I'd be interested to see what the paint scheme of service birds are like as well... so far we haven't seen the plane in anything other than variations of yellow primer.
Chinese UAV/UCAV development
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I'd be interested to see what the paint scheme of service birds are like as well... so far we haven't seen the plane in anything other than variations of yellow primer.
Hendrik_2000
Lieutenant General
Yellow paint does not indicate it is not in service. When Liaoning start operation all the J15 flying from her deck are in yellow paint, On different subject
The PLA Army Air Corps seems to be adopting the same series machine of the Cloudshadow reconnaissance,attack unmanned aircraft (1st photo) exhibited at the 2016 China Air Show, the cloud shadow reconnaissance,attack unmanned aircraft vehicle (2nd photo).
From Jane performance estimate for the export variant I guess the domestic version is better Anybody know the range?. This one is classified as medium to heavy UAV. can be both reconnaissance and attack mode
According to quwa estimate
As per ,(Wendell Minnick blog) the Cloud Shadow possesses a payload of 400 kg, cruising altitude of 14,000 m (i.e. 46,000 ft), a maximum speed of 620 km/h, and endurance of six hours. AVIC is offering the UAV with a standard line-of-sight radio connectivity suite, which offers a range of 290 km. Not sure about the range though look like it has longer range
The Aviation Industry Corporation of China (AVIC) unveiled the Cloud Shadow, a turbojet-powered, medium/high-altitude long-endurance unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) at the Airshow China 2016 exposition, which was held in the southern city of Zhuhai from 1 to 6 November.
Developed by AVIC's Chengdu Aircraft Corporation (CAC) subsidiary, the export-oriented Cloud Shadow is available in two configurations: the armed reconnaissance model, which has a maximum speed of 550 km/h but a payload capacity of 400 kg, and six underwing hardpoints for external stores; and a dedicated intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) platform, which features a higher maximum speed of 620 km/h but can only carry a 200 kg payload comprising communication, and radar surveillance equipment, or high-definition photo-reconnaissance systems.
The ISR and armed reconnaissance variants are similarly equipped with a synthetic aperture radar (SAR) for improved moving target tracking performance, although only the latter carries a belly-mounted electro-optical/infrared (EO/IR) sensor turret for target designation and post-strike battle-damage assessment (BDA).
The Cloud Shadow UAV bears a striking resemblance to the General Atomics Predator C Avenger platform, although it does not appear to possess the same level of performance. (IHS/Kelvin Wong)
Both platforms share the same 9 m long and 3.66 m tall airframe that appears to draw some degree of inspiration from the US-made General Atomics Aeronautical Systems Predator C Avenger platform, with a mid-mounted wing design that spans 17.8 m and features a forward-swept trailing edge on the inboard section tapering to a constant chord outer section, although the Cloud Shadow's wings are swept back only about 10° compared with the Avenger's more pronounced 17° sweep. However, unlike Avenger the Cloud Shadow is not equipped with an internal stores bay.
The Cloud Shadow is also equipped with V tail surfaces and a dorsally mounted pod for its propulsion system. This was revealed by AVIC to be the WP11C turbojet engine, a "modernised and refined" version of the original WP11 system developed by the Beijing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics (BUAA) for unmanned aircraft applications.
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The PLA Army Air Corps seems to be adopting the same series machine of the Cloudshadow reconnaissance,attack unmanned aircraft (1st photo) exhibited at the 2016 China Air Show, the cloud shadow reconnaissance,attack unmanned aircraft vehicle (2nd photo).
From Jane performance estimate for the export variant I guess the domestic version is better Anybody know the range?. This one is classified as medium to heavy UAV. can be both reconnaissance and attack mode
According to quwa estimate
As per ,(Wendell Minnick blog) the Cloud Shadow possesses a payload of 400 kg, cruising altitude of 14,000 m (i.e. 46,000 ft), a maximum speed of 620 km/h, and endurance of six hours. AVIC is offering the UAV with a standard line-of-sight radio connectivity suite, which offers a range of 290 km. Not sure about the range though look like it has longer range
The Aviation Industry Corporation of China (AVIC) unveiled the Cloud Shadow, a turbojet-powered, medium/high-altitude long-endurance unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) at the Airshow China 2016 exposition, which was held in the southern city of Zhuhai from 1 to 6 November.
Developed by AVIC's Chengdu Aircraft Corporation (CAC) subsidiary, the export-oriented Cloud Shadow is available in two configurations: the armed reconnaissance model, which has a maximum speed of 550 km/h but a payload capacity of 400 kg, and six underwing hardpoints for external stores; and a dedicated intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) platform, which features a higher maximum speed of 620 km/h but can only carry a 200 kg payload comprising communication, and radar surveillance equipment, or high-definition photo-reconnaissance systems.
