Chinese Engine Development
- Thread starter jackbh
- Start date
are there any technical documents/photos out there for the Z-20 engine, such as cutaways, accessory gearbox details, dust & debris mitigation, deicing systems details etc.? I want to learn more about that turboshaft but haven't been able to find anything other than airshow display units that don't display too many details.
Try the Warthunder forum.
Ha，a joke of warthunder leaker
F119 mass flow is higher than 122 kg/s, because that’s the mass flow of the F110 with a 35.66 inch (906 mm) inlet diameter, while photographs and publicly available TOs show F119 inlet diameter to be over 38 inch (965+ mm).
I’m also not sure if PLAAF wants to optimize the WS-15 the same as the F119. The F119 design some major penalties in subsonic TSFC for being supercruise optimized, because of intake heating from compression at supercruise, it has mediocre OPR by modern standards and especially the core to stay within temperature limits for rotor speed. The resulting engine is also very heavy with T/W ratio not even reaching 8. Result is an engine that pushes F-22 to Mach 1.7-1.8 in supercruise but subsonic combat radius is only 595 nmi or 1,100 km, which for how much fuel it carries is not very much, a draggier Super Hornet with a CL tank for similar fuel load and F414 engines with similar low BPR but higher OPR can exceed that.
Based on the very high T/W ratio goal of the WS-15, it’s possible that the J-20A and WS-15 may settle for a supercruise speed of Mach 1.4, not as impressive on paper but you can avoid some of the penalties the F119 pays in terms of weight and TSFC, which may be worthwhile in the end.
Last edited:
Ah, it's you again.
I'm not gonna argue with you on the diameters and MF for the F119 part. I trust you're more knowledgeable than me on that.
I've said this before, and I'm saying it again. Think about it logically.
Why would the PLAAF not optimise the WS-15 for supersonic speeds? It's pretty well known that the J-20 is the most comfortable in supersonic speeds. It makes absolutely no sense to not prioritise supercruising over, well, any else, really.
The J-20 needs to cover huge spans of territories. It's tailored for China's huge landmass and SCS operations. That means you'll want to cover loads of distance, ASAP. Not prioritising supercruising seems pretty counterintuitive, no?
The range part too. The J-20 is known for its relatively huge internal fuel load, therefore the effects on range during low speeds are pretty mitigated.
True on the F119 T/W part. It's 7.8 IIRC and the low 8.X with the nozzle removed. Therefore I'm pretty puzzled about the rumours of the WS-15 having such high thrust performances. We'll find out, I suppose.
See above. Also, we don't know if the 11 T/W is the real goal. The engine performance is rumoured to be such, however we do not know for sure the developmental T/W goals for the WS-15.
More like high 8.X or low 9.X
Add the fact that that a rectangular nozzle decreases thrust by 10% if not more...
WS-15 is optimized for high altitude and high velocity regime according to Orca. In terms of raw thrust it is a leap over the predecessor but definitely not something crazy like 18 metric tons.
Expected. WS-15 represents China's first step into the global top-tier stage of high-thrust, low-bypass turbofan engines, so a more modest expectation is safer.
I seriously do hope that the WS-15 will be comparable, if not just slightly better than the F119 on the F-22s. On the other hand, going for 18 tons (i.e. nearing the F135) would make the J-20 way too overpowered than it is realistic, given that the J-20 is largely in the same dimension and MTOW category as the F-22.
As for low-bypass engines with thrusts of 18 or more tons - Perhaps that belongs to the categories of the currently-WIP 5th-gen, high-thrust, low-bypass turbofan engines with a T/W ratio of 15+ and/or VCE/ACEs.
Last edited: