China's transport, tanker & heavy lift aircraft

Because in 2005 PLAAF believed they can actually get the 38 IL76/78 as a stop gap measure so they can afford to wait for Y20 to be ready, well that didn't go as planned.

Nobody in his right mind would put money into the AN-70 project, which Russia basically does not really want.

My impression was that the reason the deal for 38 IL-76/78 fell through was that the Russians wanted to move production from Tashkent (that is in Uzbekistan) to Ulyanovsk, and the Chinese neither wanted to wait for this or to co-finance it.

Yeppp ... I think a better explanation can not be given.

Deino said:

Yeppp ... I think a better explanation can not be given.

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therewere alot of technical risks that A-70s did not answer.

first and foremost engine out ops at lowspeed.

franco-russe said:

Nobody in his right mind would put money into the AN-70 project, which Russia basically does not really want.

My impression was that the reason the deal for 38 IL-76/78 fell through was that the Russians wanted to move production from Tashkent (that is in Uzbekistan) to Ulyanovsk, and the Chinese neither wanted to wait for this or to co-finance it.

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if the order had gone through who would get the $$$ for them? Uzbekistan or Russia? how and why did Russia want to shift the production, for 38 aircraft I would have thought they would bend over backwards to get such a large order from China?

asif iqbal said:

if the order had gone through who would get the $$$ for them? Uzbekistan or Russia? how and why did Russia want to shift the production, for 38 aircraft I would have thought they would bend over backwards to get such a large order from China?

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The original deal was that China would get transport at decent price. Russia got greedy and essentially tried to blackmail China into paying for a new factory. China would rather build a new factory for itself.

cn_habs said:

20+ years? That's absolutely brutal. Can PLAAF have those planes repaired locally? Russian customer service is known to be the worst in the industry.

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I think it's not the age but the airframe hours that matter. If those IL-76 aren't used often, then they are practically new.

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asif iqbal said:

currently they have to use IL76 converts for AWACS, with Y-20 they can make as many AWACS as they need

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I foresee that when Y-20 is available, they would still use IL-76 as platform for AWACS. Using IL-76 as AWACS is already a proven concept and well tested, whereas Y-20 AWACS would require redesign and years of additional test flights (on top of Y-20 test flights).

Engineer said:

I foresee that when Y-20 is available, they would still use IL-76 as platform for AWACS. Using IL-76 as AWACS is already a proven concept and well tested, whereas Y-20 AWACS would require redesign and years of additional test flights (on top of Y-20 test flights).

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I doubt it. If you convert the existing airframes, you will be using OLD airframes that has less service life. Contrast that with new Y-20. Yes, you will have to do test flight, but you only has to do it once and you get to build as many as you want to, and they will have full service life and no spare parts issues.

I think Y-8 AWACS (KJ-200)reduced the urgent need if KJ-2000. PLAAF probably can afford to wait for Y-20 that long.

That's really strange ! We know photos of nearly ever detail of the J-20 (o.k. not very but at least a few ) but we actually don't have a decent photo of the Y-9.

Deino