Shenyang J-21/31/F-60/AMF thread part 1

[EELightning]

I must say, weldone to China for their achievements in what seems like such a short amount of time.

But I'm rather fed up of so many people stating that they're just a copy of the likes of the F-35 and F-22 etc. It becomes somewhat, tiresome. If one follows this logic then one can claim the F-35 is a copy of the YAK-141, the F-22 is a copy of the F-15, the Gripen is a copy of the Rafale etc. Get over it or hop over to f-16.net where they claim this silly nonesense on a regular basis.

[Inst]

Do you think it's possible we'll see the J-31 in service before the J-20? Since the J-31 is intended for export and has much lower standards than the J-20; that's to say, it's a bomb truck, it should be relatively easy to make sure the aircraft works with existing engines, has basic stealth capability, has a PESA, not even an AESA radar, it could be possible they could have the plane out in service in only a few years, using the price point to push exports with the potential for future upgradability (TVC, AESA).

Compared to the F-35, this is a lot less ambitious with a lot less gold-plated experimental systems so it will really be embarrassing for SAC if they can't push the aircraft out quickly.

[franc]

From the PLAAF thread:
The "bump" under the fuselage , that is indeed only the bay doors being half open , the undersurface being smooth when they are closed, right?
Thank you.

I am so impatient of the "BMUP", BUMP is a word mostly not be used to describle something DSI alike.

gives USAF something to laugh about. Chinese designers must be their biggest fans looking at this prototype.

China will never be mighty power untill they have own progressive feature.

China makes everything by itself.. How dare you challenge the intellectual might of the Middle Kingdom?

What a sarcasm!
How dare you! The one always made cynical post would make out your rhetoric very deeply.

The Chinese have very poor engine technology; the first few instances will likely fly with Russian or outdated engines, and by having oversized engine compartments, they will be able to provide latitude if their final engine is oversize / overweight.

No worries, they have uncountable FER in troublesome, and money makes mill go in thier belief.

[latenlazy]

Latenlazy: Your first two pictures have canards and the third has a Mig-29-style LERX. There's no ascertaining whether it was CAC or SAC involved in it, although with the first two, they clearly look like SAC's triplane canard-wing-tail configuration.

Delete the canards, and you have the basic configuration of the J-31/F-22/F-35 w/e.

The point is they're not as foreign to certain design concepts as you might suggest. Using your logic of "lineage" if McDonnell Douglas can evolve the F-20 to the YF-23, I see no reason why SAC couldn't do something as simple as delete the canards (Sukhoi certainly waffled on canards for the Flanker several times)

[bandua]

navy mig29 has no chance against j31 now that we confirm it is a navy aircraft

kill and land! lol. is so stealth that they don´t need to to retray the landing gear for killing mig29s!

[FalconDude]

.........

These photos could mean anything. They could be student projects for all we know. Nothing to do with anything really.

my 2c.

"Kelly" Johnson once said, if it looks good, it flies good. The newest plane out of China looks good.

By Johnson's rule, it should fly good. But that is not the point these days anymore, is it ?

[latenlazy]

These photos could mean anything. They could be student projects for all we know. Nothing to do with anything really.

my 2c.

"Kelly" Johnson once said, if it looks good, it flies good. The newest plane out of China looks good.

By Johnson's rule, it should fly good. But that is not the point these days anymore, is it ?

Except if you followed the development of the J-XX those pictures are going to be very familiar. They were part of a series of very slow leaks on the plane's development in the last half decade (speaking of which, holy crap I've been following the J-XX/J-20 for the a half decade now).

[Amiga500]

The newest plane out of China looks good.

D'you think so? It certainly doesn't look bad from the runway shots, but personally, I'd not stick it into the good category just yet.


Are there any photos around showing the planform a bit more? (or are they all just cgi?)

[MSphere]

D'you think so? It certainly doesn't look bad from the runway shots, but personally, I'd not stick it into the good category just yet.

