This is the best J-11B picture that I can find showing the intakes, indeed it does almost seem like there has been some sort of concious effort not to show them in photos of the type.

I am sure that there are people on here with sharper eyes than me, if you can see any differences between this ana regular Su-27 in terms of the intakes please shout it out!

I don’t really see that much difference on this pic. One has to be upclose to study the intake ramps to see the difference.

Reducing RCS to 3m2 isn’t really a big thing. The difficulty has more of a logarithmic in scale, so that going down from 3m2 to 1m2 is a lot harder than going down from 15m2 to 3m2.

I wonder when people stop referring to the F-35 as light. Its 12-13 tons empty. 😮 😉
The development from F-16A Block 1 to E Block 60 has shown the limitations of the LWF concept. LWF are ok as long as you actually need LWF. The F-16 was forced into roles its not really designed for and its replacement is almost twice the size of the original YF-16. So imho, LWF only fulfill a niche role. The F-16 is not a classic because of the light is better philosophy which failed, but because ~4500 examples have been sold.
What Sprey failed to notice is only when his beloved F-16 is no longer guns/sidewinder, it has actually become useful.

The jury is still out if growing big would be good to fill in roles like CAS.

The experience of small wars around the world shows how quickly small fighters like the F-5E are pushed into CAS roles, like in the Iran-Iraq war.

Sheer tempo is what small fighters can deliver. You turned the Eagle into a fighter bomber, and yet the F-16C still did most of the work.

A quick one Crob, you make some interesting points but it’s 7.30am here and i should really be going to bed now 😉

Absolutely true, but how many times has that wheel been re-invented? You can argue the A6M Zero was an early example of lightweight vs. heavy-because-of-all-the-stuff-we-want-to-cramp-into-our-aircraft. When looking at US types, you’ll continuously see such lightweight ‘competitors’ against the heavies. The XP-77, A4D/A-4, F-104, F-5 and subsequently the F-16 and F-20 are all examples of the light=good school of thought. In the Soviet Union you even had light and heavy counterparts in service: MiG-21 vs Su-7 and -9, MiG-29 vs Su-27.

The lightweight maffia has been around for a long, long time, and just can’t be crushed. The Tejas and J-10 are definately offspring from this line of thought, and by no means ‘new’. Even more so, for embryonic national industries, there simply are less risks involved in developing a satisfactory lightweight then there are in a weight-ain’t-an-issue-let’s-get-ambitious project like the F-111 or F-22/F-23 were, for example.

The wheel has to be reinvented for every generation and faction. Lessons are easily forgotten and have to be forced to be remembered again. Light and heavy fighters are phased out, then reinvented with new technologies. Our light fighters now are capable of active BVRAAM and WOBS with HMS. With this level of lethality, who is to say using a heavier fighter would be more cost effective compared to sending more platforms into the air. In a networked environment, numbers tend to matter in a new and more significant way, because of your ability to appropriate more resources to cover greater areas and achieve higher levels of force concentration and mission generation. 20 Raptors are not going to produce more mission generation over 200 Vipers.

Just as one point, everyone was going into heavies in the sixties, and what happened in Vietnam proved to be a bad wakeup call.

This has a cyclic Zen like pattern, if you go too much to one end, there results in a self correction to turn your direction back. Once you reached the other end, you start moving to the other end again. Somewhere along the line, certain balances are reached. The USAF had actually gone light since the seventies, since the F-16 and F-18 (and maybe the F-15 too) are generally lighter than the F-4 Phantom, F-105 Thunderchief, A-6 Intruder, B-52, and so on that made up the bulk of the Vietnam air war forces. This is by comparing average empty weight of the aircraft vs. the number. Now its swinging to the heavy side again with the Raptor but still putting a foot in the light side with the JSF. Raptor is on the heavy side but it is threatening to make heavier bombers redundant.