The ISR and armed reconnaissance variants are similarly equipped with a synthetic aperture radar (SAR) for improved moving target tracking performance, although only the latter carries a belly-mounted electro-optical/infrared (EO/IR) sensor turret for target designation and post-strike battle-damage assessment (BDA).
Both platforms share the same 9 m long and 3.66 m tall airframe that appears to draw some degree of inspiration from the US-made General Atomics Aeronautical Systems Predator C Avenger platform, with a mid-mounted wing design that spans 17.8 m and features a forward-swept trailing edge on the inboard section tapering to a constant chord outer section, although the Cloud Shadow's wings are swept back only about 10° compared with the Avenger's more pronounced 17° sweep. However, unlike Avenger the Cloud Shadow is not equipped with an internal stores bay.
The Cloud Shadow is also equipped with V tail surfaces and a dorsally mounted pod for its propulsion system. This was revealed by AVIC to be the WP11C turbojet engine, a "modernised and refined" version of the original WP11 system developed by the Beijing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics (BUAA) for unmanned aircraft applications.
Want to read more? For analysis on this article and access to all our insight
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Regarding the "drones in a swarm", the core tech is the sensor and algorithm for drones to detect obstacles and distance/course/vector of other drones. All these principle techs have been put in real life, on the market. One can buy a drone having all these techs for 999$, the DJI Mavic
If DJI is hired by PLA, I am sure the cost for PLA project will be very low as the basic development cost has been paid by commercial buyers already.
The tech is there already, and it is not like rocket science, just need to do it CHEAP ENOUGH to make the swarm viable. In this regards, I think DJI has the lead and by extension PLA has the lead.
- The "No bumps and scrapes" feature help it to automatically avoid obstacles.
- The "Follow me" feature makes it keep a fixed distance, same course, speed and same vector to its "leader", the owner by imagery recognition.
If DJI is hired by PLA, I am sure the cost for PLA project will be very low as the basic development cost has been paid by commercial buyers already.
The tech is there already, and it is not like rocket science, just need to do it CHEAP ENOUGH to make the swarm viable. In this regards, I think DJI has the lead and by extension PLA has the lead.
I think all the members are autonomous and equal in the chain of comamnd? A leader drone could become a choke point or even the weakest link.
No, I think the technology used by drone swarms like what the Pentagon and CETC demonstrated is quite different to what you described.
The object avoidance of Mavic and other DJI drones is done by optical object avoidance sensors and sonar sensors (and IR sensors in the DJI Phantom 4 Pro) -- but on the drone swarms, I believe the technology for flight avoidance are not done via sensors embeded in each aircraft itself but by each aircraft in the swarm knowing where the other is via satellite guidance+telemetry, and automatically adjusting their flight if two aircraft reach a certain danger zone of each other via some sort of common datalink and processing.
More importantly, the active track feature and follow me feature of DJI drones are based on visual object recognition and following the signal of the controller respectively. It is useful for keeping track of a moving object (so long as it isn't moving too fast and so long as it isn't too small and/or too similar to the background!), but it is vastly different to what is necessary in a true drone swarm and to control a true swarm as a collective entity rather than merely assigning one drone to follow another through visual object tracking or following a single signal.
Dont' get me wrong, DJI's drones are the most advanced on the consumer and professional civilian market, but they're completely different to what a drone swarm is meant to demonstrate. I believe the hard part of drone swarms is to develop the datalinks, processing, and control mechanism for a large number of aircraft simultaneously to function as an efficient swarm, where each drone is able to talk effectively with one another as well as the controller.
OTOH, standard consumer drones like DJI drones lack any of the ability to datalink and talk with other drones -- and while they may be equipped with impressive cameras and impressive ability to datalink with their own single controller/screen and object avoidance abilities, they fundamentally lack any ability to talk to each other... which makes sense because drone swarms have no utility in the civilian/consumer market.
I have mentioned the difference, imagery sensors vs. electrical sensors. Note, Mavic use GPS too to return to a designated landing point.
All other differences are essentially SW algorithm. It is difference of quantity rather than quality (capability). One following one object vs. many following one, SW scaling up. In distributed computation, once you make the architecture works between two CPUs, making 16, 32 and 64... working is relatively easy, the barrier has been crossed.
Also remember, the CETC demonstrated object avoidance in the video where drones took off in a field of wind farm with lots of wind turbines. That has to be done by something like sonar sensors, same principle as Mavic avoiding a tree in the path.
No worries, I am not DJI salesman.