Are there any photos around showing the planform a bit more? (or are they all just cgi?)

Nobody knows. To tell you the truth, I am not fully convinced that it is a real deal.. to me it looks more like a 1:1 static test model. Something just don't seem right. Lack of flap actuators, those strange hinges on main landing gear doors....

[MadRat]

There are at least two nozzle variations of the WS-10, one of which is similar to the nozzles on this prototype. I have a feeling this airframe is sixty feet long and bigger than people think. What track record does this company have with RD33/RD93?

[Italy]

I suppose we can immediately write off AMCA, ATD-X and KFX as copies as well...

lol nice try. AMCA and KFX are paper planes.. the Indians and Koreans can't even decide what design to use

J-31 is real and built and ATD-X is being built.. one looks way more like the F-35 than the other..

hmm

[Italy]

Urgh.

The clowns that scream "COPY" are best ignored. They've obviously no f**king idea just how complex one of these machines is and how challenging they are to design.

you obviously have no idea just how complex copying is.

[Amiga500]

you obviously have no idea just how complex copying is.

Its something that you'll never see in a photograph.

[SpudmanWP]

It's one thing to "copy" some aspects related to shape which can be dirived from the photos available on the net... It's an entirely different matter to copy the avionics, software, etc which would require deep penetration cyber attacks (or a good spy) and industrial capability to accomplish.

[mack8]

It's one thing to "copy" some aspects related to shape which can be dirived from the photos available on the net... It's an entirely different matter to copy the avionics, software, etc which would require deep penetration cyber attacks (or a good spy) and industrial capability to accomplish.

Well given the hype around the alleged chinese cyber attacks against LM and their subcontractors a few years back and how some are lameting at the evil chinese who copied (badly, of course) the honest and decent american superior tech lol, what makes you think they haven't got all the info they want on radars, software, RAM , you name it. Perhaps they have it all at their finger tips.:diablo:

PS : Completely unrelated. I get a virus warning each time i navigate on this forum . It has to do with a jpg file on Mitsubishi ATD-X. Is there a hotlinked or hosted image of it ?!

[Jō Asakura]

They haven't copied. They've adopted established design solutions from 2 different aircraft in order to avoid the time, effort & expense of a 'clean sheet' design (such as the AMCA, KF-X or ATD-X). If they'd gone down that route they'd have a technical-engineering knowledge base of how and why the end product was reached. They have this for the J-20 because much of the ground work may have already been done elsewhere and they are in possession of all the data, which has facilitated their modifications to suite their needs.

In the J-31's case, I'm not so sure of how this 'mating' of 2 designs can deliver an aerodynamically efficient and structurally sound fighter by mere tinkering- such as enlarging an F-35 type intake, huge F-22 style fins etc. Besides, it would be difficult to put down certain features such as the contour and integration of the upper chine, radome shape & segment (in fact much of the fore cockpit bulkhead) as a coincidence, if this was a 'clean sheet' design, especially if it transpires that the dimensions of such features are near-identical to the F-35. Certainly if BAE Systems' was hacked as far back as 2008 (as reported), then that data would have easily been in time to be incorporated.

It looks like they have great faith in their CAD packages to iron out any scalability & dynamic issues of this hybrid design. CFD can only go so far to predict real world characteristics so the flight test programme will be interesting.

Kudos and good luck to them.

[Amiga500]

They've adopted established design solutions from 2 different aircraft in order to avoid the time, effort & expense of a 'clean sheet' design (such as the AMCA, KF-X or ATD-X).

They probably haven't even.


There was probably a full range of options considered and evaluated on model scales in wind tunnels and anechoic chambers. But, they no doubt found out that:
(1) The laws of physics in China happened to be identical to those in the USA.
(2) The American engineers are pretty good because they also found the best solution to the problem within those pesky laws of physics.

[EELightning]

It's one thing to "copy" some aspects related to shape which can be dirived from the photos available on the net... It's an entirely different matter to copy the avionics, software, etc which would require deep penetration cyber attacks (or a good spy) and industrial capability to accomplish.

