Chinese Hypersonic Developments (HGVs/HCMs)

escobar

Brigadier

ougoah

Brigadier
Registered Member
Is this the hypersonic air to air missile that was hinted at last year?

The one that was associated with some breakthroughs in thermal imaging technology which was hinted at how the hypersonic air to air (or in this case also ASAT capable) missile is using. Makes little sense until they fully reveal it years later. Honestly hate how secretive China is but it is necessary.
 

ACuriousPLAFan

Colonel
Registered Member
Honestly hate how secretive China is but it is necessary.
Same thoughts, especially WRT China's submarine fleet, warhead delivery vehicles and nuclear arsenal.

But yes, the absolute secrecy is necessary for national defense, and I believe that in the end, it would be better if we, i.e. the general public come across less related information instead of the opposite - Which means, the relevant departments and agencies are doing their job well.
 

by78

General
Oblique wave detonation engine concept.

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52491585614_c804b71e88_3k.jpg
 

sunnymaxi

Captain
Registered Member
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Chinese team says hypersonic engine can hit Mach 9 on low-cost jet fuel​

  • The device travels at nine times the speed of sound without the expense or explosion risk of burning hydrogen, according to paper
  • Researchers in China say ground experiments at Beijing’s JF-12 shock tunnel were successful
The Chinese government plans to build a fleet of hypersonic aircraft that can transport passengers anywhere on the planet in an hour or two. Photo: SCMP


Researchers in China say they have developed the world’s first
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detonation wave engine capable of powering flight at nine times the speed of sound using low-cost jet fuel.

Several successful ground experiments for the oblique detonation engine, which generates thrust through a burst of explosions, were carried out at the
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in Beijing earlier this year, according to the researchers.

The team led by Liu Yunfeng, a senior engineer with the Institute of Mechanics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, revealed technical details of the kerosene-powered engine in a paper published in the peer-reviewed Journal of Experiments in Fluid Mechanics on November 11.

“No test results for [hypersonic detonation engines using] aviation kerosene have been made public before,” they wrote.

Chinese scientists tested their hypersonic detonation wave engine in the JF-12 shock tunnel in Beijing. Photo: Institute of Mechanics, Chinese Academy of Sciences

Chinese scientists tested their hypersonic detonation wave engine in the JF-12 shock tunnel in Beijing. Photo: Institute of Mechanics, Chinese Academy of Sciences

A detonation engine can run more efficiently and powerfully than other hypersonic engines such as the
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. The detonation wave triggers a series of explosions, which happen almost instantly and release considerably more energy than conventional combustion does with the same amount of fuel, especially at speeds over Mach 8.


Scientists around the world have built
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, but they mostly use hydrogen as fuel, which comes with a high price tag and risk of explosions.
Liu’s engine uses RP-3, a jet fuel commonly found in Chinese airports.

“Aviation kerosene is the fuel of choice for air-breathing engines due to its high energy density and ease of storage and transport,” he said.

The idea of using jet fuel to power hypersonic flight has been around for decades, but the difficulty of igniting the kerosene in extremely hot and fast air has posed a challenge for scientists.

“It is not easy to detonate,” Liu said.

Kerosene burns more slowly than hydrogen, so kerosene-powered engines typically require a longer detonation chamber to retain the fuel-air mixture for a longer period of time.

Computer models estimated that the detonation chamber of a kerosene-fuelled engine would need to be 10 times longer than one that uses hydrogen.
The extra length would be impossible for most hypersonic planes, where every millimetre counts, according to the team.

The Chinese team’s engine burns aviation kerosene, generating a series of explosions within milliseconds of ignition. Photo: Institute of Mechanics, Chinese Academy of Sciences


The Chinese team’s engine burns aviation kerosene, generating a series of explosions within milliseconds of ignition. Photo: Institute of Mechanics, Chinese Academy of Sciences

But the Chinese scientists found that a simple modification – adding a thumbnail-size bump to the surface of the engine’s air inlet – could make the ignition of kerosene easier while keeping the chamber’s size small.

When fresh air arrives at the narrow mouth of the engine’s wedge-shaped inlet, fast-moving air molecules are compressed and heated.
The hot air then mixes with tiny droplets of kerosene, which break apart to form even smaller molecules.
As the mixture of air and fuel hits the bump on the otherwise smooth surface of the inlet,
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.

The results of the test run, conducted under various conditions in the JF-12 tunnel, suggest that these bump-induced shock waves could not only ignite the kerosene but help confine the explosions to a small space, generating a steady supply of thrust.

China has developed several
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, including the DF-17 and YJ-21, capable of hitting a building or moving warship fast enough to evade most air defence systems.