The DJI drone is even bigger than the Pentagon drones, making it possible to house more powerful processors and sensors to do all the "datalinks, processing, and control mechanism" thing. The matter is only necessity instead of capability.
That is only because they don't need this functionality. With the size of it bigger than the Pentagon drone, stuffing all these are matter of necessity and whether ordinary Joes are willing to pay or not. The consumer market don't need them, so DJI didn't make them, but if DJI is hired by PLA to add them, they surely can.
All I am saying is not to prove anything about DJI, but trying to say the fundamentals are vastly and easily available in the hands of Engineers, American and Chinese doesn't matter. I was using DJI to refute the notion of "Pentagon drones is a step ahead of anybody.", they are not, not even ahead of a consumer company because it is doable and has already been done (to some degree).
P.S. I do see there is a civilian market for the swarm. Police surveillance, search and rescuer over a vast area are two applications that I can think of.
But these applications don't need the kind of resilience and high availability that swarms provide. Multiple standalone drones can work just as good?
I think we can't dismiss the complexity of the software algorithm needed for a true drone swarm like demonstrated by CETC and the Pentagon, especially the ability to datalink between the drones and to efficiently and effectively control a swarm.
I don't think so -- they didn't demonstrate object avoidance from the wind turbines, if anything I think they controlled their swarm in a field away from the wind turbines. What they did demonstrate was that the drones would not collide with each other in flight, and that would be dependent not on sensors in each drone detecting each other, but more by combined telemetry of the location of each drone relative to each other.
It's okay lol, I own a DJI drone, and I've been following the company for a long time.
They put out very impressive products, however it would be a mistake to equate the current highly tailored DJI products to be similar to the demos of CETC and the Pentagon.
Yes, and I'm saying that using DJI to refute that notion is rather flawed, because the technology and requirements behind a fixed wing drone swarm like what the Pentagon and CETC demonstrated is quite different to single drone camera quadcopters which DJI produces.
I'm sure DJI could well produce drone swarms if they really wanted to, and I imagine they've probably done R&D on this as well, but using the current line up of DJI drones as a means of refuting the Pentagon demonstration I think misses the important differences of capability and technology and role between DJI drones vs the Pentagon and CETC drone swarm demos.
That's why I think it makes far more sense to use the CETC drone swarm demo to refute the statement that Sinosoldier made, whereas bringing up DJI drones or other consumer drones adds confusion.
I wouldn't consider that to be civilian, more law enforcement/security. Search and rescue isn't exactly much of a civilian market by definition imo.
Sorry, but that's definitely NOT correct. Any aircraft in yellow primer is still in test. There is no, not a single one operational that is not painted in any operational colour scheme.
Especially Your example with the very first J-15-landings is a prime example and there for completely off: The first carrier landings onboard the Laioning were made by test-pilots. When in November 2012 the prototypes #552 and 553 made their first landings, the J-15 was still in test. Handover to the PLANAF was only about one year later in late 2013.
What makes You think the PLA Army will introduce them ?? So far the Army only operates small UAVs and everything larger than - just like the BZK-005 - are either PLNAF or PLA HQs.
Deino
Hendrik_2000
Lieutenant General
That is definitely not correct. They are the first batch of pilot that receive the carrier certification .We even know the name Dai Mengmin who is the first to land and latter become the first commander of the airgroup. He is now replace but we still see him in one of the video.No they are not test pilot
Test pilot stay with factory they don't get commission
Those are no prototype ,They are more like pre serial model They were still in use right now to train the next batch of pilot In their ground facility.
From Henri K it is shocking they have operated UAV regiment for more than 12 years and this regiment are supposed to be the lead regiment that will receive soar dragon EA-03
The Eastern Navy fleet revealed, in a very discreet manner but for the first time all the same, its regiment of reconnaissance drones in an article published on January 16 on the Chinese social network Weixin.
The text speaks of an awards ceremony to 10 soldiers based on the island of Daishan, located near the city of Shanghai. As one reads, one learns about the maintenance of the drones for 12 years, and another one the communication and the transfer of the data for this regiment.
The maintenance non-commissioned officer calls his drones "small 5" and "small 7". And these are the nicknames that lead us directly to the true reference two types of drones, operated by the regiment of the fleet of the East - the HALE UAV strategic reconnaissance BZK-005 , and the MALE UAV tactical reconnaissance BZK- 007 .
This regiment has been known informally for a long time, but it is the first time that an institutional text officially mentions its existence. The satellite images show a military installation on the island of Daishan with a track 2,3 km long, on which one can also find the trace of the drones BZK-005.
The location of the island of Daishan.
The air base of the drones on the island of Daishan.
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