Hmmm? A script for Bond 24 maybe?

[latenlazy]

They haven't copied. They've adopted established design solutions from 2 different aircraft in order to avoid the time, effort & expense of a 'clean sheet' design (such as the AMCA, KF-X or ATD-X). If they'd gone down that route they'd have a technical-engineering knowledge base of how and why the end product was reached. They have this for the J-20 because much of the ground work may have already been done elsewhere and they are in possession of all the data, which has facilitated their modifications to suite their needs.

Except we also know that both SAC and CAC probably have a portfolio of data from the J-XX competition. We've been hearing about how SAC was working on a stealth design since the late 90s.

[Goldust]

Looks like a twin-engined F-35 to me, with a much wider wingspan. Could be a J-10 replacement.

[Sign]

you obviously have no idea just how complex copying is.

China have always been the best copiers in the world! so this is obvius!
do you remember:

http://defensetech.org/2012/02/06/di...o-f-35-delays/

[Italy]

Looks like a twin-engined F-35 to me, with a much wider wingspan. Could be a J-10 replacement.

this probably means J-10s will be up for sale soon for exports!

[Goldust]

this probably means J-10s will be up for sale soon for exports!

It is likely J-10As would be exported. J-10Bs are too advanced to be replaced anytime soon.

[Goldust]

Comparing the J-31 to the J-20 from the front, it appears J-31's wingspan is quite a bit longer than J-20's 12.88 meters, and therefore would be used primarily in the air to air role whereas J-20 would primarily be used in the strike role.

[Sundog]

It's one thing to "copy" some aspects related to shape which can be dirived from the photos available on the net... It's an entirely different matter to copy the avionics, software, etc which would require deep penetration cyber attacks (or a good spy) and industrial capability to accomplish.

Considering China hacked Lockheed-Martins servers, looking for information on a still classified program, and downloaded everything on the F-22 and F-35 while they were at it, you're not far off. Of course, we (The public) never found out if they got the information on the classified program they were trying to get the tech on.

[Rasputin814]

Considering China hacked Lockheed-Martins servers, looking for information on a still classified program, and downloaded everything on the F-22 and F-35 while they were at it, you're not far off. Of course, we (The public) never found out if they got the information on the classified program they were trying to get the tech on.

This is pretty laughable. You simply don't just "download" the blueprints of a modern 5th generation fighter off a server. At best they had access to some design discussion memo's or emails. I doubt lockheed-martin would network anything sensitive in a position where it can be "hacked" through the internet.

[Inst]

"I doubt lockheed-martin would network anything sensitive in a position where it can be "hacked" through the internet."

This is why the Lockmart hacking incident is so embarrassing.

Off on other forums, we already have the J-31's specifications; it's about 11.5 meters in wingspan; announced by the ******* trucking company!

Wing loading on the J-31 is likely going to be less than on the F-22 and more than the F-35; it's the low-end aspect of the J-20/J-31 mix.

[ActionJackson]

Comparing the J-31 to the J-20 from the front, it appears J-31's wingspan is quite a bit longer than J-20's 12.88 meters, and therefore would be used primarily in the air to air role whereas J-20 would primarily be used in the strike role.

I'm gonna go out there and say that neither is a pure air superiority fighter, well not unless China didn't "get" why the angled surfaces on the F-22 and F-35 are different. I give them more credit than that though.

65 degree cant angle (same as the F-35) of the side surfaces of both of these aircraft implies that they should fly at medium altitudes.

At high altitude with a high side aspect RCS starting at 20 degrees depression angle, it would be detected much sooner by a networked enemy than if it flew at lower alt.

At 55k ft, it would be exposing its highest RCS side aspect to radars within about 22miles as opposed to 14miles flying at 36k ft.

[gentle breeze]

[mack8]

Thanks for the CGI Gentle breeze.