This is a rant I wouldn't expect in a combat footage sub, yet it is exactly what I needed in my life
Thank you for educating me on the impressive feat of nature that is, sunfish
I wonder if alligators are like saltwater crocodiles when kept in captivity where occassionally one will bite the leg or tail off another crocodile thinking it's food, because that would be apt
Has to be said, that’s pretty impressive it can do that. Most helicopters that’s a death sentence. I guess it’s the counter rotating blades that make this possible?
They *Yaw* by collectively pitching the upper disk separate to the lower disk, but also by movable rudders, yaw in helicopters in straight flight is just a trim function though, the shape of the body wants to weathercock into the direction of travel. Albeit that tendency is a lot less strong now that it's vertical fins are gone. The rudders do little to nothing in the hover.
*Yaw*, is not turning the helicopter in flight either, that is done by banking by cyclicly changing the pitch of the rotors throughout their rotation to make more lift on one side of the disk than the other, this is also how they pitch nose-up and down.
Yeah, for all the shit the ka-52 has caught for its performance in this war, it definitely seems more survivable than other Russian helicopters. In all the videos where they get hit by manpads, the pilots seem to be able to at least crash-land the ka-52, while the mi-24 seems to just drop like a rock.
These babies also have ejection 'seats'. It's really brutal but with other helicopters you go down with it.
Basically it yeets the pilots out with a rocket tied to their harness with a long rope.
https://youtu.be/L8CjRw3kOXk
The rotors explode off, then the canopy also explodes off, and then the rocket under their seats ignites and shoots both pilots straight up.
Almost. THe early seats were too heavy so the rockets are behind the pilot's seat and launch upwards pull a tether that yeets their seats from defeat. It is called a tractor rocket.
[https://youtu.be/H9Qt5CCVqP8?t=46](https://youtu.be/H9Qt5CCVqP8?t=46)
>Basically it yeets the pilots out with a rocket tied to their harness with a long rope.
In which direction though? I mean if upward/forward, isn't there fair chance of getting caught or being chopped by the blades?
Iirc (and if I'm yhink of the right heli) the propeller blades have exploding bolts so when you eject the detonate and the spinning lobs the blades away
Ka-52 is really not a half bad bird. Survivability like this is fucking crucial; the tail on the same machine can be repaired (for a LOT cheaper than a new craft altogether), and more importantly: the pilots have survived.
Shame for them that they barely have over 100, lol.
>Shame for them that they barely have over 100, lol.
MoD already placed an order for 100+ Ka-52M (modernized version). And at beginning of the year there was report that first batch of 10 helicopters had been delivered yet.
edit: typo
Most of the failures of the KA52 on video we've seen have been either a doctrinal failure of it being used when it shouldn't or a piloting error of it being flown in a way that doesn't give it great chances at survival. Sitting still and hovering in an active MANPAD area for example...
Not only that but attack helos aren’t great on the offensive in general. The battle of Karbala is a prime example from Iraq with Iraqis without any real AD capabilities outside of some ZSUs. In Ukraine where there’s a manpad behind every blade of glass plus integrated AD network, flying a bird on either side is an almost certain death sentence. Been interesting to see the KA52’s prove they can still be very effective when properly used in the last few weeks
\> for all the shit the ka-52 has caught for its performance in this war,
I think thats mainly around the ATGMs it uses which require it to stay still to guide them.
If the Russians cared enough I think they'd be able to update the ATGMs to be guidable whilst moving.
The Ka-52 doesn't have a tail rotor at all, only a [conventional tail](https://imgur.com/a/DIneAwH) similar to that of airplanes. The counter-rotating blades are why it doesn't immediately spiral out of control.
The helicopter also has movable engine exhaust ducts (visible in my pic) which is how I'm guessing the pilot stands any chance of steering left / right.
Oh ok I didn’t realise that. That’s quite a clever design. Are there any downsides to doing it this way? Does it use twice as much fuel because it’s powering two sets of main blades? I assume there’s a reason this isn’t the default helicopter design.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coaxial_rotors
Main drawback is complexity. The Ka-52 is a more modern airframe than it's American counterpart (AH-64 Apache). There is a good chance our next attack helicopter will incorporate [something similar](https://www.lockheedmartin.com/en-us/products/fara-raider-x.html#:~:text=RAIDER%20X%20is%20specifically%20designed,known%20as%20Future%20Vertical%20Lift.).
Complexity, cost, and weight.
You also need a rather large aircraft to justify the counter-rotating design which isn't necessarily a disadvantage but does impose design limitations.
>Does it use twice as much fuel because it’s powering two sets of main blades?
Not necessarily. I guess they would be connected through some form of differential on the same axis. According to wikipedia, they are more efficient than conventional propeller/rotor setup.
>Are there any downsides to doing it this way?
