On 3 November 2010, the Gromov Flight Research Institute (LII) saw the first test flight of the Il-76LL flying testbed (side number 76492) carrying on the left inner engine station an advanced Kaveri afterburning turbofan under development by the GTRE gas turbine laboratory of the Indian Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) to power the LCA Tejas fighter. The advanced engine was tested in all regimes of the flight that exceeded an hour – from takeoff to landing, including Mach 0.6 cruising flight at an altitude of 6,000 m.

The flight trials of the Kaveri’s example K-9 on board Russian flying testbed are under a Russian-Indian deal clinched several years ago. GTRE has been developing the engine over 20 years and has run into a number of difficulties. This led to prototype Tejas fighters having been fitted with US-made General Electric F404-F2J3 engines. The pre-production planes are equipped with F404-GE-IN20 engines that also are going to equip the first 20 production-standard Tejas Mk I fighters slated for service entry with the Indian Air Force in 2011.

Last October, the Indian MoD decided, based on the tender’s outcome, that the upgraded Tejas Mk II, whose trials are to kick off in 2014 and the production and deliveries in 2016, would be powered by US-made General Electric F414-GE-INS6 turbofan. In this connection, the future of the indigenous Kaveri engine, whose development has cost more than 20 years (since 1989) and upwards of 28 billion rupees (In excess of $600 million), remains uncertain. Nonetheless, completion of its development is of important to India in political terms.

An important milestone towards the objective sought should be the Kaveri’s tests by Gromov LII on board Russia’s Il-76LL. According to DRDO’s official news release, 50–60 flights more are scheduled for the flying testbed in the coming several months, with the flights designed to prove the basic characteristics of the engine and its reliability and safety as well. This done, the Kaveri’s flight tests could continue on board the Tejas fighter.

Mention should be made that the Il-76LL flying testbed (No. 76492), a 1986 LII-made conversion of the 1984 production-standard Il-76TD c/n 39-08, had been used for a long time for testing the Solovyev D-90A (PS-90A) turbofan. Then, it was mothballed in 1994 and de-mothballed in 2006 for the flight trials of the Kuznetsov NK-93 propfan prototype. However, the flying testbed had performed only few missions with an NK-93 on board before the prototype was dismounted in May 2009 and the plane’s conversion under the Indian contract began.