Stealth shaping and weapon bays are bigger contributors to stealth than paints. It is still a very capable aircraft with minor degradation in stealth.
J-20 5th Generation Fighter VII
- Thread starter siegecrossbow
- Start date
- Status
Guess the FBI 'invited' him for hamburgers
In case you really want to watch that section about the J-20 availability rate, here is that section from the now deleted video with subtitles added. It's only about a minute long. Added a random J-20 picture because Youtube wouldn't accept it otherwise.
(Blitzo)
[Questioner's name] asks We've heard a lot about B21 availability required / required maintenance recently which seems impressive. And he's asking about what we know about J-20 availability / time and maintenance if anything?
I don't know; Patch do you want to field this? Or- I am mean, because I only know stuff that's from rumors and what the PLA has sneakily has told us in very limited detail.
(Patch)
No worries. Yea, J-20 availability is actually pretty impressive for their first 5th gen. It's not quite 99% or anything like that but we're seeing generally 85-95% mission-capable rates depending on what status they're in. They don't actually fly them, you know, as much as we fly say F-22s up in Elmendorf or something, so they're not going to be running down that sustainment quite as fast. We know they're able to because we've seen them do it a few times, but they just generally don't stress out their airframes in the same way that we do. And they have much more robust logistics and sustainment complex just kind of behind the whole thing anyways, so they actually have, yea, solid 85-90% is where you see most [unintelligible] for those airframes.
(Blitzo)
[Questioner's name] asks We've heard a lot about B21 availability required / required maintenance recently which seems impressive. And he's asking about what we know about J-20 availability / time and maintenance if anything?
I don't know; Patch do you want to field this? Or- I am mean, because I only know stuff that's from rumors and what the PLA has sneakily has told us in very limited detail.
(Patch)
No worries. Yea, J-20 availability is actually pretty impressive for their first 5th gen. It's not quite 99% or anything like that but we're seeing generally 85-95% mission-capable rates depending on what status they're in. They don't actually fly them, you know, as much as we fly say F-22s up in Elmendorf or something, so they're not going to be running down that sustainment quite as fast. We know they're able to because we've seen them do it a few times, but they just generally don't stress out their airframes in the same way that we do. And they have much more robust logistics and sustainment complex just kind of behind the whole thing anyways, so they actually have, yea, solid 85-90% is where you see most [unintelligible] for those airframes.
Can you upload the entire thing?
Wow, that would be quite a good number.
plawolf
Lieutenant General
Seems to be a common theme developing on a conceptual difference between how the Chinese and Americans treat training and maintenance/logistics.
The Americans seem to treat their equipment like everyday items to just be used, with maintenance and logistics treated as necessary enablers and not to be factored into operational planning. OTOH China treats its major weapons systems with a lot more care and respect. Certainly they are no longer mothering them and treating them like priceless family heirlooms, but PLA commanders seems to respect the opinion of the engineers and maintenance techs much more. So that they seriously take onboard the comments and recommendations made by the maintenance team on what sustainable use levels are, and what resources are needed to boost maintenance capabilities to increase airframe availability rates.
The PLA can and will push their machines when needed, but they just don’t make that the norm and wear everything out needlessly in peacetime for no good reason.
We are seeing the contrasting results of these views in both how the PLAAF and PLAN asset availability rates compare to USAF and USN (the same is almost certainly also try with the army, but that’s much harder to get good numbers and examples on).
This is not to suggest the PLA is taking training lightly or slacking off. Contrary to modern mass media indoctrinated beliefs, ‘Train like you fight’ is not a new nor western revelation. If anything, that is a revelation first documented by ancient Chinese generals, and has long since become part of the cultural background knowledge for ordinary Chinese people, while it seems like it’s the US that has only understood the surface levels of it.
Sure, you should train like you fight, but only where appropriate and in moderation.
Humans and machines all have limits, while humans can push the envelope and expand our limits (to a degree), machines just get worn out.
This is why the PLA does a lot of training without their equipment. Because for most of the human envelope pushing training, you don’t need to be using your combat gear to achieve the same results.
The equipment is saved for the kinds of operational training where having the real thing adds enough training and experience value to justify the wear and tear costs.
You might get internet trolls laughing at how your soldiers are not all carrying battlefield ready gear in training photos and videos and nit picking about flight hours and time out at sea, but the PLA isn’t wearing the crap out of all its combat gear in peace time training needlessly either.
Not really. I think what pla has done with its availability rate is extraordinary. Much to do with their usage of predictive maintenance and maintaining discipline on how hard and often the planes are flown. Iirc, patch mentioned that us military often use it's assets harder than they should be used and that causes reduced readiness.
Well Patch deleted the original video, so I imagine there must be some reason for that. Given that it's not my own content, I don't want to be just uploading the entire thing. So I've been operating on a case-by-case basis where if it doesn't seem like anything too sensitive is discussed, I'll can instead give a short summary of what was said.
I think that is underselling what the PLAAF has done in its logistic/sustainment complex. The F-35 seems to have abnormally low ready rates, but it seems like the rest of the fleet still doesn't reach those 85-90% ready rates of the J-20. The Air Force Times article seems to indicate manned non-stealth fighters hover at roughly 70% ready rate in the US.
But I've seen news report similarly low rates in other countries. Here in 2018 says the Germany ready rate for Eurofighters was 39 out of 128 and 82 out of 128 if it includes tricks such as flying without protection systems. That works out to 30% up to 64% for the German Eurofighters.
Here, quotes Justin Bronk in this section:
Working that back, that would mean 101 Typhoons were not in sustainment, or that 65% is the normal ready rate. If it is true that such a number is well within the top cohort of airforces, then 85-90% shouldn't been viewed as expected but abnormally high.
It's no secret that over the years, China as a country has put a lot of focus on logistics and that has bleed over into the PLAAF. For example, I know there's heavy adoption of blockchain-powered smart contracts in Chinese logistic companies to help provide automated verification of shipping contents. There's also predictive maintenance as tphuang has mentioned and a whole host of other emerging technology integrations. If we match all these techniques along side Chinese industrial capability, it makes sense that China (given sufficient discipline) would have the highest ready rates in the world.
He was also fed up with Internet discussions. Which I can understand. I am a civilian with limited knowledge and even I can see that ~80% of all content is nonsense.Guess the FBI 'invited' him for hamburgers
No, F-35 production is also increasing. And around around 2030 time frame we are looking at 6th gen fighters with probably 1000 plus stealthy drones coming from the US side.
- Status