CAC‘s 6th generation fighter prototype/demonstrator

5+ years ago China was flying AL-31s on J-20s which is like 2 generations behind the AL-51. I have higher hopes that the KAAN flies with their domestic engines before the J-36 flies with a variable cycle engine because engine technology took years of development and research to reach each generation requirement, and it is not something you immediately complete with just snapping your fingers.

This is why people should not be disappointed if others suggest ideas that it won't be a true 6th generation aircraft like particularly what the engine performance will be. It is a little difficult to get into the mindset that 2 new aircraft projects from China that look aerodynamically like 2 different stealth UAV projects are another generation from an F-22 or F-35 without giving us some kind of exclusive technology details that makes it one generation ahead. Usually if you claim you are one generation ahead you would have to give some details of why you believe you have the air to air or air to ground superiority that others don't have like do you have quantum radars or something? To me the aircraft doesn't have any new exclusive engine technology and if they did it will take a long while, and I already have a feeling the avionics and missiles will not be all that different from what the west produces or has. No one here even entertained the idea if it has a degree of stealth better than a F-22 or F-35. My current expectations for the aircraft just feel so underwhelming.

You show some projects from the Soviet era. The MiG office is almost gone now.

That is rather bad news for everyone then I guess... how many western military systems are post cold war?

They are screwed.

It is pretty clear MiG will be making the MiG-31 replacement and it is also pretty clear they are making a single engined light jet trainer too, which means they are not almost gone.

Some of the Chinese super planes you keep going on about look suspiciously like MiG prototypes in fact... did they steal the designs or did they hire the Russians  and work with them.  30 years ago the relationship was not very good so I would have said stole, but these days they have the money and they don't have the huge egos that western pricks carry round as baggage. If someone has a production with solutions you want you buy it...

Russia has the technology to deliver metal penetrators to targets at speeds where the heating on those materials is close to the temperature of the sun and you think they don't have the materials or the skills to make something that reenters the atmosphere where the compression temperatures will be higher than flying at such hypersonic speeds

Maybe they should just destroy their Zircon missiles and never both making such systems because clearly they can't design materials or shapes for things flying at such speeds because some guy on the internet thinks MiG is over.

How many new aircraft designs has MiG created in the last decades? Not even any space ones? The MiG office is dead. Presenting some designs from the height of the USSR's power is ridiculous.

You are in denial... The MiG department of the UAC is developing new aircraft... which is what a design bureau does.

The economic situation and political situation might determine whether the Russian military buys it or not, but that is not their problem.

They have working scramjet engines and they have heat resistant metals that they have developed since the end of the cold war that will allow them to make aircraft designs that were simply not possible during the cold war. They also have supercomputers and design equipment to allow them to test all sorts of different shapes and structures using all sorts of new propulsion systems and materials that were not available then either.

Garry lives surrounded with warm memories of his younghood

No. Garry lives around flame baiting arseholes who want to wind him up because they don't think he will ban them... but occasionally I have a few drinks and I can become quite a different person.

I don't turn green or anything... but my patience disappears and my good nature recedes...

Like everything, lets wait a bit to see what these actually are... hypersonic is a very loose term that could mean anything at all.

The whole structure of UAC was to prevent Russian design bureaus from going under because of neglect or the domination or one or other bureaus.

In the west and even in Asia, as famous car companies collapse and get bought or merge with other companies lots of famous names are going to disappear, but that is perfectly normal too. Company names from 80 years ago are not the same as the top company names now... Apple and Google couldn't exist then.

The MiG-31 is probably one of the two or three most successful fighters Russia has at the moment.

Its replacement is assured.

My current expectations for the aircraft just feel so underwhelming.

Another important factor is WTF is a 6th gen fighter... what defines it? And what authority do they have to make those claims.

I could claim if a 5th gen fighter does not have a coffee cup holder that can withstand inverted flight or sustained 10g manouvering then it s not a 5th gen fighter.

I remember claims that a 5th gen fighter can supercruise, and was even part of the reason for the ridiculous single engine fitted to the F-35 yet it seems the F-35 can't supercruise in most configurations... does that mean it is a 4th gen fighter?

Depends on who is telling the story.

Also to be clear these are prototypes and technology demonstrators and some members make it sound like they are in serial production already...

I understand the US makes planes without developing them first... leading to lots of headaches in service because they don't work properly yet, but China does not play those games AFAIK, and neither does Russia.

If frustrates these children that proper tests are done first before serial production starts, but it leads to a better product... experience in the Ukraine shows you which team has the right idea...

What new planes has France developed in the last 20 years?

What new planes has Germany developed in the last 20 years?

What new planes has the UK developed in the last 20 years?

A pic is worth a thousand words.

MiG-31 being used in the Ukraine conflict as the only aircraft capable of carrying Kinzhal missiles:



New light single jet engined trainer they are working on to replace the L39 called the MiG-UTS:



But of course no photos of the actual UTS or MiG-41 or light single and twin engined 5th gen fighters from MiG because they are secret.

