The Sukhoi Su-57 (Russian: Сухой Су-57; NATO reporting name: Felon)[5] is a single-seat, twin-engine stealth multirole fighter aircraft developed by Sukhoi. The aircraft is the product of the PAK FA (Russian: ПАК ФА, short for: Перспективный авиационный комплекс фронтовой авиации, romanized: Perspektivnyy Aviatsionnyy Kompleks Frontovoy Aviatsii, lit. ''prospective aeronautical complex of front-line air forces'') fighter programme, which is intended to be the basis for a family of stealth combat aircraft. Sukhoi's internal designation for the aircraft is T-50. The Su-57 is the first aircraft in Russian military service designed with stealth technology. A multirole fighter capable of aerial combat as well as ground and maritime strike, the Su-57 incorporates stealth, supermaneuverability, supercruise, integrated avionics, and substantial internal payload capacity. The aircraft is expected to succeed the MiG-29 and Su-27 in the Russian military aviation arms. In addition to serving the Russian armed forces, the aircraft has also been marketed for export. After a protracted development due to various issues that emerged during trials, including the destruction of the first production aircraft in a crash before its delivery, the first aircraft entered service with the Russian Aerospace Forces (VKS) in December 2020. The fighter is expected to have a service life of up to 35 years. The Su-57 is a fifth-generation multirole fighter aircraft and the first operational stealth aircraft for the Russian armed forces. In addition to stealth, the fighter emphasizes supermaneuverability in all aircraft axes, capacious internal payload bays for multirole versatility, and advanced sensor systems such as active phased-array radar as well as a high degree of integration of these systems. In the Su-57's design, Sukhoi cited the Lockheed Martin F-22 as the baseline for a supermaneuverable stealth fighter, but addressed what the bureau considered to be the limitations, such as the inability to use thrust vectoring to induce roll and yaw moments, a lack of space for weapons bays between the engines resulting in insufficient payload, and complications for stall recovery if thrust vectoring fails. The aircraft has a wide blended wing body fuselage with two widely spaced engines and has all-moving horizontal and vertical stabilisers, with the vertical stabilisers canted for stealth; the trapezoid wings have leading edge flaps, ailerons, and flaperons. The aircraft incorporates thrust vectoring and large leading edge root extensions that shift the aerodynamic center forward, increasing static instability and maneuverability. These extensions have adjustable leading–edge vortex controllers (LEVCONs) designed to control the generated vortices and can provide trim and improve high angle of attack behaviour, including a quick stall recovery if the thrust vectoring system fails. To air-brake, the ailerons deflect up while the flaperons deflect down and the vertical stabilisers toe inward to increase drag. Although majority of the structural materials are alloys with 40.5–44.5% aluminum alloys and 18.6% titanium alloys, the aircraft makes extensive use of composites, with the material comprising 22–26% of the structural weight and approximately 70% of the outer surface. Designed from the outset as a multirole aircraft, the Su-57 has substantial internal payload capacity. Weapons are housed in two tandem main weapons bays in the large ventral volume between the widely spaced engine nacelles and smaller side bays with bulged triangular-section fairings near the wing root. Internal weapons carriage eliminates drag from external stores and enables higher performance compared to external carriage, as well as preserving the stealth shaping. The high degree of static instability (or relaxed stability), advanced KSU-50 flight control system, and canted thrust vectoring nozzles make the Su-57 departure-resistant and highly maneuverable in both pitch and yaw, enabling the aircraft to perform very high angles of attack maneuvers such as the Pugachev's Cobra and the bell maneuver, along with doing flat rotations with little altitude loss. The aerodynamics and engines enable it to achieve speeds of Mach 2 and fly supersonic without afterburners (supercruise) giving a significant kinematic advantage and extends the effective range of missiles and bombs over previous generations of aircraft. Combined with a high fuel load, the fighter has a supersonic range of over 1,500 km (930 mi), more than twice that of the Su-27. An extendable refueling probe is available to further increase its range. For much more detail on development,design, operational history and variants, click here.
