China's transport, tanker & heavy lift aircraft

Re: China's Transport Aircraft

Russia wanted to move the factory back to Russia to make those 38 planes and increased price, China didn't budge and the deal felt through. I think that when China finally made the decision to heavily invest in Y20 to get it going. PLAAF has now started to equip over a dozen second hand IL76MD/TDs from Belarus and Russia, considering the limited life of those airframes they are just a stop gap measure before Y20 can enter serial production, hopefully around 2015.

Re: China's Transport Aircraft

With this very nice image I would like to say good bye for the next weeke to take a long deserved break with my famliy.

Surely within the next 7 days the J-31 will fly, J-20 '2003' will appear, the Y-20 will have it's roll-out and maybe even the first image of the JH-7B/JH-XX will emerge .... so stay tuned and take care.

Deino

Re: China's Transport Aircraft

I think Y-9 payload shall be more than 30 tons and comparable to France A400. Given the new six blade composite turboprop engine. I can't believe if it still have a payload of only 20tons.

Re: China's Transport Aircraft

I am more worried about cargo area than payload weight. width was unchanged from y8? if so, It's little under 3 meters wide at floor level for most of its cargo area, then widening out in front of wingbox, which is sort of pointless. I hope for y9 at least the rear lead-to-ramp area was improved, giving a wide deck all the way instead of a shallow trench leading to the ramp. For me, whole y9 idea seems like a stopgap measure, design wise. But money wise i don't know if we'll see a proper replacement in the next 20 years.

As for second hand il76 what contracts are out there? I know of 5 ex russian ones and 3 ex belarussian ones. Are there more?

Re: China's Transport Aircraft

Lion, the A400M is a much larger aircraft so they can't really be compared.

The Y-9 specs at Wiki has 5700km as the range, probably for the payload of 25 ton. Ferry range was 7800 km. Unfortunately no reference was provided for this figures.

Re: China's Transport Aircraft

A-400 is a pretty good air lifter

United States Air Force Air Mobility Command has shown interest for 118 of them and total orders as of now are 174

theres a big article on A-400 in this months Air Force Monthly Magazine will scan it in when i get time

by the time A-400 is being delivered Y-20 will have made its first flight, i think Y-20 will only be few years behind A-400, if not they might even be side by side because A-400 is facing rising costs and delays

i bet China has order books full for Y-20! Once China has it they can form a proper airborne divsions which can be air lifted far away at short notice, like in North Western region and other countrys, it will give China rapid response capability

I bet Y-20 has been designed to that it can lift Chinas heaviest main battle tank, i cant see China not taking into account this design/lift requirment, so whatever Chinas MBT weight is Y-20 will be able to lift one tank so that gives us a idea of Y-20 lift capability

Re: China's Transport Aircraft

Totoro said:

I am more worried about cargo area than payload weight. width was unchanged from y8? if so, It's little under 3 meters wide at floor level for most of its cargo area, then widening out in front of wingbox, which is sort of pointless. I hope for y9 at least the rear lead-to-ramp area was improved, giving a wide deck all the way instead of a shallow trench leading to the ramp. For me, whole y9 idea seems like a stopgap measure, design wise. But money wise i don't know if we'll see a proper replacement in the next 20 years.

As for second hand il76 what contracts are out there? I know of 5 ex russian ones and 3 ex belarussian ones. Are there more?

Click to expand...

PLAAF can order many Y-9 and when Y-20 is finally enter service and in significant numbers. PLAAF can sold this second hand Y-9 with decent airframe to other countries. They offer an attractive alternative compare to C-130J.

Re: China's Transport Aircraft

tphuang said:

there is an entry on my blog comparing Y-9 to C-130. You can take a look at it.

Click to expand...

Cant find it. Besides, how do you know y-9 performance? the plane has barely started flying.


Anyway, besides the new engine, what are the diferences betwen y-8 and y-9?

Re: China's Transport Aircraft

Another nice photo of Y-9

Re: China's Transport Aircraft

Lion said:

Another nice photo of Y-9

Click to expand...

