Chinese Engine Development

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Enestori

New Member
Registered Member
Here's the latest evidence I was able to gather.
  • The WS-15 first flew in 2023.
  • The newest J-20A has the upgraded WS-10C2 instead of the WS-15.
  • An insider stated "没呢，太行的20A，不急不急". He responded to a user's two posts "似乎是新的黄皮20a+ws15” and "请问除了2012单15，2052，2056双15以外，还有新的装15的吗？"
  • Another insider stated "就像我的大篇一样，需要磨". He responded to the question "ws15还要测到什么时候啊，我佛了".
(I note that 磨's direct translation is "grind." In the context of 大扁 - long draft/article - most translators use "polish." However, by itself 磨 is usually first translated as "grind.")

Optimistic Theory
Large-scale production of J-20s with WS-15s is coming in one to two years. It just takes some time to get full-scale production.

Pessimistic Theory
Large-scale production of J-20s with WS-15s will have a long delay, until even 2030. The issue is not just ramping up production; there are some flaws with the WS-15.

In my opinion, the sparse evidence doesn't contradict the optimistic theory. It is quite possible that we'll be seeing mass WS-15 usage in a year or two.

However, the sparse evidence also doesn't contradict the pessimistic theory. It is also quite possible that we'll be seeing mass WS-15 usage only in 2030 or beyond.

Most of us on SDF are PLA enthusiasts, and so we prefer the optimistic theory. I also wish for it. However, perhaps we should not underestimate the probability of the pessimistic theory.
 
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latenlazy

Brigadier
Enestori said:
Here's the latest evidence I was able to gather.
  • The WS-15 first flew in 2023.
  • The newest J-20A has the upgraded WS-10C2 instead of the WS-15.
  • An insider stated "没呢，太行的20A，不急不急". He responded to a user's two posts "似乎是新的黄皮20a+ws15” and "请问除了2012单15，2052，2056双15以外，还有新的装15的吗？"
  • Another insider stated "就像我的大篇一样，需要磨". He responded to the question "ws15还要测到什么时候啊，我佛了".
(I note that 磨's direct translation is "grind." In the context of 大扁 - long draft/article - most translators use "polish." However, by itself 磨 is usually first translated as "grind.")

Optimistic Theory
Large-scale production of J-20s with WS-15s is coming in one to two years. It just takes some time to get full-scale production.

Pessimistic Theory
Large-scale production of J-20s with WS-15s will have a long delay, until even 2030. The issue is not just ramping up production; there are some flaws with the WS-15.

In my opinion, the sparse evidence doesn't contradict the optimistic theory. It is quite possible that we'll be seeing mass WS-15 usage in a year or two.

However, the sparse evidence also doesn't contradict the pessimistic theory. It is also quite possible that we'll be seeing mass WS-15 usage only in 2030 or beyond.

Most of us on SDF are PLA enthusiasts, and so we prefer the optimistic theory. I also wish for it. However, perhaps we should not underestimate the probability of the pessimistic theory.
Click to expand...
If it was a fundamental design problem that portended another 5 year delay the Chinese aerospace industry wouldn’t be talking about the engine’s performance capabilities so openly and widely over the last 2 years. The only reason people were so confident before the recent news was because it was clear the industry as a whole chose to end radio silence on the project. This doesn’t happen without confidence in the level of development for the product.
 
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Michaelsinodef

Senior Member
Registered Member
latenlazy said:
If it was a fundamental design problem that portended another 5 year delay the Chinese aerospace industry wouldn’t be talking about the engine’s performance capabilities so openly and widely over the last 2 years. The only reason people were so confident before the recent news was because it was clear the industry as a whole chose to end radio silence on the project. This doesn’t happen without confidence in the level of development for the product.
Click to expand...
So probably some smaller refinement/polish when it comes to mass manufacturing of the WS15, and actual design problems or actual problems with it.

Not that surprising, as mass producing like 200 to even 300+ (spares), is quite a challenge to scale up from the testing stage (where the engineers and experienced workers can have far more attention to the few testing ones).
Or even lrip stage.

Especially if that scale needs to happen within a single year.
 