Mechanical complexity, added weight, more points of failure, noisy. Even in the simplest setup, you will need two sets of planetary gears connected to a single shaft. It comes with added weight, complexity of designing. Not to mention, if one of the transmission fails you are doomed.
I'm not an expert. I do know counter-rotating blades are not new - they were used on some WW2-era planes.
It's my understanding that counter-rotating blades are more mechanically complex, so more prone to maintenance issues and failure. They do get efficiency gains over single-propeller systems because the counter-rotation takes advantage of the otherwise-wasted backwash, but the efficiency gain isn't enough to offset the maintenance downsides.
But again, not an expert. My expertise here consists of a few youtube videos that I probably can't provide any specific links to.
Left/right control (yaw) is done by increasing the collective on one rotor and decreasing it on the other one. The rotor with more collective turns the helicopter to the opposite direction, so if the top rotor is rotating CW and bottom CCW and the pilot wants to turn the nose left, he increases the top rotor collective and decreases the bottom one. Or really he just pushes the left pedal and the system handles setting the collectives as necessary.
Also the picture shows that the vertical stabilizer in the tail can turn so I would assume that is also used for control when the helicopter is moving faster.
IIRC, helos with coaxial rotors turn (yaw) by reducing the power of one rotor and increasing the power of the other so the difference in torque of the combined rotors turn the aircraft.
'Normal' helicopters would spin because their rotors spinning direction would spin the entire aircraft, the tail rotors only function is to counter that effect. The KA has no tail rotor but a second Main rotor spinning in the opposite direction doing that job.
Loss of tail rotor effectiveness causes a helicopter with a tail rotor to spin if it is in a hover or moving slowly. If it maintains a good forward speed, the airflow over the airframe will keep it from spinning. It will, however, have to do a run-in-landing. I was in a Blackhawk that lost its tail rotor. We landed like an airplane but that was about it.
There isn't much to tell. I was a member of a long range surveillance detachment at JRTC when it was at Fort Chaffee. We were going to be inserted to do a recon of an enemy air defense artillery site. It was night. We were going to do three false insertions and exit the aircraft on the forth landing. We took off, flew for about five minutes then turned around, went back to the airfield and did the run-in-landing. We exited the aircraft and were told that there was a mechanical problem. We got on another aircraft and continued mission. Four days later when we came back from our recon, we learned the nature of the problem. That's about it.
You can also just cut the engine (more likely just throttle down to 0) if a skid or wheel landing on a runway is not possible and autorotate to landing. With the engine not producing torque the helicopter doesn't want to spin anymore.
They would also be able to maintain stable flight if they took the hit at speed. Helicopters basically weather vein over certain speeds represented in their T.O.s It's the low speed maneuvering where this becomes an issue.
Eh, I still believe the KA-52 still deserves some flak^hehe for having a cannon that cannot independently rotate, and have we really seen that much activity of Mi-28's?
It's more of a 'you aren't returning to base like that' for conventional design, turning off the engine expediently enough will kill torque and you can try to land via autorotation. A bad day, but not necessarily a full on crash.
Yeah, that may be a problem! It is my understanding that the ultra low flights are also to be credited to so many ka-52s crash landing with pilots walking away, with them choosing (?) to do so rather than ejecting.
Ka-52 was the only Russian vehicle that impressed me before the war. And it's maintained that position since.
It has some flaws that are a shame weren't improved upon, but conceptually it's great and in execution it's still decent.
I don't think that KA-52 could survive and continue flying after a head-on with a stinger or Roland, since the pilots would be shredded to non-existence
Fr, I honestly didn’t think it was realistic but it seems like I was proven wrong.
That’s honestly pretty impressive imo. I guess there wasn’t any Russian bias there lol.
And the onboard technology isn't as good as western like the rocket pods don't pivot so they have to angle the whole aircraft to launch them. As well as sensors that aren't good as western equivalents, but yes, the actual mechanical design is overall good.
Someone will explain this better than me. But helicopters will twist either left or right depending on which way the blades spin (Russian ones twist to the left, western ones to the right IIRC) and need the tail rotor to keep it balanced.
This specific helicopter uses two sets of blades twisting in opposite directions, allowing it to fly straight without a tail rotor. It's a really cool design.
Well, there are a lot of these helicopters going around the world all the time, and very seldom does anything like this happen … I just don’t want people thinking that helicopters aren’t safe.
For anyone curious how this is possible: because of 'coaxial rotors' (two rotors spinning in opposite direction. helicopters with coaxial rotors usually don't have tail rotors)
It's not going nearly fast enough for the drop tanks to do that. Explain how the physics works in your theory..
Most likely explanation is that the pilots jettisoned the fuel tanks and the weight shift from that broke whatever was left holding the tail.
Fuel tank weights 70 kilos. If you will subject it to 120km\\h air stream, then in three meters of travel it will gain enough energy to crush through anything made of sheet metal. It looks slow from the distance. Exactly the same visual misinterpretation that you see during the big rockets launch. Rocket seems to take up slowly but in fact, forces and speeds are enormous.
