Chinese Aviation Industry

You will need to conduct wind tunnel testing, check changes to the center of gravity and stresses on pylons and wing. Then conduct tests with the engine on the wing.
Finally replacing the engines is like half the cost of a new aircraft usually.

It is probably not worth the cost to re-engine.

In the case of the US tankers and B-52 bomber the engines were not manufactured anymore and the extra range/time on station makes a massive improvement in technical characteristics.

gelgoog said:

In the case of the US tankers and B-52 bomber the engines were not manufactured anymore and the extra range/time on station makes a massive improvement in technicals characteristics.

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I would expect replacing WJ-6 with WJ-10 would yield similar benefits, from most accounts I've heard, WJ-6 is just a terrible engine in both efficiency and reliability.

gelgoog said:

You will need to conduct wind tunnel testing, check changes to the center of gravity and stresses on pylons and wing. Then conduct tests with the engine on the wing.
Finally replacing the engines is like half the cost of a new aircraft usually.

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If they decide to start making new special mission Y-9s with WJ-10s as some people have rumored, it'll be something they'll have to figure out anyways making replacing the existing fleet easier. Engines might be half the cost of a normal aircraft but with special mission aircraft the electronics onboard is usually much more expensive than the actual base aircraft making it more economical for reengining rather than just retiring them and procuring new aircraft.

Tomboy said:

from most accounts I've heard, WJ-6 is just a terrible engine in both efficiency and reliability.

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It should be. The Ivchenko Al-20 was basically a TV-2 turboprop designed at Kuznetsov design bureau by Junkers engine designers. It is an early 1950s engine. Stalin era. The TV-2 engine design was passed to Zaporizhzhia, Ukraine to be serially produced there, that is when it became the Al-20.

Kuznetsov design bureau designed the more advanced NK-4 engine as a replacement for TV-2 but it was not accepted. A lot of people think this was more due to politics than anything.

ACuriousPLAFan said:

Video of said MA700 taxiing and taking-off/landing (the latter part of video may have been sped up):

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1980223240527389103

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I remember reading about this airplane. Didn't it have its first flight a few years ago?

H6BomberGal said:

I remember reading about this airplane. Didn't it have its first flight a few years ago?

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Yes, but no-one said this would be its maiden flight!

Blitzo said:

Depending on the scale of improvement, it is not exactly uncommon imo.

The most famous being KC-135R, where the fleet size seeing an engine upgrade was in the hundreds.

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The KC-135 re-engining, for the J57-to-CFM56 cases, has increased the offloadable fuel capacity by 50% in usual mission profiles. That is a generational leap for a tanker. I'd say it was more than worth the cost for the US. If the difference is going to be that big then it would be worth it for China too.

BoraTas said:

The KC-135 re-engining, for the J57-to-CFM56 cases, has increased the offloadable fuel capacity by 50% in usual mission profiles. That is a generational leap for a tanker. I'd say it was more than worth the cost for the US. If the difference is going to be that big then it would be worth it for China too.

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WJ-10 is another question, but would WS-20 produce that big an improvement/is it actually similar to CFM56-5? There are claims on Weibo it's pretty underwhelming & IIRC range or other parameters only boosted 10ish %.

ismellcopium said:

WJ-10 is another question, but would WS-20 produce that big an improvement/is it actually similar to CFM56-5? There are claims on Weibo it's pretty underwhelming & IIRC range or other parameters only boosted 10ish %.

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WS-20 is related with CFM56 series but with modern tools and material and comes under same category.. so how can you compare both machines ??

WS-20 as compare to D-30KP2 is a generational leap. as per AECC, Y-20B range , payload and speed have increased with news Engines. all claims are pure guess coz Shenyang never disclose the specification.

here is the screen-shot.



AECC also present the more advance variant of WS-20 called AEF-1300 at 2022 airshow.

ismellcopium said:

WJ-10 is another question, but would WS-20 produce that big an improvement/is it actually similar to CFM56-5? There are claims on Weibo it's pretty underwhelming & IIRC range or other parameters only boosted 10ish %.

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The J57 was a turbojet hence it was even less efficient than the D-30 family engine on the original Y-20. The improvement shouldn't be that big. But it should still be substantial.