
 
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snne said:
Just because they didn't share any footage so far doesn't mean that the tests haven't started yet. TAI's approach is to usually make progress in silence, they haven't shared any taxiing footage before Hürjet's FF either. We only had a short video of it and it was a leak instead of an official video. They're more discreet with Kaan/MMU given the nature of the project.

And silence is good, it means they're focusing on making progress instead of PR.

Sure, there is still a possibility that the maiden flight might get postponed but they had months to work out any problems that may arise and according to the CEO everything's been ready for a month now. It might get delayed a couple of days due to weather, runway conditions, etc. but my educated guess is that it'll fly either before the end of the year or within the first couple of days in 2024. A couple of days doesn't make any difference in this case.
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I agree with you. And I am hopeful, but the possibility of postponement is high in terms of security and warranty. I don't need to see taxi tests, tire cutting tests. We will see it in the documentary anyway. I hope he flies tomorrow.
 
snne said:
Just because they didn't share any footage so far doesn't mean that the tests haven't started yet. TAI's approach is to usually make progress in silence, they haven't shared any taxiing footage before Hürjet's FF either. We only had a short video of it and it was a leak instead of an official video. They're more discreet with Kaan/MMU given the nature of the project.

And silence is good, it means they're focusing on making progress instead of PR.

Sure, there is still a possibility that the maiden flight might get postponed but they had months to work out any problems that may arise and according to the CEO everything's been ready for a month now. It might get delayed a couple of days due to weather, runway conditions, etc. but my educated guess is that it'll fly either before the end of the year or within the first couple of days in 2024. A couple of days doesn't make any difference in this case.
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Welp...
️KAAN will make its first flight in a few weeks

According to the information we have obtained, KAAN's ejection seat tests, full length static tests, inertia and static tests of control surfaces, landing gear drop tests, avionics system tests in the system integration laboratory, engine starting tests after fuel tests have been carried out. Following the completion of ground tests and taxi tests, KAAN is expected to make its first flight within a few weeks.
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https://x.com/Defence_Turk/status/1739631051046011188?s=20
 
The project has been carried out with incredible speed and competence. Seems like Turkey has been hiring the best talent around the globe and is doing the best I've seen so far of all nations to rapidly develop the skills of it's own MIC. It is as if Turkey had learned the lessons of China while taking full advantage of its position within the natosphere. It seems like they are internalizing as much tech as possible in case there comes a future where relationships with the west cool rapidly. Turkey has an enviable position geographically and is vital to the west, and for whatever you might think of Erdogan, he is master of working with all sides, and playing all sides with and against eachother. For a nation in Turkey's position it is the smartest thing it can do.

This fighter, if it does not meet any serious roadblocks ahead, will be formidable and have unique characteristics. Almost like a stealthy F-15 with a unique internal bay layout similar to the su-57 so that it can carry more than just guided bombs and air to air missiles.
 
WDF, that Turkish stealth fighter is to fly soon ? impressive, indeed.

It's pretty amazing to think that South Korea and Turkey both pulled out F-22 / F-35 "in between" stealth fighters. Although with Superbug and F-15 propulsion; so not as up-to-date obviously, as F119 and F135...
 
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I think that both fighters will get more modern engines after they enter service Archibald, I am surprised that they did not design and build indigenous engines as well instead of relying on F/A-18 and F-15 engines?
 
FighterJock said:
I think that both fighters will get more modern engines after they enter service Archibald, I am surprised that they did not design and build indigenous engines as well instead of relying on F/A-18 and F-15 engines?
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Well the Turks are designing an indigenous engine and I believe the Koreans will eventually too.
 
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That is better news Waterballoon. It will be interesting to watch the development of both engines.
 
Better late than never..It is important that KAAN does not become a political tool in the run-up to local elections on March 31, 2024. I am waiting for the day when this bird flies overhead
 
Allmagor said:
Better late than never..It is important that KAAN does not become a political tool in the run-up to local elections on March 31, 2024. I am waiting for the day when this bird flies overhead
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But that's the point: It is already! Turkey uses almost everything and especially Sweden's access to NATO as a tool to make pressure, uses the refugee-issue as another tool ... and the way the topic "request" for Eurofighter to Germany was presented was also purely political.

As such, the fighter itself, its program and technical breakthrough is indeed a great achievement, but as long as this "political egg dance" (as we say in Germany) - on the one hand alienating long-standing partners, playing bully, sympathizing with Russia and at the same time being dependent on the success of this type, since it uses US engines for some years to come - Kaan will remain at risk
 
Allmagor said:
Better late than never..It is important that KAAN does not become a political tool in the run-up to local elections on March 31, 2024. I am waiting for the day when this bird flies overhead
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Obviously they rushed the current prototype to get it rolled out on time, that's why they had to replace some subcomponents to make it airworthy since then. I don't think it'll be a political tool since delaying this project to the election date has grave consequences for a country in Turkey's geography and geopolitical position.

