Allegedly an image of GJ-11 in flight. I cannot locate the original image from Weibo, so I can't be certain of its authenticity.
Ok ... I thought it might be one spotted at the RCS facility at Gaobeidian?!
Chinese UAV/UCAV development
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Ok ... I thought it might be one spotted at the RCS facility at Gaobeidian?!
What are they trying to achieve by connect wingtip of multiple drone?An interesting concept. Several drones link up by their wingtips to fly as a single unit. The illustration shows five drones flying abreast, each serving a specialized function. From left to right: power supply drone, recon drone, (network) command drone, recon drone, defender drone. As you can see from the bottom illustration, the linked-up formation is not rigid; it allows a certain amount of flexibility in the wingtip joints.
plawolf
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Just off the top of my head, I can think of multiple advantages.
1) fuel efficiency/increased range
2) allow modular design, whereby a complex system could have component modules in separate drones. This allows you to add functions almost at will and allow you to put up potentially high-end UAV/UCAV capabilities without needing a full length runway and/or catapults. This could be especially useful in naval and small base applications in allowing FFGs and DDGs and small bases without full sized runways to launch (and recover) multiple small drones from the heli deck, that can connect to give you capabilities you would normally only find on a land based MALE UAV.
3) disguised drone swarms. No matter how good your ASEA radar is, connected drones are going to show up as a single radar return. So you may not know you are on the receiving end of a drone swarm attack until they break, by which point it could already be too late to effectively counter them.
4) networked arrays/radar. With these connected drones, you could potentially have them link up and acted as a giant antenna array, far bigger than what any single aircraft could realistically lift by itself. This opens up potentially interesting counter stealth applications as it allows you to use very long frequency radars waves against which stealth planes are not optimised against. As well as possible new roles in terms of communications relays and EINT/EW applications.
Increased Span of the wings allows for greater lift for a particular airspeed.
Usually, High altitude aircrafts have huge wingspan. ( U-2 Dragonfly ex.) Range is also extended.
The Albatross is nature's solution for extended range flight.
THere was a study on a flying "aircraft carrier". However here, the concept was to extend the range of the fighter aircraft by assistance of a bomber.
There is, as evidenced by the video, less need of fuel as the propulsion/thrust is offered by the "carrier".
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I am thinking it is developed---evolved but not the same---from the turbofan used with cruise missiles such as DF-10 or YJ-18.
by78
General
WJ-700 from a slightly different angle.
A much larger version (2048 × 1365). For an even bigger version (4000 × 2666), .
Can this even be considered news worthy... I mean the whole idea of out of control AI has been around in sci-fi since the 50s and Hollywood sci-fi movies and anime has reminded us again and again of this potential threat for like 4-5 decades, any 15 year old child today would have at least some idea, Terminator, 2001: a space Odyssey, iRobot etc... and the pentagon have only just thought of / realised the possibility... are they even fit to be policy advisers?
As a student of Computer science, my biggest concern regarding autonomous drone swarm is human ambition outgrowing capacity. AI & NN is basically at it's infancy. An "autonomous" or AI drone swarm is a recipe for mass murder waiting to happen. People or these so called future command generals who never has been in class room, only wants to militarize technologies they can get their hands on.
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