Thank you Crobato for your answer. I like reading your responses but not when it comes to star49. Please ignore him but please continue writing your analysis! It’s very interesting.

Other features of the J-11B include the use of a wide area HUD. This is confirmed in video of the J-11B. Think of the HUD used in the Rafale or F-22. In that sense, its better than the J-10 which still uses the thin HUD (ironically Lavi uses a wide area HUD). This is the part of the J-11B’s avionics that are unique from the FC-1 and the J-10, until the latter two is upgraded.

The J-11B also has uses optical/UV MAWS as in Missile Approach Warning System. The MAWS is a set of four, and two of them is visible on the back near the RWR. Don’t know where the other two is. Very interesting feature because it gives the plane “eyes” in the back. Both the J-10 and the FC-1 uses MAWS too.

The J-11B should use the same RWR set as the FC-1 and J-10. I heard it has around 500 radar signatures in its database. That’s quite some ELINT work put on it.

Its not confirmed if the J-11B can use Russian AAMs like R-77 and R-73. Only that it is said to do so.

Modern Chinese jets tend to share a similar set of avionics, so I can expect the J-11B should have that white satlink/datalink somewhere. The question of using the LS-6 and FT-2 satellite positioned bombs is the most likely now for the J-11B, rather than the KD-88, which requires a two seater (J-11S), with the second officer as the man in the loop control.

Guess what: once retired (or only in some very obscure service), they’ll all be classics. As relatively obscure and operationally non-specaculair as they all might be, I do consider the likes of the Q-5, the G.91, the MB326, AJ, QU-22 and Yak-27 to be absolute classics.

We have to look at them seperately and find out through reevaluation.

Now if we’re talking legendary fighters… Then you’ll be getting into the realm of the F-4, MiG-21, SR71, MiG-25 and Mirage III. I can see the F-14 and perhaps the F-15 joining that group, but not any of the current modern fighters. The technical breakthroughs simply aren’t spectaculair or noteworthy anymore: anyone thinking a Subpar Hornet is interesting because of it’s computing power, should become an electronic calculator-geek instead of wasting his time on aircraft. Neither will the F-16 ever be a true classic. It was designed to be a pawn in a chessgame where the real fighting is done by F-15s. Everybody rightfully ignores a Mitsubishi Colt when compared to a Lancer Evo, right?

Legendary fighters may not be classics but neither classics need not be legendary fighters.

Legendary covers the plane’s role in history. but it has no regard to a plane’s flyability, which I think is important for being a classic. An Me-262 is legendary, but is it really flyable? Would you prefer to fly this over, let’s say, the LaGG-5 which is a lot less known?

Technical breakthroughs are not also the point for classicity, or even for legendary status. Waht technological breakthrough is there for the Mitsubishi Zero or F-6F Hellcat?

One argument which might survive is that of the democratisation of the fighter industry. Over the last decades we’ve seen (former) development countries coming up with their own domestic fast jets. While this is obviously a development which started in the late 1940s (Argentina’s Pulqui fighters, Egypt’s HA300, India’s Marut which actually entered service), this is IMHO more an issue of national pride rather then the stuff true legends are made from. The F-CK-1 will rightfully be a classic in the RoC, as will the JF-17 in Pakistan. But that is something due to the fact these machines simply exist, not because of their qualities/character.

Its not about nationalism but about concept. Planes like the JF-17 and the Tejas may yet mark the much needed return to the light, cost effective fighter to the world which the US and Europe has so abandoned (except for the Gripen). Throwing money and electronics into bigger and heavier planes isn’t my idea of being a classic. For many countries, there is just simply a limit in affordability, and there is a point in overdoing it. When a plane is tagged and dies by an ARH missile, it does not matter if it costs 20 million, 60 million or 200 million. And numbers still matter. Two 20 mIllion dollar fighters with ARH missiles have a seriously better chance of killing a 50 million dollar fighter with ARH missile than the other way around. Especially with technological equalizers like ARH and WOBS missiles.

