Ask anything Thread (Air Force)

Totoro

Major
VIP Professional
sac was, for the period of 2000 to 2015, delivering roughly 30 combat planes per year. whether their cappscity can be Increased is a matter of orders and investment. it is possible their deliveries have increased to a certain degree lately but counting new planes has gotten harder...
 

Schwerter_

Junior Member
Registered Member
sac was, for the period of 2000 to 2015, delivering roughly 30 combat planes per year. whether their cappscity can be Increased is a matter of orders and investment. it is possible their deliveries have increased to a certain degree lately but counting new planes has gotten harder...
Thanks. I saw somewhere that in 2017 SAC produced around 50 jets (almost all of which flanker variants), but can't find any concrete evidence to back this statement up.
 

Schwerter_

Junior Member
Registered Member
50 flankers is definitely possible, do you know what flankers? I'd imagine J-15, J-16 and possibly J-11D?
If the source was correct, there were 43 J-16, 4 J-15 and 4 J-11B/BS. It seems that the production of J-11D hasn't been put on the table yet. Some believe that since 4 Gen fighters are in use, a 3.5 Gen fighter whose main goal is air superiority is a high-cost low-revenue project, and think that instead of manufacturing J-11D, SAC should, for the time being, focus on J-16 and the upcoming electronic warfare aircrafts.
 

Brumby

Major
Actually US, Russian, and Chinese high-end fighters have trended towards increased maneuverability. The F-22 has 2D TVC, the Su-57 has 3D TVC and lots of moveable surfaces, the J-20 has canards and will have 3D TVC in the future.
It is the F-35 which is the exception in this regard yet people still defend this choice. Which to me is baffling.
It was nothing more than a cost-cutting exercise.
All designs involve trade offs and the F-35 is no exception. The design requirement was that the F-35 maneuverability would be on par with the existing 4th gen platform and in this respect it has met its requirement. The TVC issue keeps popping up because the F-35 is superior in so many areas that the simplest was just to focus on what it does not have rather than how relevant is TVC in the equation.

In a 2008 Red Flag exercise, the Indians participated with their brand new SU-30MKI and was show casing its TVC but performed rather poorly for reasons we have known all along
. upload_2019-7-8_15-54-11.png


In addition there is plenty of circumstantial evidence that modern AI might be more efficient at detecting targets than any human operator, regardless if he has that helmet or not, the AI basically can analyze targets in all aspect. A human is limited because of binocular vision. The AI can basically detect targets much like a fly with compound eyes, in fact, that is kind of what AESA is, a multiple sensor array. It just operates in the microwave instead of visible or near-visible spectrum. But that leads us to another question, which is if the pilot should have something akin to a dead-man's switch which turns control over to AI in war combat situations to reduce the latency. Last but not least, there is one major omission people forget but we have heard Chinese engineers mention, which is that the maneuverability increases your chances of escape even if stealth fails. No amount of sensor trickery counters that.
In the end this might prove to be the crucial part.
AI per se don't detect targets. It is the job of the sensors. It is the million of codes to direct the software of the sensors to make them intelligent. Modern 5th gen platforms like the F-35 is fully integrated between its multi sensors and its ESM like ALN/ALQ-239 and ALE-70 Its battlespace screen display provides it with a "god's eye view" of situational awareness. Its AI system generates a blue line to vector an optimal flight route against all known threats, In effect, a lot of the functions are automated and the pilot just need to focus on making the major decisions.

As this is a J-20 thread, we should be discussing the J-20 capabilities rather than the F-35.

I also wonder if the time advantage of the helmet in the F-35 is all it is cracked up to be. Because of the fact that weapons are supposed to be carried internally you will have more lag until the missile actually starts on its way to the target compared with shooting off a rail. The J-20 has the side doors and exposed missile sensor for the close range IR missiles but the F-35 does not. This may also be a critical problem with the F-35 and an advantage of the J-20.

AFAIK, the F-35 can launch weapons from its internal bays even when flying at supersonic speed. Does the J-20 have similar capability?
 

Blitzo

Lieutenant General
Staff member
Super Moderator
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AFAIK, the F-35 can launch weapons from its internal bays even when flying at supersonic speed. Does the J-20 have similar capability?

F-22 can launch weapons from its internal weapon bays while supersonic as well, in fact they were among the earliest weapons fire testings done for its integration tests of different weapons during its EMD phase.
(E.g.: F-22's first guided AMRAAM test fire was in September 2001, and the first supersonic guided AMRAAM test fire was a year later in November 2002
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So I'm not sure why you write of the ability of launching weapons from internal weapon bays is considered something unique or exceptional. If anything I would argue it is a rather rudimentary and basic capability that should be demonstrated rather early on for 5th generation aircraft during their development/EMD phase. (After all 4th generation aircraft and even 3rd generation aircraft are capable of deploying weapons while supersonic; it would be a rather concerning backwards step if 5th generation aircraft were not!)


