Zitat:NORINCO (China North Industries Corporation) is developing a new VP10 wheeled armored personnel carrier for the China Army amd export.

NORINCO VP10 is an amphibious wheeled armored personnel carrier will be amphibious and air-transportable by Il-76 or Y-20.

Zitat:Amid high tensions in the South China Sea, Beijing announced it conducted large-scale military drills at both air and sea on Tuesday, focusing on new information warfare systems.

With over 100 ships and dozens of aircraft, state-run China Military Online reported that Beijing conducted large, live-ammunition drills in the South China Sea.

According to the Chinese Defense Ministry, the exercises concentrated on integrating information warfare systems between air and naval defense, and accomplished "new breakthrough" in China’s military capabilities.

Using a variety of new weapons, as well as "all sorts of information technology tactics," military forces were able to successfully conduct anti-submarine drills, intercept supersonic anti-ship missiles, and engage with high-speed low-altitude targets.

Zitat:Last month, the Philippines conducted massive joint drills with the United States and Japan. This followed an announcement in April that the US would begin holding regular exercises with Indonesia, a move seen as being a direct message to Beijing.

Zitat:China previews new ballistic missiles in practices for 3 September parade

Rehearsals in late August for the 3 September parade in Beijing commemorating the 70th anniversary of Japan's surrender in China provided the first views of some new missiles in the People's Liberation Army (PLA) Second Artillery Corps' service.

If the parade includes the same kit as the rehearsal, the Dong Feng (DF, East Wind) DF-15B short-range ballistic missile (SRBM), DF-16 medium-range ballistic missile (MRBM), DF-21C MRBM, DF-26 intermediate range ballistic missile (IRBM), the warhead section of the DF-5B intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM), the DF-31A ICBM, and the DF-10 land attack cruise missile (LACM) will be shown publically the first time.

Zitat:China showcases new weapon systems at 3 September parade

The central event of the 3 September commemoration of the 70th Anniversary of the Chinese People's War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression and the World Anti-Fascist War in Beijing was a military parade that saw the first 'official' revelation of many new weapon systems.

Zitat:DF-26 IRBM may have ASM variant, China reveals at 3 September parade

One of the surprising revelations from Chinese television announcers during the 3 September military parade marking the 70th anniversary of the end of the Second World War was that the newly revealed DF-26 intermediate-range ballistic missile (IRBM) may have an anti-ship variant.

Zitat:China to Fly FC-31 Stealth Fighter by 2019

Zitat:A year after unveiling the FC-31 stealth fighter, Chinese officials say a production version of the fifth-generation aircraft — the country’s answer to the American-made F-35 Joint Strike Fighter — will fly by 2019, according to multiple news reports.

Li Yuhai, deputy general manager at China’s Aviation Industry Corp., known as Avic, and Lin Peng, the FC-31’s chief designer, were on hand at the Dubai Airshow this week to talk about the program.

Tony Osborne, a reporter for Aviation Week & Space Technology, reported:

“With a first flight planned for 2019, an initial operating capability would occur in 2022 or 2023, and the aircraft would be fully operational two years later.”

What’s more, the FC-31 is apparently no longer simply intended for export, as the officials said talks were underway to supply the aircraft to the People’s Liberation Army Air Force, the article states.

The state-run China Radio International reported that Peng said fighter can be tailored to suit specific requirements from customers:

“The users can designate domestic or International suppliers to provide communications equipment, sensors and guided weapons.”

The aircraft, also known as the Shenyang J-31, was unveiled at the 2014 Zhuhai Air Show. It was the event’s star attraction, marking the first time Chinese authorities allowed a plane that was still in development to be displayed to the public.

A model of the aircraft was displayed abroad for the first time this week at the Dubai Airshow in the United Arab Emirates (see photo above).

The plane is made by Shenyang Aircraft Corp., a subsidiary of Avic, and resembles the U.S. military’s F-35 Joint Strike Fighter manufactured by Lockheed Martin Corp., though with two engines rather than one. The pair of Russian-made Klimov RD-93 engines are a variant of the propulsion systems found on the Mikoyan MiG-29.

Pakistan is considering buying between 30 and 40 of the Chinese aircraft to replace American-made F-16s for close air support, air interdiction and other missions.

November 12th, 2015

Zitat:Chinese Scientists Unveil New Stealth Material Breakthrough

Zitat:Planes and warships just got a lot harder to see with microwave radar.

A group of scientists from China may have created a stealth material that could make future fighter jets very difficult to detect by some of today’s most cutting-edge anti-stealth radar.

Zitat:The researchers developed a new material they say can defeat microwave radar at ultrahigh frequencies, or UHF. Such material is usually too thick to be applied to aircraft like fighter jets, but this new material is thin enough for military aircraft, ships, and other equipment.