Beautiful plane Now if they have the money to build 40 of them
Nobody know for sure the J-9 spec but various sources guess seem to have longer length than C130J but a tad of lower load capacity.. Good to know that Y-9 enter service with PLAAF after long delay due to urgent requirement of Y-8 High and low platform Anybody know what is the status of Y-8C transport? 23 were ordered back in 2010 . they definitely need a lof to transport plane. This Y-9 is big improvement over Y-8 larger pay load, more volume, longer range more efficient engine High altitude capability

Y-9 Huitong guess
A brand-new PLAAF Y-9 was taking off. This design was first unveiled at the 11th Beijing Airshow in September 2005 as the next generation medium transport aircraft to replace the obsolete Y-8/An-12. It appears to have superseded the earlier Y-8-X project. The aircraft features a stretched cargo cabin which can quickly load/unload a maximum of 20t containerized cargo, or airdrop 13.2t equipment or 98 paratroopers. It has a 4-crew cockpit featuring 6 color MFDs and EFIS. The aircraft is equipped with advanced communication, navigation, radar, EGWPS, collision avoidance systems to ensure safe flight under all weather conditions. Based on Y-8 "Category III Platform", Y-9 is powered by 4 WJ-6C turboprops (rated @ 5,100ehp each) with JL-4 6-blade high efficiency propellers made of composite materials, which improve its high temperature and high altitude performance. It also has solid nose and tail cone housing a weather radar and additional electronic equipment. An EO turret (containing FLIR/TV) is mounted underneath the nose for all weather/low altitude operation. Its horizontal tailplanes have additional samll vertial stabilizers intalled as well to improved its stability at low speed. Some specifications: max TO weight 65t, max payload 20t or 106 paratroopers, 15t payload range 2,200km, max range 5,000km, max level speed 650km/h, cruise speed 550km/h, service ceiling 10,100m, cruise altitude 8,000m. The development of Y-9 started officially in October 2005 and the construction of the first prototype (tail and head sections) started in 2006. However the project appeared to have been halted in 2007 due to shifting the production to the high priority High New series as well as Y-8C transport aircraft. The development resumed in late 2008 after the two year delay and the first prototype was believed to have made its maiden flight on November 5, 2010. At least one Y-9 prototype (#741) has been undergoing tests at CFTE. The transport started to enter the service with PLAAF in 2012 (S/N 10x5x).


C130-J

General characteristics

Crew: 3 (two pilots, and one loadmaster are minimum crew)
Capacity: :* 92 passengers (128 for C-130J-30) or

64 airborne troops (92 for C-130J-30) or
6 pallets (8 pallets for C-130J-30) or
74 litter patients with 2 medical personnel (97 litters for C-130J-30)
2–3 Humvees, or 1 LAV III(with turret removed) or an M113 armored personnel carrier

Payload: 42,000 lb (19,050 kg) ; for C-130J-30: 44,000 lb/ 19,958 kg
Length: 97 ft 9 in, 29.79 m (for C-130J-30: 112 ft, 9 in, 34.36 m)
Wingspan: 132 ft 7 in (40.41 m)
Height: 38 ft 10 in (11.84 m)
Wing area: 1,745 ft² (162.1 m²)
Empty weight: 75,562 lb (34,274 kg)
Useful load: 72,000 lb (33,000 kg)
Max. takeoff weight: up to 175,000 lb (79,378 kg); normal 155,000 lb (70,305 kg)
Powerplant: 4 × Rolls-Royce AE 2100D3 turboprop, 4,637 shp (3,458 kW) each
Propellers: Dowty R391 6-blade composite propeller, 1 per engine

Performance

Maximum speed: 362 knots (417 mph, 671 km/h)
Cruise speed: 348 knots (400 mph, 643 km/h)
Range: 2,835 nmi (3,262 mi, 5,250 km)
Service ceiling: 28,000 ft (8,615 m) with 42,000 pounds (19,090 kilograms) payload



Specifications (Y-9 Transport)
Wiki Guess
General characteristics

Crew: 3-4
Capacity: 25,000 kg cargo
Length: 36 m ()
Wingspan: 40 m ()
Height: 11.6m ()
Empty weight: 39,000kg ()
Useful load: 25,000kg (55,090lb)
Max. takeoff weight: 77,000kg ()
Powerplant: 4 × Zhuzhou WoJiang-6C (FWJ-6C) turboprops, 3,805 kw (5,100 shp) each
Propellers: JL-4 6-blade composite propeller, 1 per engine

Performance

Cruise speed: ~650km/h
Range: ~5,700 km ()
Ferry range: 7,800 km ()
Service ceiling: 10,400m (ft)