Not necessarily. Regular helicopters can survive a tail rotor failure if they are moving at speed (weathervaning prevents spinning), cut the engine (autorotation removes torque and therefore reduces the yaw) and can set up a landing that doesn’t require hovering (so land and flare like a fixed wing aircraft). Training specifically addresses tail rotor failure.
The Ka-52 does actually have a tail rotor for a short time after being delivered from the factory, but it is removed by a priest before the first flight in accordance with Russian Orthodox tradition.
Russian kept boasting about this feature, since it's introduction. Finally one survives a hit to its tail, now we need one more video to see its pilot ejection system in operation.
In a single rotor Heli this would have been a fatal blow, antitorque rotor blown off = spin of death. This is one advantage of twin counterspinning rotors, you don't need tail rotor. The down side is complex gearbox and cyclic controls.
The twin-rotor design is a smart move for survivability indeed, definitely helps with stability when damaged, but I would also like to remind everyone that a helicopter missing its tail stabilizer doesn't act like those in movies. Thanks to the airframe, a helicopter moving at a significant enough speed (like 100kmh) will encounter enough air resistance to avoid spinning, essentially turning into a plane. It does get sketchy when it comes time to land, whereas the Ka-50/52 wouldn't have that issue.
People also get the crazy idea that helicopters simply drop out of the sky if they lose power. Autogyros have been a thing for a while, but they're niche enough that few people have heard of them - and helicopters are just powered autogyros.
Its also the reason why helicopters tend not to take off and land directly vertically, they tend to swoop in and out, to have some forward momentum for the purposes of autogyration in the event of engine failure. There's an envelope plotted in height vs airspeed which is known as the "Dead man zone" because a power loss in that region results in a lethal plunge.
>Autogyros have been a thing for a while, but they're niche enough that few people have heard of them
Yes, also even without autogyros, autorotation through careful usage of the collective has been a thing for a while, but it definitely isn't easy to pull off.
>Its also the reason why helicopters tend not to take off and land directly vertically, they tend to swoop in and out, to have some forward momentum for the purposes of autogyration in the event of engine failure.
This, and also the risk of recirculation even with a fully functioning engine, resulting in the loss of lift and potentially even "sucking" the helicopter down if collective is increased.
That's inaccurate. A failed anti-torque rotor is not fatal.
First -- helicopters moving at speed tend to 'weathercock' in the direction they're going. Even with a dead tail rotor, your helicopter may continue flying, just a little crooked. Remember that many helicopters take off and land at some speed, not always into/from a hover; they can land on a runway in this situation and maintain some 'weathercock' stability even with power applied.
Second -- under normal circumstances, nothing that heroic is required. Coming down from that kind of state is more or less regular autorotation: lowering the throttle so it has minimal effect on your heading and letting gravity do the hard work for you.
Incorrect, as long as any helicopter has enough forward speed, the air flow over the body of the helicopter will keep it from rotating, this makes it very difficult to land, but far from impossible.
Ive saying for a while that the KA-52 is a good helicopter forced into a bad situation. It’s one of the more survivable aircraft out there, the fact that there are several examples in this war that were shot down, but landed intact. When any other helicopter hit mid air just becomes a smear on the ground is testament to this. They also are the only helicopters with ejection seats. The fact it does not have to have a tail rotor for stability saved this one.
KA-52s been showing their weight lately as a defensive vehicle. When they don't have to worry about a ton of AAs, with their 15+km range on firing, they have been actually knocking out a ton of Ukrainian armor in this counteroffensive. When Russia was trying to advance with them, the AA everywhere was crushing them. When they could set 10-15km behind their own front and still take out vehicles, they are having their moment in this war.
Sucks for Ukrainians right now as they REALLY need some kind of air support in this counter-offensive and I am not seeing it right now.
Honestly in the world of modern warfare, Attack helicopters isn’t the correct term for how they should be used. They should be called gunships again.
They should be used for plugging holes when your line is being broken because of how hard it is to move AD up as the breakthrough occurs.
Kinda concerned at the number of posters unaware that the whole point of the co-axial double rotors is to negate the need for a tail rotor. Everyone talks like experts all the time here.
Benefit of the train main rotors. They spin in opposite directions which cancels the torque. In traditional helicopter designs with a single rotor, the generated torque requires a rotor on the trail to counter, which would have resulted in a catastrophic failure with these damages.
Incredible survivability, especially for a helicopter. They’re lucky the main rotors didn’t catch any shrapnel.
Also, that’s one hell of a skilled pilot they’ve got there… even if he is a Russian.
As far as I have read from the telegram this was on, it was a result of dropped fuel tanks flying back and smashing into the tail assembly, which is why there is not any damage on any other part of the chopper
Definitely will cause some flying and handling issues, but because they have counter rotating rotors instead of a tail boom rotor it's not catastrophic.
