Chinese Hypersonic Developments (HGVs/HCMs)
- Thread starter A.Man
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Great podcast between Xi Yazhou and someone who's working in hypersonic space in China. I'm still going through it (look at how long this one is!)
Some information:
1. Back in 1995 someone has already proposed hypersonic bomber for the PLA. This thing will take off and remain within China's airspace for its entire bombing run, accelerating payloads up to hypersonic speed and releasing them before landing back in China. Conceptually it's very similar to Tengyun spaceplane's first stage, however it was pointed out that they are not identical. One of the fuel Tengyun will carry is hydrogen peroxide which is not storable long term and unsuitable for military use. It's also conceptually similar to Falcon 9, only it's recovered as a plane. Study was done between this method and vertical recovery and it was found horizontal recovery is a bit cheaper.
2. Figures quoted for this is a 400 ton MTOW craft with 60 ton of payload. That 60 ton payload could be 12 Iskander size missiles. Only by launching them at high speed and altitude they will have 2500km range instead of 800km if launched from ground. Conversely you could carry a smaller number of DF-21 sized payload and get DF-26 range, or DF-26 sized payload for DF-41 range. Although in that last case if you're firing ICBM range weapons then reusability might be a bit moot. This boost of range would then greatly increase PLARF firepower for a given budget.
3. From simulations it was determined that ideal main engine cut off speed for the winged first stage would be mach 9.25. If it's too low it means the 2nd stage will have to be bigger which means the first stage will have to be bigger, leading to higher cost. If you instead aim for mach 11 MECO that will also lead to first stage being a lot bigger than it needs to be (even if 2nd stage will be smaller), again increasing the cost. Mach 9.25 turns out to be the optimum. For military use this may not be so critical as military application for missiles are not aiming for orbital velocity.
4. Currently with hydrocarbon fuel the MECO limit is at mach 7. At this speed the compressed air from the intake is as hot as the exhaust after burning the fuel, so no further work can be done using hydrocarbon fuel. Hydrogen fuel is not being considered at this time as all the air breathing hydrogen technology are not considered mature enough.
Xi and this guy also did a podcast before where they discussed hypersonic development between US and China which was also highly educational:
Some information:
1. Back in 1995 someone has already proposed hypersonic bomber for the PLA. This thing will take off and remain within China's airspace for its entire bombing run, accelerating payloads up to hypersonic speed and releasing them before landing back in China. Conceptually it's very similar to Tengyun spaceplane's first stage, however it was pointed out that they are not identical. One of the fuel Tengyun will carry is hydrogen peroxide which is not storable long term and unsuitable for military use. It's also conceptually similar to Falcon 9, only it's recovered as a plane. Study was done between this method and vertical recovery and it was found horizontal recovery is a bit cheaper.
2. Figures quoted for this is a 400 ton MTOW craft with 60 ton of payload. That 60 ton payload could be 12 Iskander size missiles. Only by launching them at high speed and altitude they will have 2500km range instead of 800km if launched from ground. Conversely you could carry a smaller number of DF-21 sized payload and get DF-26 range, or DF-26 sized payload for DF-41 range. Although in that last case if you're firing ICBM range weapons then reusability might be a bit moot. This boost of range would then greatly increase PLARF firepower for a given budget.
3. From simulations it was determined that ideal main engine cut off speed for the winged first stage would be mach 9.25. If it's too low it means the 2nd stage will have to be bigger which means the first stage will have to be bigger, leading to higher cost. If you instead aim for mach 11 MECO that will also lead to first stage being a lot bigger than it needs to be (even if 2nd stage will be smaller), again increasing the cost. Mach 9.25 turns out to be the optimum. For military use this may not be so critical as military application for missiles are not aiming for orbital velocity.
4. Currently with hydrocarbon fuel the MECO limit is at mach 7. At this speed the compressed air from the intake is as hot as the exhaust after burning the fuel, so no further work can be done using hydrocarbon fuel. Hydrogen fuel is not being considered at this time as all the air breathing hydrogen technology are not considered mature enough.
Xi and this guy also did a podcast before where they discussed hypersonic development between US and China which was also highly educational:
I assume this would be a H2O2/Kerosene rocket like the one in the Black Horse space plane?
H2O2 does decay into H2O and O2 with time. But if you passivate the fuel tank (i.e. coat the inside with Teflon) and add a stabilizer chemical it can last a decent amount of time. H2O2 used to be used in torpedos and most of the solutions for how to solve those issues were solved back then. If they really need it this can probably be done. But in most cases LOX will work just as fine on a rocket.
escobar
Brigadier
Gen Wei has acknowledged that the test last year was a weapons demonstration, contradicting earlier alibis from the foreign ministry,” said Ankit Panda, a nuclear expert at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. “The subtext to his comments is that we should expect more such tests, perhaps, as China continues to modernise.” “We still don’t understand whether China intends to field such a weapon, however,” he added.
I have been half-expecting that to be the case ever since the news of that hypersonic vehicle flight test by China was reported by the Financial Times last year.
Even if the hypersonic vehicle that China has conducted flight test upon last year was truly indeed just a space vehicle, it would only be a matter of time until China installs one or few warheads on it, and made it a hypersonic missile - whether those warheads are conventional or nuclear.
Although, the initial denial by the Chinese MOFA didn't really comes as a surprise for me. The PLA did the same for the J-20 back then, although the revealation was made as an accidental leak rather than being discovered by the US
You can find out more about the J-20 leak in this Quora answer below:
China's hypersonic development program has always been for dual-purpose. This has never been a secret nor denied by anyone. This is similar to China's Earth Observation satellite program. Whenever a satellite of such nature is launched, it's always for agriculture, disaster reduction and homeland survey purposes. China is not lying, it just doesn't say everything about the program.
You can understand the statement from Foreign Ministry spokesperson on hypersonic vehicle testing in similar vein.
You can understand the statement from Foreign Ministry spokesperson on hypersonic vehicle testing in similar vein.
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Do not trust the FT or this Ankit fellow.
A warhead is technically a space vehicle.
China's strong and would not be bullied. It's China's right to test any weapons to protect its territory and national interests. Would the US stop testing its own weapons? NO!! What gives US the right to tell other nations what to do! You hypocrits!
I'm baffled by the TengYun uses hydrogen peroxide claim, it has low isp as monopropellant, also not sure where they'd use it in a combined cycle engine, I assume the ramjet/scramjet part would use something like hydrogen or methane....
Otherwise it's a great idea to build something like a hypersonic yeeter