The Q-5, J-7, J-8 and older PLAAF aircraft

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Andy1974

Senior Member
Registered Member
siegecrossbow said:
PLAAF is such a strange animal. On one hand you’ve got J-20s and J-16Ds with J-35 prototype already in the air, on the other you still have J-7s that are alive and well. It really runs the gamut between world class aircraft and obsolete relics.

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Who is to say these might not become relevant again?

In my short time PLA watching I have been impressed by the great care China takes of its older equipment, from aircraft to ships.

They always seen to upgrade older equipment to keep it relevant and in the fight, perhaps with a changed role. E.G. old destroyers -> sub hunters.

Now, I am no expert, but I can imagine an EM/Cyber environment where j20 might not be operable, but a j7 could be, simply because of its low technology level.

Also, if you have all your modern aircraft destroyed then you will be thankful to have plenty old ones as backup.
 
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Atomicfrog

Major
Registered Member
Andy1974 said:
Who is to say these might not become relevant again?

In my short time PLA watching I have been impressed by the great care China takes of its older equipment, from aircraft to ships.

They always seen to upgrade older equipment to keep it relevant and in the fight, perhaps with a changed role. E.G. old destroyers -> sub hunters.

Now, I am no expert, but I can imagine an EM/Cyber environment where j20 might not be operable, but a j7 could be, simply because of its low technology level.

Also, if you have all your modern aircraft destroyed then you will be thankful to have plenty old ones as backup.
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Modern aircraft need a lot more maintenance to keep them in full capability. Flying them intensively is grindy and they become Hangar queen in no time. We had 24 CF-18 in war simulation training at green bay, only two aircraft were flyable after one week and an half.... imagine an aircraft with ram that need to be care off with big electronic suit to maintain, etc.

More than 40hrs maintenance per hours of flight for a f-22, around 20hrs/flight hours for f-18 f-16 and around 12 for mig-29 and F-5.
F-117 was over 100hrs per hours of flight...outch.

J-7maintenance hours is probably at low end, maybe around f-5 time. It make it capable to fly numerous time in the same day. A top of the line fighter, flying more than once probably make it unavailable for the next day...

Keeping j-7 could be a life saver in a long term campaign.
 
F

FishWings

Junior Member
Registered Member
by78

by78

General
A wooden mockup of JH-7. It was assembled in 1979.


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szbd

szbd

Junior Member
Andy1974 said:
Who is to say these might not become relevant again?

In my short time PLA watching I have been impressed by the great care China takes of its older equipment, from aircraft to ships.

They always seen to upgrade older equipment to keep it relevant and in the fight, perhaps with a changed role. E.G. old destroyers -> sub hunters.

Now, I am no expert, but I can imagine an EM/Cyber environment where j20 might not be operable, but a j7 could be, simply because of its low technology level.

Also, if you have all your modern aircraft destroyed then you will be thankful to have plenty old ones as backup.
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All Q5 were retired, about half were upgraded version produced in 21th century. There must be a special reason they kept much older J7
 
G

Grupo2

New Member
Registered Member
stannislas said:
well, this is how big organization works, budget is divided through numerous departments, and therefore you only have so much money to replace old equipments

and there is also needs to maintain a big pilots team
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Not sure the late model J-7's can be fairly
siegecrossbow said:
PLAAF is such a strange animal. On one hand you’ve got J-20s and J-16Ds with J-35 prototype already in the air, on the other you still have J-7s that are alive and well. It really runs the gamut between world class aircraft and obsolete relics.

View attachment 78622
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View attachment 78624
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Is it fair to call late model J-7''s obsolete relics? They had upgraded it to produce a very viable point defence fighter and in the last 10 years or so had been relegated to Regiments that did not appear to be "front line" in terms of being based near potential hot spot like Taiwan. But yes, if course there is a great difference with units flying the latest aircraft. Seems similar to Russian Air Force flying legacy Su-27's and Mig-29's in areas like the far East or southern region.
 
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AndrewS

Brigadier
Registered Member
Atomicfrog said:
Modern aircraft need a lot more maintenance to keep them in full capability. Flying them intensively is grindy and they become Hangar queen in no time. We had 24 CF-18 in war simulation training at green bay, only two aircraft were flyable after one week and an half.... imagine an aircraft with ram that need to be care off with big electronic suit to maintain, etc.

More than 40hrs maintenance per hours of flight for a f-22, around 20hrs/flight hours for f-18 f-16 and around 12 for mig-29 and F-5.
F-117 was over 100hrs per hours of flight...outch.

J-7maintenance hours is probably at low end, maybe around f-5 time. It make it capable to fly numerous time in the same day. A top of the line fighter, flying more than once probably make it unavailable for the next day...

Keeping j-7 could be a life saver in a long term campaign.
Click to expand...

Today, we see 100 of the retired J-6s were converted into unmanned drones for target practice and for SEAD over Taiwan. Note the J-6s don't have a useful weapons payload for ground attack.

But the J-7 has a payload of 2 tonnes on 4 underwing hardpoints, and could carry 4 low cost JDAMs ($26K each) or other bombs. That is a useful ground-attack payload.

And it looks like 150 J-7s were retired early in the past 3 years.

Plus if China continues to produce around 100 fighter aircraft per year, the remaining 250-odd J-7s will be retired within the next 3 years. Yet most of these airframes still have years of life left.

So if 100 J-7s were converted into a ground-attack role for Taiwan with 1 sortie per aircraft per day, you would be looking at 12000 JDAMs dropped on fixed targets over the course of a 30 day campaign.

In terms of cost, we see the US converts its surplus F-16s into unmanned drones for $1.3 million each. If the J-7 conversion cost is similar, it means you have an extremely low cost (and therefore completely expendable) drone with a significant 2tonne weapons payload. Note that a new J-16 would cost approx 61x more than a J-6 drone conversion. The latest JASSM cruise missiles are also about $1.3 million each.

Operating costs for a J-7 drone would also be minimal since they are kept in storage until needed.

Side question. Any ideas on the maintenance hours/costs for a J-7 or F-5?
 
A

Atomicfrog

Major
Registered Member
AndrewS said:
Today, we see 100 of the retired J-6s were converted into unmanned drones for target practice and for SEAD over Taiwan. Note the J-6s don't have a useful weapons payload for ground attack.

But the J-7 has a payload of 2 tonnes on 4 underwing hardpoints, and could carry 4 low cost JDAMs ($26K each) or other bombs. That is a useful ground-attack payload.

And it looks like 150 J-7s were retired early in the past 3 years.

Plus if China continues to produce around 100 fighter aircraft per year, the remaining 250-odd J-7s will be retired within the next 3 years. Yet most of these airframes still have years of life left.

So if 100 J-7s were converted into a ground-attack role for Taiwan with 1 sortie per aircraft per day, you would be looking at 12000 JDAMs dropped on fixed targets over the course of a 30 day campaign.

In terms of cost, we see the US converts its surplus F-16s into unmanned drones for $1.3 million each. If the J-7 conversion cost is similar, it means you have an extremely low cost (and therefore completely expendable) drone with a significant 2tonne weapons payload. Note that a new J-16 would cost approx 61x more than a J-6 drone conversion. The latest JASSM cruise missiles are also about $1.3 million each.

Operating costs for a J-7 drone would also be minimal since they are kept in storage until needed.

Side question. Any ideas on the maintenance hours/costs for a J-7 or F-5?
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For that type of drone, would see a one way ticket for AA defense saturation, turning in circle until shutdown and maybe crashing on something while running out of fuel.
 
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