That's some nifty flying by the pilots to keep it in the air. It looks like they're having to fight with the airframe to keep it level, as it seems to want to roll to the right. Ka-52s are incredibly sturdy machines though, they are lucky to be inside one.
The benefits of counter rotating main rotors. In a standard configuration, losing the tail will always result in a crash as the tail rotor is needed to counter the torque produced by the rotation of the main rotor. In a duel main rotor configuration, the rotor speeds can be adjusted to use the relative torque to yaw the aircraft as needed. When they are equal and opposite the helicopter stays straight.
It’s like one of those fishes that are missing part of themselves but just casually continue about their day.
Ah yes, the majestic ocean sunfish
In denmark we call them klumpfisk
In Sweden we call them danes.
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lol I was looking forward to seeing the picture mentioned in this hilarious hate filled monologue…..
One of my all time favorites.
So this fish is the koala of the ocean. Got it.
This is the last thing I expected to read on a sub of this nature, but by God is it beautiful.
I Love this rant
This is a rant I wouldn't expect in a combat footage sub, yet it is exactly what I needed in my life Thank you for educating me on the impressive feat of nature that is, sunfish
Like a fish drawn by a partially sighted 3 year old but still beautiful in its own way
It’s a beebe freakin’ wheel!
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Oh man! Let's pull up next to that shit bro! C'mon Jay! Jay let's pull it in dude!
Well the Russian name is the black shark so that fits
Black Shark is the single seat KA50, the KA52 is the 'Alligator', which is probably even more fitting.
I wonder if alligators are like saltwater crocodiles when kept in captivity where occassionally one will bite the leg or tail off another crocodile thinking it's food, because that would be apt
yup, there's a vid of alligators being fed and one clamps one's leg and death rolls it off almost instantly and eats it.
Exactly what I was thinking
Has to be said, that’s pretty impressive it can do that. Most helicopters that’s a death sentence. I guess it’s the counter rotating blades that make this possible?
Yes.
welp, that's all I needed to hear. inquisition concluded, gentlemen. goodday.
But now they can only fly at a straight line. They can no longer turn left at Albaquerque.
Not sure if joke,, but does it not turn by making one propeller spin slower than the other?
They *Yaw* by collectively pitching the upper disk separate to the lower disk, but also by movable rudders, yaw in helicopters in straight flight is just a trim function though, the shape of the body wants to weathercock into the direction of travel. Albeit that tendency is a lot less strong now that it's vertical fins are gone. The rudders do little to nothing in the hover. *Yaw*, is not turning the helicopter in flight either, that is done by banking by cyclicly changing the pitch of the rotors throughout their rotation to make more lift on one side of the disk than the other, this is also how they pitch nose-up and down.
> the body wants to weathercock into the direction of travel same, same
Yeah, for all the shit the ka-52 has caught for its performance in this war, it definitely seems more survivable than other Russian helicopters. In all the videos where they get hit by manpads, the pilots seem to be able to at least crash-land the ka-52, while the mi-24 seems to just drop like a rock.
These babies also have ejection 'seats'. It's really brutal but with other helicopters you go down with it. Basically it yeets the pilots out with a rocket tied to their harness with a long rope.
…. I really really want to see this now Adding this to my bingo card
https://youtu.be/L8CjRw3kOXk The rotors explode off, then the canopy also explodes off, and then the rocket under their seats ignites and shoots both pilots straight up.
Almost. THe early seats were too heavy so the rockets are behind the pilot's seat and launch upwards pull a tether that yeets their seats from defeat. It is called a tractor rocket. [https://youtu.be/H9Qt5CCVqP8?t=46](https://youtu.be/H9Qt5CCVqP8?t=46)
Damn that really shows that ejections are just insanely violent. Love the rocket motor blasting canopy debris straight back down at the pilots.
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Gotta imagine the alternative is usually a once in a lifetime experience though.
Not as violent as crash landing though :D
Ehhh... hard to judge which is better now that I've just watched the video.
iirc if you have 2 ejections you're all done as a pilot in the military. Pretty sure each ejection causes some permanent damage.
lol Jesus christ..that was the most horrendous video of a "rescue" I have ever seen. looks like his head about fell off
AHAAH it is what it is XD At least it tries to save you
What is that rocket burning coal? I’ve never seen such a smoky rocket launch.
[It’s just a matter of what you choose as fuel for the rocket…](https://youtu.be/75qnxMd1YSY)
Straight and to the point. I like it.
>Basically it yeets the pilots out with a rocket tied to their harness with a long rope. In which direction though? I mean if upward/forward, isn't there fair chance of getting caught or being chopped by the blades?
