re: F-35 Joint Strike Fighter Thread
When do y'all think that the Chengdu J-20 will be in service with the PLAAF?
Well Josh, kyanges and plawolf both suggest that the J-20 is more of a testbed, than tech demonstrator, I would concur with the additional observation that they are flying it a lot. That really doesn't normally happen with test aircraft, they tend to fly them a little, and work on fixing whats broke or needs "tweaked" a lot. Since they are flying it a lot, there seems a couple of likely possibilities, 1 She's almost perfect, "not likely", 2 She's a photo op, kind of like a supermodel, to say hey, we're in this game to play too. My perception is that they are sticking to a fairly benign flight envelope, and if we weren't supposed to be watching her, we wouldn't be seeing her" The appearance of Pak-Fa as a demonstration aircraft at Mak 2011, looking very, very, slick I might add, in spite of her take off abort on day two, shows a much more mature aircraft in the developement process. Thats possible, because in spite of the new design, she retains the primary design of the su-27, tweaked stretched, but very slick. The J-20 on the other hand is a totally new platform, bearing some design cues, but really looking more like a test bed type aircraft. The real issue that keeps Pak-Fa and the J-20 from moving forward rapidly continues to be the powerplant, but believe me when I say that lots of developement time and money are being spent on that right now. Although we have seen pictures, the implication was that we were years away from any possibility of a serious fifth gen player from either of these two teams. That we have several airworthy examples of each is something of a surprise to the "experts", and their assertions to the contrary. As we are finding out with the F-35, the developement hurdles are costly and complex, things happen much more sedately here in the west, we test, test, test and then fly, as the old saying goes, "theres more than one way to skin a cat". (figure of speech for you peta folks) The J-20 and Pak-Fa are fast tracked, thats evident in that just as we are pushing ahead with the F-35, fly now, fix later, the other players have come up to speed quickly, as the stakes are high and these birds are, the A team, (sorry guys). You guys and gals from the other team, feel free to fill in the gaps, I find it all quite fascinating if more than a little dicey?