As for the F-16, I know you hate it but it does seriously prove the viability of small is better concept, along with John Boyd’s EM theories, with transient performance as the centerpiece. You cannot get around that less mass means better transient performance, something a light fighter will always have over heavier jets.

The plane is considered an outsider by the USAF and the whole concept is maintained by a vocal few and not by the mainstream of the USAF, which is advocating bigger and more expensive jets. And yet, the plane became the bread and butter of the USAF. It has proven to be the most cost effective, the best bang for the buck of the teen fighters, and one cannot even say that the much more expensive F-15 and F-14 can win a dogfight against one, even against the much maligned F-16C with its high wing loading. Historically it has done the most missions, had the best mission rates.

Sure it looks like the US did its best to proliferate the F-16 around the world. Afterall, Reagan wanted to push its flyaway costs (in 80s dollars) to less than 8 million, and he got it.

But it really didn’t have that much of a competition other than the Mirage 2000, another classic but isn’t really cheaper. All the other US/Euro/Russian competition have been bigger and more expensive to maintain jets. What the rest of the world wanted, including many countries in NATO, is an affordable light jet, and after the F-5E, the F-104, the MiG-21, the Mirage III and the Mirage F-1 is gone, who else is left. The field is suddenly down to two, with no cost advantage to the other. MiG-29s and F-18s are not replacements for light jets, though they have advantages on their own right.

It maybe debatable to some that the F-16C to be a classic, due to its weight, despite being a tough bird. But for me, the F-16A certainly earned that right,. and even today, an F-16A is still very hard to beat by much more modern, much more expensive and electronics jets in BFM combat.

While one talks about technological breakthroughs not being worthy anymore, that for me is hardly an issue. What many modern designs have in common is learning from hindsight. Does refinement count? Yes. Today’s designs are much safer to fly, much more maintainable and easier to fix, for pilots, much more user friendly, and overall, much more reliable and can be counted to be both available and reliable when the mission calls.

The Ching Kuo for example. In the end, probably a mere footnote in fighter history. Yet, it has one of the best safety records for any fighter aircraft. For all the years in service, only two attrited and probably both due to pilot error. Compare that to how many pilots died on the F-104 and the MiG-21.

Here is another fighter. Many will still debate about it being a classic. Many hate it. I call it the Rodney Dangerfield of fighters.

The F-18 Hornet. Judge it by you will. Why? The plane has a great safety record, mission availability and reliability rates. It is robust, and Northrop designs some of the best landing gear in the business. An F-18 will live better on short grass strips better than any of the teen jets and most US fighters in history. Even when brutally damaged, the plane is tough and still gets the pilot home.

Some of the aerodynamic ideas are brilliant, such as using the LERX to route air into the intakes at high AoA. Jack Northrop knew his stuff when he designed these features in the YF-17. Others are questionable though, as Northrop shared Kelly Johnson’s interest on trapezoidal wings. Like the F-104 and the F-5, the YF-17/18 has straight, very thin wings. But unlike the Starfighter which is very long in length and has very short wingspans, the wave drag on the F-18 would have fallen into the wings at a much lower speed than the Starfighter’s. Combined with the LERX, this raises the drag on the planes, which affects their range and top speed. The less than spectacular TWR didn’t help much either. USAF doctrine requires the ability to “dash” out of troublesome situations, but the speed of the F-18 meant it cannot do that, and has to stick around and fight. For the latter though, it is blessed with the best maneuverbility and high AoA characteristics of all the teen jets. The jet is the best example of the point to kill philosophy.

The LERX also creates buffeting effects on the tail which threatens to break the rudders prematurely. That teething problem proved to be solved with brute force, adding a fence on the LERX which even improved high AoA behavior, and reinforcement on the tail.

So here is a jet less than spectacular in looks, design and technology. Yet when it goes down to the details, did many things right. Do we consider it a classic because it is truly one of the most dependable around? Or not a classic because it is a bit too plain and just not sexy enough?