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dingyibvs

Senior Member
SlothmanAllen said:
About the only thing I can think to add to the discussion surrounding WS-15 over the last couple of pages is to remember that China has a very small commercial aerospace industry. Unlike the United States, China does not produce thousands of commercial turbofans per year. So I think it would be safe to assume that engines like the WS-15 might be subject to delays or technical difficulties because China has a much smaller industrial base for such things.
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Commercial aerospace industry probably doesn't matter as much to the military aerospace industry as say commercial automobile or shipbuilding industries to their respective industries. For example, Boeing delivers several hundred commercial aircrafts a year, while they build ~100 F35s a year. Even taking into consideration the difference in engines per aircraft that's still maybe a 10x difference. By value it's probably even smaller, considering Boeing makes ~40% of their revenue from civilian aircrafts and ~30% from military aircrafts. Compare this to say automobiles where the difference is maybe thousands vs tens of millions, or >10,000x difference. Or shipbuilding where the difference is ~100x in China's case.
 
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qwerty3173

Junior Member
Registered Member
dingyibvs said:
Commercial aerospace industry probably doesn't matter as much to the military aerospace industry as say commercial automobile or shipbuilding industries to their respective industries. For example, Boeing delivers several hundred commercial aircrafts a year, while they build ~100 F35s a year. Even taking into consideration the difference in engines per aircraft that's still maybe a 10x difference. By value it's probably even smaller, considering Boeing makes ~40% of their revenue from civilian aircrafts and ~30% from military aircrafts. Compare this to say automobiles where the difference is maybe thousands vs tens of millions, or >10,000x difference. Or shipbuilding where the difference is ~100x in China's case.
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In research and development probably yes, military aviation research is just as active as the civilian sector. But existing industry provides lots of go by choices since you don't need to make everything unique, there are already on shelf solutions such as common parts. Both research speed and final construction speed may not have that much of a difference but the speed of ramping up production in a project's early days will be affected.
 
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SlothmanAllen

Senior Member
Registered Member
gelgoog said:
If you look at the medium airliner segment, the engines use common core technology with military engines. The CFM56 and PW GTF series being examples of this.
Click to expand...
This is a great point. Outside of that, you also have a massive supplier base which is sustained with commercial development so you don't loose talent if military aircraft orders slow down.

This is all outside the scope of this thread, but my original point was just to highlight that a lack of commercial aerospace industry (and turbofan production in particular) could potentially impact Chinese engine development.
 
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Atomicfrog

Major
Registered Member
latenlazy said:
If it was a fundamental design problem that portended another 5 year delay the Chinese aerospace industry wouldn’t be talking about the engine’s performance capabilities so openly and widely over the last 2 years. The only reason people were so confident before the recent news was because it was clear the industry as a whole chose to end radio silence on the project. This doesn’t happen without confidence in the level of development for the product.
Click to expand...
The engine is clearly near completion of testing I suppose. A lot of stuff need to be done after that.

We could say that the plane will work better with the WS-15 but is no slouch with last iteration of ws-10 and can do his job.

If WS-15 fit in WS-10 place, you dont ditch good engines that you have in stock with spare parts for a new engines that is starting to be produced and dont have good spare parts stocks available.

Even if serial production is started, you need to maintain these engines, repair technicians need to be formed, distribution centers and logistics too need to be set.
 
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latenlazy

Brigadier
Atomicfrog said:
The engine is clearly near completion of testing I suppose. A lot of stuff need to be done after that.

We could say that the plane will work better with the WS-15 but is no slouch with last iteration of ws-10 and can do his job.

If WS-15 fit in WS-10 place, you dont ditch good engines that you have in stock with spare parts for a new engines that is starting to be produced and dont have good spare parts stocks available.

Even if serial production is started, you need to maintain these engines, repair technicians need to be formed, distribution centers and logistics too need to be set.
Click to expand...
Yup. Part of the point is the supply chain needs to be reliable enough for operational sustainment. You’re not trying to produce showpieces. The logistics tail for the engine matters if you want to ensure the planes flying with them are operationally available. This is much harder to do if your supply chain has to be able to supporting 100 new aircraft a year vs 24 new aircraft a year.
 
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