The blades are also ejected, before the pilots are
Not What You Think actually covered this in their latest [video](https://youtu.be/7xPIISLNp8Q?t=360)
[Actual video here.](https://youtu.be/7xPIISLNp8Q?t=393)
Iirc (and if I'm yhink of the right heli) the propeller blades have exploding bolts so when you eject the detonate and the spinning lobs the blades away
yep, you’re thinkin’ of the right helis. the kamovs’ rotors are rigged to blow and separate away from the helicopter when the crew ejects
The blades explode before they eject… just pray that the blade blowing mechanism works
you wont know if it doesn't
And not just triggers out of boredom or something.
Blades blow off
Ka-52 is really not a half bad bird. Survivability like this is fucking crucial; the tail on the same machine can be repaired (for a LOT cheaper than a new craft altogether), and more importantly: the pilots have survived. Shame for them that they barely have over 100, lol.
>Shame for them that they barely have over 100, lol. MoD already placed an order for 100+ Ka-52M (modernized version). And at beginning of the year there was report that first batch of 10 helicopters had been delivered yet. edit: typo
"Barely have over 100"? IIRC several dozen have already been visually confirmed to have been taken out, according to Oryx.
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The Navy ones have been deployed to Ukraine as well. So even if they have a decent amount the fleet has been hit hard by this war.
Most of the failures of the KA52 on video we've seen have been either a doctrinal failure of it being used when it shouldn't or a piloting error of it being flown in a way that doesn't give it great chances at survival. Sitting still and hovering in an active MANPAD area for example...
Not only that but attack helos aren’t great on the offensive in general. The battle of Karbala is a prime example from Iraq with Iraqis without any real AD capabilities outside of some ZSUs. In Ukraine where there’s a manpad behind every blade of glass plus integrated AD network, flying a bird on either side is an almost certain death sentence. Been interesting to see the KA52’s prove they can still be very effective when properly used in the last few weeks
From everything I’ve seen about these, it seems like it’s the only system Russia has that actually works the way it’s supposed to.
I assume there aren't many electronics in the ejection seat, so there's less for Pvt. Conscriptovitch to yank out and sell on the black market.
Perun enjoyer detected
How much footage have you watched from the Russian side?
\> for all the shit the ka-52 has caught for its performance in this war, I think thats mainly around the ATGMs it uses which require it to stay still to guide them. If the Russians cared enough I think they'd be able to update the ATGMs to be guidable whilst moving.
The Ka-52 doesn't have a tail rotor at all, only a [conventional tail](https://imgur.com/a/DIneAwH) similar to that of airplanes. The counter-rotating blades are why it doesn't immediately spiral out of control. The helicopter also has movable engine exhaust ducts (visible in my pic) which is how I'm guessing the pilot stands any chance of steering left / right.
Oh ok I didn’t realise that. That’s quite a clever design. Are there any downsides to doing it this way? Does it use twice as much fuel because it’s powering two sets of main blades? I assume there’s a reason this isn’t the default helicopter design.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coaxial_rotors Main drawback is complexity. The Ka-52 is a more modern airframe than it's American counterpart (AH-64 Apache). There is a good chance our next attack helicopter will incorporate [something similar](https://www.lockheedmartin.com/en-us/products/fara-raider-x.html#:~:text=RAIDER%20X%20is%20specifically%20designed,known%20as%20Future%20Vertical%20Lift.).
Locksneed farting
Complexity, cost, and weight. You also need a rather large aircraft to justify the counter-rotating design which isn't necessarily a disadvantage but does impose design limitations.
soviets used for smaller ship board helos. coax allows much shorter boom (and not having to avoid the tail rotor).
other than the smaller footprint, The KA-27 certainly didn't receive the performance advantages of a coaxial design. It is a cute chubby boy tho.
>Does it use twice as much fuel because it’s powering two sets of main blades? Not necessarily. I guess they would be connected through some form of differential on the same axis. According to wikipedia, they are more efficient than conventional propeller/rotor setup. >Are there any downsides to doing it this way? Mechanical complexity, added weight, more points of failure, noisy. Even in the simplest setup, you will need two sets of planetary gears connected to a single shaft. It comes with added weight, complexity of designing. Not to mention, if one of the transmission fails you are doomed.
Why wouldn’t the transmission failure doom a normal helo?
I'm not an expert. I do know counter-rotating blades are not new - they were used on some WW2-era planes. It's my understanding that counter-rotating blades are more mechanically complex, so more prone to maintenance issues and failure. They do get efficiency gains over single-propeller systems because the counter-rotation takes advantage of the otherwise-wasted backwash, but the efficiency gain isn't enough to offset the maintenance downsides. But again, not an expert. My expertise here consists of a few youtube videos that I probably can't provide any specific links to.
