00X/004 future nuclear CATOBAR carrier thread
- Thread starter AETHER
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A comparison:
I have a question about the two nuclear reactors for the Type 004, are they HEU (high enriched uranium) or LEU (low enriched uranium)?
I know the US navy uses HEU.
China traditionally has used LEU for its nuclear submarines. However this was a decision made back in the days when economic resources was scarce and access to enriched uranium was limited. Today China has the engineering and economic capacity to do anything the USA can do.
I can't find any "news" about the enrichment rate of the nuclear reactors.
I know the US navy uses HEU.
China traditionally has used LEU for its nuclear submarines. However this was a decision made back in the days when economic resources was scarce and access to enriched uranium was limited. Today China has the engineering and economic capacity to do anything the USA can do.
I can't find any "news" about the enrichment rate of the nuclear reactors.
Chinese SSNs and boomers likely still use LEU fuel. And it is highly probably that 095 also uses LEU similar to French subs. For supply chain reasons, maybe 004 could also use LEU. But doing so would require the 004 to be refueled roughly every 10 years, which would mean cutting open the deck to replace the fuel rods every 10 years or so. Thus, an indicator whether 004 uses LEU or HEU fuel would be if there appear to be large prices of removable deck pieces directly above the reactors.
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a new reactor has designed for 09V SSN specifically. and nobody knows whether it is LEU or HEU.
Given that USN is going for only 1 single refueling for Ford class CVNs and none for Virginia and subsequent SSN(X), it seems counter productive for PLAN to go instead for LEU reactors which require much more frequent refueling cycles which basically ruin combat readiness. LEU was only used before to my knowledge due to PLAN and in general China at the time not being able to afford HEU for anything other than nukes and even then, it was pretty strained.
But given expansions in refining facilities and the current budget, affording HEU in reactors should be of little issue
I think there are more aspects than just the availability of HEU. China is experienced with LEU naval reactors. A clean sheet nuclear powered carrier and now the new generation submarines already carry significant developmental risk all by themselves. Putting an unproven HEU reactor into such designs adds to risk, and PLAN tends to be very risk-averse in developmental efforts.
Maybe a decade or two down the road this is going to be a different story. Just my two cents.
Maybe a decade or two down the road this is going to be a different story. Just my two cents.
From the latest Yankeesama podcast, he said this.
Again, a question of interpretation, should it be understood that the JN workers are sent to DL so that they can get hands on experience in building a CVN, so that in the future JN will be building a CVN as well, instead of the long rumoured conventional CV?
To be fair, before the 004 CVN, Dalian has never constructed a CATOBAR supercarrier, whereas Jiangnan does.
So I suppose it could work both ways.
I agree, come to think of it JN built the most advanced chinese carrier to date (Fujian) without any prior carrier building experience at all, while DL converted Liaoning and built the fairly similar Shandong, when logically one would have expected to be the other way around, but that's history now.