Chengdu next gen combat aircraft (?J-36) thread

plawolf

plawolf

Lieutenant General
dingyibvs said:
I remember early on during 6th gen discussions there was a lot of talk about it being optionally manned. I think some specialized unmanned variants of the J-36 could fulfill some valuable support roles. It would probably be a waste to just make them into unmanned weapons platforms like what a CCA is typically imagined as, you can probably do that with cheaper, specially designed platforms. But as unmanned force multipliers I think its high cost can possibly be justified. For example, you can make the cockpit and the IWBs into swappable modules. Place fuel modules in them and you can enable very deep (e.g. 5000km+) or fast (e.g. supercruising the entire flight) missions. Place EW modules in them and mass a few of them per each manned J-36 and you can have a distributed EW spearhead ahead of a large strike package. They would have essentially identical flight profiles as the J-36, thus greatly simplifying operational planning and logistics while increasing flexibility. Of course, you can also just place weapons in the IWB.

Taking a more generalized view, it would essentially make it so that all J-36 missions are solo missions as whenever you need more than one you can just add more unmanned versions to the formation.
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‘Optionally manned’ design suggestions weren’t really about having hot swappable modules for pilots and other needs, it’s more like the equivalent of an F35U unmanned version built from the ground up as a CCA but sharing as much airframe and parts commonality as possible with the manned versions for lower R&D and maintenance costs while also enjoying greater economies of scale across the board.

The problem with that suggestion for the likes of the J36 and even J20 is that the cost-benefit balance tips massively against this suggestion the bigger the base platform, since the weight savings as a percentage of total aircraft weight saving/range extension drops the bigger the base aircraft weight, which in turn eats up the range increase.

Especially in the case of the J36, with it needing 2 pilots from the get-go, you will loose a massive amount of combat potential removing the pilots and just end up with a massively expensive CCA that doesn’t bring anything remotely justifying it’s cost to the table.

For China, there is also the added consideration of production bottleneck, as it will want next gen assets in frontline service ASAP, so having one factory building and common set of core components for both the manned and unmanned elements is going to slow both down in terms of peak production rates, so it’s far better to have different factories and component suppliers so production can run in parallel without as many common bottlenecks.
 
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dingyibvs

Senior Member
plawolf said:
‘Optionally manned’ design suggestions weren’t really about having hot swappable modules for pilots and other needs, it’s more like the equivalent of an F35U unmanned version built from the ground up as a CCA but sharing as much airframe and parts commonality as possible with the manned versions for lower R&D and maintenance costs while also enjoying greater economies of scale across the board.

The problem with that suggestion for the likes of the J36 and even J20 is that the cost-benefit balance tips massively against this suggestion the bigger the base platform, since the weight savings as a percentage of total aircraft weight saving/range extension drops the bigger the base aircraft weight, which in turn eats up the range increase.

Especially in the case of the J36, with it needing 2 pilots from the get-go, you will loose a massive amount of combat potential removing the pilots and just end up with a massively expensive CCA that doesn’t bring anything remotely justifying it’s cost to the table.

For China, there is also the added consideration of production bottleneck, as it will want next gen assets in frontline service ASAP, so having one factory building and common set of core components for both the manned and unmanned elements is going to slow both down in terms of peak production rates, so it’s far better to have different factories and component suppliers so production can run in parallel without as many common bottlenecks.
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I'm not suggesting that there may be swappable modules for pilots. I'm suggesting that the pilot space can be made into a space that can host swappable modules. The CCA version would not have the ability to be converted to a manned aircraft.

The sophistication of the J-36 likely means that training for pilots would be a very long and arduous process, far more so than aircrafts that come before it. If we are to think of it as an air cruiser, think about how many people are involved in making decisions on a naval cruiser, and now we're putting it all on two people. You're concerned about production bottleneck, but with the rapidity of industrial advances in China I'm not concerned about that very much. I'm more concerned about a pilot bottleneck. Just finding the talent to fly the J-36, ones with the brains, brawns, and the willingness to sign up for the military would be difficult, let alone the time it would require to train them.
 
lcloo

lcloo

Captain
dingyibvs said:
You're concerned about production bottleneck, but with the rapidity of industrial advances in China I'm not concerned about that very much. I'm more concerned about a pilot bottleneck. Just finding the talent to fly the J-36, ones with the brains, brawns, and the willingness to sign up for the military would be difficult, let alone the time it would require to train them.
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I don't think that you need to worry about the bold part. Joining PLA, especailly PLAAF fighter pilots position is a priviledge that many Chinese would die for.

Finding talents is not as hard as you think, China produced more than 70,000 Phd degree STEM graduates in one year. If 0.5% of them join PLAAF pilot training for 5th and 6th gen aircraft, they would have more than 350 brainy pilots every year.
 
T

tygyg1111

Captain
Registered Member
BoraTas said:
Americans are already working on 8th gen. The B-21 is 6th gen and they showed it. You know, if Americans have shown anything they already have the next gen in service and are working on the double next gen. The 8th gen has no engines, no fuselage, no tails, no weapons, no radar. It is thus 1000% stealthy.
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So they're neck to neck with the Indians then... Truly a race between supapowas
 
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