Shailesh

Exploring the convergence of Computers and A&D #Aerospace #Defense

[Shailesh @ShaileshPandh]

@tarunvats33 10+ years from android gingerbread and recent devices got green line

[News IADN @NewsIADN]

Gurugram-based #AnadroneSystems has signed an agreement with California-based #KratosDefense to explore next-gen unmanned systems.

[Swara Mehta @swaramehtaa]

DRDO's DATRAN 1500HP engine project only began because foreign MTU engine supply collapsed reactive indigenisation, not planned

[Ambassador Sergio Gor @USAmbIndia]

Great to be with Minister @PiyushGoyal and @USTradeRep Ambassador Greer today in New Delhi. Ongoing discussions on finalizing the trade deal between the US and India.

[Parimal @Fintech03]

The sidelining of the HAL HF-24 Marut by the Indian govt is 1 of the most frustrating chapters in our defense history. It was not sidelined because the design was bad; it was sidelined because the airframe was a magnificent, world-class sports car that the govt forced to run on a 3 cylinder auto-rickshaw engine.

Kurt Tank designed the Marut’s gorgeous, area-ruled, swept-wing fuselage specifically to achieve Mach 2. Yet, it lived & died w/o ever fulfilling its true aerodynamic potential. The program was systematically starved & eventually abandoned due to a toxic mixture of internal short-sightedness, bureaucratic failure & brutal international arm-twisting.

When building a fighter jet, we normally pick a proven engine & design the plane around it. India did the exact opposite: we designed a flawless Mach 2 airframe 1st & assumed we could buy/build an engine later. HAL initially pinned its hopes on the British manufacturer Rolls-Royce to develop an upgraded, high-thrust version of their Orpheus engine (the Orpheus 12). Rolls-Royce offered to co-develop it with India for a development cost of about £3 million.

The Indian bureaucracy, suffering from extreme penny-wisdom, rejected the offer as too expensive. India then tried to collaborate with Egypt, which was developing a promising engine called the Brandner E-300 for their own fighter project. India even sent a Marut airframe to Egypt to test it. But following the disastrous 1967 Six Day War & subsequent political shifts, the Egyptian engine program imploded.

Left with absolutely no options, the govt ordered HAL to fit the Marut with twin Bristol Siddeley Orpheus 703 engines. This was the exact same engine used in the tiny Folland Gnat fighter. It was entirely un-reheated (no afterburners) & grossly underpowered. The Marut’s frame was designed to handle immense supersonic forces, but its engines could barely push it past Mach 1 in a steep dive.

The Indian Air Force found itself operating a cutting-edge interceptor that was functionally obsolete in top speed the day it rolled out. While India was struggling to find an engine for the Marut, the Soviet Union walked into New Delhi with a highly seductive, ready-made solution: the MiG-21.

The Soviets offered a full domestic license-production agreement with tech transfers in local currencies (rupee-ruble trade). For a govt facing severe economic strains & immediate military threats from neighbors, the temptation was too high. Why pour millions of rupees and a decade of painful research into stabilizing a homegrown, underpowered plane when the Soviets could hand you a mass-produced, Mach 2 capable interceptor right now?

The Ministry of Defence shifted its priority, funding & focus toward compiling the massive MiG-21 ecosystem, quietly leaving the Marut to starve in the background. The final nail in the Marut’s coffin was geopolitical. In 1974, India conducted its 1st peaceful nuclear test (Smiling Buddha) in Pokhran. The Western world reacted with instant fury, slapping India with strict, sweeping embargoes on dual-use technologies, aerospace components & specialized alloys.

The Marut, despite being "indigenous," still relied on critical British spares & components for its basic Orpheus engines. Overnight, sourcing parts to maintain even the existing fleet became a diplomatic nightmare. Any lingering hopes of importing a Western engine to upgrade the Marut to its true Mach 2 state were permanently vaporized by international sanctions.

The most tragic element of the Marut's demise was a complete lack of long-term vision within the defense establishment. Despite being heavily underpowered, the Marut was an absolute beast at low altitudes. During the 1971 Indo-Pak War, it flew over 300 combat sorties, hitting enemy positions relentlessly. Because of its brilliant aerodynamic design, it was incredibly stable & resilient; several Maruts returned to base safely after taking heavy anti-aircraft fire & having 1 entire engine blown completely apart.

Yet, the decision-makers at the time failed to realize that building an indigenous aerospace industry requires absorbing massive structural failures & investing consistently through the iterations. Instead of viewing the engine crisis as a challenge to conquer by setting up an indigenous jet engine development lab right then, the program was quietly capped at just 147 units & phased out entirely by 1990.

By stopping the Marut program instead of fixing its propulsion bugs, India effectively caused a 30 yr systemic gap in its indigenous design memory. When we finally started the LCA Tejas program in the late 1980s, we had to relearn the entire physics of fighter jet design from scratch & we faced the exact same bottleneck again: the lack of a homegrown engine :((

[News IADN @NewsIADN]

Mumbai-based #Exicom has successfully tested it's IP Mesh Networking with the #IndianArmy and achieved reliable communication over distances of 5–15 km.

[News IADN @NewsIADN]

Hyderabad-based #EONSpaceLabs has developed an indigenous Buho-75 IR Imager (Drone Tracker) with a detection range of 1 km.