The Chinese government plans to find civilian applications for hypersonic technology by building a fleet of aircraft that can transport passengers anywhere on the planet within an hour or two.
Meanwhile, defence contractor
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plans to conduct the first flight of the SR-72, an unmanned hypersonic spy plane known as “Son of Blackbird”, by 2025.

Hypersonic aircraft must be capabale of making routine long-distance flights under extreme conditions. Reducing construction and operational costs remains a major challenge, according to scientists and engineers involved in developing the technology.​

 

ACuriousPLAFan

Colonel
Registered Member
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Chinese team says hypersonic engine can hit Mach 9 on low-cost jet fuel​

  • The device travels at nine times the speed of sound without the expense or explosion risk of burning hydrogen, according to paper
  • Researchers in China say ground experiments at Beijing’s JF-12 shock tunnel were successful

The Chinese government plans to build a fleet of hypersonic aircraft that can transport passengers anywhere on the planet in an hour or two. Photo: SCMP

Researchers in China say they have developed the world’s first
Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!
detonation wave engine capable of powering flight at nine times the speed of sound using low-cost jet fuel.​

Several successful ground experiments for the oblique detonation engine, which generates thrust through a burst of explosions, were carried out at the
Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!
in Beijing earlier this year, according to the researchers.​

The team led by Liu Yunfeng, a senior engineer with the Institute of Mechanics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, revealed technical details of the kerosene-powered engine in a paper published in the peer-reviewed Journal of Experiments in Fluid Mechanics on November 11.​

“No test results for [hypersonic detonation engines using] aviation kerosene have been made public before,” they wrote.​

Chinese scientists tested their hypersonic detonation wave engine in the JF-12 shock tunnel in Beijing. Photo: Institute of Mechanics, Chinese Academy of Sciences

Chinese scientists tested their hypersonic detonation wave engine in the JF-12 shock tunnel in Beijing. Photo: Institute of Mechanics, Chinese Academy of Sciences​

A detonation engine can run more efficiently and powerfully than other hypersonic engines such as the
Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!
. The detonation wave triggers a series of explosions, which happen almost instantly and release considerably more energy than conventional combustion does with the same amount of fuel, especially at speeds over Mach 8.​

Scientists around the world have built
Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!
, but they mostly use hydrogen as fuel, which comes with a high price tag and risk of explosions.​

Liu’s engine uses RP-3, a jet fuel commonly found in Chinese airports.​

“Aviation kerosene is the fuel of choice for air-breathing engines due to its high energy density and ease of storage and transport,” he said.​

The idea of using jet fuel to power hypersonic flight has been around for decades, but the difficulty of igniting the kerosene in extremely hot and fast air has posed a challenge for scientists.​

“It is not easy to detonate,” Liu said.​

Kerosene burns more slowly than hydrogen, so kerosene-powered engines typically require a longer detonation chamber to retain the fuel-air mixture for a longer period of time.​

Computer models estimated that the detonation chamber of a kerosene-fuelled engine would need to be 10 times longer than one that uses hydrogen.​

The extra length would be impossible for most hypersonic planes, where every millimetre counts, according to the team.​

The Chinese team’s engine burns aviation kerosene, generating a series of explosions within milliseconds of ignition. Photo: Institute of Mechanics, Chinese Academy of Sciences

The Chinese team’s engine burns aviation kerosene, generating a series of explosions within milliseconds of ignition. Photo: Institute of Mechanics, Chinese Academy of Sciences​

But the Chinese scientists found that a simple modification – adding a thumbnail-size bump to the surface of the engine’s air inlet – could make the ignition of kerosene easier while keeping the chamber’s size small.​

When fresh air arrives at the narrow mouth of the engine’s wedge-shaped inlet, fast-moving air molecules are compressed and heated.​

The hot air then mixes with tiny droplets of kerosene, which break apart to form even smaller molecules.​

As the mixture of air and fuel hits the bump on the otherwise smooth surface of the inlet,
Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!
.​

The results of the test run, conducted under various conditions in the JF-12 tunnel, suggest that these bump-induced shock waves could not only ignite the kerosene but help confine the explosions to a small space, generating a steady supply of thrust.​

China has developed several
Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!
, including the DF-17 and YJ-21, capable of hitting a building or moving warship fast enough to evade most air defence systems.​

The Chinese government plans to find civilian applications for hypersonic technology by building a fleet of aircraft that can transport passengers anywhere on the planet within an hour or two.​

Meanwhile, defence contractor
Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!
plans to conduct the first flight of the SR-72, an unmanned hypersonic spy plane known as “Son of Blackbird”, by 2025.​

Hypersonic aircraft must be capabale of making routine long-distance flights under extreme conditions. Reducing construction and operational costs remains a major challenge, according to scientists and engineers involved in developing the technology.​

Now we anxiously awaits for China's level-breaking, state-of-the-art hypersonic military bomber civilian transport aircraft to enter service.

