The SAAF Forum

South Africa aquired 5 ex-Israeli Nesher B airframes and these formed part of the Cheetah D upgrades. These aircraft were designated Chetah B's and carried SAAF serials from 858 - 862. Along with three Cheetah D's, eight Cheetah D2's and the five Cheetah B's, they all were known as the Cheetah D's.

According to the follwing sites, the Nesher T's delivered to SA, carried the Israeli serials of 618, 620, 634, 649 and 666.
http://www.aeroflight.co.uk/waf/aa-mideast/israel/af/types/iai1.htm#nesher
http://idfaf.110mb.com/Nesher/NesherTable.html

I found some photo's of these specific Nesher's in Israeli service ... it would be great to know what the eventual SAAF serial tie-ups were.


Source: From Mirage to Kfir: IAI Nesher by Amos Dor


Source: From Mirage to Kfir: IAI Nesher by Amos Dor


Source: From Mirage to Kfir: IAI Nesher by Amos Dor


Source: From Mirage to Kfir: IAI Nesher by Amos Dor


Source: From Mirage to Kfir: IAI Nesher by Amos Dor


Source: From Mirage to Kfir: IAI Nesher by Amos Dor


Source: From Mirage to Kfir: IAI Nesher by Amos Dor

Cheers

_________________
Brent Best

Now this is interesting and very informative... Kremlin, are you sure you're not a spy? The stuff you sometimes come up with...

I believe Cheetah B 860 has the con no of '110F/10F' which may make it a Mirage 5 (essentially a Nesher).

The plot thickens ....

Some points of interest:

Israel had ordered 50 Mirage 5J's from Dasault, then due to political tensions in the Middle East, the French government embargoed the sale of these aircraft to Israel. These 50 airframes were then taken into service by the French Air Force, and became Mirage 5F's.

The Nesher S (Single seater) & Nesher T (dual seater) were unlicensed versions of the Mirage 5, apparently built in Israel after the French embargo. The Nesher program carried c/n's in the S-01 - S-51 and T-01 - T10, range.

According to Winston Brent in "Cheetah - Guardians of the Nation", the c/n's for the SAAF Cheetah B's are 101F, 103F, 108F, 110F, 1061/6A. This info was obtained during an Air Force open day. These are French serials in the Mirage 5 range.

This calls into question, the actual origin of the Nesher airframes used in the upgrades. Were they manufactured in Israel? I believe that the embargo, was nothing more than political "sabre rattling", and that Israel did indeed receive the Mirage 5's from France.

So our aircraft were manufactured in France as Mirage 5F's, some cloak & dagger stuff got them delivered to Israel, possibly in crates as the basis for the Nesher T, then acquired by South Africa & upgraded to Cheetah B.

Cheers

_________________
Brent Best

From an earlier thread on the Cheetah's for Ecuador:
http://www.saairforce.co.za/forum/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=2602&start=15

_________________
Brent Best

The mirage F1 had the 09K50 A20 while the Cheetah C had the Atar 09k50 C02 or C11. Why the difference between the 2 c model engines? I know but wont tell! And as far as the difference between the Chet d/d2 and b? Well i would love to see you guys try and swop the spares between the two birds! Airframes were quite different. Just love reading the consp theorys.

Now you'll have to tell!

I am interested. If we tally up the Mirage F1's and later Mirage III's numbers that came with the ATAR 09K50, we have under 60.

The Cheetah C procurement ran to 38, with 16 D's. (As far as we know.)

The F1's were still in service when the C was introduced.

The extra engines had to come from somewhere. The Israeli's never used the 09K50.

Also, what is the difference between the 09K50 A20 (F1's) and C02 or C11 (Cheetah's)? Is it related to prolonged life or TBH's, or thrust levels?

Do you know anything about the ATAR Plus that had a new compressor, turbine, and electronics?

C'mon, DarkNight.......