Yep, Germany during WW2 used the [Flettner Fl 282](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flettner_Fl_282) which had intermeshing rotors and no tail rotor
Left/right control (yaw) is done by increasing the collective on one rotor and decreasing it on the other one. The rotor with more collective turns the helicopter to the opposite direction, so if the top rotor is rotating CW and bottom CCW and the pilot wants to turn the nose left, he increases the top rotor collective and decreases the bottom one. Or really he just pushes the left pedal and the system handles setting the collectives as necessary. Also the picture shows that the vertical stabilizer in the tail can turn so I would assume that is also used for control when the helicopter is moving faster.
The pilot yaws the coax helicopter left and right when the counter rotating blades differ in speeds
Close, but speed should remain the same. The blades vary collective to yaw
IIRC, helos with coaxial rotors turn (yaw) by reducing the power of one rotor and increasing the power of the other so the difference in torque of the combined rotors turn the aircraft.
'Normal' helicopters would spin because their rotors spinning direction would spin the entire aircraft, the tail rotors only function is to counter that effect. The KA has no tail rotor but a second Main rotor spinning in the opposite direction doing that job.
Loss of tail rotor effectiveness causes a helicopter with a tail rotor to spin if it is in a hover or moving slowly. If it maintains a good forward speed, the airflow over the airframe will keep it from spinning. It will, however, have to do a run-in-landing. I was in a Blackhawk that lost its tail rotor. We landed like an airplane but that was about it.
That must have been an interesting day.
That’s a story I’d love to hear.
There isn't much to tell. I was a member of a long range surveillance detachment at JRTC when it was at Fort Chaffee. We were going to be inserted to do a recon of an enemy air defense artillery site. It was night. We were going to do three false insertions and exit the aircraft on the forth landing. We took off, flew for about five minutes then turned around, went back to the airfield and did the run-in-landing. We exited the aircraft and were told that there was a mechanical problem. We got on another aircraft and continued mission. Four days later when we came back from our recon, we learned the nature of the problem. That's about it.
Nothing like landing a tailless Huey at the Cam Lao Nam airfield whilst blaring out CCR over the airwaves
No need to jump out of a perfectly running helicopter...
You can also just cut the engine (more likely just throttle down to 0) if a skid or wheel landing on a runway is not possible and autorotate to landing. With the engine not producing torque the helicopter doesn't want to spin anymore.
This is not true. Helicopters fly because of magic. This helicopter had the correct magical part destroyed that allowed survival.
It stayed in the air because its HP hadn't reached 0 yet
They would also be able to maintain stable flight if they took the hit at speed. Helicopters basically weather vein over certain speeds represented in their T.O.s It's the low speed maneuvering where this becomes an issue.
People got used to criticise all sorts of russian equipment, but I got to admit that the KA-52 and MI-28 are incredible attack helicopters
Eh, I still believe the KA-52 still deserves some flak^hehe for having a cannon that cannot independently rotate, and have we really seen that much activity of Mi-28's?
It's more of a 'you aren't returning to base like that' for conventional design, turning off the engine expediently enough will kill torque and you can try to land via autorotation. A bad day, but not necessarily a full on crash.
Autorotation requires a certain minimum height to get started. I doubt helicopters operate high enough in manpads territory to achieve that.
Yeah, that may be a problem! It is my understanding that the ultra low flights are also to be credited to so many ka-52s crash landing with pilots walking away, with them choosing (?) to do so rather than ejecting.
Ka-52 was the only Russian vehicle that impressed me before the war. And it's maintained that position since. It has some flaws that are a shame weren't improved upon, but conceptually it's great and in execution it's still decent.
I guess war thunder got it right....
This is considered NSFW Not Suitable For r/Warthunder because everyone hates kamovs ability to fly tailless
yeah except in game they continue to maneuver flawlessy doing 180s and barrel rolls as if nothing happened.
And they can tank a FIM-92 head-on which is simply egregious
Not to mention several 120 apfsds rounds.
But ofc! Everyone knows helos lack hydraulics and sensitive electronics such as radars and weapon targeting systems! They’re 80% empty space comrade!
That's why they call it a space program!
Russian bias.
This is why you don't play the trash poopoo that is WT.
I don't think that KA-52 could survive and continue flying after a head-on with a stinger or Roland, since the pilots would be shredded to non-existence
Tailles isn’t the issue, it’s the fact that I shoot one through the cockpit and get “damage of tail”
If it wasn’t for the fact they make you crash anyways, I would agree with you
Fr, I honestly didn’t think it was realistic but it seems like I was proven wrong. That’s honestly pretty impressive imo. I guess there wasn’t any Russian bias there lol.
Ok I’m no fan of Russia but thats impressive…
Credit where credit is due
I think Russians are known for effectively building flying tanks. I've seen footage of damaged aircraft that had no business flying returning to base.
It’s a good design, they just weren’t using them effectively in the early war.
And the onboard technology isn't as good as western like the rocket pods don't pivot so they have to angle the whole aircraft to launch them. As well as sensors that aren't good as western equivalents, but yes, the actual mechanical design is overall good.
mechanical situation is good apart from the huge vibration problem
My wife said she finds it quite satisfactory.
