"Chinese J-20 stealth fighter" Topic

An interesting article on Chinese J-20 stealth fighter.

aviationweek.com/defense/j-20-stealth-fighter-design-balances-speed-and-agility

Apparently 4 prototypes have been confirmed together with a number of external changes.

The bits that describe the aircraft best:

The J-20 design, therefore, is an air-to-air fighter with an emphasis on forward-aspect stealth, efficient high-speed aerodynamics and range, with a modest internal payload and more than adequate agility for self-defense

And from a tactics perspective:

The J-20's primary mission, therefore, may be to use stealth and speed to break through the CAP and threaten vital tankers and ISR platforms. Its range gives it a "long lance" advantage—if the tankers, ISR aircraft and escorts have to stay out of the J-20's range, the tactical aircraft that they support will not have the airborne radar cover or range needed to reach their targets.

It's an innovative tactical concept. In essence the Chinese avoid direct confrontation with enemy airpower and instead seeks to neutralise it through destruction of support assets.

It turns US advantage of force multipliers into a weakness.

And at least one major think tank in US is now promoting emphasising long range assets over short range tactical jets ala F-35:

aviationweek.com/defense/new-strategy-would-cut-f-35s-boost-bombers-and-uavs

It also shows China's main strategic stance is continuing to be defensive – protection of China and outlying islands. The J-20s weapons bay is too small to use it as a long range strike fighter and thus long range strike will continue to be handled by non-stealthy Su-30MKK/J-16 and JH-7 as well as cruise missile armed H-6(Tu-16) bombers.

Aviation Week is a tool of the aviation industry to justify spending more money on more projects no matter how unlikely the possibility under discussion, IMO.

"Defensive" means whatever I want it to mean…

Wait, Stealth and speed? Those usually don't go together all that well.

Aviation Week is a tool of the aviation industry to justify spending more money on more projects no matter how unlikely the possibility under discussion, IMO.

And what analyses of J-20 do you have to offer in return?

This is one of the first saner ones I've seen on this jet. Other articles are too baised either for or against it.

"Defensive" means whatever I want it to mean…

Defensive in this context means it's a defensive jet – air defence is mainly a defensive capability unlike ground attack and particularly long range ground attack.

There is no long range stealthy ground attack/multi role jet currently at any level of advanced design in China. The latest such platform in Chinese service is J-16 which is a knock off Su-30MKK Flanker. And that's not stealthy.

If they had a more offensive doctrine, the J-20 would be a multi-role aircraft with extensive ground attack capability.

Integration of anti-radar missiles would give it some enabler ability in offensive operations, but the proliferation of advanced interceptors, radars and SAMs in the north Asian region make this a rather limited capability.

Wait, Stealth and speed? Those usually don't go together all that well.

The US has been doing "stealth and speed" for a while now with F-22 (Max speed with AB Mach 2.25, max speed with "supercruise" Mach 1.82).

F-35 is designed up to Mach 1.6 but it's always been intended as bomb truck first.

I question the "…more than adequate agility claim…", especially if it has to dance in a dogfight, given its long length, and overall size.

Of course, I'm sure they hope it will never get to that, but it appears to be only a marginal design to me, with presumably long range, but little ability to fulfill anything than the long-range, fire and forget, interceptor role.

Su27 can dance pretty well in a dogfight, so just being a big lug of a plane does not automatically mean an unmaneuverable lug of a plane.

Lion In The Stars hits the nail on the head.

It's all about thrust to weight ratio, software and having the appropriate aerodynamic components and shape.

Here's footage of the latest Flanker variant, , the Su-35, doing some crazy stuff as well as photos to demonstrate how massive this aircraft is (look at the biplane behind it or the F-16 in the second photo next to the Su-37 Flanker).

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UsyMUAfh6fgg[/youtube]

(TMP doesn't do Youtube apparently)

The F-15 and F-22 are also great at maneouvring despite being large.

Here's an F-15 next to an F-16 – the F-15 is a monster but can tangle with the super maneouvrable F-16.

Or supermaneovurable F-22 with some old girls of the sky. The F-22 can eat F-15 and F-16s in 1v1 and the smaller Eurofighter has to be stripped to bare bones to be able to get an edge over it in dog fighting.

Quite true about the Sukhois, but the Chinese bird seems overly long to me, which will hinder some maneuvers a bit.

The Russian birds are quite large, but proportionately shaped, instead of being as elongated as the Chinese stealth jet.

I suspect pushing the nose up, or down will be a bit more challenging for it, unless they decide to equip it with moveable engine nozzles.

Re: Sukhoi series: How do you say "pretty airplane" in Russian?

And it's apparently really easy to retrofit 3d thrust vectoring onto older engines, you just need to change the "turkey feathers" actuator mounting point from a fixed ring to a floating ring and attach 3-4 actuators to the floating ring like on the Su37. Though this apparently takes up a bit too much space to install on the F35B's twistable exhaust duct, it could be retrofitted to every single F15, F16 and F18 if the US wanted to.

So just because the J20 has conventional turkey feathers instead of the US-style 2d thrust vectoring nozzles doesn't mean that the J20 doesn't have thrust vectoring at all.

Original Su-27s and MiG-29s were capable of crazy maneouvres without thrust vectoring. Russian aeronautical science at its best.

The Chinese are looking at or have ordered Su-35s with thrust vectoring so I suspect they'll get a look in at the

I'm not an expert on aerodynamics so have no idea. It was easier in the old days when you could say "that F-4E is more maneouvrable than an F-4C/D cause it's got leading edge slats."

Today you get a whole heap of small components contributing to aerodynamic performance.