They would be useful to transport and deliver conventional and nuclear bombs or missiles civilian passengers and cargo/freight towards their intended targets towards international airports across the globe within only a small period of time.

Go China!
 

Biscuits

Major
Registered Member
Now we anxiously awaits for China's level-breaking, state-of-the-art hypersonic military bomber civilian transport aircraft to enter service.

They would be useful to transport and deliver conventional and nuclear bombs or missiles civilian passengers and cargo/freight towards their intended targets towards international airports across the globe within only a small period of time.

Go China!
They're defintely looking into that, a few months ago, research on the world's first wind tunnel test where a payload was dropped from a hypersonic object without destroying the object was made public.

I'll guess that hypersonic aircraft are coming within 1-2 decades. Even America nowadays is aiming to get hypersonic missiles by 2025. China needs a next level project to keep missile dominance.
 

ACuriousPLAFan

Colonel
Registered Member
Remember several months back when @Temstar mentioned about a 1995 proposal for a hypersonic bomber for the PLA?
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Great podcast between Xi Yazhou and someone who's working in hypersonic space in China. I'm still going through it (look at how long this one is!)

Now coupled with this:
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Chinese team says hypersonic engine can hit Mach 9 on low-cost jet fuel​

  • The device travels at nine times the speed of sound without the expense or explosion risk of burning hydrogen, according to paper
  • Researchers in China say ground experiments at Beijing’s JF-12 shock tunnel were successful

The Chinese government plans to build a fleet of hypersonic aircraft that can transport passengers anywhere on the planet in an hour or two. Photo: SCMP

(The two quoted posts in this thread have to be cut short in order to stay below the 10000-characters limit. You guys can click on their usernames to refer to their posts in full)

Can anyone see the connection? I hope my guessing is right.

If the aforementioned hypersonic bomber can operate as near-space vehicles, then it could reasonably lob munitions over great distances towards their intended targets without having to personally approach the enemy territories and increase exposure to enemy defenses.

Envisioned method would be:
1. Fly the hypersonic bombers towards near-space altitudes (preferably close to the Karman Line) at Mach 9;
2. Launch onboard payloads at angles close to that near the end of boost phase/early mid-course phase of ballistic phase;
3. Hypersonic bombers then return to base;
4. Payloads first travel towards their targets in trajectories similar to a ballistic missile;
5. Until a certain distance from the targets, those payloads would fire up their onboard propulsion system;
6. Payloads transform behavior into that of a cruise missile/quasi-ballistic missile; and
7. Payloads continue towards their targets while able to actively avoiding and dodging enemy defenses.

Of course, both the hypersonic bombers and their payloads must be made such that they:
1. Are considerably cheaper than ICBMs;
2. Can be produced in larger numbers;
3. Can be produced in shorter durations of time;
4. Able to utilize airfields and airbases, support facilities and infrastructures that are already available across the PLAAF; and
5. Can be ordered into action at a moment's notice.

This method of intercontinental strategic strikes against the enemy may, unlike what Temstar has stated in the 1995 proposal, require the hypersonic bombers to travel outside of China's borders. On the other hand, either the hypersonic bombers can be made smaller, or that the payloads onboard can be made smaller to allow more of it to be fitted into the bomb bays of the hypersonic bombers.

Another way of seeing it would be like bombers launching smaller DF-17 but with HCM at near space altitudes.

As China has neither military bases across the world nor bombers that are capable of striking targets at intercontinental ranges with rates similar to that of the WW2 bombing campaigns, I believe such hypersonic bombers and payloads would be the way to go for China.

What do you guys think?
 
Last edited:

tphuang

Lieutenant General
Staff member
Super Moderator
VIP Professional
Registered Member
I found it interesting that in the dod report, they had mrbm launchers at 250 and missiles at 500+. I would imagine the number has to be a lot higher and this is just a conservative estimate to represent 1 missile + 1 reload for df16 and df17. Based on Lyman comment, I would imagine they get to over 1000. Especially with what the kind of battle of attrition they have seen in the Ukraine conflict. Even 1000 seems to be insufficient.

The other interesting one is df26. I am assuming the 250 is just a conservative estimate. They would probably need double that for a high intensity Westpac conflict.

The other one I am curious about is df27. My impression is that it's a 5000 to 8000 km hgv based on previous rumors and Lyman comment. So longer ranged than df26. The dod report implies that df27 is not in service yet. When it does go in service, the obvious targets would be Alaska, Darwin and possibly even Hawaii. If it has the range to reach pearl, that would change the dynamic of the conflict quite a bit. Because ships spend good chunk of their time in ports. If port is facing a bunch of really hard to intercept hypersonic missiles, then this would add a huge wrinkle to war planning.
 
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