J-20 5th Gen Fighter Thread VIII

[latenlazy]

Also, it's kind of unlikely the weight of meta material per aircraft is going to increase significantly when Kuang-chi itself says 4th gen is going to be lighter than 3rd gen. So even if you increase its application, it's probably not to the degree where the weight of the material will increase 50 to 100%.

It really depends on how they want to approach requirements revisions. Do they bank in the weight savings or do they use the same quantities and get more gain?

And what if they've decided to dramatically increase application of RAM on planes that used to not get much of it?

I'm not saying this can't be a sign that production of aircraft isn't expanding, just that it may not be all for stealth fighters. Just want to be sure we don’t make the wrong assumptions about math here. How much expansion of plane production it indicates is a bit more open ended than we might think*.

 

[tphuang]

It really depends on how they want to approach requirements revisions. Do they bank in the weight savings or do they use the same quantities and get more gain?

And what if they've decided to dramatically increase application of RAM on planes that used to not get much of it?

I'm not saying this can't be a sign that production of aircraft isn't expanding, just that it may not be all for stealth fighters. Just want to be sure we don’t make the wrong assumptions about math here. How much expansion of plane production it indicates is a bit more open ended than I think.

I think in the past, J-10C and J-16 would also be using RAM extensively. Although, I'd imagine J-20 applied more. J-20A will probably increase further, but how much extra weight that is, there is definitely not going be any public information on that.

I mean we will have to wait and see how much their revenue goes up. At present, the production capacity is going 3x over the next couple of years. Even if production 2x during this time frame, it's going to mean significantly increased fighter jet and UCAV production.

 

[Maikeru]

Of course an H20 would require significantly more metamaterial (whatever that is) per airframe than a J20/35 or GJ11.

 

[taxiya]

My one theory is that they are actually not looking to buy like 250 J-20/35 a year. They want the factory capacity to be there, so that if a conflict breaks out, they can crank things up to 1 aircraft a day or something like that.

50% capacity during peace time is a price that China is willing to pay. Excessive unused industrial capacity in aerospace and material science sector is something they want to have.

I remeber hearing from Xi Yazhou's youtube talk that it is China's practice of setting up production capacity in peace time according to wartime demand. He was talking about China's "excessive" artillery ammunition production capacity.

 

[lcloo]

I remeber hearing from Xi Yazhou's youtube talk that it is China's practice of setting up production capacity in peace time according to wartime demand. He was talking about China's "excessive" artillery ammunition production capacity.

I remember during the active days of CJDBY, there were often postings saying that peace time production is always around 25% capacity. We cannot be sure 25% is correctly stated but they certainly can instantly surge their production rates with existing production lines in time of conflict.

 

[plawolf]

Another possible factor to consider is VLO cruise missiles.

Hypersonics and ballistics are good spear-tip/door-kicker HVT hunters, but VLO subsonics gives you a much more economical and large volume yet high KP workhorse weapon.

 

[plawolf]

I remember during the active days of CJDBY, there were often postings saying that peace time production is always around 25% capacity. We cannot be sure 25% is correctly stated but they certainly can instantly surge their production rates with existing production lines in time of conflict.

I think that depends entirely on the type of weapon in question. For land based systems like tanks, IFVs, artillery, that’s entirely plausible if not understated, but I don’t think the ratio would be that high for top-end assets like heavy fighters and heavy warships etc.

I think one additional factor to consider for what peak production might look like for fighters is to look at the existing pilot to aircraft ratio. Because fighters are useless without pilots, and pilots are by far the bigger bottleneck to rapid and massive fleet expansion.

If the pilot to plane ration is 2-1, then I think it would be safe to assume that peacetime production rate is around 50%.

I know that with ejection seats, you would expect a reasonable percentage of pilots to survive shoot downs to be able to go back into rotation. But you also need to consider the potential delay with new pilots coming online, and I don’t think you want to be in a situation with significantly more planes than pilots in a peer v peer fight, since a large build up of such high value assets being stationary for too long would make for obvious targets for opfor that could result in significant damage if they can hit them.

Obviously there are a ton of other factors to consider, but I think this would be a reasonable ballpark figure on balance without doing a dissertation level analysis.