However the F-35 is indeed off topic. I think the topic of the principles of A2A combat that geloog and others wrote about is not uninteresting so if people want to continue talking about the merits of certain capabilities and design characteristics of aircraft, missiles, avionics and so on, they can do so in a new thread.
 

Brumby

Major
F-22 can launch weapons from its internal weapon bays while supersonic as well, in fact they were among the earliest weapons fire testings done for its integration tests of different weapons during its EMD phase.
(E.g.: F-22's first guided AMRAAM test fire was in September 2001, and the first supersonic guided AMRAAM test fire was a year later in November 2002
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)

So I'm not sure why you write of the ability of launching weapons from internal weapon bays is considered something unique or exceptional. If anything I would argue it is a rather rudimentary and basic capability that should be demonstrated rather early on for 5th generation aircraft during their development/EMD phase. (After all 4th generation aircraft and even 3rd generation aircraft are capable of deploying weapons while supersonic; it would be a rather concerning backwards step if 5th generation aircraft were not!)


However the F-35 is indeed off topic. I think the topic of the principles of A2A combat that geloog and others wrote about is not uninteresting so if people want to continue talking about the merits of certain capabilities and design characteristics of aircraft, missiles, avionics and so on, they can do so in a new thread.

The question hasn't changed. Do you know whether the J-20 has launched weapons from its internal bay while travelling at supersonic speed? Deploying weapons externally is different from launching from internal bays. One can't assume is business as usual until is proven.
 

Blitzo

Lieutenant General
Staff member
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Registered Member
The question hasn't changed. Do you know whether the J-20 has launched weapons from its internal bay while travelling at supersonic speed? Deploying weapons externally is different from launching from internal bays. One can't assume is business as usual until is proven.

My belief regarding J-20's ability to launch weapons from its internal weapons bay at supersonic speed is similar to my belief that J-20 has an AESA radar, that J-20 is capable of supersonic speeds in general, that J-20 has demonstrated its ability to fire guided missiles, among others.

I.e.: yes I believe we can assume certain things to be "business as usual" without needing evidence of the kind that you expect or which we would see and receive for weapons projects of other nations who are more open.



There are reasonable capabilities or demonstrations that shouldn't be assumed and which sufficient evidence or rumours should be expected if they are particularly new or exotic or technically challenging. But there are also some capabilities and demonstrations which can be assumed based on how not new, how un-exotic or their relative lack of technical challenge.

Launching weapons from an internal weapons bay while supersonic for a 5th generation stealth fighter should very much in the latter category.

Putting it another way, as localizer said, the most reasonable null hypothesis for your question regarding J-20's ability to launch weapons from its weapons bay while supersonic should be to assume that it can be, and the burden of proof should be on those making the contrary argument instead.
 

Brumby

Major
My belief regarding J-20's ability to launch weapons from its internal weapons bay at supersonic speed is similar to my belief that J-20 has an AESA radar, that J-20 is capable of supersonic speeds in general, that J-20 has demonstrated its ability to fire guided missiles, among others.

I.e.: yes I believe we can assume certain things to be "business as usual" without needing evidence of the kind that you expect or which we would see and receive for weapons projects of other nations who are more open.



There are reasonable capabilities or demonstrations that shouldn't be assumed and which sufficient evidence or rumours should be expected if they are particularly new or exotic or technically challenging. But there are also some capabilities and demonstrations which can be assumed based on how not new, how un-exotic or their relative lack of technical challenge.

Launching weapons from an internal weapons bay while supersonic for a 5th generation stealth fighter should very much in the latter category.

Putting it another way, as localizer said, the most reasonable null hypothesis for your question regarding J-20's ability to launch weapons from its weapons bay while supersonic should be to assume that it can be, and the burden of proof should be on those making the contrary argument instead.

It is not business as usual because the drag coefficient is different between designs. For example between an F-15E and a F-16C.

upload_2019-7-8_17-8-17.png

upload_2019-7-8_17-8-57.png

Further more the aerodynamic forces are different depending on speed.

Briefly, the parameters that govern the magnitude of aerodynamic forces and moments include the following:
(1) configuration geometry, (2) angle of attack, (3) vehicle size, (4) free-stream velocity, (5) density of the undisturbed air, (6) Reynolds number (i.e., as it relates to viscous effects), and (7) Mach number (i.e., as it relates to compressibility effects). In order to correlate the data for various stream conditions and configurations, the measurements are usually presented in dimensionless form. In practice, however, flow phenomena such as boundary-layer separation, shock-wave/boundary-layer interaction, and compressibility effects limit the range of flow conditions over which the dimensionless force and moment coefficients remain constant. In essence, the motion of the air around an aircraft or missile produces pressure and velocity variations, which produce the aerodynamic forces and moments.
(source : Pahe 68, Missile Guidance and Control systems by George Siouris)
 
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