JF-17 to have best avionics, weapons
from Our Correspondent
ISLAMABAD – The JF-17 Thunder aircraft will have state-of-the-art avionics, weapons and airframe as the first batch of 8 jetfighters rolls out from the assembly plant in mid 2006, a senior PAF official said Friday.
The total number of aircraft in the maiden batch will be 16 and half of the jetfighters will go to China. The aircraft, which according to air force experts, will not only restore air-power balance vis-à-vis India, it rather will give Pakistan an edge over Indian air combat capability.
About 50 per cent parts of the aircraft, which is a joint product of Pakistan and China, will be made by Pakistan—mostly the airframe. The JF-17 Thunder, which will help Pakistan reduce its reliance on US-European generation of fighter aircraft, will have latest BVR (Beyond Visual Range) capability.
The serial production of the aircraft will start in 2007 and China has already placed order for a large number of aircrafts, Chief Project Director of JF-17, Air Vice Marshal Shahid Lateef told journalists. In addition to China, other regional countries are also interested in buying this aircraft, which carries a one fourth price tag as compared to its other contemporaries but is far better in efficiency and fuel consumption.
Like avionics, the weapons in the aircraft are also being manufactured jointly by China and Pakistan. In avionics and weapons the JF-17 Thunder surpasses Pakistan’s so far best bird in the arsenal, US-made F-16, by several paces. The airframe, he said, is a bit inferior to F-16, but otherwise it is a better performer than F-16. “There is no match between the two,” Air Vice Marshal Shahid Lateef said.
To a question he said there was no problem in cash flow for this project and the team will give the best result of the money being spent on this project. He also paid tributes to Chinese cooperation and said no country had any objection to this joint venture. Pakistanis and Chinese scientists, engineers, and test-pilots, he said, were satisfied over the performance of the aircraft and the pace of the project.
During test flights so far, he said, they did not find any difficulty in airframe, avionics, and weapons. This was quite an achievement, he said, adding technologically superior countries such as in Europe took more than 30 years to start production of Euro-fighter aircraft. India spent a whopping $ 3.5 billion to $ 4 billion and took about 25 years to manufacture Light Combat Aircraft, which has become obsolete as the technology used in this series is quite old.
He said the whole team was proud of this achievement and would give more good news within six months time about the development in manufacturing of this aircraft.
He said the transfer of technology was one major part of the joint venture and Pakistan would soon be able to manufacture 100 percent parts of JF-17 aircraft.
The second Proto Type of JF-17 Thunder aircraft flew its successful maiden flight at Chengdu, in China on April 9. The first Proto Type of JF-17 aircraft, which had flown its maiden flight in September last year, is already passing through an extensive flight-testing phase.
The flight of the second Proto-type is considered to be yet another important milestone in the progress of the Project. This aircraft has been manufactured and flown, well before its scheduled date. While these two Proto types of JF-17 are being used for exploring the ‘operational flight envelope of the aircraft, and for testing of the aircraft sub-systems.
Shahid Lateef said the programme so far had met all deadlines successfully and would do the same in future as well as it was essential to market this product in a better way
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