Chinese Hypersonic Developments (HGVs/HCMs)

SinoSoldier · Sep 19, 2015

Henri K. did a fairly thorough analysis of the aircraft (with what tentative knowledge we have).

1) After conducting a background search on the author of the article, it appears that his work have been mostly centered around drones. Hence, Henri believes that this aircraft is a drone.

2) The article mentions that the vehicle was delivered to a test base, indicating that the drone was tested at a facility that was military in nature. Henri suspects that it was tested at Dingxin military base.

3) The test flight was mentioned to have occurred several days ago, lasted for several hours, and was done at speeds exceeding Mach 5 (presumably at high altitude). By cross-checking these parameters with recent NOTAMs, Henri was able to dig up a recent notice.

A2538/15 NOTAMN

Q) ZLHW/QARLT/IV/NBO/E/311/999/
A) ZLHW B) 1509090500 C) 1509090945
E) THE FLW SEGMENTS OF ATS RTE CLSD AT 9500M AND ABOVE:
1.B330: YABRAI VOR 'YBL' - GOBIN .
2.A596: YABRAI VOR 'YBL'- DENGKOU VOR 'DKO'.
F) FL311 G) FL999

The NOTAM was for September 9th from 5:00-9:45 UTC, for an altitude of 9500 meters. The speed was under Mach 5, approximately 5382 km/hr. The small flight envelope suggested that the drone was dropped from a larger aircraft.

5. The engine is believed to be the same variable-cycle engine that was revealed in August 2015 (which operates from Mach 0-5).

6. Since it was CAC's mandate to develop hypersonic drones, Henri believes that this project thus falls under their supervision. Henri has posted a Google Earth image showing the purported drone, which has a length of 9 meters and a wingspan of 6 meters.

NOTE: Our friend RAJ47 believes that the following image, rather the one Henri posted, is of the drone.

Deino · Sep 19, 2015

Honestly I don't think this is this mystery super-secrte hypersonic testbed ... IMO the one in the first image (yellow circle) is simply a Wing Loong I without wings ! but regarding the second image (red circle) how sure we are at all that this "thing" again comes from CAC ?

Deino

taxiya · Sep 19, 2015

SinoSoldier said:
Wait, can you elaborate?

Did it mention that pilots were used in this test flight (implying that the aircraft is manned) or are they planning to build a manned variant in the future?

Granted, the term "operator" (i.e. of drones) could easily be mistaken for "pilot", especially when translated.

The word in the original Chinese version post #96 was "试飞员", which literally means test flight/flying person. Assuming the Chinese author of the original article is not making a mistake it should be translated at "test pilot". The appropriate Chinese word for drone operator however is "操作员" which literally means operator. This is why it is translated as pilot by someone in this thread.
However it can be that, the test pilot was referring to the (H-6) carrier's pilot, the actually hypersonic plane is unmanned.
For me, although I would like it to be true, but it is a huge leap not only for China but for any countries, it is a manned hypersonic plane taking off and landinf by itself, it is a bit too good to be true. But again, China never stops surprising us these days. And I don't think we can get official confirmation until something major happens, similar to J-20's debut when some VIP's visit.

taxiya · Sep 19, 2015

JayBird said:
That's the problem with the style of writing with such article from the more official news. There is always ambiguity with the wordings that you have to decode the true meaning from it.

But at least for me the article sounded a lot more like this plane was taking off on it's own. It mention about the sound of the engines starting before taking off, unless the writer meant the engines of the H-6. and the test pilot was meant the pilots on the H-6.

I am inclined to the carrier/UAV thinking.

newguy02 · Sep 19, 2015

SinoSoldier said:
Henri K. did a fairly thorough analysis of the aircraft (with what tentative knowledge we have).

1) After conducting a background search on the author of the article, it appears that his work have been mostly centered around drones. Hence, Henri believes that this aircraft is a drone.

