"Most Powerful Chinese Weapons of War in the Sky" Topic

"The People's Liberation Army Air Force is no longer a peasant air force of ancient fighters incapable of projecting power beyond its borders. During the Cold War, there was no need for such an expensive force—or to fight a major war outside of China's borders.

Now, as China's economy has expanded at a staggering rate, China's interests have grown beyond its borders, indeed even beyond its traditional area of interest in East Asia to a truly global scope. A Chinese air force is emerging that is capable of acting in support of those interests, capable of challenging longstanding powers such as the United States and Japan.

China's youthful aerospace industry is churning a dizzying array of weapons systems. From slow, low-flying cruise missiles to hypersonic vehicles that rip through the sky at Mach 5, from bombers based on sixty year old designs to advanced, fifth generation combat planes, China's air forces have made the great aeronautical leap forward…"
Full article here
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Amicalement
Armand

AWACS, a 1950s vintage bomber (hey, the B52 is still flying), aerial tankers, a hypersonic test program, and a still-in-prototype 4.5 or 5th generation fighter.

China is a big country, almost the size of the contiguous US (the "lower 48"). Parts of China are really inhospitable, so it's impractical to put ground-based radars there (or more to the point, impractical to put the people to operate and maintain those radars there). So AWACS makes sense anyway.

I'm kinda surprised that China isn't trying for a 'do-everything' AWACS+tanker bird.

Hypersonics are so far down the rabbit hole in terms of development that even the US seems to have a 1-in-3 success rate.

The J20 is also a long way down the rabbit hole.

And all of those programs mean NOTHING if China can't fix the QA problem. The engines used by the J20 only last 30 hours and don't spool up as fast as the Russian equivalents. Slow spooling is fatal for a fighter.

The Chinese air force can't even duplicate stolen Russian engine designs 20 years old due to their insufficient metallurgical abilities. Not too worried.

The Chinese air force can't even duplicate stolen Russian engine designs 20 years old due to their insufficient metallurgical abilities. Not too worried.

Like that matters when the Russian bear eagerly supplies them.

As for Russian engine designs being "20 years old", theyre actually far older dating back to the 1970s. But then so is your average engine used by the West.

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The article is garbage.

For example their Il-78 fleet is currently 3-4 airframes with a total of 8 on order. All that to refuel a tactical force of 1600 aircraft (excludes a couple of hundred in PLAN). Hardly decisive.

The article ignores the mainstay of the Chinese airforce – the Flanker in its Su-27/-30/J-11/J-16 variants. The Flanker is a large super maneouvrable, long range heavy multi-role fighter with advanced weapons and is roughly comparable to an F-15.

The Chinese operate both interceptor (equivalent to F-15C/D) and multirole (equivalent to F-15E) versions with a plethora of weapons.

The unknown birds are the J-10 and JH-7.

J-10 is basically equivalent to an F-16 and developed with Israeli help (basically an enlarged Lavi).

JH-7 is roughly equivalent to a Tornado IDS interdictor. Early versions were pretty limited (and probably deserved NATO reporting name Flounder). However the Chinese have persisted with the design and it has been heavily modernised over the years.

J-20 and smaller J-21/31 stealth fighters are prototypes only.

Whilst the Flanker/J-10/JH-7s are non-stealthy 4th generation types it should be remembered that even countries like Korea, Taiwan and Japan still field large numbers of older aircraft ala F-4 Phantom and F-5E/F Tiger.

The more modern types are all 4th generation ala F-16A/B/C/D/F-2, F-15C/D/K, F-CK-1 (equivalent to F-16), F/A-50 (equivalent to modern F-5) and Mirage 2000 (in Taiwanese service and possibly to be withdrawn by 2020 due to high utilisation with no replacement).

Philippines has no airforce whilst Vietnam operates largish numbers of MiG-21s and Su-22s to supplement some 50 Su-27/-30 Flankers.

Like that matters when the Russian bear eagerly supplies them.

Maybe back in the 1950s and 1960s.

I know the Russians are all sorts of ed off about the Su27/J11 piracy. Last I heard, the Russians had stopped all parts support for Su27s and their engines, so the Chinese are forced to use locally-made engines and/or parts. The WS10 engine lasts about 30 hours, the Russian-made equivalent lasts 400. The P&W F100s last 6000 cycles between inspections, which I think translates to about 1500-2000 hours between overhauls.

Maybe back in the 1950s and 1960s.

They've just sold the Su-35s which are the most advanced Russian jets currently in production. In fact the Russians wanted to sell them more!

The Chinese have also been buying/licence producing SU-27/30s, Il-76/78s, Mi-8/-17/-26 choppers, Ka-28/29 naval choppers, S300 SAMs, VA-111 Shkval torpedos, Kilo submarines and Sovremeny destroyers.

Russian firms have also assisted with designing Chinese military systems such as Z10 attack helicopter.

Indeed the Chinese basically kept the Russian arms industry alive in the 1990s and early 2000s and are still 3rd main export market for Russian defence exports.

The WS10 engine lasts about 30 hours, the Russian-made equivalent lasts 400. The P&W F100s last 6000 cycles between inspections, which I think translates to about 1500-2000 hours between overhauls.

Any modern sources on this? I've not seen much on newer WS10A variant since 2009!

Also bare in mind Russian engines were designed to operate at better performance than Western ones, hence their lifespans are cut short. Western engine design has been deliberately limited to ensure longer engine life and reduce costs.

The Russian model is based on 1950s paradigms when aircraft had short lifespans due to high attrition and quick replacement rates due to rapid obsolescence.

HOWEVER AL31s have been upgraded over last 20 years in terms of engine life to 900 hours TBO to 1500 hours TBO and recent claims are 2000 hours TB0.