Chapter 884: Future AWACS Route

The plane made a tight turn over Nanzheng and then slowly landed on the runway of Chenggu Airport.

Compared with Shengfei or Rongfei, where Chang Haonan has often visited in recent years, Qinfei Group is indeed far behind in terms of scale and development level.

This is not difficult to see from the situation at the airport.

After all, it was just a backup set up during the Third Front construction phase just in case, and its status was similar to that of the Guizhou Aviation Group in the mountains.

Therefore, after the special period ended, the status itself was rather embarrassing.

Before Chang Haonan was reborn, Qin Fei had even carried out asset restructuring with Gao Fei.

It is said to be a reorganization, but in fact it is just a merger into the latter.

After all, their geographical locations and business scopes are relatively close.

Given that there were only three aircraft models weighing more than 80 tons at the time (Y-20, Y-9, and H-6K), there was really no need to retain two production bases for large aircraft.

But in this life, the development of China Aviation's manufacturing industry is more than a billion points better than the original timeline, so Chang Haonan actually still wants to guide Qin Fei Group, his little brother.

……

Since they were here to attend the delivery ceremony of the KJ-200, the two chief designers were naturally waiting on the tarmac.

Wang Xiaomo and Liang Shaoxiu.

At a slightly further distance, the KJ-200 had been painted in the characteristic gray-white livery of naval aviation, and even had the words "Chinese Navy" written on its side.

There were many maintenance personnel wearing blue Type 87 marine camouflage standing around.

Obviously, at an operational level, the aircraft should have been taken over by comrades from the Naval Aviation Force.

What will be held tomorrow is just a handover ceremony.

Chang Haonan was naturally very familiar with the KJ-200.

Not only the overall design plan came from him.

And about a year ago, he also verified high-level data dimensionality reduction technology on this aircraft.

It can be said that it covers both hardware and software.

Therefore, after a brief greeting, what was supposed to be a two-on-two arrangement turned into three people introducing the basic situation of the entire project to Zhang Hongbiao...

"By the way, Mr. Chang."

Liang Shaoxiu, who was walking a little behind, suddenly called out to Chang Haonan:

"Some time ago, Director Ding and General Manager Liu called me over to arrange a transport aircraft project for you."

Chang Haonan was stunned:

"Moving so fast?"

Of course he knew about this.

After all, it was Chang Haonan and Ding Gaoheng who first proposed the idea.

But after a few months, the aviation industry has already begun to organize its forces for research and development, which is indeed a bit unexpected.

But on second thought, the head of Aviation Industry Corporation has been replaced by Liu Gaozhuo...

That's reasonable.

Liang Zhuoping cannot be said to be a bad person, but he is an old man from the head office era after all. Faced with the Aviation Power Group that took away half of his family property, it is inevitable that he would feel a little unbalanced.

But Liu Gaozhuo does not have this psychological burden.

He also had a very smooth cooperation with Chang Haonan.

"Ah... Although the leader didn't say it explicitly, he's probably worried that we can't keep up with your progress in aeroengine development."

To some extent, Liang Shaoxiu could even be said to be the chief engineer brought up by Chang Haonan, so he looked calm when he said this:

"After all, if the aircraft is waiting for the aeroengine, we can use other models to test the flight first, but the aeroengine cannot even be finalized..."

"Don't be too stressed. The WS-20 may not be as fast as you think."

Chang Haonan shook his head helplessly:

"Although the core engine is ready-made, the high bypass ratio turbofan still has many unique technical difficulties, and it is difficult to take shortcuts..."

The reason why the WS-10 can be put into service with such high efficiency is that it uses a generation-leading active cooling design to achieve a higher-than-expected turbine pre-temperature, and then combines it with a generation-leading overall design, which ultimately results in performance that is basically the same as the 3.5-generation engine.

At least for now, it cannot be said that China has caught up with the developed countries in all aspects of aeroengines.

There are still shortcomings, and they are not easy to overcome.

However, Liang Shaoxiu was obviously much more optimistic than Chang Haonan himself:

"fine."

He waved his hand:

"That's what you said when you were designing the anti-icing system for the Y-8."

"The actual effect turned out to be better than the theoretical expectations."