Here’s a question for you: This J11B, do you think it is superior to India’s SU-30MKI?

The J-11B will probably last physically longer due to the airframe changes, but the radar and systems on the MKI is still better. But that’s okay for China because what matters more of them is that the J-11B better than the MKK’s which isn’t better than what the Taiwanese have and they’re not in competition with the MKI.

tell this to FC-1 team first and than the rest of the world.

yes, tell them why 5 of the first 15 engines had to be rejected.

I don’t have to tell the rest of the world as they know the engine sucks already.

It is cleary written in Flagrue report. I dont have to repost so many times.

What report. It is not there. I wonder how they are impressed with they beat the GAF MiG-29.

Does not matter.

Surely u know nothing. these are the middle class of America at best. u havent seen upper class. so how u know who has wealth?
have u seen any building on this planet sold for $4B? that is the hidden wealth that controls everything.

Have you ever really seen upper class? You have no idea who I rub shoulders with. Have you ever paid $1000 just for a dinner ticket to pay for some democrat party fundraising campaign?

U have to understand alot deeper before u know these things. Jewish lobby is on all sides but pretend to be on one side.

You are the one who is in lala land, as if you think the Jewish lobby wants to invest funds on a country that is historically–no even in prsent time—that has prejudiced against Jews? There is a reason why Jews left Russia and are still leaving.

Where is your vast army of rich Russian immigrants trying to reinvest in the country, huh? I know an American in Russia married to a Russian wife, and he works for a translator there. He said life is hard and looking seriously to return to the US

Surely China got every thing from West but from where West got everything?
First u have to make theoretical foundation than U have convert it into mathematical equations than u invent things using material sciences. This is long way to go before things are invented.

Blah blah blah.

Offcourse u havent heard of Software power of current generations. Just look at IBS software in Boeing. five figures salaries were common a decade ago for software speciallist.

So what? Russia is a software power now?

Russian Science is very deep at Fundamental level. looking for superpure materials.

Yeah with the help of the US. how is this impressive by the way? Will it help human quality of life?

http://www.geocities.com/giantfideli/art/CellNEWS_China_SC_symp.html

“Some 21 different research groups from all over China and 14 from Japan, Sweden, Switzerland and United States were represented at the meeting. The Chinese groups came from as far apart as Hong Kong in the south and Haerbin in the north of the country. Still, there are many more groups known in China concentrating their efforts on stem cell and regenerative medical research.”

I am not going into Nasa Ames research and other space stuff.

Oh any Russians there? Does not stop you from taking credit you don’t earn.

I posted two decades old article. u havent heared about Closed Cities and Research unknown to the rest of the world.

and how are the articles relevantant?

they can be of any east euroepan origin. and i dont want to embrass u with Asian immirgration. u are in big denial.

And you cannot tell if they are Asian or Eastern European? Looks to me you are the one in denial. As always.

they are all European but they all got some thing very important from Russian Science. thats the point.

Oh really.

Here is Marie Curie’s educational background.

“Because she was female, and because of Russian reprisals following the Polish 1863 Uprising against Tsarist Russia, Skłodowska was denied admission to a regular university. She worked several years as a private tutor while attending Warsaw’s illegal Floating University and helped support her elder sister Bronisława, who was studying medicine in Paris. Eventually in 1891, having saved up some money earned working as a governess, Maria went to join her elder sister in Paris.

Skłodowska studied mathematics, physics and chemistry at the Sorbonne. (Later, in 1909, she would become the Sorbonne’s first female professor, when she was named to her late husband’s chair in physics, which he had held for only a year and a half before his tragic death). In early 1893, she graduated first in her undergraduate class. A year later, also at the Sorbonne, she obtained her master’s degree in mathematics. In 1903, under the supervision of Henri Becquerel, she received her DSc from ESPCI (École Supérieure de Physique et de Chimie Industrielles de la Ville de Paris), becoming the first woman in France to complete a doctorate.”