Today’s synthetic aperture radar use arrays of antennas directing microwave energy to essentially see through clouds and fog and provide an approximate sense of the object’s size, the so-called radar cross section. With radar absorbent material not all of the signal bounces back to the receiver. A plane can look like a bird.

Zitat:“Our proposed absorber is almost ten times thinner than conventional ones,” said Wenhua Xu, one of the team members from China’s Huazhong University of Science and Technology, in a statement.

In their paper, published today in the Journal of Applied Physics, the team describes a material composed of semi-conducting diodes (varactors) and capacitors that have been soldered onto a printed circuit board. That layer is sitting under a layer of copper resistors and capacitors just .04 mm thick, which they called an “active frequency selective surface material” or AFSS. The AFSS layer can effectively be stretched to provide a lot of absorption but is thin enough to go onto an aircraft. The next layer is a thin metal honeycomb and final is a metal slab.

Zitat:Nov 19 China is to buy a batch of 24 Sukhoi-35 fighter jets from Russia in a deal worth more than $2 billion, an industry source told Reuters on Thursday, in a move that may help the Kremlin's strained finances.

Zitat:The deal makes China the first foreign buyer of the Su-35, one of Russia's most advanced military aircraft, and is one of the largest contracts for military jets to have ever been signed between the two countries.

Zitat:Thursday, December 03, 2015
PLA Daily commentaries on the two recent PLAAF developments
Canopy, a highlight of China's new J-20 fighter jet
Source: China Military Online
Editor: Zhang Tao
2015-12-03 16:310

The China-made fourth-generation J-20 stealth fighter with fuselage number 2017 completes its first flight recently.


BEIJING, Dec. 3 (ChinaMil) -- The latest China-made fourth-generation J-20 stealth fighter with fuselage number 2017 has successfully completed its first flight on November 24, 2015, only over two months after the first flight of the J-20 stealth fighter with fuselage number 2016.

This is the eighth China-made J-20 fighter and also the sixth prototype J-20 fighter used for test flight.

Fu Qianshao, deputy editor of the Aviation Magazine under the PLA Air force, said in an interview that canopy with metal-film coating is used for J-20 fighter with fuselage number 2017, which can further improve the fighter’s stealth performance.

Fu held that launching two prototype J-20 fighters in such a short time not only proves that the results of test flight assessment for the J-20 fighters are satisfactory, namely the relevant tests on J-20 fighter’s aerodynamic performance, stealth performance and airborne equipment have achieved or been close to the index requirements, but also indicates that the J-20 fighter has entered its key test-flight completion stage.

Fu introduced that the current eight prototype J-20 fighters can be classified into three categories, namely the black color J-20 fighters with fuselage numbers 2001 and 2002 are technical verification models, which are similar to the U.S. YF-22 prototype models; the J-20 fighters with fuselage numbers 2011 and 2012, which have different coatings and appearances from the previous ones, are apparently the engineering prototype models equipped with Pitot tubes; and the J-20 fighters with fuselage numbers 2013, 2015, 2016 and 2017 are prototype models, which are close to the stereotyped models.

“It is possible that the China-made J-20 fighters will soon be deployed to PLA troops,” Fu estimated.

According to the released photos, the canopy of the J-20 fighter with fuselage number 2017 has been slightly adjusted as compared with the previous models, namely its canopy has a shrunken edge curve, Fu continued.

Fu expressed that the canopy modification is in consideration of strength enhancement, air resistance reduction and stealth improvement. The J-20 fighter’s canopy has been modified for two times, and such modifications are mainly for stealth performance improvement and at the same time, for air resistance reduction, Fu explained.

In addition to the canopy appearance change, the canopy of the prototype J-20 fighter with fuselage number 2017 has another highlight, namely use of metal-film coating, Fu mentioned.

The aircraft cockpit is a strong reflector, which can affect aircraft’s overall stealth performance, Fu analyzed. But after the use of canopy with metal-film coating, radar waves cannot penetrate into the cockpit, and even some of the radar waves enter the cockpit, only small fraction of radar waves can be reflected, which will further improve aircraft’s stealth performance, Fu added.

Zitat:Fist production J-20 is here!
The initial operational date for the J-20 is estimated at 2018. Now, with this production copy "2101" emerging out of the thick Chinese smog, perhaps we should revisit the 2018 date.

Zitat:On Chinese TV show tne new Type 05A self-propelled mortar system with 120mm gun, which combines the features of the mortar and the howitzer.

This mortar system can be used as mortar or howitzer, delivering direct or indirect fire.

The Type 05A 120mm self-propelled mortar-howitzer system based on Type 04A tracked Armored Infantry Fighting Vehicle. Type 04 is a 20-ton class, medium armored, amphibious, infantry fighting vehicle (IFV) evolved from the tracked chassis of the of the ZBD97.