Let's also don't forget the fact that the maiden flight date has been set forward twice by TAI already, first from 2025-6 to 2024 and then from 2024 to December 2023.

It is obvious that TAI have a lot on their plate, from a new heavy class attack heli to a LIFT aircraft, from the LIFT to a flying wing wingman and a 5th generation fighter. They currently have 3 heli and 4 fixed wing projects in active development right now.

Even the bigger players in this sector would have trouble developing all of these at the same time, therefore it is impressive of TAI to realize these without facing major delays.
 
Deino said:
But that's the point: It is already! Turkey uses almost everything and especially Sweden's access to NATO as a tool to make pressure, uses the refugee-issue as another tool ... and the way the topic "request" for Eurofighter to Germany was presented was also purely political.
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You view everything as a purely political tool, as a blackmail from "a country ruled by an evil dictatorship" as usually most Germans do as I've found out.

But the reality is not usually as black and white as that.

The fact is Turkey is overrun by current/potential conflicts from all sides, from Georgia and Ukraine to Iran/Iraq/Syria; the only stable region bordering Turkey is the Balkans and even then there's always going to be a potential conflict with Greece over the Aegean and East Med and whatver internal clusterfuck the ex-Yugoslavia states get themselves into.

There's also the fact that Turkey hasn't made a major aircraft procurement in 20 years (except the F-35 and we saw how that turned out) and as a result of this parsimony the current inventory got old and out of date. The inventory size also went from ~350-400 aircraft to somewhere in between 230 and 250 within the said timeframe.

As a conclusion, TurAF desperately needs modern aircraft until Kaan gets developed and serially produced.

No matter what your political view of Turkey is, weakening a major ally that protects NATO's southern flank pretty much on its own against Russia has dire consequences for even Germany itself.

AKP, TurAF command and Erdogan are also to blame since they haven't made any contingency plans in case the F-35 deal fell through. They should've pressed ahead with said plans as soon as possible to keep the TurAF deterrent against any hostile forces to the south and to the west.

But since they've only realised the problem as of late, even if Turkey manages to get F-16V and/or Eurofighter deals approved, the aircraft are going to be delivered as late as 2027-28.

That leaves a major and consequently a dangerous gap in Turkey's capabilities. I'd not be surprised if Turkey gets dragged into a heated political situation in that timeframe because of this weakness.
 
snne said:
...

As a conclusion, TurAF desperately needs modern aircraft until Kaan gets developed and serially produced.

No matter what your political view of Turkey is, weakening a major ally that protects NATO's southern flank pretty much on its own against Russia has dire consequences for even Germany itself.
...
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If Turkey really "TurAF desperately needs modern aircraft until Kaan gets developed" is your point of view, but more important is the next statement I would like to rephrase a bit:

"No matter what your political view of NATO is, weakening NATO by refusing Sweden to enter as a major ally that will protect NATO's northern flank pretty much on its own against Russia has dire consequences for even Turkey itself.
 
Took me a while to realize that Turkey now has shit shows in the north (Ukraine, 2022) and in the south (Syria since 2011, plus the brand new Middleast clusterfuck, vintage 2023)... wait, there is another one - in the East: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Nagorno-Karabakh_War They are lucky Russia 2008 war in Georgia ended quickly, otherwise... geez, another one clusterfrack - on their doorstep.

Never quite realized how Turkey was encircled by conflicts: all around except perhaps in the Mediterranean... unless of course they trigger a bloodfest with Greece.
 
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Archibald said:
Took me a while to realize that Turkey now has shit shows in the north (Ukraine, 2022) and in the south (Syria since 2011, plus the brand new Middle east clusterfuck, vintage 2023)... wait, there is another one - in the East: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Nagorno-Karabakh_War They are lucky Russia 2008 war in Georgia ended quickly, otherwise... geez, another one clusterfrack - on their doorstep.

Never quite realized how Turkey was encircled by conflicts: all around except perhaps in the Mediterranean... unless of course they trigger a bloodfest with Greece.
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That's what I mean, decades of underinvesting in the Armed Forces, especially in the Air Force, is quite literally lunacy in this geopolitical position.

I'd also like to add persistent counter-terorism ops in Iraq/Syria and regional rivalries with Russia, Egypt, Israel and Greece to your list.