 

[tphuang]

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，目前光启技术的709基地一期已经处于满负荷生产状态，公司将在今年年底前争取709基地二期满产。

公开资料显示，光启技术顺德709基地是新一代超材料大规模制造基地，集研发、制造、检测于一体，建成后公司将拥有超材料尖端装备产品科研及产业化全链条能力。目前公司709基地二期已正式投产。

More on this subject. Looks like phase 1 at Shunde is nowhere near enough capacity. Phase 2 production has already started. They are aiming for full production by end of this year. That seems a little aggressive since it's supposed to be 2.5x the size of phase 1 factory.

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除了以上原因外，今年研制任务的激增也大大挤占了批产任务的产能。“今年将近30%的产能用在了研制上面，只有70%的产能用于批产，这样的比例对于当前的批产交付的任务来说是远远满足不了的。”不过他也表示，二期的投产可以在一定程度上缓解交付压力，有助于今年最后这么几个月的冲刺，但是解决不了实际的产能缺口。

so apparently 30% of production capacity this year was used for R&D. Only 70% used for mass production, so they've been behind on delivery. They need phase 2 to enter production to deliver what the customer needs

目前光启还在加速启动新基地的建设。据悉新基地也是集研制与生产功能于一体的超材料基地，一期用地规模超过200亩，接近709基地一二期的面积。建成后可满足众多定点任务以及订单需求。“投产即满产，首站即决战”。

刘若鹏董事长指出，2025年是一个重要时间节点，也是公司产能集中释放的关键时期。不过即便709基地一二期全部实现了满产仍不能满足明年的交付需求，所以公司计划在2025年之前布局并建设新的生产基地。通过709基地与新基地的产能结合，共同保证2025年的交付计划。“这一举措将对整个行业的大规模生产制造提供极大的助力，也标志着我们从10向100转变的实质性成果。”

The production capacity is dramatically expanding.
The current 709 base in Shunde in total cannot apparently complete requirement for next year. That's why they have started to work on their new production base whose area for just phase 1 will be equal to the combined area of 709 base for phase 1 and 2.
So the industrialization in China of meta material is really happening.

作为一家致力于前沿技术的战略新兴企业，光启技术还将AI技术成功应用于超材料的研发、设计、生产、测试全产业链和企业管理运营，赋能并驱动新质生产力的全面发展与升级。

They are also using AI for research, design, production and testing of meta material.

The new base is in Zhuzhou

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拟在株洲建设“株洲 905 基地项目”，分两期进行，主要建设超材料研发、生产及检测中心。项目一期计划用地近 200 亩，一期用地邻近预留二期用地约 200 亩，预留三年，还预留三期产业园用地约 600 亩。今年上半年，光启技术接到定点任务激增，现有产能不足，需扩大产能满足市场需求。公司称本次合作利于充分利用当地产业配套及生态优势，确保产品生产与交付。光启技术是我国新一代尖端装备核心供应商

So the new base will be 905 base. It will eventually composed of 3 phases. Each phase will use similar land area ( 200 亩) to the current 709 base.
So the first half of this year, they saw significant increase in demand and found the current production level not able to satisfy the demand, hence the huge increase in capacity

9 月 7 日，公司称 709 基地二期部分区域试生产，设备调试于 9 月开始，产能正逐步释放，满产后是一期的 2.5 倍，正加快投产进度及新基地筹建。近期，光启技术筹划引入战略投资者事项吸引投资者调研，10 月 16 日称因行业特殊性正引进战略投资者支持业务增长，还在筹划新基地选址等工作。

Again, 709 base 2nd phase started trial production in September and capacity has been increasing steadily. The full production is 2.5x phase 1 (as I said previously) and it's quickly trying to add capacity elsewhere.

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According to news from today.
905 base has started construction.

yes, so meta material production is growing exponentially for aircraft

 

[tphuang]

A more traditional RAM producer in China is Huaqin Technology (华秦科技)

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So this is clearly spelt out as stealth material, rather than meta material.
Their production figure isn't as easy to find out, but looks like their revenue is also going up exponentially. Based on the description of their R&D efforts, looks like they are mostly just selling stealth material at this point.

One point I forgot earlier is that stealth layer does need replacement. As such, some of the production is simply used to replace and fix up the older stuff that lost its characteristics. As J-20/35 fleet get larger, more of the production will be for maintenance vs new aircraft.

 

[siegecrossbow]

Stealth material is not just RAM paint though. I recall that one CCTV documentary showed stealth material membrane under the skin of the plane that had metallic looking disks on it.