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Innovative New Chinese UAV Emerges
Jul 1, 2011
By David A. Fulghum, Bill Sweetman
The latest unmanned aircraft pictures from China show a reconnaissance truck with a joined wing and tail that could considerably increase range and payload and produce better handling at high altitudes.
U.S. analysts already are suggesting that the new Chinese UAV design with its 60,000-ft. cruising altitude, 300-mi. radar surveillance range and low radar reflectivity if it uses the right composite structure could serve as the targeting node for Chinas anti-ship ballistic missiles. The ASBM threat against carriers finally has U.S. Navy officials worried.
Photographs emerging from Chinese Internet sources, depicting the aircraft on what is likely Chengdu Aircraft Corporations (CAC) ramp, show a new design featuring a novel joined-wing layout. In the same size class as the General Atomics-Aeronautical Systems Inc. Avenger, and powered by a single turbofan engine, the new UAV is the most advanced Chinese design seen to date and the largest joined-wing aircraft known to have been built.
The company also makes the J-10 strike fighter, the J-20 stealth fighter prototype and a Global Hawk-like maritime reconnaissance UAV called the Xianglong, or Soaring Dragon, which flew in December 2009. CAC officials say it has a wingspan of 75 ft., length of 45 ft. and a cruise altitude of 55,000-to-60,000 ft. Chinese sources credited it with a 7,500-kg (16,500-lb.) takeoff weight and 3,800 nm range. The forebody is bulged to accommodate a high-data-rate satcom antenna.
Joined wings a subset of closed-wing systems comprise a sweptback forward wing and a forward-swept aft wing.
In the new Chinese UAV (as in many such configurations) the rear wing is higher than the forward wing to reduce the effect of the forward wings downwash on the rear wings lifting qualities. The rear wing has a shorter span than the front wing and its downturned tips meet the front wing at a part-span point.
Advocates of the joined wing claim that its advantages stem from the fact that the front and rear wings are structurally cross-braced.
This allows a higher aspect ratio while keeping down weight and staying within flutter limits. A higher aspect ratio reduces drag due to lift, and because the wings are both slender and short-span (relative to a single wing with equivalent lift) the wing chords are short, which makes it easier to achieve laminar flow. The joined wing also can reduce trim drag.
Studies of joined wings go back to the earliest years of aviation, but modern work is traceable to Julian Wolkovitch, a California aerodynamicist.
Wolkovitch worked with Burt Rutan on an early design study, the Model 58 Predator agricultural airplane, and drew up plans to develop a flight demonstrator based on the fuselage of the Ames-Dryden AD-1 skewed-wing aircraft. However, the project was still unfunded when Wolkovitch died in 1991. (Rutan went on to build a different Predator design.)
More recently, Boeing used a joined-wing configuration in its contribution to the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratorys (AFRL) SensorCraft project, aimed at developing an aircraft capable of carrying an airframe-integrated, 360-deg.-coverage, high-resolution radar and remaining on station for 30 hr. at 2,000 nm range.
A small, low-speed free-flight model known as VA-1, with a 14-ft. wingspan, was completed by AFRL in 2003 and test flown.
A model of Boeings Joined Wing SensorCraft was tested last year in NASA Langleys Transonic Dynamics Tunnel under the Air Forces Aerodynamic Efficiency Improvement program.
*ttp://www.aviationweek.com/aw/generic/story_generic.jsp?channel=aerospacedaily&id=news/asd/2011/07/01/02.xml&headline=Innovative%20New%20Chinese%20UAV%20Emerges
They're probably installing some sensitive equipment under its belly.Guys why is it standing on a bunch of blue boxes???? Where is the gear?
The original Xiang Long design has been changed to what you see today. Xiang Long never made it to service, and this is its first test flight since the change. Therefore there is no basic/improved version so to speak, because this is the prototype. In addition, this design can carry armament.
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I thought the DF-21D was guided by the Chinese military guidance satellites. The Soar Dragon when in its URAV mode would most likely serve as a reconnaissance platform or as a guidance aid to anti ship and cruise missiles.
Not enough military guidance satelites. In war situation, US will use many ASAT weapons against Chinese sats so China should have minimum 100 of those guidance sats. It will cost a lot, but increasing defence budget to more than 200billion USD per year and it is easy to do.
^^^ I'm not really a fan of its undercarriage design, reminds me of a baby cart.
China's Pterodactyl UAV
China's Pterodactyl UAV carries HJ-10 anti-helicopter/anti-tank missiles with 10+ km range
"The Pterodactyl is capable of being fitted with a variety of sensors, including a forward-looking infrared turret and synthetic aperture radar;[2] in addition, the aircraft is capable of carrying weapons.[4] The Pterodactyl I's total payload capacity for sensors and weapons is 200 kilograms (440 lb).[2]"
[Note: Thank you to HouShanghai for the pictures.]