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marie_Curie

It is such a shame you want to take credit for something on someone’s work whose nationalilty suffered persecution and discrimination from Russia in addition to sexual discrimination.

I am only referring to Su-35 engine in PaK-FA thread that i just posted. nothing to do with PAK-FA engine.

That still is not certified. Just because it is fitted on a prototype does not mean certification.

1 million is not big for country with u think logically. It is 145million population with 20 million extra illegals and they have bases in former republics also.

It is not 1 million but 1.3 to 1.4 million and that is 1.4% of your population base. Yes that is quite big.

The articles written by this person has zero credibility. he simply cannot digest 80% popularity of Putin.

BS. The article has straight figures.

I can show u alot of things that seem so stupid about Chinese military. It seems they are stuck in 19th century.

Go ahead. I can mention a lot of things that were stupid with the Russian military, like the way they train fighter pilots. In Vietnam War, the Vietnamese disregarded what the Soviets thought them.

Actually i am well travelled person. I know alot of things. especially very high end real estate in many different countries. Japanese are nowwhere to be found. they simply cannot survive outside there own companies and localities.
Global wealth is some thing eles.

Liar and I know you just lied through your teeth. You really have not travelled to many US and Asian cities because many of the top end real estate is still owned by Japanese, like the office buildings. If they’re not Japanese, then its Korean or overseas Chinese. Even mainland Chinese are grabbing properties here and there. Where are the Russians?

It is first time Moscow has beaten Wall Street in wages.

And inflation is a good sign?

Hong is not a country why it needs taxes. and VAT is every where just like Sales tax.

You are an idiot. Hong Kong is a self administrative region, which means China does not pay for its expenses and the money Hong Kong makes, Hong Kong keeps to pay for its own administration and police forces. Why do you think it has a seperate foreign reserve of 113 billion and over for its own? Hong Kong is a country within a country, and runs completely everything on its own with the PRC flag on top for decoration.

VAT is like everywhere? Bull. 20% is hideous.

Profit tax is not worse. when u dont know short term and long term capital gains distribution and corporate tax.

profit tax is the same as the US. So nothing different there, except that US has a lot of exemptions. Aliens are taxed 30% in Russia no matter what. Wow. Maybe you tax some people less because you tax businesses much higher.

what about Income tax than? VAT only applies when u buy things. u have pretty much outside world to store ur wealth.

VAT applies for every transaction. Your income tax is still varied. 13% is not applied to everyone, perhaps just the poor.

You lied about the taxes.

I know that money exclusively used to support US treasury. They didnot have control on there wealth because this wealth does not belong to them to begin with.

But neither is this money belong to Russia either.

Offcourse. Japanese do things to make money by selling stuff at Retail level. that is there level of Science. Japanese simply dont have the financial muscle to do this kind of things in opposition to West because they are so much depended on West. it means there wealth is bogus.

Bull. Japan is far ahead of Russia in everything dealing with electronics, communications, cars, and computers. Not to mention medicine, building and infrastructure construction. Anyone can see the obvious which you are in such denial of, that its so laughable. Do you have photo etching equipment for microchips? eh? Do you have robotic assemblers? Do you have five or six axis milling machines?

If I remember correctly, The Iraqis always found the Mirage F1 to be a lot more effective at taking on Iranian F-4s and F-14s than any of their MiGs. I believe it had something to do with the avionics fit of the F1, especially with the EW and ECM equipment on the Mirage, which was miles ahead of anything supplied by the Soviets.

The Mirage F1 was also responsible for knocking out a lot more Iranian shipping than any MiG-21 or MiG-23 either…:rolleyes:

MiG-21 does not really have much of antishipping capability. But if I remember correctly, the Iranians considered the MiG-21 to be the most annoying and threatening of the Iraqi aircraft when faced air to air.