Timed to coincide with the Day of Missile Forces and Artillery, this annual all-Russian science-to-practice conference was held November 20th through 21st. This event organized at South Ural State University united the members of our country’s scientific community, that deals with development of new types of armaments, military equipment and artillery. More than eighty participants presented about sixty relevant reports over the course of two days.
Day two of the conference began with opening of the “Rocket Engines and Power Plants” section, managed by the Head of the SUSU Department of Aircraft Engines Ruslan Peshkov.
“This conference, and in particular, the topics of this section’s reports are aimed at exchanging the scientific knowledge by representatives of universities and the sector-related enterprises of Russia,” noted Ruslan Peshkov. “It is especially important that among the event’s participants are young scientists, who are working on their candidate theses. For them, this conference has become a platform, where they have been able to present the results of their research studies before the competent scientific community. The common task for all the participants is to find points of contact and use them in the future to implement into educational process and during training of personnel.”
Ten reports were presented in the “Rocket Engines and Power Plants” section. Thus, lead engineer of the Fluid Dynamics and Heat Exchange Department of the Innovations Implementation Centre of the Engineering Centre of Digital Technologies for Mechanical Engineering at Ural Federal University named after the First President of Russia B.N. Yeltsin (Ekaterinburg) Vasiliy Salich shared on the improvement of a subsonic jet pump based on numerical simulation of the working process, while lead engineer of “NPO “SPLAV” named after A.N. Ganichev” company (Tula) Tatiana Titova talked about the approaches to the numerical study of the impact of multicomponent gaseous jet on the complex-shape body rotation in flight. Design engineer of the SUSU Research Laboratory for Launch Vehicles and Unmanned Aerospace Vehicles Pavel Tretiakov proposed a method for assessing the level of acoustic loads when designing a reusable launch vehicle equipped with a propulsion system with central body at the take-off and landing stage, while the Research Laboratory’s design engineer Demid Kuplevatsliy also presented a method of designing an electric-pump propellant feed system for a liquid-propellant rocket engine. Department Deputy Head at PAO “MZIK” company (Ekaterinburg) Aleksandr Gordich presented his reports on such topics as “Liquid-propellant Reheat Rocket Engine”, “Wheeled/Tracked Propulsive Device” and “Multi-mode Aircraft Engine”. Professor of the SUSU Department of Aircraft Engines Valeriy Kirillov shared on a method of calculation of gas flow in the vent of a low-temperature gas generator. Acting Deputy Chief Designer in Research JSC R&DIME (Nizhnyaya Salda) Aleksandr Taratorin talked about using numerical modelling when designing a low-thrust rocket engine with a “gaseous oxygen and gaseous methane” propellant system.
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Aleksandr Klenov from the Russian Federal Nuclear Centre – VNIITF (Zababakhin All-Russia Research Institute of Technical Physics, Snezhinsk) shared some details on the materials science complex at the Russian Federal Nuclear Centre – VNIITF: “In my report, I have presented our Research Institute’s pneumatic and powder gun-type loading units, as well as a software package for predicting the intraballistic characteristics of the gun-type loading units, and additionally demonstrated data of the held experiment. As a result of the work performed, our team developed a materials science complex of the Russian Federal Nuclear Centre – VNIITF to study the dynamic properties of structure materials in a wide range of strain rates at a totally new level and based on ballistic installations.”
The second section, “Unmanned Aerial Vehicles”, was managed by Viktor Fedorov, Associate Professor of the SUSU Department of Aircraft Engines and Head of the Rocket and Space Technology Centre named after V.P. Makeyev.
“Development of the technologies of Unmanned Aircraft Systems is among the priority tasks for the Russian Federation,” stressed Viktor Fedorov. “The relevance of these technologies and the demand for them is confirmed by the matter of the defensive capability of Russia. At the same time, the current level of such technologies is far from perfect. We have been set the tasks of developing the key technologies: artificial intelligence for the systems of navigation, object recognition, movement control, localization of development and manufacture of propulsion systems for UAV based on electric motors, and of microprocessor-based movement control systems. We must pay special attention to the integration of the aircraft and spacecraft components into a unified system. With the emergence and rapid development of the technology of nanosatellites, CubeSats, based on commercial components, there has appeared an opportunity for prompt and cost-effective deployment of low-orbit groups for the information support of the Unmanned Aircraft Systems. SUSU, jointly with its partner enterprises, is actively developing the Unmanned Aircraft Systems technologies, and for this purpose it is also elaborating the plans for upgrading the facilities and equipment for training of students.”
The presentations of reports in the second section of the conference was opened by Director of the “Delta Tsentr” Experimental Design Bureau Vitaliy Pervushin. He shared on the current trends in the development of unmanned aircraft systems. Director of ZAO “Aerokosmos” company Oleg Tretiakov presented a developed system of preventing UAV attacks for industrial objects. Vladislav Khalamov, Director of the House for Youth Engineering Creativity of the Chelyabinsk Region, talked about studying UAV in supplementary education groups as a method of mastering new technologies and obtaining primary pre-professional education. Head of the SUSU Aerospace Engineering Teaching Laboratory of the Rocket and Space Technology Centre named after V.P. Makeyev Mikhail Griaznov proposed a concept of developing the Teaching Laboratory’s facilities and equipment for practical training of students of the Unmanned Aircraft Systems academic programmes. SUSU postgraduate Bogdan Kiselev shared on the results of his research on studying the criteria of emerging of resonant behaviour in descent vehicles when designing them. The topic of a report by the university postgraduate Roman Kurbatov was the “Navigation and Information Support for Unmanned Aircraft Systems Based on CUBESAT Low-orbit Group”, while engineer from the Rocket and Space Technology Centre named after V.P. Makeyev Artur Vorobyev presented a report on the “Ground Testing of the UAV Propulsion Systems Using a Test Bench”.
In 2025, South Ural State University has become a member of the Consortium of Enterprises of the Conventional Armaments Industry, Munitions and Special-purpose Chemistry Industry, and the Institutions of Higher Education.
To wrap up the conference, a Round Table was held with representatives of the Chelyabinsk Region’s enterprises, where the participants discussed the issues of the scientific-and-technical cooperation and training of personnel for the defence industry complex of our region.