On BRAHMOS air-launch version

Following BRAHMOS’ successful demonstration of capabilities for the Indian Navy and Indian Army, the Indian Air Force (IAF) decided to take advantage of this indigenously produced weapon. The IAF realised that they could use the cruise missile for air-to-ship and air-to-ground applications. This called for three major developments:

• The modification of the Su-30;
• The design and development of a launcher and modifications in avionics software of the aircraft; and
• A redesigning of the missile.

Since any modifications for the Su-30 required approval from the Sukhoi Design Bureau (SDB), and moreover, SDB quoted astonishingly high price for the same, BrahMos Aerospace decided that it would like to synergise the capabilities of Indian aircraft designers, developers, and manufacturers along with certifying agencies for an indigenous solution.

The golden moment for Indian aerospace engineers and scientists was when my predecessor Dr Sivathanu Pillai, stated that “One day we have to bite the bullet. Why shouldn’t we do it now?”

So, we decided structural modifications of the aircraft. Both Dr Pillai and Dr R.K. Tyagi, the then CMD of HAL were the twin minds behind the BRAHMOS air version who decided to bite the bullet together. Dr Tyagi and his development team studied the existing structure of the aircraft. They redesigned and modified the structure of the Su-30. They stripped open the aircraft and carried out the modifications. Moreover, they developed several new materials and metal joining technologies and completed the task in a record time of 23 months, which was well ahead of schedule. After subsequent modifications, the aircraft was subjected to ground vibration tests in the fully-loaded condition, which it passed successfully. Almost four years ago, the aircraft was symbolically handed over to BrahMos Aerospace. DRDO Labs in Bangalore, such as DARE (Defence Avionics Research Establishment), DRDL (Defence Research and Development Lab), and RCI (Research Centre Imarat) among others were fully involved in the developmental process of the air version.

With regards to the launcher, nobody has developed a launcher till now in the history of Indian aviation. BrahMos Aerospace is the first engineering company to have successfully developed a launcher. In this effort, different labs of DRDO like DRDL, RCI, DMRL (Defence Metallurgical Research Laboratory), R&DE (E) and Ordnance Factory Ambajhari developed the launcher alongside BrahMos engineers. We have developed one of the most complicated, reliable, and the largest missile launchers with a length of approximately six metres designed to carry 4.5 tons load. However, keeping the safety factor in mind, the launcher is cleared for 3 tons of payload with the air-version of BRAHMOS weighing approximately 2.65 tonnes compared to the 2.9 tonnes for the land and sea versions.

In this, the Software Development Institute (SDI) of IAF, along with DARE and BATL (BrahMos Aerospace Thiruvananthapuram Ltd) played a vital role. Considering the missile that is air-launched already has a speed advantage of the aircraft it’s launched from, we were able to cut down on the