J-20 5th Generation Fighter VII

banjex said:

I don't believe it's ahead of the F-35, but it's still a big number. Russia can't produce 55 previous gen jets lol

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It can (lines that easily produced more fighters of a single type are still there). The same is true for "57" production - because production is ultimately but a function of designed line capability, and ability to sustain it. What will it do with them then, though?

PLAAF has quite a requirement for J-20A(in several hundred, perhaps even high hundreds-numbered standing force). VKS fighter force literally has to expand to absorb more, and doing that isn't exactly free. Especially with heavy fighters.
Especially now, when they do that fighting thing, and their maintenance expenditure is up from an already high peacetime pricetag.

Russia has four factories which produce fighters. KnAAPO (Su-35, Su-57), NAPO (Su-34), Irkutsk Aviation Plant (Su-30), and Sokol Aircraft Plant (MiG-35, Yak-130). Each factory could probably produce two dozen aircraft a year if they wanted to. Right now a significant amount of available factory capacity is being used for aircraft upgrades. Like the Su-34M, Su-30SM2, and MiG-31BM programs. Some new Su-35, Su-57, Yak-130, and Su-34 or Su-30 aircraft are being built however. My guess is they are currently building 40+ new aircraft a year for the Russian Air Force.

ACuriousPLAFan said:

@伏尔戈星图 on Weibo claimed that Factory 132 (i.e. CAC) handed over 16 J-20s during the 2nd quarter of 2023, and managed to reach the target(?) around one week ahead of the end of June.

He also claimed that the eventual annual production rate of J-20 for 2023 should be around 55-60, which is 10 more than 2022.

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He is not even remotely reliable on production rate.

Official wechat from CAC said they delivered 100th J-20 around the end of 2021 and the CB07156 was spotted via official photo release by the end of 2022. Following this logic, CAC has produce at least 60 J-20s during 2022 and the second main assembly plant didn't even look finished until the third quarter.

And @伏尔戈星图 is suggesting CAC will either reduce or maintain the current delivery rate even if the assembly plant expanded at the same time. He is also contradicting with every other sources and evidences and holds a strong bias on Chengdu over Shenyang so I have no idea why he is insisting on wrong methodology after all these evidences. It is literally like insisting Type 003 is nuclear in 2023.

Btw Changchun airshow is releasing their tickets, hopefully they could send some fresh J-20 out of production line to give us an idea on how far they have been.

CAC J-20 factory update:

Local blogger takes a photo outside of new factory buildings.

It seems that Shilao is agreeing that J-20 production rate is near 100.
Another source claimed the new building is for test facility not assembly plant and also an indirect response to @伏尔戈星图's claim.

@天真卖萌Bernard:年产三位数五代机是这样子的
Shilao: This is what a three-digit annual production of five-generation aircraft looks like.
052D成都舰 :航空装备实验基地项目，极大压缩研制生产交付流程，另外最近有人胡说什么季度集中交付，这是屁话，谁信谁哈批
(This is) aviation equipment experimental base project, greatly compressed development and production delivery process, in addition to the recent nonsense that CAC is delivering in quarterly schedule, which is bullshit.



Source:

ACuriousPLAFan said:

@伏尔戈星图 on Weibo claimed that Factory 132 (i.e. CAC) handed over 16 J-20s during the 2nd quarter of 2023, and managed to reach the target(?) around one week ahead of the end of June.

He also claimed that the eventual annual production rate of J-20 for 2023 should be around 55-60, which is 10 more than 2022.

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As was said earlier, there are no ways CAC produced less than 60 J-20s in 2022, unless we had missed a production ramp-up that happened earlier. That is unlikely and the CAC facility is currently larger than it has ever been.

ACuriousPLAFan said:

In retrospect, like, seriously?? Isn't the annual production rate of the J-20 is expected to reach ~100 units this year?? Seeing the claims of a mere 55-60 is rather shocking, to-be-honest.

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Patchwork did display a depth of knowledge but always take claims of access to classified info with a grain of salt. Patch likely did have access to US classified info but how can we be sure US info is correct? We can't. This extends to this Weibo user too. How he got these numbers? How he is sure they are truthful?

ACuriousPLAFan said:

Besides, in that case - Speaking in terms of pilot resources across the PLAAF and PLANAF: All the remaining 200+ J-7s which are slated for retirement by the end of this year certainly didn't match with the expected rollout rate of new fighters from both CAC (J-20) and SAC (J-16) this year either...

Meanwhile, looking at LockMart with the annual production rate of the F-35 already passing 100 units for years now... man...

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All militaries are getting smaller. LM's F-35 production rate is mostly irrelevant to China. LM is producing for 10+ countries. Even if China procures just 70 J-20s this year that is still enough for now. China will have 350+ VLO fighters by the middle of the decade. That is a lot.

BoraTas said:

As was said earlier, there are no ways CAC produced less than 60 J-20s in 2022, unless we had missed a production ramp-up that happened earlier. That is unlikely and the CAC facility is currently larger than it has ever been.

Patchwork did display a depth of knowledge but always take claims of access to classified info with a grain of salt. Patch likely did have access to US classified info but how can we be sure US info is correct? We can't. This extends to this Weibo user too. How he got these numbers? How he is sure they are truthful?

All militaries are getting smaller. LM's F-35 production rate is mostly irrelevant to China. LM is producing for 10+ countries. Even if China procures just 70 J-20s this year that is still enough for now. China will have 350+ VLO fighters by the middle of the decade. That is a lot.

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Even if just take ~160 as in service by 2022 december and then goes with the 60 a year, that would already yield 160 + 8 x 60 = 640 by end of year 2030 and ~580 by start of the year.

And well, we know of production increases, so just going with the 600+ as a minimum is likely gonna be quite the understatement not to mention yours 350+.

Michaelsinodef said:

Even if just take ~160 as in service by 2022 december and then goes with the 60 a year, that would already yield 160 + 8 x 60 = 640 by end of year 2030 and ~580 by start of the year.

And well, we know of production increases, so just going with the 600+ as a minimum is likely gonna be quite the understatement not to mention yours 350+.

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IMO 950 by the end of 2030 is a realistic minimum. Up to 1100 is still realistic.

BoraTas said:

IMO 950 by the end of 2030 is a realistic minimum. Up to 1100 is still realistic.

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Is a dedicated heavy air superiority force this big necessary in the first place?
The Cold War United States tended to go for the 750 as a production goal.

Gloire_bb said:

Is a dedicated heavy air superiority force this big necessary in the first place?
The Cold War United States tended to go for the 750 as a production goal.

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Why is it not necessary? Overwhelming numerical advantage would be one way to achieve hard power that china needs.

China shouldn't use USAF as guideline on how many j20s it needs. If it can produce 100/year at lower unit cost, then it should do so.

Gloire_bb said:

Is a dedicated heavy air superiority force this big necessary in the first place?
The Cold War United States tended to go for the 750 as a production goal.

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If you have more air dominance fighters than needed to achieve air dominance in a fight, you can always use them to delivery air to ground munitions, especially if said air dominance fighters are VLO. OTOH, if you don’t have enough air dominance fighters and the enemy achieve air dominance, all your bombers are just really expensive targets for the enemy now.

Western bean counting and obsession with multirole over pure-bred air dominance was a historic mistake borne out of complacency and laxity from a rare and brief period where western air forces could assume air dominance as a given without needing to devote significant resources and effort into attaining it. Those days are long past and China would be a fool to repeat their mistakes.