COMAC flew the Lingque-B model Blended Wing Body aircraft on April 21 on the Jingmen Zhanghe civil airport in Hubei province for the first time. Henri Kenhmann describes it on his site:
The model weights 240 kg and has a wing span of more than 6 metres. The flight was autonomous and without input from the ground.
BWB should reduce drag and thus fuel consumption as well as take off and landing distances.
The larger part of the fuselage is built from composites and some parts as well as the undercarriage is made using 3D printing.
Its desiners, a group of young engineers from the « Dream Studio » (梦幻工作室) from the COMAC research centre in Beijing hope to investigate flight properties at low speed, manouvrability and stability of the configuration and lastly the controllability.
Lingque-B will be used for three types of flight test to validate successively the platform, performance and useful load. CFTE (China Flight Test Establishment), Beihang University and five other Chinese entities participate in the development program according to the « Open Lab » model.
More photographs on his site.
The model weights 240 kg and has a wing span of more than 6 metres. The flight was autonomous and without input from the ground.
BWB should reduce drag and thus fuel consumption as well as take off and landing distances.
The larger part of the fuselage is built from composites and some parts as well as the undercarriage is made using 3D printing.
Its desiners, a group of young engineers from the « Dream Studio » (梦幻工作室) from the COMAC research centre in Beijing hope to investigate flight properties at low speed, manouvrability and stability of the configuration and lastly the controllability.
Lingque-B will be used for three types of flight test to validate successively the platform, performance and useful load. CFTE (China Flight Test Establishment), Beihang University and five other Chinese entities participate in the development program according to the « Open Lab » model.
More photographs on his site.