J-20 5th Gen Fighter Thread VIII

Andy1974 · Feb 19, 2024

Blitzo said:
So I'm not trying to pour cold water over you, but yes you've done a summary of the article, however all of those points are things that we have surmised for a while (in some cases, things we've been aware of years ago).

Unless the goal is to rediscuss well established understandings of J-20, I'm not sure what this achieves.

This isn't your fault, the problem is that the information is all old to us.

Hey and thanks, and also not trying to be cheeky or anything…

I was not thinking that all this information was new to this forum, though I did think the red part might be. I was also not suggesting a discussion. I am especially not trying to re-discuss old things.

I think, I hope, my post was useful in 2 ways:

1. What I do think is useful is that here is an article from the leading English Chinese news website, putting information out there, for everyone to see and know at this particular time. Yes, we know this, but now we also know that the Global Times is informing the world of this too, and that may be useful to our community of PLA watchers. Global Times articles and like the voice of China, I’m an avid reader, and think it’s useful to know what they are saying, and when. And not just a single article, but how a series of articles can go together, all informing the world about the PLA, in what appears to be a systematic way.

2. But also, and in addition, I have been here for a while, yes years, I guess I am a slow learner, but I have been following along with everything. My memory might not be great, but I didn’t remember us talking about the ability for the J-20 to commence combat ops in extreme weather, though we did discuss the issues the F-35 has with thunderstorms and that the J-20 wouldn’t have these issues.

I searched this forum for “weather”, but not all the previous J-20 threads, as there was nothing relevant, I decided to highlighted it in red, as such it is not just a summary, but an (probably flawed) analysis of what might be new, and there for useful. My “analysis” is just the red highlighting, the rest is summary, which was really useful to me, and I thought it might also be useful to others. The bold parts let’s you skim keywords and you don’t even have to read the summary unless you see something.

If I was right, and this was perhaps new information, or an otherwise useful dimension to previous information, you or someone else could discus, as you said you don’t want people trying to start discussions, so this is a way for me not to start discussion, but post useful information (for 2 reasons above) which might also allow the possibility of a discussion starting if you or some other experts decides to start it. Otherwise, it can be safely ignored, while still being useful for the first reason above. There is not even a superfluous word in my post trying to start a discussion, just that red highlight.

If I got the red highlight wrong, then it’s because I only seared this J-20 forum and not all the previous ones, but again, it’s still useful a because of 1. Of course, you may not agree with 1, in which case yeah it’s utterly useless, and it might be worth clarifying for me and other members that regularly post GT articles, what the guidelines actually are for these cases.

My motivation for posting it was to be, and become a useful contributor to the forum and field, honestly. Believe it or not, I do love being here, and really like several members, so I want to be part of this community, a useful part.

@Blitzo, I did try to start discussions about things I know nothing about based on fantasies, I’m sorry, I’m reforming myself.

taxiya · Feb 19, 2024

pkj said:
US/Western air force high performance pilots seem to require 9G for 15 seconds:

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First of all the paper and researchers are from Taiwan. So the standard and definitions are ROCAF. It is likely the same as US, but it is more precise and safe to call it ROCAF standard.

That being said, it is a common problem of quoting a number from a professional paper without knowing the context of that number. Here I quote what you talk about

The training target of flying jet fighters is to sustain 7.5 G for 15 s. High-performance fighter pilots are required to tolerate the challenge of 9 G for 15 s, at a very high-onset rate.

It seems that in ROCAF aircrew standard, 15 second is defining duration instead of 10s. This indicate that PLAAF and ROCAF have different definations of their testing regime. What the pilot is subjected to besides the G number may be different, such as demanding pilot to perform something beside keeping concious. These are unknowns and the paper does elabrate, nor do we know anything about PLA.

Another question arising from the paper is that what is the difference between "flying jet fighters" and "High-performance fighter pilot"? Which one is the catagory for a regular fighter pilot? Is "high-performance fighter pilot" limited to test pilot and top-gun kind of instructors? We know that 9G/10s of J-20 is meant for regular pilot only.

A good example to prove my point is the recent discussion of 120% load test of Y-20 when the video report did not specify what that test was about exactly.

ACuriousPLAFan · Feb 19, 2024

Said to be a PLAAF brigade from the NTC transitioning/transitioned from J-11A to J-20. Requires further verification.

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Blitzo · Feb 19, 2024

Andy1974 said:
Hey and thanks, and also not trying to be cheeky or anything…

I was not thinking that all this information was new to this forum, though I did think the red part might be. I was also not suggesting a discussion. I am especially not trying to re-discuss old things.

I think, I hope, my post was useful in 2 ways:

1. What I do think is useful is that here is an article from the leading English Chinese news website, putting information out there, for everyone to see and know at this particular time. Yes, we know this, but now we also know that the Global Times is informing the world of this too, and that may be useful to our community of PLA watchers. Global Times articles and like the voice of China, I’m an avid reader, and think it’s useful to know what they are saying, and when. And not just a single article, but how a series of articles can go together, all informing the world about the PLA, in what appears to be a systematic way.

2. But also, and in addition, I have been here for a while, yes years, I guess I am a slow learner, but I have been following along with everything. My memory might not be great, but I didn’t remember us talking about the ability for the J-20 to commence combat ops in extreme weather, though we did discuss the issues the F-35 has with thunderstorms and that the J-20 wouldn’t have these issues.

