All About the Chinese Su-33

Shenyang and its boys are too slooowwwwww in the R&D research. It took almost 10 yrs to clone the SU-27. When will they display its first SU-33 equivalent plane, I mean just folding wing and landing gear, nothing revolutionary about it. Those guys need to speed up. I still seeing pics of them monkeying around the old J-8II in their production line.

Chengdu I think is way more efficient. J-10 and FC-1 two new planes already out. I bet they will be the first one to come out the J-xx plane.

I really disappointed at Shenyang aircraft division, moving like snails.

Scratch said:

SteelBird:

Back in Nov. 06 there were some reports on chinese plans to buy close to 50 Su-22 worth $2,5B and would probably buy 2 test aircraft for $100M.
That's were the $50M / aircraft come from, I think.

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You are talking about Tupolev Tu-22M...

Cheers

Pepe

lilzz said:

Shenyang and its boys are too slooowwwwww in the R&D research. It took almost 10 yrs to clone the SU-27. When will they display its first SU-33 equivalent plane, I mean just folding wing and landing gear, nothing revolutionary about it. Those guys need to speed up. I still seeing pics of them monkeying around the old J-8II in their production line.

Chengdu I think is way more efficient. J-10 and FC-1 two new planes already out. I bet they will be the first one to come out the J-xx plane.

I really disappointed at Shenyang aircraft division, moving like snails.

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1. Reverse engineering might actually end up being slower than working on a brand new piece of paper.

2. I think the delays on the J-11B does not seem to be with the plane but rather on the engine. They were already flight testing the plane since December of 2003.

3. Once the J-11 is "cloned" with the engine issues put aside, the major hurdle in the work has passed, and doing a carrier variant would not be as hard.

4. Older J-8IIs are getting modern radar upgrade to use the PL-12 missiles. Don't you want that?

5. I think delays on the carrier project means delays on a carrier plane. I think those delays are more political than budget or technical wise.

lilzz said:

Shenyang and its boys are too slooowwwwww in the R&D research. It took almost 10 yrs to clone the SU-27. When will they display its first SU-33 equivalent plane, I mean just folding wing and landing gear, nothing revolutionary about it. Those guys need to speed up. I still seeing pics of them monkeying around the old J-8II in their production line.

Chengdu I think is way more efficient. J-10 and FC-1 two new planes already out. I bet they will be the first one to come out the J-xx plane.

I really disappointed at Shenyang aircraft division, moving like snails.

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"JUST" folding wings and landing gear!? Where do you get the idea that it's easy, especially for plane like Su-27!? Get this, people, structural engineering is hard. Material science is hard. System integration is HARD. It isn't SIMPLE because it looks like you just fold it on your paper-plane model! Sheesh.

That's why there comes a point when it's easier to design something from scratch.

Troika said:

"JUST" folding wings and landing gear!? Where do you get the idea that it's easy, especially for plane like Su-27!? Get this, people, structural engineering is hard. Material science is hard. System integration is HARD.

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It can't be that hard after all they already had the blueprint and the actual 2 orginal SU-33 they got from Ukraine. WIth all that and just hire some consultants from SUKHOI, that portion can be realized in no time.

lilzz said:

It can't be that hard after all they already had the blueprint and the actual 2 orginal SU-33 they got from Ukraine. WIth all that and just hire some consultants from SUKHOI, that portion can be realized in no time.

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That's just wishful thinking...

Not only do you have to modify the wings and strength the landing gear, there is also a need to reinforce the airframe to take the rigors of carrier landings, install a naval arresting gear, improve low speed capabilities, install high lift flaps, reduce the size of the rear tail cone, move internal wing fuel tanks to a new position, install more durable avionics and naval landing avionics. It is not a simple upgrade.

For example, a simple upgrade of the avionics can be a very tricky task. There are thousands of connections that have to be made, and when you are debugging during tests, it can be a very difficult task to figure out which connection is the problem. To give an idea of how big a task this could be, read these backgrounders on the Canadian Forces C-130E/H avionics upgrade program:

Roger604 said:

China can get oil from Russian and Central Asian pipelines in any event. And in 2005, China started stockpiling 3 months of oil imports as a strategic reserve.
...

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Usually military forces have their own oil reserve. During WW II, Japan has a 1 year worth of oil reserve to fuel its military forces only. I assume China probably has 1 year oil reserve only for its military forces.

lilzz said:

It can't be that hard after all they already had the blueprint and the actual 2 orginal SU-33 they got from Ukraine. WIth all that and just hire some consultants from SUKHOI, that portion can be realized in no time.

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True they might of got the blueprints but they were for landbased version, not carrier-sea versions. Fighters that are constantly exposed to sea air such as carrier fighters have higher risk and of corrosion and other problems that decrease the operational life of the carrier. China hasn't in history had to deal with this kind of situation. They've only operated land based fighters. Material protection, structural altering and reinforcment, re-wiring, re-program, landing gear, mechanism for the fold wings are all very very complex. Its not a wave the wand problem.

SAC also has other projects to work on, so they can't devote all their energy to the Su-33.

Skywatcher said:

SAC also has other projects to work on, so they can't devote all their energy to the Su-33.

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Hmm ... but what projects !!!???

If You lokk at its competitor Chemgdu they are working on the J-10-production, updating + testing improved versions of the J-10, manufacturing (LRIP) of the PAF FC-1 fighter, development work on the XXJ and the UAV not to forget !

What's Shenyang doing all the time ??? ... they've lost out the XXJ contest, the J-8II is nearing its production end ... all what's left is the modernisation of in-service J-8II's to the latest standard.

Besides that: Are there any news reagrding the Su-33 in China esp. after pilot training has started ?

Deino