SOURCE: IDRW NEWS NETWORK
The Dry Kaveri engine core is now being made stable due to critical breakthroughs in key technologies over the years, leading to successful certification of the engine that might be completed by 2026. Dry Kaveri engine can generate a 46kN Class of thrust that will be used in the Indian Unmanned Strike Air Vehicle (IUSAV) program but DRDO has now started working on a new afterburner section that is not for the IUSAV program but might be used for a new derivate that might be cleared post-certification of the Dry Kaveri engine program.
idrw.org has been told that proposal under consideration if the Dry Kaveri engine program meets the deadline and enters production could be to develop an uprated core that can generate 57-60kN class of Dry thrust which when mated to the afterburner section can generate a maximum thrust of 85-90kN. This engine will be ideal to be equipped on the Tejas Mk1A fleet when they are due to engine change sometime in the mid-2030s.
Tejas Mk1A fleet is powered by an American F404-GE-IN20 turbofan engine that can generate 84kN of Wet Thrust and over 40 years, each Tejas Mk1A will be requiring on average 3.5 engine swaps for the entire duration of its operational life. While the in-ground trial Dry Kaveri engine has demonstrated great core stability and has achieved the required thrust but it still waiting for high-altitude trials that were scheduled to have been taken place earlier this year but have been delayed due to the ongoing war between Russia and Ukraine.
India is also in talks with Safran and Rolls-Royce for the development of a new hybrid engine for the AMCA program that can generate 110-120kN Class of thrust. A New co-developed engine will also be tuned and hardened with additional safety measures for single engine operations to be used on the Second batch of Tejas MkII. Marine variant of the same engine for shipborne fighters like TEDBF will also be developed, but this engine won’t make it to the older Tejas Mk1A type due to which uprated Kaveri engine talks are taking place even though its success depends on certification of the Dry Kaveri engine and serial production of the engine.
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