Chinese Trainer Aircraft (JL-8, JL-9, JL-10 (L-15), etc.)
- Thread starter tphuang
- Start date
CJ-6 is way overdue for retirement.
One other application is use as drone hunter for militaries that can’t afford fancy jets.
of course, you can use basic trainers to train any pilot, I would imagine. It's just cool they are able to go full CFRP here. I'd hope to see more CFRP across new Chinese aircraft projects.
by78
General
The engine is likely to be provided by an aviation engine company jointly invested by CETC and the Wuhu Government.
The aircraft itself design originated from Austria DART-450
This is not a big news, as many city governments are more interested in investing in the automotive industry.
This Weibo talks about the progress and the engines
This aircraft has a well-known reputation: it is the world’s first trainer aircraft with a full carbon fiber composite fuselage and China’s first domestically-produced turboprop trainer. The model mentioned in the news, the DART-450, is actually the prototype, and it originates from the Austrian company Diamond Aircraft Industries.
Diamond Aircraft Industries specializes in manufacturing small aircraft. Founded in 1981, its light aircraft are very popular in Europe and North America. The company has close ties with China. In 2013, China Electronics Technology Group Corporation (CETC), Diamond Aircraft, and the Wuhu municipal government jointly established CETC Wuhu Diamond Aircraft Manufacturing Co., Ltd. Through technology transfer, Wuhu Diamond has since achieved domestic production of the DA40 and DA42 models.
The DART-450, a flagship product from Diamond, made its maiden flight in 2016. It is a dual-use trainer aircraft for both military and civilian purposes. However, the company soon faced a financial crisis and was acquired in 2017 by China’s Wanfeng Auto Holding Group, becoming a Chinese-owned enterprise. This accelerated the transfer of technology to China. In 2016, Wuhu Zhongke Aircraft Manufacturing Co., Ltd. was founded as a new entity, and its only model to date is the TA-20, which evolved from the DART-450.
The domestically produced TA-20 has also achieved partial localization of subsystems. For example, the original Garmin G3000 avionics system (yes, the same Garmin known for smartwatches) has been replaced with the SMART-210 integrated avionics system, newly developed by Chengdu Hermes (unrelated to the Israeli drone company). It features full-sized multifunctional touchscreen LCD displays and is equipped with a diffractive head-up display. The AI-450S engine used in the aircraft was designed by Ukraine’s Ivchenko-Progress Design Bureau and manufactured by Motor Sich, but China has already obtained the license for local production.
As mentioned earlier, Diamond Aircraft is well-received in Europe and North America. It even has a subsidiary in Canada called Austro Engine, which provides engines exclusively for Diamond aircraft. After India announced the cancellation of its TAPAS-BH-201 long-endurance UAV project last year, the later prototypes of the drone used Austro Engine’s E4 (AE 300) engine. The successor to that project, the Archer-NG UAV, continues to use the same engine. Given India’s relations with both China and Canada, many Indians have expressed concerns over this.
Figure 4 shows a scaled model of the TA-20 bearing the insignia of the Air Force, publicly displayed—perhaps sparking some imagination.
A short message from 8 years ago
《Austrian companies hope to participate in the bidding for Chinese military aircraft》
It seems that the Austrians failed to cooperate with AVIC and finally chose to cooperate with the joint venture of CETC and Wuhu government.
Well, in fact it is major issue and if the TA-20 is indeed finally ready it would be an even more major news Since the type itself is not the point, the point is, it would be IMO a perfect trainer for the PLAAF and we know the Dart 450 since years, but the Chinese TA-20 and especially its engine is a mystery.
Therefore thanks, but a sentence like „engine is likely to be provided“ is a bit too unspecific for me.