What's new

Chinese hypersonic research

Do you believe this news is true?

  • Yes.

    Votes: 24 85.7%
  • No.

    Votes: 4 14.3%
  • Well ,There is such a project, but the speed performance is hardly faster than SR-71.

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • Total voters
    28
So in the month of September 2015, we have or will have

(1) unveiled the DF-21D and DF-26D RASM(ASBM)
(2) successful conclusion of WS-15's high altitude tests
(3) 4th gen AAM PL10 and PL15 completion tests hitting targets
(4) J-2016 maiden flight
(5) J-10C spotted with the 14000kgf WS-10G
(6) WZ-10 completed for Z-20, new heavy attack helicopter in development and future high-speed stealth helicopters
(7) a mysterious type of hypersonic vehicle making first flight at a flight test centre
(8) CZ-6 maiden flight carrying 20 payloads
(9) CZ-11 maiden flight

WZ-10
102214k0o0ghz1ozow0kgz.jpg.thumb.jpg


Anything else of significance that I have missed?

Oh yes, the development of PL-21(an ultra long range AAM)is proceeding to plan and schedule.

Anything else?

WOW!

Absolutely incredible progress.
 
09.29.151:05 AM ET

Did China Just Hit Mach 5?

By David Axe

A news report describes a landmark event: the flight of an airplane that can go twice as fast as the Concorde. Then, just as quick, the report vanishes. What just happened?

On a night apparently in early September, at a flight test center somewhere in China, a dark-painted airplane reportedly took off on a momentous mission—to fly faster than five times the speed of sound then return safely to Earth.

The airborne experiment, allegedly involving a manned aircraft with a human pilot aboard, marked a huge leap forward for China as it competes with the United States to develop warplanes and missiles capable of so-called “hypersonic” flight—so fast that they’re almost impossible to shoot down or dodge.

Yes, the September test was a massive technological step. But only if ... it actually happened. For as suddenly and dramatically as the news of the aerial trial broke, it quickly evaporated. Now it’s not clear what, if anything, actually occurred in the sky over that Chinese airfield.

Reporter Qi Shengjun from China Aviation News is, so far, the sole source for the potentially world-changing development, one that could give Beijing an enormous military edge over Washington. In a dispatch dated Sept. 18, Qi breathlessly described the nighttime test—the "roar of the engine," the dark-painted aircraft as it “disappeared in the sky,” the “excitement” and “indescribable emotion” of the test team on the ground.

“A few hours after takeoff, the task is complete,” Qi wrote, adding a literary fluorish as he compared the test plane’s landing to the sheathing of a sword. “When the ‘aircraft brake’ instruction is issued, this mission comes to a successful conclusion. The original anxiety and tension is instantly released—applause, laughter sounding in the control room.”

“The flight test center achieved a breakthrough in the field of hypersonic flight.”

But Qi’s news report appeared only briefly at the state-run Website of China Aviation News. A few days later, the story was gone—either retracted or censored.

The Chinese Communist Party keeps a close eye on the country’s media and routinely suppresses stories it's not comfortable with. An army of censors working for the Public Security Bureau scours news sites and blogs and other social media sites, yanking any material considered politically sensitive. The censors pay close attention to any Web content describing Chinese military capabilities.

Now, at any other time the Party might have been happy to celebrate yet another breakthrough in China’s rapidly-developing high-tech weapons industry. But mid-September marked Chinese president Xi Jinping’s first official visit to the United States.

In talks with U.S. president Barack Obama, Xi struck a conciliatory tone—vowing to crack down on cybercrime, for instance, and also proposing to team up with the U.S. government to shut down the illegal ivory trade that’s driving the slaughter of an estimated 30,000 elephants every year.

Maybe September wasn't the best time to shove a new hypersonic aircraft test in America’s face. Maybe Qi’s report was overeager; hypersonic engineering is a notoriously difficult-to-master discipline.

Whatever the reason, Qi’s dispatch disappeared. But that shouldn't necessarily cast doubt on the underlying premise of his reporting. For years now—decades, even—China and the United States have been making uneven progress toward the very kind of high-tech achievement Qi described.

Hypersonic aircraft are not new. In October 1967, the X-15 rocket plane—the product of collaboration between the U.S. Air Force and NASA—achieved Mach 6.7 with pilot William Knight at the controls. That speed record for a manned aircraft still stands.

More recently, the Pentagon has been tinkering with a number of unmanned hypersonic missiles and gliders that it hopes to turn into weapons someday. But it’s no easy task to design a vehicle that can travel faster than Mach 5 reliably and safely while also being affordable.

Around half of recent U.S. hypersonic tests have ended in failure. More than 40 years after the X-15’s first flight, the Pentagon is still struggling to deploy a hypersonic aircraft it can use in day-to-day operations.

Undaunted, in 2013 Lockheed Martin proposed to build a Mach-6 spy plane for the Air Force. “Speed is the next aviation advancement to counter emerging threats in the next several decades,” Brad Leland, Lockheed Martin's hypersonicsprogram manager, said in a company press release.

Not to be outdone, Boeing is working on a prototype drone space plane for the military's fringe-science Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. The company hopes the XS-1 will reach speeds up to Mach 10, allowing the robotic plane to boost small rockets into low orbit starting as early as 2019.

While America doggedly pursued high-speed aircraft, China raced to catch up. A few years ago, Beijing built the world's largest wind tunnel capable of simulating conditions up to Mach 9. In 2012, China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation tested a new rocket-style, solid-fuel engine for hypersonic flights. Two years later, Chinese engineers began a series of tests of a Mach-10 glider called the WU-14 that could form the basis of a new missile or drone.

