Well, after listening to Yankee and Shilao spend a significant portion of yesterday's podcast diving into the history of self-developed testbeds from Chinese universities and research institutes, I think the picture is pretty clear now: this is a research project test aircraft. As for what might eventually spin off from this program—well, that’s a conversation for another time.
Mystery aircraft 4th August 2025: CCA vs other
- Thread starter Deino
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I've seen testbeds from universities like the Beihang flying wing demo, most small drones rarely manned aircraft but those tend to be tiny as well. This aircraft seems to be the size of J-36 if not larger there is no way a university without massive military/science funding can afford to build something like this.
Shilao mentioned on the podcast that it’s much larger than the F-60—I’d estimate it’s roughly the size of a heavy fighter. And let’s be honest: in a country where universities are actively researching hypersonic weapons, developing a flight-configuration testbed like this seems entirely within the realm of possibility.
All of those aforementioned fancy projects were actually military projects contracted to university research labs developed using military funding, which is very normal, what isn't normal is university self-funding highly complicated projects like a heavy stealth aircraft without outside incentives/contracts. Such projects costs billions in funding which makes it extremely difficult if not impossible for universities to self-fund.
This is likely just an aerodynamic testbed—no need to validate complex onboard systems. And regarding funding, it’s true that university budgets alone couldn’t cover this. But if it’s a government/military-backed research project (like HPPSARP, for example), then the whole thing starts making sense.
I think it's useful to withhold definitive judgement until better picture evidence of its size emerge.
But if credible people on the Chinese grapevine are suggesting it's a test bed/tech demo and of a relatively large size (bigger than F-60 aka FC-31), then it may be something to consider as a major possibility.
One remaining question would naturally be if it is manned or unmanned.
I feel like the bigger question is what this aircraft is meant to test/demonstrate and whether this is going to be a one off or will lead to a production aircraft. Normally one-off X-planes would usually borrow extensively from production airframe to lower cost but given the supposed size(Said to be larger than F-60/FC-31 with some indications it would be even larger than the J-36) and shape of the aircraft, it'll be difficult to even borrow a landing gear for such an aircraft, much less engines and avionics due to size and aerodynamic layout. IMO, this points to significant investment on this project.
If it's said by the grapevine to be larger than FC-31, that is something that can be entertained.
But I wouldn't take visual estimates of it with much seriousness at this stage yet.
Whether it's going to end up being a production aircraft, who knows. Back in the day, the idea of FC-31 was only a tech demonstrator and there was never a guarantee that the PLA would adopt it for their own use. It is not entirely abnormal if, as of today's PRC aviation industry, that technology demonstrator was developed that is almost a full size heavy tactical aircraft.
My advice is to consider the viable/plausible options, and try to avoid focusing on the most "exciting" or "interesting" options and focus on the least "exciting" instead.
This of course, is assuming the airframe itself is actually the size of a proper heavy tactical aircraft.