Another photo of the J-35 at the production site. Posted by @追风少年小白鲨 on Weibo.
J-35 carrier fighter (PLAN) thread
- Thread starter Deino
- Start date
I'm not even sure what is so surprising to have 30 J-35s built to date. It first flew in 2021, and if we have LRIP airframes built from say 2024 onwards, if anything that still looks like a fairly slow production rate. Hopefully Fujian started operating production J-35s in the recent cruises and maybe they'll show us that soon.
30 or more J-35s is absolutely "within estimates" of how many might exist by now -- the reason why it is slightly surprising is primarily due to a few reasons
- Relatively few production J-35s seen prior to the presence of that 30th produced airframe (prior to this it was the handful of production airframes we saw at the parade last September that we have since observed on CV-18 once or twice)
- That J-35 and J-35A airframes are both undergoing production simultaneously, and as we should have no reason to think J-35A production is occurring any slower than J-35 production, it has certain consequences for what the total number of production J-35 and J-35A might exist today
Putting it another way, if we had seen a confirmed 15th or even 20th production J-35 airframe first before we saw the 30th J-35 airframe, that would've been a little less jarring.
But going immediately to the 30th J-35 (with there likely being many more by now), is a bit eyebrow raising. Still within bounds of estimates, but eyebrow raising nonetheless.
Has complete fidelity been established on whether current production J-35A fighters are powered by pairs of the WS-21 turbofan, or the more advanced, but technologically riskier WS-19 turbofan?
If the J-35A is indeed being powered by the latter, then it's plausible J-35 production is ahead of J-35A production because AECC is still in the process of ramping up WS-19 production.
All production J-35As we've seen so far have been powered by WS-19 as I understand it.
I suppose it's plausible that J-35A production might be slower than that of J-35 if they are bottlenecked by WS-19s, and/or if the priority for J-35A is not as high as for J-35 due to the fact that J-20A/S being in production means the need for land based J-35As in the immediate future is not as high as for carrierborne J-35s.