China's V/STOL studies, concepts & considerations

Tomboy

Senior Member
Registered Member
There's a massive difference between an engine doing 250+kN in F119 form factor vs an engine doing 200kN in F135 form factor. I'm pretty sure the engineers over at Xian probably modified and tested a WS-15 producing 200kN too. But that's not really the point here. The point here is that, for an aircraft of this kind, PLAMC has two choices. Either deal with the massive headache of operating a twin-engine VTOL design, which no one has done before basically (no the Harrier doesn't count), or go all in on a radically new engine design and the most powerful of its kind ever.
It's going to be a single engined design as the lift fan as the clutch and gearbox can only accept a single input shaft, why do you need an engine with 250kN thrust again? 200-220kN is already plenty of thrust and within the limits of an engine with similar overall dimension as the F-135.

PS: Harrier is a single engined aircraft, it just uses 4 vectored exhausts. Yak-38 uses three separate engines.
 

Alfa_Particle

Senior Member
Registered Member
It would appear that, according to a tender announcement, the Chinese have got their hands on a F135-PW-600 (or at least some critical parts) and proceeded to reverse engineer it...

606 then, allegedly, utilised the information collected from this endeavour and created their own STOVL engine (with marginal improvements relative to the F135-PW-600), likely based on the WS-15 also.

Of course, they're all just rumours based on a tender announcement (courtesy of @Chaos314159).
 

ACuriousPLAFan

Brigadier
Registered Member
It would appear that, according to a tender announcement, the Chinese have got their hands on a F135-PW-600 (or at least some critical parts) and proceeded to reverse engineer it...

606 then, allegedly, utilised the information collected from this endeavour and created their own STOVL engine (with marginal improvements relative to the F135-PW-600), likely based on the WS-15 also.

Of course, they're all just rumours based on a tender announcement (courtesy of @Chaos314159).

Let's just say that if this rumour information is indeed accurate/factual - Then this is certainly going to be the 2nd most amazing feat ever achieved in the domain of military SVTOL engine developments.
 

sometimesnaive

New Member
Registered Member
It would appear that, according to a tender announcement, the Chinese have got their hands on a F135-PW-600 (or at least some critical parts) and proceeded to reverse engineer it...

606 then, allegedly, utilised the information collected from this endeavour and created their own STOVL engine (with marginal improvements relative to the F135-PW-600), likely based on the WS-15 also.

Of course, they're all just rumours based on a tender announcement (courtesy of @Chaos314159).
Acknowledging that they are rumours, how could this occur? What method could they use to feasibly "get their hands on" an F135 or its parts? I'd assume it would simply be digital.
 

Alfa_Particle

Senior Member
Registered Member
Acknowledging that they are rumours, how could this occur? What method could they use to feasibly "get their hands on" an F135 or its parts? I'd assume it would simply be digital.
The document explicitly mentioned "inspection and reverse-engineering of critical parts/关键零件检测与逆向设计" and my interpretation on that is for physical, tangible parts.
 

Alfa_Particle

Senior Member
Registered Member
Where is the document posted?
Sounds insane but that's unfortunately not up to me to disclose...

Know that along with it the following were also mentioned:
- 升推一体动力系统用轴承加工 (processing of the bearings for the STOVL engine)
- 升推一体动力系统燃气发生器关键零件检测与逆向设计 (inspection and reverse-engineering of a STOVL gas turbine engine)
- 升推一体动力系统组合压气机加工制造装配 (compressor processing and assembly)
- 升推一体动力系统核心机原理实验测试系统集成 (integration of the STOVL engine core mechanism's test systems, core as in engine core)
 

sometimesnaive

New Member
Registered Member
Sounds insane but that's unfortunately not up to me to disclose...

Know that along with it the following were also mentioned:
- 升推一体动力系统用轴承加工 (processing of the bearings for the STOVL engine)
- 升推一体动力系统燃气发生器关键零件检测与逆向设计 (inspection and reverse-engineering of a STOVL gas turbine engine)
- 升推一体动力系统组合压气机加工制造装配 (compressor processing and assembly)
- 升推一体动力系统核心机原理实验测试系统集成 (integration of the STOVL engine core mechanism's test systems, core as in engine core)
Searching some of these I can find scraps of information from a few months back pertaining to procurement from the PLA, AECC etc.
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Shame I'm unable to get access to the actual docs due to a lack of a mainland phone number.
Nothing for the second, reverse engineering parts or anything pertaining to f135.

Captain posted about similar bidding back in June.
 
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