Shenyang FC-31 / J-31 Fighter Demonstrator
- Thread starter RedSky
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You would design an aircraft for a given radar and design an appropriate radome. When you are starting to test the aircraft you will test the strength and stiffness of the radome too and possibly carry ballast instead of the radar, if only to save the time for fitting that equipment while you will be testing much about that aircraft for which you don't need radar.
AssassinsMace
Lieutenant General
If it is PSed, the person was keen enough to include SAC's trademark empty engine slots with covers.
plawolf
Lieutenant General
Aye, true enough, but as I understand it, the first flying prototype typically have an all metal nose, which is taken up by flight testing equipment such as the air speed tube we see on the J20. It is only with the second or third flying prototype, where you are starting to look at installing a real radar.
OTTOH, I cannot remember another example of a Chinese (or any) fighter which had a radar installed on the first flying prototype.
We only have two blurry photos thus far, but from the looks of it, this prototype does not look like it has an airspeed probe in the nose, and the different paint would strongly indicate that it has a proper radome installed. That all strikes me as a little odd.
As I said, there could be many explanations, maybe it's just a publicity stunt, maybe the pictures are CGI/PSed, maybe this isn't the first prototype and the whole programme is further along than we realise, or maybe SAC is looking to cut some corners to try to achieve a similar induction time as the J20. We just need to wait and see if any more information pops up to gives us a better indication of what is going on with this plane.
plawolf
Lieutenant General
Well I have always speculated that SAC would be aiming the J21 primarily as a 5th gen carrier fighter for the PLANAF since the PLAAF already rejected their design for their land based next gen stealth fighter.
SAC really have a great opportunity here to design the plane the F35 wanted, and probably should have been. It might not be as fancy as the F35, but it shouldn't be anywhere as eye wateringly expensive as the F35, and may actually come out at the price LockMart originally promised the F35 to cost when the programme was first awarded.
With twin engines, the J21 may have a shorter range and less internal space for weapons, but it should hopefully be safer both in terms of operationally and technically, as developing a medium thrust engine should be less technically challenging than designing a high thrust engine, especially if supercruise was not a requirement.
As for not carrier fighters not having a single piece canopy, well that is down to the higher requirement the navy (USN at least) set for the structural strength of carrier fighter canopies compared to air force specs. This in turn is because seabirds tend to be larger than their land base brethren, so when they strike an aircraft, they strike with more force, and a single piece bubble canopy such as those seen on the F22 and J20 would just not be able to withstand that kind of an impact.
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