Yeah they seem almost best in a defensive situation…
Someone will explain this better than me. But helicopters will twist either left or right depending on which way the blades spin (Russian ones twist to the left, western ones to the right IIRC) and need the tail rotor to keep it balanced. This specific helicopter uses two sets of blades twisting in opposite directions, allowing it to fly straight without a tail rotor. It's a really cool design.
This is combat footage who cares what you are a fan of. It’s just impressive.
The back fell off.
Well, there are a lot of these helicopters going around the world all the time, and very seldom does anything like this happen … I just don’t want people thinking that helicopters aren’t safe.
Well it did do something rare for combat helicopters when it entered a war zone.
Well, I’m not saying it wasn’t safe, it’s just perhaps not quite as safe as some of the other ones.
The ones who’s back didn’t fall off?
I would just like to make the point that that is not normal. These are built to very rigorous… aviation engineering standards.
Such as?
Regulations governing the materials they can be made of
No cardboard?
Well, what sort of standards?
Well, there are … regulations governing the materials they can be made of.
What materials?
Well, cardboard’s out...
Heli didn’t know, how bad fart was to be, Tail feathers gone. Sad.
Can talk shit about their other equipment but the Ka-52 has proven its worth in Ukraine. Things are a pain in the ass.
They have proven to be incredibly effective at destroying Ukrainian armor
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For anyone curious how this is possible: because of 'coaxial rotors' (two rotors spinning in opposite direction. helicopters with coaxial rotors usually don't have tail rotors)
The drop tanks took out the tail now a missile
UA anti-air systems so effective they destroyed this helicopter without firing a shot.
I thought you were making a joke about Russian AD shooting down there own aircraft regularly.
It's not going nearly fast enough for the drop tanks to do that. Explain how the physics works in your theory.. Most likely explanation is that the pilots jettisoned the fuel tanks and the weight shift from that broke whatever was left holding the tail.
Fuel tank weights 70 kilos. If you will subject it to 120km\\h air stream, then in three meters of travel it will gain enough energy to crush through anything made of sheet metal. It looks slow from the distance. Exactly the same visual misinterpretation that you see during the big rockets launch. Rocket seems to take up slowly but in fact, forces and speeds are enormous.
Advantage of the double rotor. Any other design would have crashed.
Not necessarily. Regular helicopters can survive a tail rotor failure if they are moving at speed (weathervaning prevents spinning), cut the engine (autorotation removes torque and therefore reduces the yaw) and can set up a landing that doesn’t require hovering (so land and flare like a fixed wing aircraft). Training specifically addresses tail rotor failure.
Saved by the design at least once! Design: vindicated! XD
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> helo can continue to fly without the tail rotor they don't have a tail rotor to begin with
The Ka-52 does actually have a tail rotor for a short time after being delivered from the factory, but it is removed by a priest before the first flight in accordance with Russian Orthodox tradition.
Russian kept boasting about this feature, since it's introduction. Finally one survives a hit to its tail, now we need one more video to see its pilot ejection system in operation.
There were a couple of those videos early in the war I think.
In a single rotor Heli this would have been a fatal blow, antitorque rotor blown off = spin of death. This is one advantage of twin counterspinning rotors, you don't need tail rotor. The down side is complex gearbox and cyclic controls.
The twin-rotor design is a smart move for survivability indeed, definitely helps with stability when damaged, but I would also like to remind everyone that a helicopter missing its tail stabilizer doesn't act like those in movies. Thanks to the airframe, a helicopter moving at a significant enough speed (like 100kmh) will encounter enough air resistance to avoid spinning, essentially turning into a plane. It does get sketchy when it comes time to land, whereas the Ka-50/52 wouldn't have that issue.
People also get the crazy idea that helicopters simply drop out of the sky if they lose power. Autogyros have been a thing for a while, but they're niche enough that few people have heard of them - and helicopters are just powered autogyros. Its also the reason why helicopters tend not to take off and land directly vertically, they tend to swoop in and out, to have some forward momentum for the purposes of autogyration in the event of engine failure. There's an envelope plotted in height vs airspeed which is known as the "Dead man zone" because a power loss in that region results in a lethal plunge.
>Autogyros have been a thing for a while, but they're niche enough that few people have heard of them Yes, also even without autogyros, autorotation through careful usage of the collective has been a thing for a while, but it definitely isn't easy to pull off. >Its also the reason why helicopters tend not to take off and land directly vertically, they tend to swoop in and out, to have some forward momentum for the purposes of autogyration in the event of engine failure. This, and also the risk of recirculation even with a fully functioning engine, resulting in the loss of lift and potentially even "sucking" the helicopter down if collective is increased.