I searched this forum for “weather”, but not all the previous J-20 threads, as there was nothing relevant, I decided to highlighted it in red, as such it is not just a summary, but an (probably flawed) analysis of what might be new, and there for useful. My “analysis” is just the red highlighting, the rest is summary, which was really useful to me, and I thought it might also be useful to others. The bold parts let’s you skim keywords and you don’t even have to read the summary unless you see something.

If I was right, and this was perhaps new information, or an otherwise useful dimension to previous information, you or someone else could discus, as you said you don’t want people trying to start discussions, so this is a way for me not to start discussion, but post useful information (for 2 reasons above) which might also allow the possibility of a discussion starting if you or some other experts decides to start it. Otherwise, it can be safely ignored, while still being useful for the first reason above. There is not even a superfluous word in my post trying to start a discussion, just that red highlight.

If I got the red highlight wrong, then it’s because I only seared this J-20 forum and not all the previous ones, but again, it’s still useful a because of 1. Of course, you may not agree with 1, in which case yeah it’s utterly useless, and it might be worth clarifying for me and other members that regularly post GT articles, what the guidelines actually are for these cases.

My motivation for posting it was to be, and become a useful contributor to the forum and field, honestly. Believe it or not, I do love being here, and really like several members, so I want to be part of this community, a useful part.

@Blitzo, I did try to start discussions about things I know nothing about based on fantasies, I’m sorry, I’m reforming myself.

Look, you can post what you want.

But if you are going to post articles to try to prompt discussion, you may find yourself learning that there actually isn't much to talk about because the things which are interesting and new to you are either pedestrian or having been discussed in the past and no longer being worthy of discussion apart from brief acknowledgement.

Alternatively, if you have specific questions or want to ask if certain things are new/notable, then that is fine and people will give answers. Just don't be disappointed if the answers end up saying "yes, we've discussed this before" and "yes this has been acknowledged a few years back" and "yes, this is just common sense".

Seeing as you are being genuine in your question, I will address it -- 9 times out of 10, Global Times and Chinese state media do not tell us anything new about leading edge PLA developments. Occasionally there will be a juicy morsel that is interesting and new to us, but that is overwhelmingly the exception rather than the norm.

In this case, the Global Times article that you linked to (and some of the recent GT articles you've linked to recently) do not tell us anything new either, in fact it is all stuff that is either obvious, established, or poorly formulated by the GT writer, or a combination thereof.

The forum's search function is also rubbish so you probably aren't going to find anything specific to begin with.
If you do want to do a thorough reading, you could legitimately read this thread and all of the past threads on J-20 going back a decade and a half, and doing so will probably catch you up on most of the relevant information up to now as well as teach what discussions are productive and which are not.

Finally, do not use coloured text like blue or red -- those are reserved for moderator use.

Deino · Feb 20, 2024

ACuriousPLAFan said:
Said to be a PLAAF brigade from the NTC transitioning/transitioned from J-11A to J-20. Requires further verification.

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Hmm? Never hear this guy!

But here similar if I'm not mistaken

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But wait, when the 89th Air Brigade at Dalian/Pulandian AP is now a J-16 unit as reported/rumoured recently, there are no more J-11 units left in the NTC!?

minime · Feb 20, 2024

Blitzo said:
This isn't your fault, the problem is that the information is all old to us.

Not old from official record point of view.
The article is base on the recent CCTV Wanghai brigade report.

pkj · Feb 20, 2024

taxiya said:
First of all the paper and researchers are from Taiwan. So the standard and definitions are ROCAF. It is likely the same as US, but it is more precise and safe to call it ROCAF standard.

That being said, it is a common problem of quoting a number from a professional paper without knowing the context of that number. Here I quote what you talk about

The training target of flying jet fighters is to sustain 7.5 G for 15 s. High-performance fighter pilots are required to tolerate the challenge of 9 G for 15 s, at a very high-onset rate.

It seems that in ROCAF aircrew standard, 15 second is defining duration instead of 10s. This indicate that PLAAF and ROCAF have different definations of their testing regime. What the pilot is subjected to besides the G number may be different, such as demanding pilot to perform something beside keeping concious. These are unknowns and the paper does elabrate, nor do we know anything about PLA.

Another question arising from the paper is that what is the difference between "flying jet fighters" and "High-performance fighter pilot"? Which one is the catagory for a regular fighter pilot? Is "high-performance fighter pilot" limited to test pilot and top-gun kind of instructors? We know that 9G/10s of J-20 is meant for regular pilot only.

A good example to prove my point is the recent discussion of 120% load test of Y-20 when the video report did not specify what that test was about exactly.

There are indeed a lot of unknowns even with such a paper on ROCAF (which presumably follows "USAF style" of training), as well as a lot of unknowns with the PLAAF (which I gather, is more normal than not normal, for LA watchers).

I do still beg the question of whether the PLAAF pilots flying J-20s, are in general, still RISING UP to Western training standards (assuming ROCAF training represents or matches USAF standard) or if the PLAAF pilots flying J-20s are ALREADY AT the Western training standards...

Thank you.

Blitzo · Feb 21, 2024

siegecrossbow said:
I think it is a part of an effort to standardize formation lights on newly produced PLAAF fighter aircraft. Even the AL-31 equipped J-20 in the 9th brigade started switching from three to two lights.

This is from the J-10 thread, but I'm continuing it here -- but do we have any confirmation that Al-31 powered J-20s (i.e.: first batch/es of J-20) changed to new formation lights?

I assume you're referring to pictures for example here: