J-10 Thread III (Closed to posting)

[franco-russe]

But the pictures in escobar's post # 3755 are obviously of 4 Naval Aviation Division 10 Regt J-10AH.

 

[shen]

Interestingly, the "blue team", represented by the J-10s from the Chengdu military district, was playing the "Chinese side" this time. The red team of J-11Bs had superior electronic warfare capabilities and tried to attack the defending J-10s and SAMs. The blue team fooled them into attacking false targets, which was a costly mistake for the red team since they lost something like 6-7 fighters. One of them locked onto a J-10 towards the end of the exercise but was shot down by a SAM.

Pretty intense exercise that took place in 2012.

When the J-10 and the flanker were going head to head at each other, both with ECM jamming others' radar, you would think the Flanker's passive EO sensor would've gotten a lock on before the J-10 got close enough to burn through the jamming.

 

[escobar]

CCTV: J-10 vs J-11 or Red vs Blue

[video]http://p.you.video.sina.com.cn/swf/quotePlayer20130507_V4_4_41_59.swf?autoPlay=0&actlogActive=1&as=1&vid=103360030&uid=1978579341&tokenURL=http%3A%2F%2Fyou.video.sina.com.cn%2Fapi% 2FsinawebApi%2Foutplayrefer.php%2Fvid%3D103360030_ 1978579341_OkK0SXFsBmXK%2Bl1lHz2stqlF%2B6xCpv2xhGu 9vFqhIgdaUQ2YJMXNb9wH4yrQAM9B8XoLHcwydP4l1BstaKlY% 2Fs.swf&tHostName=[/video]

youtube version

[video=youtube;egLAgOMv8Ks]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=egLAgOMv8Ks#t=0s[/video]

 

[plawolf]

When the J-10 and the flanker were going head to head at each other, both with ECM jamming others' radar, you would think the Flanker's passive EO sensor would've gotten a lock on before the J-10 got close enough to burn through the jamming.

Maybe it was, the story was told through the pov of the blue force, so we don't know what the red force pilot saw or didn't see. But throughout, you get the impression that the red force pilot had the upper hand in terms of situational awareness, so it could be that the flanker pilot was able to see the J10 clearly with his IRST through all the jamming.

However, if the J11 was not carrying any long range IR guides missiles, getting a 'lock' with the IRST still doesn't allow you to get a shot off if the two were outside of WVR.

The red force pilot likely did not want to get too close and surrender his EW advantage, but that also meant he wasn't able to take full advantage of his IRST to take a long range shot if he cannot get a radar lock through the jamming, which was why he was trying to get on the J10's 'six I guess.

Something interesting I noted was that the J10 pilot was not wearing a HMS whereas the J11 pilot was. I wonder why not?

 

[tphuang]

Maybe it was, the story was told through the pov of the blue force, so we don't know what the red force pilot saw or didn't see. But throughout, you get the impression that the red force pilot had the upper hand in terms of situational awareness, so it could be that the flanker pilot was able to see the J10 clearly with his IRST through all the jamming.

However, if the J11 was not carrying any long range IR guides missiles, getting a 'lock' with the IRST still doesn't allow you to get a shot off if the two were outside of WVR.

The red force pilot likely did not want to get too close and surrender his EW advantage, but that also meant he wasn't able to take full advantage of his IRST to take a long range shot if he cannot get a radar lock through the jamming, which was why he was trying to get on the J10's 'six I guess.

Something interesting I noted was that the J10 pilot was not wearing a HMS whereas the J11 pilot was. I wonder why not?

that's the thing, we very rarely see J-10 pilots with HMS. I wonder why that is.

 

[Totoro]

was there ever an image of pilot sitting inside j10 wearing actual hms? i havent seen it all these years.

 

[plawolf]

that's the thing, we very rarely see J-10 pilots with HMS. I wonder why that is.

Well I can count on one had the number of times I have seen any PLAAF pilot with HMS, and they were all during exercises IIRC.

The J10 has all the head tracking sensors installed in the cockpit, so it is clearly designed and equipped for HMS, my only guess would be that the PLAAF don't allow J10 pilots to use HMS during DACT with J11s to give the J11s a chance in WVR if the J10s are as dominating as rumoured.

The J11B upgrade was primarily for radar and avionics, and it looks like this J10 was up against a J11B, with the pilot taking full advantage of the new EW suit this time, but there is only so much you can do in terms of improving agility if you are working with an existing airframe.

 

[tphuang]

was there ever an image of pilot sitting inside j10 wearing actual hms? i havent seen it all these years.

