Air Power Australia (APA) has just released a lengthy preliminary study on the low observable potential of the Chinese J-20 fighter aircraft. Some parts of it can only be understood by engineers.
The parts that can be understood by a non-engineer reveal the following.
1.The U.S. leadership has very little credibility in their statements about the potential threat of this aircraft. One may believe that the J-20 does qualify as a “capability surprise”.
2.The U.S. does not know the current ability of Chinese engineering skill in the area of low observable materials (radar absorbent skin and radar absorbent material).
3.The rules of low observable aircraft design are shaping, shaping, shaping and material. The APA paper looks at the shaping of the J-20 aircraft. The APA paper also takes a look at the potential effects of known radar absorbent material with the J-20 design.
4.APA has determined that the J-20 has the potential to be a very-low-observable (VLO) design if China can make it so. In this area of concern, the J-20 design has growth potential.
"In conclusion, this study has established through Physical Optics simulation across nine frequency bands, that no fundamental obstacles exist in the shaping design of the J-20 prototype, which would preclude its development into a genuine Very Low Observable design."
All of this is important because the U.S. has ended production of the F-22. Out-going U.S. Secretary of Defense Gates theory that the U.S. will have several hundred “fifth-generation” fighter aircraft in the 2020’s holds no water. In any event, if the J-20 is successful, it will be produced in a number that will make the 120 or so combat coded F-22s just not enough to secure future U.S. air superiority needs.
Some will say the authors of the APA paper don’t have access to the classified information involved in such programs. This is true. However, just because a program is classified, does not mean the engineers get to ignore the laws of physics.
4 comments:
What now Spudman?
LM pork is correct.
I am actually more concerned about China and its financial ability to realize the J-20's VLO potential than I am Russia with the PAKFA. This concern is compounded by China's rising need for oil and their coziness with countries like Iran.
I appreciate the effort put in here and know that APA has it's detractors. I see a couple of problems here but FIRST I want to say to those detractors: if we don't have people that are willing to go against the grain or against the military industrial complex and the big boy message, how are we supposed to know what the heck is going on? I am sick and tired as a taxpayer of always hearing: "civilians don't know anything" or "don't worry, trust us! we have access to classified info and you don't!" Personally, that's BS!, be it from LMT, stock market barons or Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster and governments, it is always the same message: don't worry, you don't have the info to judge, don't worry it's late or over budget or it's safe, sure you can eat that!....Or my favorite: don't worry, housing prices will always go UP for EVER!LOL
The problems I see and I am sure there are others, well, I am no software engineering so is this a good program? Does it have the right level of sophistication and detail to give good results? This is where a third party person could give us some insight. Also with so much guess work concerning Chinese RAM and level/quality of manufacturing of J20, shouldn't it be difficult to get a reliable/ meaningful result? I am guessing here but wouldn't even one erroneous value have big consequences on LO? Also canards were touched upon but can they really be "ignored"?
I saw a lot of renderings and some pretty colors but what exactly are we looking at? Without some baseline or comparison, I think it is wrong to take a simulation of J20 and pit those results against real world fighters. Seems to me we are comparing apples to oranges. If you want to do that, I know it would be time consuming and all but you need to use the same software and values and plug in F22/F35/PAKFA. Then you are comparing all these fighters together, even if results aren't precise and don't exactly conform with reality which is classified, I think it would be fairer and more "appropriate", then you can make commentaries on the results, IMHO.
Again,thank you APA for at least giving us a different point of view and I can't wait to hear from detractors.
Interesting - as always. I would like so see the same analysis applied to the F-35, F-22, PAK-FA and a referece 4th generation fighter.
B. Bolsøy
Oslo
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