China's Hong-20 stealth bomber

zerion · by **zerion** » 10 Oct 2018, 19:05

China's Hong-20 stealth bomber trial flight expected very soon

The trial flight of China's new-generation stealth bomber Hong-20 may take place soon, military experts said on Tuesday after China's official television station confirmed the name of the bomber. Disclosing the new bomber is a potential deterrence, Song Zhongping, a military expert and TV commentator, told the Global Times on Tuesday.

Usually the development of equipment and weaponry of the People's Liberation Army is highly confidential," he said.

Revealing the bomber name before trials shows the Chinese aviation industry is gaining more confidence, said Shanghai-based news site thepaper.cn.

China Central Television confirmed in a documentary in August that "the development of new long-distance strategic bomber, Hong-20, has made great progress."

It was the first time "Hong-20" appeared officially. "Hong" is the first character of hongzhaji, "bomber aircraft" in Chinese.

Song said the public unveiling of the bomber suggested that it might have finished testing the hydraulic pressure, electricity supply and avionics systems.

"The trial flight will come soon," he said.

China's Hong-20 bomber has been under development at the Shanghai Aircraft Design and Research Institute since 2008, Russian newspaper Rossiyskaya Gazeta previously reported.

"The new generation of bombers can carry more bombs than previous H-6K bombers, have the advantage of stealth features and are able to strike targets from standoff ranges," Song said in a previous interview in April.

The Hong-20 could improve both defensive and offensive air force capabilities and "enable the army to possess stronger nuclear and conventional deterrence," Song said.

http://www.airrecognition.com/index.php ... -soon.html

jetblast16 · by **jetblast16** » 10 Oct 2018, 20:14

Hey wait...that looks like the B-21. Never mind.

marsavian · by **marsavian** » 10 Oct 2018, 21:16

They have had a long time to steal B-2 blueprints.

milosh · by **milosh** » 10 Oct 2018, 21:37

marsavian wrote:They have had a long time to steal B-2 blueprints.

I think they even got B-2 engineer which design engine heat reduction system, he is in US jail now.

sferrin · by **sferrin** » 10 Oct 2018, 23:06

jetblast16 wrote:Hey wait...that looks like the B-21. Never mind.

B-21 won't have a kinked leading edge. They're copying the X-47B.

popcorn · by **popcorn** » 10 Oct 2018, 23:09

Why reinvent the wheel?

sferrin · by **sferrin** » 10 Oct 2018, 23:52

popcorn wrote:Why reinvent the wheel?

This thing is just fan art anyway. Guess we should wait to see what we see. Hopefully they don't roll out an FB-23.

guy@rdaf.dk · by **guy@rdaf.dk** » 11 Oct 2018, 10:26

When looking at the picture of the (Well)Hong-20, I get the feeling that the Chinese missed a very important aspect of their weapons design. Everybody knows that warheads needs to be pointy.....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OMDQzITWJyU

sferrin · by **sferrin** » 11 Oct 2018, 11:51

guy@rdaf.dk wrote:When looking at the picture of the (Well)Hong-20, I get the feeling that the Chinese missed a very important aspect of their weapons design. Everybody knows that warheads needs to be pointy.....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OMDQzITWJyU

It's fan art.

weasel1962 · by **weasel1962** » 11 Oct 2018, 12:19

sferrin wrote:
guy@rdaf.dk wrote:When looking at the picture of the (Well)Hong-20, I get the feeling that the Chinese missed a very important aspect of their weapons design. Everybody knows that warheads needs to be pointy.....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OMDQzITWJyU

It's fan art.

Have you consulted professor bobeye?

mixelflick · by **mixelflick** » 11 Oct 2018, 14:28

Quite unlikely it'll be an F/B-23 or 23 in shape. They have an interesting design challenge for this one - span the whole damn pacific ocean to hit America's West Coast. Which means it's almost certainly a flying wing design...

This challenge is compounded greatly by the fact that if China lags in anything, it's her tanker fleet (almost non-existent vs. America's). To be fair, no nation has tanking capabilities like we do. But the problem still stands... it'll need a lot of VLO tech and at least one aerial refueling to hit the US Mainland.

If it was me, I'd be simultaneously developing a hypersonic weapon for use with this thing. That way, it only needs to get close. Of more concern though would be this thing married to a hypersonic boost/glide vehicle hitting US carriers. Not going to be much time to react.

Finally, this will really be sticking it to Russia and leaving them further and further behind. They have the SU-57, but that's it (and its stealth is dubious). And assuming they can't afford large numbers of those (or even small ones), there's no way the rubles are going to manifest to fund something as ambitious as this. At least with the rest of their projects they have on the drawing board...

noth · by **noth** » 11 Oct 2018, 20:46

Nice job photoshopping the main body of a B-2 onto a smaller UAV, not. That's so fake the fan should be ashamed!

sferrin · by **sferrin** » 11 Oct 2018, 22:20

weasel1962 wrote:
sferrin wrote:
guy@rdaf.dk wrote:When looking at the picture of the (Well)Hong-20, I get the feeling that the Chinese missed a very important aspect of their weapons design. Everybody knows that warheads needs to be pointy.....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OMDQzITWJyU

It's fan art.

Have you consulted professor bobeye?

geforcerfx · by **geforcerfx** » 12 Oct 2018, 00:25

mixelflick wrote:Quite unlikely it'll be an F/B-23 or 23 in shape. They have an interesting design challenge for this one - span the whole damn pacific ocean to hit America's West Coast. Which means it's almost certainly a flying wing design...

This challenge is compounded greatly by the fact that if China lags in anything, it's her tanker fleet (almost non-existent vs. America's). To be fair, no nation has tanking capabilities like we do. But the problem still stands... it'll need a lot of VLO tech and at least one aerial refueling to hit the US Mainland.

If it was me, I'd be simultaneously developing a hypersonic weapon for use with this thing. That way, it only needs to get close. Of more concern though would be this thing married to a hypersonic boost/glide vehicle hitting US carriers. Not going to be much time to react.

Finally, this will really be sticking it to Russia and leaving them further and further behind. They have the SU-57, but that's it (and its stealth is dubious). And assuming they can't afford large numbers of those (or even small ones), there's no way the rubles are going to manifest to fund something as ambitious as this. At least with the rest of their projects they have on the drawing board...

Less of a threat to the continental USA, but dramatically improves China's reach in the region and gives them something they can strike Guam or maybe Hawaii ( with better tanker support)with which would hurt our strategic reach in the region. China also uses there current bomber fleet as long range anti-ship weapon.

weasel1962 · by **weasel1962** » 12 Oct 2018, 02:09

What is known about the H-20 is that its a H-6 replacement and will have a better load than the H-6.

What isn't known is who's going to operate it. PLAAF operates the H-6K which is basically land-attack. The PLAAF H-6K bases are deep within China. PLAN operates the H-6G which is anti-ship, those bases are closer to or along the coast. The reason why the H-6s don't need tankers is basically due to siting of the air base vs target sets. The PLAAF target sets are normally Japan, Korea, Taiwan. The PLAN's target sets would be naval vessels incl CVBGs.

The Chinese don't change doctrine that much and its only the tabloids that start selling more newspapers by going thermonuclear. My guess is that its likely PLAAF because they mention strategic and the inland bases will be much more discreet so less likely anti-ship and more LACMs first.

P.s. @ Sferrin, its the guy with the massive forearms - see link provided by dk.