China has hinted it will take the wraps off its J-10 fourth-generation fighter at Airshow China in Zhuhai in early November, adding weight to local reports that Chengdu Aircraft (CAC) began deliveries to the Chinese air force earlier this year. But the first public display of a fighter that has been two decades in development is unlikely to answer questions about how and where China plans to use the aircraft.
Because of delays and disappointments with indigenous combat aircraft development programmes, the Chinese air force has begun re-equipping with Russian-supplied Sukhoi Su-27SK and Su-30MKK Flankers. Although the J-10 is regarded as a capable design, it may be too little and too late to displace the Russian fighters from their pole position in the air force's modernisation plan. Chengdu may face opposition to buying the J-10 in large numbers from some air force leaders who favour spending procurement funds on Su-27s and Su-30s.
A local report says Chengdu delivered the first four J-10s to the Chinese air force in May from an initial block of 50 aircraft, enough to equip two regiments. A group of air force pilots is undergoing tactical training in preparation for the J-10, according to the report. There is no mention of where the aircraft are based, although the report says J-10s will be deployed at coastal air bases in the future.
A public debut at the Zhuhai show would provide an opportunity to test the prevailing theory that the J-10 design was based on that of the cancelled Israel Aircraft Industries (IAI) Lavi. Although both aircraft share a close-coupled canard/delta configuration, chin intake, single fin and twin ventral strakes, the latest pictures of theJ-10 show a less compelling resemblance to the Lavi than earlier impressions suggested. While the single-seat, single-engined J-10 is similar in profile to the Lavi, its planform more closely resembles that of the Saab/BAE Systems Gripen.
The wing planform, which differs substantially from that of the Lavi or Gripen, clearly shows that the J-10 traces its origins back to the J-9, developed in the 1970s in parallel with the Shenyang J-8. The single-engined J-9 was abandoned in 1980, around the time the twin-engined J-8 entered service, by which time design had evolved from a tailless delta to a long-coupled canard/delta.
The J-10 has been developed jointly by CAC at the 611 research institute, the team responsible for the J-9. With an inadequate design capability and unresolved technical issues, Chengdu entered into a co-operative agreement with IAI during the 1980s to obtain design assistance - a link both sides still deny, but which is evident in the Lavi influence on the final J-10 configuration.
The first prototype J-10 is believed to have flown in March 1998, and a total of nine aircraft are said to have been produced for flight and structural testing and weapons trials. Photographs show the J-10 flying with PL-8 infrared-guided air-to-air missiles mounted Eurofighter-style under the wingtips, rather than Lavi-style on the tips. Drawings show the aircraft with missiles or bombs on four outer wing stations, fuel tanks to two inner wing and one underfuselage station and bombs on four conformal fuselage stations.
China has invested significant resources in development of the J-10 over the last two decades, and the aircraft is generally accepted to be a capable design with good performance under certain conditions.
But the J-10 is likely to be an expensive aircraft, with high acquisition and uncertain life-cycle costs. The substantial foreign content - whether Israeli or Russian, such as the Saturn/Lyulka AL-31F engine - could also raise in-service support issues because of the need to buy equipment from overseas. Russia has agreed to supply engines, but refused China a licence to produce them.
Although the J-10 will play a role in China's plan for the selective modernisation of its huge but obsolescent air force, Beijing remains committed to acquiring a substantial number of air-superiority Su-27SKs produced locally under licence as the Shenyang J-11, while continuing to buy two-seat ground-attack Su-30MKKs from Russia.
But Chengdu remains confident in its product, and a leading CAC official has alluded to the possibility of providing the air force with a "new type of combat aircraft" in a higher gross weight class. This is expected to be derived from the baseline J-10, apparently in response to unspecified air force criticisms of the Su-27SK. A local report says Chengdu is targeting a first flight of this aircraft during the first half of next year.
The development delays and difficulties experienced by the J-10 could also affect China's plans to develop a fifth-generation fighter, the existence of which was revealed by the US Office of Naval Intelligence in 1997.
Notionally designated the XXJ, this twin-engined fighter has been under conceptual study by the 601 research institute with Shenyang and the 611 institute with Chengdu for some time. The likely in-service date has been assessed at 2015.
The XXJ appears optimised for the counter-air mission now performed by the Su-27/J-11. The 601/Shenyang design is largely conventional, most resembling the Boeing F-15, while the 601/ Chengdu design is a close-coupled canard/delta. Both show signs of efforts to reduce radar signature. It is difficult to see how the ambitious requirements underlying design of the XXJ can be met without significant and sustained foreign input during development. This would seem to reinforce a Chinese trend towards increasing dependence of outside expertise.
The J-10 looks to be a competent fourth-generation fighter, but rather than raise the level of Chinese industrial capability, its protracted development may have had the opposite effect. Instead of narrowing the technological gap between China and the West is widening. Barring substantial progress with the XXJ, China may once again look abroad to meet its combat aircraft requirements.
Source: Flight International