The new research warranted a mention in the 2015 edition of the Pentagon's annual report on the Chinese military. Beijing “is developing and testing several new classes and variants of offensive missiles, including hypersonic glide vehicles,” the report warned.

But if Qi’s reporting is accurate—if a manned hypersonic plane just completed a successful first flight—and if that plane someday proves suitable for routine use, then China would no longer just trying to catch up to the United States when it comes to flying Mach 5 or faster.

Indeed, China might have zoomed right past America, potentially taking the lead in super-speedy airplanes.

Did China Just Hit Mach 5? - The Daily Beast
 
David axe? i thought he is regarded a spook by some members here?

Not any clear info to assure that plane is real. It could be just a rumor like many other rumors.
Please update more details, spread wide rumor with 1960 design of US planes or engine pod of B53 ... wouldn't make it real, but bigger imaginary.
 
Last edited:
IOC when?


Sorry, but we are still discussing if, when, with what result and even more powered by what engine, if manned or unmanned ... to think about a possible IOC is a bit too far fetched ?

Deino
 
A text passage possibly pertaining to a potential hypersonic aircraft project:

Specificaitons:
- Max speed: Mach 6
- Service ceiling: 40000 m
- Combat radius: 8000 km

image.jpg
 
A text passage possibly pertaining to a potential hypersonic aircraft project:

Specificaitons:
- Max speed: Mach 6
- Service ceiling: 40000 m
- Combat radius: 8000 km

View attachment 265352

One of many hypersonic projects

Looks like China is pouring a huge amount of resources into the research and development of RBCC and TBCC powered hypersonic vehicles。
 
U.S. Hypersonic Researchers Question Chinese Scramjet Pronouncement | Technology content from Aviation Week

China’s success in flying a scramjet-powered hypersonic aircraft, trailing the U.S. by no more than a few years, reveals that its engineers have overcome severe cooling problems first mentioned five years ago. The successful test, announced in October, followed the January 2014 flight of a Chinese hypersonic glider.

The China Society of Aeronautics and Astronautics says the engine of the aircraft, which must have been unmanned and probably quite small, is the world’s first kerosene-burning scramjet with regenerative cooling. This is at odds with the Boeing X-51A WaveRider, in which fuel cooled the engine while being heated to improve combustion, flown in the U.S in 2010 and again in 2013.

The society announced the Chinese success to recognize the achievements of the project leader, Wang Zhenguo. A professor at the National University of Defense Technology, Wang led the research and development team for more than 20 years, from concept to planning and system integration. This involved “development and production in a nationally important project for a certain type of hypersonic aircraft,” the society says. Wang, referred to as the chief designer, was also in charge of flight testing.

As a result, China has become only the second country, behind the U.S., to independently fly such an aircraft, the society says. Chinese media quoted the society as making these statements in a report on its award to Wang.

On its website, csaa.org.cn, the society says Wang has undertaken pioneering research on scramjets and their ground and flight testing, achieving a leap in technology. Among his responsibilities has been an unnamed “large and important national project”—which sounds like a priority weapon system.

The date of the Chinese test is not disclosed, except that it came after the X-51A’s fourth and final, fully successful flight in May 2013. The first flight of the U.S. scramjet-powered experimental aircraft in May 2010 was successful, but shorter than planned. Two failures followed.

China revealed details of ongoing studies of regeneratively cooled scramjets in 2010 but acknowledged problems with uneven temperature and heat-flux distribution thatweresevere enough to cause local plasticity in the flow-path structure. This early work, undertaken at the China Aerodynamics Research and Development Center in Mianyang and at NorthwesternPolytechnical University in Xian, openly recognized the earlier scramjet developments made by Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne (now part of AerojetRocketdyne).

At that time, Pratt & Whitney was developing the SJX61-2 scramjet, cooled by its JP7 fuel, to power the X-51A, a missile-size demonstrator built by Boeing for the U.S. Air Force. The vehicle achieved sustained flight above Mach 5 on its final test in 2013 and proved the practical viability of an air-breathing, scramjet-powered hypersonic vehicle.

Although no follow-on demonstrators were funded, developers hoped to investigate future propulsion systems fueled by RP-1, RP-2 or JP-10. Denser than JP-7, JP-10 is a special high-flash-point fuel originally used by the Lockheed SR-71. In all cases, the key issue was the fuel’s endothermic, or heat-absorbing, capability. All these fuels are essentially kerosene, with additives.

The final X-51A flight ended after 210 sec. under scramjet power when its fuel was exhausted. It proved JP-7 could successfully cool the engine and in doing so be preheated to an optimum temperature for combustion. Such recycling of extracted heat is regenerative cooling.

The Chinese claim to have successfully tested the first kerosene-burning scramjet with regenerative cooling is therefore puzzling to senior propulsion specialists who were involved in the X-51A project. Some speculate the Chinese could be making a distinction between JP-7 and standard kerosene, or possibly between a scramjet and a dual-mode propulsion system. The X-51A was first accelerated to hypersonic speeds by a rocket booster after air launch from a B-52, then flew under the power of its scramjet engine.

On Jan. 9, 2014, China tested a hypersonic glider the Pentagon dubbed WU-14. Launched by an intercontinental ballistic missile, it was presumably a demonstrator or prototype for an unpowered warhead that would exploit lift to extend range and confound defenses with maneuvers. Conceivably, the WU-14 could have been used to test the flight control system for the powered hypersonic aircraft that has now been flown.
 
Back
Top Bottom