2) The article mentions that the vehicle was delivered to a test base, indicating that the drone was tested at a facility that was military in nature. Henri suspects that it was tested at Dingxin military base.

3) The test flight was mentioned to have occurred several days ago, lasted for several hours, and was done at speeds exceeding Mach 5 (presumably at high altitude). By cross-checking these parameters with recent NOTAMs, Henri was able to dig up a recent notice.

The NOTAM was for September 9th from 5:00-9:45 UTC, for an altitude of 9500 meters. The speed was under Mach 5, approximately 5382 km/hr. The small flight envelope suggested that the drone was dropped from a larger aircraft.

5. The engine is believed to be the same variable-cycle engine that was revealed in August 2015 (which operates from Mach 0-5).
View attachment 18986

6. Since it was CAC's mandate to develop hypersonic drones, Henri believes that this project thus falls under their supervision. Henri has posted a Google Earth image showing the purported drone, which has a length of 9 meters and a wingspan of 6 meters.
View attachment 18987

NOTE: Our friend RAJ47 believes that the following image, rather the one Henri posted, is of the drone.
View attachment 18988

If you look closely, the second fuselage kind of looks like the Dark sword, however the problem is that the Dark sword is SAC's concept/project so unless there was cooperation between the two I'm not sure what to say about the second fuselage.

Blitzo · Sep 19, 2015

newguy02 said:
If you look closely, the second fuselage kind of looks like the Dark sword, however the problem is that the Dark sword is SAC's concept/project so unless there was cooperation between the two I'm not sure what to say about the second fuselage.

The second fuselage could be the drone, but there's no reason to think it's dark sword beyond a possible superficial resemblance that it's dark and arrow shaped.

Deino · Sep 20, 2015

Deino said:
... but regarding the second image (red circle) how sure we are at all that this "thing" again comes from CAC ?

Maybe I missed it in the meantime but with so much rumours going on its a bit difficult to sort out especially where this "thing" comes from.

Besides that two images/diagrams regarding a

Chinese ramjet-test.

Deino

no_name · Sep 20, 2015

Deino said:
Maybe I missed it in the meantime but with so much rumours going on its a bit difficult to sort out especially where this "thing" comes from.

Besides that two images/diagrams regarding a

Chinese ramjet-test.

Deino
View attachment 18991
View attachment 18990

I remember seeing the first pic in this forum before.

edit yeah it's from here: https://www.sinodefenceforum.com/cx-1-cruise-missile.t7099/page-9#post-314165

Something written in Chinese here where the pics seems to be from, I haven't had time to go through it:

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Skywatcher · Sep 20, 2015

Thinking about it some more, I wonder if this combined cycle engine would have a scramjet mode in later models?

Now some ramjets can work up to Mach 6, but scramjets still offer higher speeds (and more efficiency, I think).

The X-47B's planned engine would be a rocket based combined cycle engine, which would have its ramjet take over at Mach 2.5 speeds, and transitions into hypersonic flight by transforming the engine into a scramjet at Mach 5+ speeds.

But obviously, China would want to test the ramjet part of the engine first before moving onto the scramjet.

newguy02 · Sep 20, 2015

Bltizo said:
The second fuselage could be the drone, but there's no reason to think it's dark sword beyond a possible superficial resemblance that it's dark and arrow shaped.

While it may or may not be Dark Sword, it does have a lot of resemblance to the Dark Sword as it does appear to have canards although that could be because the image is to blurry to tell, and like you said it is arrow shaped which is precisely what the Dark Sword's shape is but this is all my own speculation/opinion so until we can get clear images we have no real way of telling what this is.

Chinese Hypersonic Developments (HGVs/HCMs)

SinoSoldier

Colonel

Deino

Lieutenant General

taxiya

Brigadier

taxiya

Brigadier

newguy02

Junior Member

Blitzo

Lieutenant General

Deino

Lieutenant General

no_name

Colonel

Skywatcher

Captain

newguy02

Junior Member