I believe we saw picture of J-10 pilots with HMS helmet last year.

 

[shen]

Well I can count on one had the number of times I have seen any PLAAF pilot with HMS, and they were all during exercises IIRC.

The J10 has all the head tracking sensors installed in the cockpit, so it is clearly designed and equipped for HMS, my only guess would be that the PLAAF don't allow J10 pilots to use HMS during DACT with J11s to give the J11s a chance in WVR if the J10s are as dominating as rumoured.

The J11B upgrade was primarily for radar and avionics, and it looks like this J10 was up against a J11B, with the pilot taking full advantage of the new EW suit this time, but there is only so much you can do in terms of improving agility if you are working with an existing airframe.

HMS doesn't advantage without penalty. The extra weight compare regular helmet will limit the pilot's ability to pull G. Currently J-10s are armed with PL-8. J-10s good turning characteristic probably allow it to exploit the full 30 degree off bore capability of the current WVR missile without HMS. USAF hasn't widely used HMS, probably because AIM-9X hasn't entered widespread service yet. Use the helmet that matches the missile capability.

 

[plawolf]

HMS doesn't advantage without penalty. The extra weight compare regular helmet will limit the pilot's ability to pull G. Currently J-10s are armed with PL-8. J-10s good turning characteristic probably allow it to exploit the full 30 degree off bore capability of the current WVR missile without HMS. USAF hasn't widely used HMS, probably because AIM-9X hasn't entered widespread service yet. Use the helmet that matches the missile capability.

An HMS/HMD would not pass the first selection criteria if its weight would limit the pilot's ability to pull max Gs in flight.

That is why you see those fancy HMD on Z10s but not on fighters - even though those HMD are generations ahead of the basic HMS currently used on J11s and J10s, their weight means pilots cannot pull 9G+ with them, so they do not even qualify for consideration for fighters.

You also seem to be a little confused on what off-boresight capacity means, off-boresight means away from where the nose is pointing. In addition, it refers to the missile's seeker field of view rather than some limitation on the missile's turning ability. That quote 30 degrees off boresight is therefore a reference to how wide the field of view the PL8 seeker has.

This is significant because until relatively recently with the introduction of lock-on after launch (LOAL) capability, you can only launch a missile after it has acquired a lock. Traditionally even IR missiles are cued via radar, so the radar's field of view limits how far off boresight you can get a lock.

With earlier HMS, you can use the HMS to cue the missile, which freed you from the limitations of the radar's field of view, allowing for greater off-boresight capability, but that was still limited by the missile's own seeker field of view. The missile cannot lock on to what it cannot see. Which is why the off-boresight capability of the missiles themselves were seen as an important indicator for a long time.

With modern HMS enabled LOAL missiles, the off-boresight capacity of the missile does not really have a great deal of correlation to how far off boresight the missile can be fired any more. Theoretically, if the pilot can see the target and keep it in his sights for the few seconds, you can launch agains that target. Off-boresight capabilities of missiles are still important, because they determine how well a missile can maintain a lock during violent manoeuvring. But that's not really what we are talking about here.

So, no matter how well your turning ability, it has nothing to do with your off-boresight capability. Those are two completely separate things.

Using HMS and high off-boresight launches does carry a cost, more like a cost and a benefit rolled into one.

The cost is to the range and kill probability (KP) of the missile. A dogifghting missile only has a range of a few dozen miles in most cases, and their rocket engines typically only burn for 30 seconds or less. These missiles are also designed to burn their fuel ASAP to accelerate to their max speed ASAP.

Rocket engines don't have throttles, so the missile will be burning its engine just as hard whether it is flying straight forwards or doing a 180. If you have your missile do too violent a turn at the start of its flight, you are wasting a lot of its fuel and speed and energy, so it may not have the range and/or speed needed to catch its target.

The advantage is that if your missile is doing much of the hard work, your plane doesn't have to. HMS and off-boresight capacity, if used right, can drastically reduce the number of Gs the plane and pilot had to pull to get a shot off. The less violent the turn the plane has to make, the less energy and airspeed it looses, so the pilot will have more options to go chase another target and/or avoiding becoming a target himself. To a lessor degree, the fewer Gs the pilot has to pull, the less fatigued he should get, but since pilots are trained to pull heavy Gs regularly, their endurance should not really be a big issue in a dogfight. Thus, on balance, off-boresight is a very big plus for the pilot and plane, less so for the missile and its KP, but the benefits to the former two overwhelming compensates for the latter.