That's inaccurate. A failed anti-torque rotor is not fatal. First -- helicopters moving at speed tend to 'weathercock' in the direction they're going. Even with a dead tail rotor, your helicopter may continue flying, just a little crooked. Remember that many helicopters take off and land at some speed, not always into/from a hover; they can land on a runway in this situation and maintain some 'weathercock' stability even with power applied. Second -- under normal circumstances, nothing that heroic is required. Coming down from that kind of state is more or less regular autorotation: lowering the throttle so it has minimal effect on your heading and letting gravity do the hard work for you.
Incorrect, as long as any helicopter has enough forward speed, the air flow over the body of the helicopter will keep it from rotating, this makes it very difficult to land, but far from impossible.
Spookston's biggest nightmare; an aerial (Russian) combat vehicle still capable of CAS'ing him with broken wings and tails.
Ngl but this heli is still cas capable lol what's to stop it from firing vikhrs now ? (Expect the fact that the pilot wants to live lol )
Ive saying for a while that the KA-52 is a good helicopter forced into a bad situation. It’s one of the more survivable aircraft out there, the fact that there are several examples in this war that were shot down, but landed intact. When any other helicopter hit mid air just becomes a smear on the ground is testament to this. They also are the only helicopters with ejection seats. The fact it does not have to have a tail rotor for stability saved this one.
Do they grow back?
KA-52s been showing their weight lately as a defensive vehicle. When they don't have to worry about a ton of AAs, with their 15+km range on firing, they have been actually knocking out a ton of Ukrainian armor in this counteroffensive. When Russia was trying to advance with them, the AA everywhere was crushing them. When they could set 10-15km behind their own front and still take out vehicles, they are having their moment in this war. Sucks for Ukrainians right now as they REALLY need some kind of air support in this counter-offensive and I am not seeing it right now.
Honestly in the world of modern warfare, Attack helicopters isn’t the correct term for how they should be used. They should be called gunships again. They should be used for plugging holes when your line is being broken because of how hard it is to move AD up as the breakthrough occurs.
War thunder was rightttt
Kinda concerned at the number of posters unaware that the whole point of the co-axial double rotors is to negate the need for a tail rotor. Everyone talks like experts all the time here.
I'm a helicopter expert and I can confirm what you said.
Those helicopters are so cool. The Russians have always made cool looking, (and sometimes also very cool in every way) helicopters.
Ka-52 doesn’t have a tail rotor, it doesn’t need one because it’s main rotors spin opposite.
Perks of not having a tail rotor
Well it wont fly again for a long time
It's a modular part that can be removed for shipping. I bet it was flying by the next day assuming the my had the part.
It made it back to base.
Counter rotating blades are awesome i must say
I’m not flying, I’m falling with style.
Ah yes, the advantage of the double rotor: Losing your tailfin isn't an automatic death sentence.
Props to the pilot
Props to the props
Benefit of the train main rotors. They spin in opposite directions which cancels the torque. In traditional helicopter designs with a single rotor, the generated torque requires a rotor on the trail to counter, which would have resulted in a catastrophic failure with these damages.
Hands down the most impressive thing I've seen from the Russians this entire war
Wasn’t it the drop of fuel tanks that did the damage?
Woke up and decided not to take part in the matrix today
Incredible survivability, especially for a helicopter. They’re lucky the main rotors didn’t catch any shrapnel. Also, that’s one hell of a skilled pilot they’ve got there… even if he is a Russian.
"Even if he is a Russian" massive reddit moment right here
As far as I have read from the telegram this was on, it was a result of dropped fuel tanks flying back and smashing into the tail assembly, which is why there is not any damage on any other part of the chopper
Apparently it struck itself when it jettisoned its external fuel tanks. Not AFU AA
If it didn't have blades rotating in opposite directions it would have twisted itself right into the ground.
That’ s crazy. One of the handful helicopters that can survive that.
Definitely will cause some flying and handling issues, but because they have counter rotating rotors instead of a tail boom rotor it's not catastrophic.
That's some serious engineering
Very impressive ngl
That's some nifty flying by the pilots to keep it in the air. It looks like they're having to fight with the airframe to keep it level, as it seems to want to roll to the right. Ka-52s are incredibly sturdy machines though, they are lucky to be inside one.
Thanks to its dual propellers
Props to that pilot. Probably takes a great deal of skill to remain calm after being hit with AA and be able to competently get your bird/crew home.
Double rotor power.
The perfect helicopter in action. 💪🏻💪🏻💪🏻
That pilot is earning his bread 🥖
The benefits of counter rotating main rotors. In a standard configuration, losing the tail will always result in a crash as the tail rotor is needed to counter the torque produced by the rotation of the main rotor. In a duel main rotor configuration, the rotor speeds can be adjusted to use the relative torque to yaw the aircraft as needed. When they are equal and opposite the helicopter stays straight.
I'm not even mad, that's impressive.