[Shailesh @ShaileshPandh]

@Gadgetsdata Avoid it. Samsung won't give free hardware support after they trick green line to it.

[Shailesh @ShaileshPandh]

@TechHome100 Avoid it. No support from samsung for green lines.

[Shailesh @ShaileshPandh]

@Nomadic_Reader @SamsungIndia Not your fault. @Samsung is giving long software support but non durable hardware for Indian heat and climate.
Displays for smartphones and TV facing line issues in huge no. Lost trust on them after buying six samsung devices and facing hardware issues on newer ones.

[Tarek Fatah @TarekFatah]

India's #Demonitsation triggers Pakistani casualty. Money laundering king Javed Khanani commits suicide in Karachi. https://t.co/d0vuUvrNgP

[Tehseen Poonawalla Official 🇮🇳 @tehseenp]

Ethanol is highly hygroscopic, it loves water. Once the water tolerance limit is crossed (often around 0.5% by volume depending on temperature & blend percentage, Ethanol pulls away from the petrol & forms two distinct layers: an ethanol-water mix at the bottom and petrol on top. This leads to: Poor starting, jerks, knocking & stalling while driving &
potential corrosion and engine issues (especially in older or non-compatible vehicles).

𝐍𝐢𝐭𝐢𝐧 𝐆𝐚𝐝𝐤𝐚𝐫𝐢 𝐣𝐢 𝐢𝐧 𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐁𝐄𝐓𝐀 𝐁𝐀𝐃𝐇𝐀𝐎 𝐘𝐎𝐉𝐍𝐀 𝐢𝐬 𝐡𝐮𝐫𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐮𝐬 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐰𝐞 𝐡𝐚𝐯𝐞 𝐭𝐨 𝐭𝐚𝐤𝐞 𝐭𝐨 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐬𝐭𝐫𝐞𝐞𝐭𝐬 𝐧𝐨𝐰 𝐭𝐨 𝐬𝐭𝐨𝐩 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐫𝐮𝐛𝐛𝐢𝐬𝐡! 𝐖𝐞 𝐧𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫 𝐚𝐬𝐤𝐞𝐝 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐬. #𝐄𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐧𝐨𝐥𝐒𝐜𝐚𝐦

[Shailesh @ShaileshPandh]

@chelawat @SamsungIndia @Samsung is having display issues in India. Either its TV or smartphone quality issues are there in India or Indian environmental conditions.

[PlaneCrazy @IXGguy]

Grow the Su-30MKI fleet to 400+, Add as many AMCA sqn's you need, and then make up the balance of the force with umpteen nos. of LCA Mk.2. Rafale's will anyways draw down as fast as they are inducted once France itself drops support over time.

[Shailesh @ShaileshPandh]

@NewsIADN If true, export order will be huge

[Microsoft Flight Simulator✈️ @MSFSofficial]

Coming soon exclusively to the Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 Marketplace: The Do 228 by Carenado

[Shailesh @ShaileshPandh]

@TheGalox_ I've got green line on my two samsung devices. Most people at service centers are there for green line. Samsung makes both phone and its part, they must have the data on what really is the issue here. Other brands using display from samsung are less likely to get green line.

[Gaurav Seth @GauravSeth93]

Introducing Vidura: a SAR payload built primarily for on-ground defence operators, enabling intelligence, surveillance & reconnaissance beneath forest cover.

Vidura operates in X-, L-, and P-band configurations, each unlocking different operational use cases, from high-resolution structural detection to deep foliage penetration.

And that’s just the start.

There are plenty of other aspects that deserve their own post - cross-border surveillance, drone-agnostic deployment, 3 km. standoff ISR, and human detection (expected by this time next year).

We'll unpack each of these later. For today though, here’s where we are….

Vidura has already secured a few contracts, with multiple field trials scheduled throughout 2026.

We're also actively looking to partner with drone manufacturers who would want to integrate Vidura into their platforms and take a combined radar-drone solution to market. Achintyaa is leading those conversations, reach out to him at [email protected].

Above all of this, I have seen the team work day & night to turn Vidura into a reality. Honestly, I am nothing but thankful to have this bunch by my side :)

Because of them, we now have two: Varuna & Vidura!

[Airbus Defence @AirbusDefence]

The first 'Made in India' Airbus C295 military transport aircraft has conducted its first test flight from the Final Assembly Line in Vadodara 🇮🇳, marking a milestone for Indian aviation and defence. This maiden test flight is a crucial step in the aircraft's post production testing process. As the first of 40 aircraft to be built in India, the test flight advances the programme's objective of delivering the first 'Made in India' C295 aircraft this year to the Indian Air Force.

A game changer in the Government of India's 'Make in India' vision, the C295 India programme is the first instance of a military aircraft being manufactured in India by the private sector. The programme's progress reflects the steady and dedicated work of Airbus, Tata Advanced Systems Limited and the several Indian MSMEs, which are manufacturing parts for the aircraft across India.

We thank the Indian Air Force, Ministry of Defence and Government of India, for their unwavering trust in us.

We are building the future of Indian aerospace.

#Airbus #TASL #C295 #MakeInIndia #AatmanirbharBharat

[Shailesh @ShaileshPandh]

@Timoldland Tarzan the wonder car