The Su-75 on the other hand needs funding so it is not secret because it is looking for customers...

The JSF programme is more than 20 years old... as is Typhoon and Rafale and Gripen and F-22... the only really new designs are Chinese and Sukhoi, but they have funding.

I see that the MiG factory is now moving into this thread!

How the heated discussion about MiG vs Sukhoi got into this, too ?

It's a Soviet era aircraft that's not in production now. That's it. I don't deny the success of the MiG office in Soviet times. However, it's a bankrupt office now and it won't design a new PAK DP interceptor.

The EF and Rafale are good planes for conflicts in Libya and Syria, but the companies that make them are bankrupt and decaying and cannot come up with anything new... even the Tempest is a Typhoon with slightly more stealthy shape and the canards removed... there is no innovation and they have no new ideas and the only countries buying their products do so more for political reasons than because they are good aircraft.

MiG is working on new aircraft and the fact that you are butt hurt over that is just amusing... or is the problem that they are not talking a lot about their new projects the problem?

The goals of the light 5th gen fighter is that it is cheap to buy and cheap to operate while being actually stealthy and be able to perform most missions with internal weapons and fuel and thereby retain its stealth until the battle determines a bomb truck is needed when it can start using external pylons to increase the death it deals.

The available known western 5th gen light fighters simply don't exist because they are more expensive than 4th gen fighters that would be better at the same role.

There are very few actual western 5th gen aircraft and you are talking about a mythical 6th gen that some reporters or marketing department ghouls have just made up to represent its superiority over everything with a lessor number.

Experience in the Ukraine suggests 4th gen fighters do the job just fine most of the time, but that 5th gen fighters have value.

There are not enough 5th gen fighters in service to justify needing a 6th gen fighter... the only combat proven sensible 5th gen fighter is the Su-57... everything else is marketing and bullshit. The F-35 and F-22 might have seen combat but don't seem to have done anything the previous generation could not have done better and cheaper.

Chinas 4th gen fighters would be more than a problem for US and western 5th gen fighters because currently they are crap, but of course China is just taking a technology and moving it forward... as we have seen in all sorts of areas the west is happy to create a useful technology (whether they actually develop it or buy it or steal it from different places and call it their own) and then rent that technology to other countries using it is political and military and commercial power to maintain a monopoly, and therefore also a steady comfortable income.

Imagine if the guys making roads and footpaths charged a usage tax... you could make a dozen important roads and footpaths in central cities and essentially retire on the income. Of course just moving around would then become rather expensive... but the people earning that money don't care about that.

So I was reading in the military aviation news thread for the Russian AF and I found a post by Lancelot....

This is the article he posted:

Tupolev Design Bureau solved the problem of airframe heating when flying at hypersonic speeds
04.11.2023

PJSC Tupolev has patented a hypersonic aircraft with a combined power plant, including two turbojet engines running on jet fuel and another one on cryogenic fuel. About it reports TASS with reference to the description of the invention to the patent.

The invention is designed to solve the problem of airframe heating when flying at supersonic and hypersonic speeds, caused by the interaction of external surfaces with the oncoming air flow.

“When a turbojet engine using cryogenic fuel operates, the aircraft accelerates to hypersonic speed. At the same time, due to the increased friction of the outer parts of the airframe with the air, they are intensively heated and to continue a long flight at hypersonic speed they need to be cooled. For this purpose, cryogenic fuel is supplied from the tank through pipelines to the hottest parts of the aircraft airframe and engine, as a result of which intensive gasification of cryogenic fuel occurs in the pipelines. This process is endothermic in nature, in which heat is absorbed from the heated parts of the aircraft airframe and engine. The heated cryogenic fuel turns into gaseous form and is fed into the engine combustion chamber and afterburner to create thrust,” the description explains.

In a hypersonic aircraft, thermally stable T-6 or T-8B grade fuel can be used as aviation kerosene, and liquefied natural gas or liquefied hydrogen can be used as cryogenic fuel.

Among the authors of the invention is Honored Designer of Russia Valery Benderov, who in 2012-2019 served as program director - chief designer of the multifunctional flight modeling complex (LMK-214), leading design engineer at the Tupolev Design Bureau.

https://aviation21.ru/okb-tupoleva-reshilo-problemu-nagreva-planera-pri-polyote-na-giperzvukovyx-skorostyax/

So in 2023 Tupolev patented a hypersonic bomber design that uses THREE engines...

PJSC Tupolev has patented a hypersonic aircraft with a combined power plant, including two turbojet engines running on jet fuel and another one on cryogenic fuel. About it reports TASS with reference to the description of the invention to the patent.

Imagine that....

Wonder what sort of person would see a Chinese aircraft design with three engines who might have thought it could be a high speed aircraft?