It is a millenium long fact, if a power is to populate Anatolia, it has to be deterrent and powerful enough to protect its position from other ambitious powers. We've observed this multiple times throughout history.
 
snne said:
underinvesting in the Armed Forces, especially in the Air Force
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As if they had a choice. It is what you get for being a vassal of the US, they only give you as much as they see fit.

The airforce has only one AIM-120C and less than that in AIM-9X for every F-16.

What's the purpose of having such a large fleet of fighters (and advanced AWACS and aerial refueling capability) if each of them can only fire off one BVR missile? Compare that to Pakistan which got 6 AIM-120C for every F-16, more than 4 SD-10 for every JF-17 and 12(!) PL-15 for every J-10C.

The most pressing issue at this moment in time for the TURAF is not the Kaan, nor getting more F-16's or Typhoons. It is the Ozgur upgrade, MURAD AESA radar and the Gökdogan BVR missile which are all on the late side.

These 3 systems can't get quick enough into service I tell you. It would be even better if the Gökhan is also sped up.
 
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Been trying to find decent data or even good educated guesses on the major specifications of this fighter. Based upon t/w ratio I can gather it might have some supercruise ability with nominal internal loads. Based on the design it seems it will have fairly long legs. The internal bay layout is future proof and currently will allow internal carriage of anti shipping cruise missiles as well as other air to ground and air to air ordinance.

I am no expert as you guys know. Based on what is known of the weight figures, aerodynamics, and dry thrust do you guys think it will supercruise?
 
I know it's way too early to discuss this, but does Turkey realistically expect there to be an export market for this aircraft ? The only prospective customer that I can think of would be Pakistan, but even they would seem to prefer an aircraft that would be ITAR free, which only China could provide. Turkey could very well find itself in a situation where the number of aircraft ordered is reduced in the future because of severe financial difficulties which would result in the unit cost of each airframe escalating, prompting even deeper cuts.
 
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alberchico said:
I know it's way too early to discuss this, but does Turkey realistically expect there to be an export market for this aircraft ? The only prospective customer that I can think of would be Pakistan, but even they would seem to prefer an aircraft that would be ITAR free, which only China could provide.
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Until Turkey can produce most of the things in-house, I suspect countries it could export to are those that the US would like to sell to, but won't sell their best.
i.e. Indonesia, Pakistan, Thailand, Argentina and potentially other Turkic countries.

among those, the countries that could fund it may be smaller.
 
Getting it flying before the end of this year was always a rushed political goal, so it would happen during the countries centenary.
 
helmutkohl said:
Until Turkey can produce most of the things in-house, I suspect countries it could export to are those that the US would like to sell to, but won't sell their best.
i.e. Indonesia, Pakistan, Thailand, Argentina and potentially other Turkic countries.

among those, the countries that could fund it may be smaller.
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Well, the only things it can't produce in house right now are (obviously) the engines, the ejection seat, radar (for now, even then the MURAD GaN based F-16 radar recently started airborne tests).

But I don't think there will be a lot of countries lining up. Only a select number of countries can afford or do require a 5th gen fighter and even then most of them are currently getting F-35s. The rest are either going for KF-21 Block 2 (if it materializes) or land based J-XY/35 (if China allows exports).

Most of the world doesn't need/won't need 5th gen fighters. The number of countries needing a heavy fighter are even lower.
 
helmutkohl said:
Until Turkey can produce most of the things in-house, I suspect countries it could export to are those that the US would like to sell to, but won't sell their best.
i.e. Indonesia, Pakistan, Thailand, Argentina and potentially other Turkic countries.

among those, the countries that could fund it may be smaller.
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I think Ukraine could be a potential customer in the future. The Turkish and Ukrainian MICs and militaries have cooperated a lot lately, the Kaan would be a NATO fighter despite current difficulties, Ukraine could lend a hand with the development of the indigenous engine of the Kaan and the Ukrainian Su-27s would need replacement rather soon. The only problem would be finances, but personally I'm rather optimistic about Ukraine's recovery post-war.
 
Topi said:
I think Ukraine could be a potential customer in the future
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If there is a "Ukraine" left still standing... Even a blind man can see that Russia won't retreat anytime soon unless NATO intervenes.
Topi said:
Ukraine could lend a hand with the development of the indigenous engine of the Kaan and the Ukrainian Su-27s would need replacement rather soon.
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Even in their current states TEI, Kale and TRMotor have much more experience designing turbofans than the Ukranians themselves do. They haven't designed a new turbofan in 40+ years.

I also think that even if there is a Ukraine left in the future, it would be a war-torn country in poverty and I don't see the West supporting them anymore.

There have also been a lot of rumors in the industry circles lately that Turkish companies have been disappointed with Ukrainian engines and suppliers
 

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