Potential PLANAF Carrier Aviation Alternatives

How does France and the US train its pilots?

Russia has a point in a side by side trainer for carrier landings, but I haven't seen any other than maybe the A-6 Series, which from looks doesn't seem to fly like a fighter. China should get a side by side trainer of some sort in my opinion. (And without confirmation of the SU-34 design being used on (if it exist!) JH-7B, I wouldn't put hope on it much.)

sumdud said:

How does France and the US train its pilots?

Russia has a point in a side by side trainer for carrier landings, but I haven't seen any other than maybe the A-6 Series, which from looks doesn't seem to fly like a fighter. China should get a side by side trainer of some sort in my opinion. (And without confirmation of the SU-34 design being used on (if it exist!) JH-7B, I wouldn't put hope on it much.)

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USN uses the T-45 Goshawk, a variant of the BAe Hawk, modified for carrier ops. It's a tandem trainer (instructor behind pilot).

russia have the Yak-130 design as carrier trainer , which seeems to be very simillar to the chinese L-15

One hour ago, while under the shower, something came to my mind. It's not specific chinese airwing but more a generall question on how to get aircraft airborne.

The , an american carrierborne fighter of the 50s and 60s, had the ability to adjust it's angle of incidence (the angle between the longitudinal axis of the fuselage and that of the airfoil), to allow lower T/O, landing speeds.
I've never seen that anywhere else.
Would it be usefull to fit that into modern fighters (perhaps even the J-10)? I know it's maintenance intensive. And it's probably not neccessary when you have strong cats or sky-jumps. Even more so since we see canards nowaday everywhere to accelerate the T/O roll.

It's just: will we ever see that again ... ?

The Vought F-8, an american carrierborne fighter of the 50s and 60s, had the ability to adjust it's angle of incidence (the angle between the longitudinal axis of the fuselage and that of the airfoil), to allow lower T/O, landing speeds.

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I don't see any reason why it could not be engineered. But it would require some R & D to make it work. The reason the Crusader was modified like it was so it could land on old Essex Class CVA's.

I know it's maintenance intensive.

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Friend, you have no idea the maintance required to keep that airframe in tune. Many, many hours.

Oh by the way the last USN Crusader VF squadron was decomissioned in 1976. The USN last photo recon squadron was decomissioned in 1986. The FN flew varaints of the F-8 until 31 DEC 1999.

The PLANAF should go with combat drones. They are smaller so that will allow them to field more aircraft with fewer carriers. They don't require as much maintainance because there are no parts to support a human pilot on-board. They can carry more fuel/weapons for the same space. There's always a ton of cheap electronics in china to get 'em built!

Could rocket-assisted takeoff be a substitute for catapult-assisted takeoff? If so, this could be a cheaper alternative to catapults on PLAN's CVs!

BLUEJACKET said:

Could rocket-assisted takeoff be a substitute for catapult-assisted takeoff? If so, this could be a cheaper alternative to catapults on PLAN's CVs!

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I would imagine the backblast from rockets would be considerably higher than the commonly used catapult system - the flight deck would have to be completely cleared, and a significant amount of fuel would have to be used. From a technical aspect, it's probably a bad idea.

I've read that B-52s used the engines of CM under their wings for T/O assistance, and once airborne, refuled those CMs with fuel from their on (B-52) tanks. Could perhaps be a possibility for heavy loaded strike aircraft.

Scratch said:

One hour ago, while under the shower, something came to my mind. It's not specific chinese airwing but more a generall question on how to get aircraft airborne.

The

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, an american carrierborne fighter of the 50s and 60s, had the ability to adjust it's angle of incidence (the angle between the longitudinal axis of the fuselage and that of the airfoil), to allow lower T/O, landing speeds.
....

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and what do you think about the DO-31 VTOL transport plane




see:



(its just: Dornier was purchesed by chinese investors)