Chengdu next gen combat aircraft (?J-36)
- Thread starter Blitzo
- Start date
There are the earlycomer's advantages, and there are also the latecomer's advantages. So this is an expected development.
All-in-all, to ensure that China's lead over the US in this domain is generally maintained (or any lagging behind can be minimized/remidied with immediate effect) for the foreseeable future, it would be absolutely crucial for the AVIC and their subsidiaries at Chengdu and Shenyang to continue developing their current 6th-gen platforms, in order to come up with further iterations that are even more advanced and capable than what they have currently with their current "vanilla" Gen-6 platforms (i.e., Gen-6.5/Gen-6+ platforms).
This would be similar to the likes of the J-20A and J-20S (where both stemmed from the vanilla J-20 platform), to put it simply.
(Or, maybe, those peeps at Chengdu and Shenyang can come up with changes and upgrades for their Gen-6.5/Gen-6+ platforms that are even more drastic than what we've seen with the J-20A/S compared to the vanilla J-20s, though that's too early to tell for now.)
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At this stage I think the overriding principle for engines still applies -- if there is no overwhelming clear evidence to the contrary, then the consensus should be the "less advanced/interesting option".
I.e.: if it does manage to somehow enter PLA hands in 2028 (likely IOT&E equivalent), the consensus expectation should be with interim engines unless there are strong indications to the contrary.
My overall point is that the F-47 itself might still surprise us, and that people should probably view things in a "the game is afoot" rather than trying to declare a definitive cutoff point for "who is ahead" to call the game, so to speak.
This is probably going to be a fairly long duration competition for both sides, and each will have one set of cards to play that can close the gap of the other or get a bit ahead, before the other side then responds. Long term enduring or baked in "advantages" probably shouldn't be expected.
I feel like this is a given, given how Chinese military does things. So im guessing first blocks of the F-47 would definitely be better than the first blocks of J-36, but later blocks J-36 would be better.
I also wouldn't go that far.
Words like "definitely" shouldn't be thrown around too casually.
I think just asking everyone to keep an open mind is enough
The U.S. only signed the development contract for the F-47 with Boeing only under pressure after China’s sixth-generation fighter jet completed its maiden flight. Prior to that, the NGAD program had been put on hold, as the U.S. military was dissatisfied with several proposed design options. Furthermore, the U.S. intends to conduct the F-47’s first flight within President Trump’s term. I doubt whether the rushed development schedule of the F-47 will enable it to outperform the J-36. What’s more, China also has the J-50.
Basically all the convos/photos about new J-36 prototype have been deleted. Make of that what you will.
i hope this new pictures are real. DSI plus old nozzles are just 
I don't think VCE will be that fast; I think it's a bit too radical. The first batch equipped with WS-15 and its improved versions will already have considerable combat capability.