Difference between 09K50 A-series and 09K50 C-series related to where the accessory drive gearbox mounted - on top or near the bottom, I think. I forget which position was used for Mirage F1 and which for Mirage III / Cheetah. 09K50 engines could be converted between A-model and C-model, and I believe some Mirage F1 CZ engines were converted for Cheetah C use by Denel Aviation. The Mirage F1 CZs were taken out of service in 1992, shortly before the time Cheetah C was introduced.

Other 09K50 engines were probably bought through secure channels (probably from Snecma, the French manufacturer.) Even though Denel Aviation had a license to manufacture 09K50 engines, they only ever manufactured small parts such as turbine blades, not the large engine casings etc.

All the new and ex-Mirage F1 Cheetah C engines had various upgrades, mainly intended to improve reliability - for example, a welded combustion chamber instead of the old riveted design.

ATAR Plus was an Atar upgrade developed jointly by Denel Aviation (the part of DenAv which was split off as Turbomeca Africa = TMA), Snecma (the original designer), and some Spanish (I think) engine company??? The market was upgrades for the hundreds of 09C and 09K50 engines which were still in use world-wide. Cheetah C 09K50 engines were built or upgraded before the full ATAR Plus upgrade became available.

I believe that the drive gearbox was fitted to the bottom but I'm no expert.

You are correct about the F1-CZ's engines being removed but my understanding was that these were for the F1-AZ. Could have been smoke and mirrors though. Below is a cartoon from that period.


Israel did aquire a number of 09K50 engines and at the time the propaganda machine said that they were for Sri lanka's Kfirs, which today we know is not the case. The aircraft delivered from Israel around May/June 1993 all arrived with the engines.

I know the ATAR 9K50 was also to be used, initially at least, in the Carver, albeit in upgraded and uprated form.

Also, mention has been made that the Cheetah C was fitted with a more powerful engine. whether this refers to differences between the 09C and 09K50 I'm unsure of. Deltawingman (I think) mentioned that Denel did some research on different castings of turbine blades for the 09K50 as part of this research.


Does anyone know what sort of thrusts were looked at and achievable, above the usually listed 5035kg dry and 7200kg wet figures?

On the Atar Plus, it is mentioned as having a new compressor, new turbine, new electronics. This is obviously devoted to increased thrust, particularly the compressor and turbine.

Maybe this was referring to the fact that Cheetah C had 09K50 compared to Cheetah D with 09C.

Cheetah D's were re-engined with 09K50s - I think that project started in 2000 or so, although it had been suggested for years before that. The upgrade was motivated by logistics - support for two different engine types was expensive. In any event, re-engining made a massive improvement to the Cheetah Ds, since the 09K50 has much better power characteristics than 09C. And since about half the Cheetah Cs were in storage and the Mirage F1s were out of service, there were engines available so the retrofit could be done without buying too much extra equipment.

That was Project Recipient I believe, with the re-engined Cheetah D's having a curved splitter-plate in front of their intakes.

Thanks - I was trying to remember the project name.

It resulted in some annoyed Cheetah C pilots, because Cheetah D's out-performed C's (better acceleration, better sustained turn rate, etc) with the new engine.

Kremlin,the photos you've provided were obviously scanned from a printed source. most probably from this one.
http://www.iafe.net/nesherbook.htm
so a proper credit should be in order here.

SNECMA did sell some 20 Atar 9K50 to the IAI in 1989 to be used on "prototype Kfirs" (Not sri-Lanka's)
That's according to the statement issued by SNECMA itself at the time.

I have another question though.
there's some discrepancy in some sources about the type of canards installed on verious Cheetahs.
Particularly the ones on Cheetah C,which are apperantly much larger then the ones installed on the Cheetah D and E.
Can any one confirm that the Cheetah C is indeed installed with larger canards?
If someone can provide accurate dimensions of them (I assume there is a possibilty to take measurments in SAAF museum) ,I will be very grateful.

Indeed, I've added the source of the pictures.

_________________
Brent Best