"Is there still this?"

Chang Haonan himself doesn't remember it.

"Have."

Liang Shaoxiu nodded.

Since the other party was so sure, Chang Haonan couldn't say anything more.

He did not have very high requirements for the Y-9 project itself.

In China's system, tactical transport aircraft do not actually need to undertake heavy tasks of transporting large equipment.

But it must at least be able to fit a standard-sized pallet that is 3.2 meters wide.

Otherwise, it would be just like the Y-8 that was modified from the Y-9 in the previous life, and even transporting supplies would be difficult.

It's very stiff.

Therefore, the conversation among the few people quickly shifted to topics related to the early warning aircraft.

"After the KJ-200 is put into service, what is your next plan?"

This question was naturally asked by Zhang Hongbiao.

"Whether it's a balance beam antenna or a T-shaped antenna, it's not suitable for large early warning aircraft."

Wang Xiaomo replied:

"So, we have built a ground simulation device for airborne radar antennas and are testing the three-sided fixed array and the two-sided rotating array respectively."

"Can it be made into a double-sided rotating array?"

As the deputy director of the Science and Technology Commission, it was impossible for Zhang Hongbiao to not do any homework, so before coming here, he learned about the relevant situation of the circular ring project and knew the design of the three-sided fixed array antenna.

But he was not a professional after all, so he was completely in the dark when the topic was expanded a little.

"Well... from the perspective of the antenna, it doesn't matter. Just hide the back-to-back antenna design like a balance beam inside the disc-shaped radome."

Wang Xiaomo also saw that the other party was just cramming, so he used a very popular way to describe it:

"The advantage is that for a radome of the same size, the single antenna area of ​​a double-sided rotating array can be nearly twice that of a three-sided array, but the total power consumption is only increased by about one-third. It will show huge advantages in detection distance and detection efficiency, but the mechanical structure will be more complicated and the weight will be greater."

“That’s not all.”

Seeing that Wang Xiaomo had no intention of continuing, Chang Haonan added:

"The two back-to-back arrays can also be designed with different bands. For example, one side uses the S band for precise scanning, and the other side uses the L band for anti-stealth detection. It is only necessary to rotate the corresponding array surface to the mission direction according to the requirements of different types of missions."

"But wouldn't that leave two blind spots?"

Zhang Hongbiao asked:

"The information I read before said that radar cannot detect a 180° range."

“Of course there are blind spots.”

Wang Xiaomo smiled.

That's the look on a professional's face when he hears a layman's question:

"However, in most cases, early warning aircraft are far away from the main battlefield, and there is not much demand for 360° omnidirectional detection. The problem with the balance beam and T-shaped antenna is that the aircraft needs to adjust its route to adapt to the scanning angle, which will limit the flight route."

"But if a rotatable disc is designed, the direction of the aircraft is still free, so a smaller field of view is not completely unacceptable. It mainly depends on how the user chooses to make a choice..."

After all, the rotation of the mechanical scanning radar is a necessary step for the normal operation of the radar, and the rotation speed is equal to the refresh rate.

But for phased array radar, rotation is only for filling blind spots. After adjusting the angle, it can stop and will not affect the detection capability.

“Of course, we are also developing some new technologies to minimize the blind spots of the double-sided array.”

After a brief pause, Wang Xiaomo continued:

"The detection angle of a traditional single-sided array is about 120°, but if wide-angle scanning technology is used, such as real time delay lines to replace conventional phase shifters, it has the potential to be increased to 150° or even 160°. In this way, the blind area of ​​the double-sided array will be compressed to a very low level..."

Chang Haonan was just following behind, but suddenly he heard a term from Wang Xiaomo that he seemed to have heard some time ago.

"Wait... Academician Wang."

He directly interrupted Wang Xiaomo's explanation:

"You just said that you can use wide-angle scanning technology to further improve the detection range of the single-sided array?"

"Yes."

Wang Xiaomo and Chang Haonan were old acquaintances. After being interrupted, he was not annoyed, but just nodded:

"But this is only theoretical. The actual situation is far from being as simple as it sounds. I estimate that it is unlikely to be applied to existing models within at least 10 years."