Rebirth of the 1980s: The Military Industry Empire

"Okay, the simplest way for our intermediate trainer is to reverse engineer and copy the American T45 carrier-based trainer currently under development," Qin Yang said. "We have an opportunity to acquire this trainer. When that happens, it can be used not only on land but also on aircraft carriers, providing the navy with a suitable platform."

Yu Ximing widened his eyes: "We can get an American trainer?"

"Yes, and we still need to improve it." Saying this, Qin Yang glanced at the trainer beside him.

The Mountain Eagle is ready. How about improving the Sea Mountain Eagle based on it? If it's improved, wouldn't we not need to mess with the American carrier-based trainer?

However, he quickly shook his head. The performance of the Sea Mountain Eagle isn't that good. The navy's choice of this trainer is a helpless one. After all, looking at what's available, only this aircraft can be used.

As a carrier-based trainer, the first important performance aspect is landing speed. After all, the most important thing for carrier-based trainers is training pilots to land. If the landing speed is too high, the difficulty will be very high. The JJ-7 is inherited from the J-7. Even if it has a double-delta wing structure, it is still a second-generation aircraft. The take-off and landing speeds of this second-generation aircraft are very high.

This alone makes pilot training difficult. Moreover, the JJ-7 has many other shortcomings. For example, the tail of this aircraft is very long, which means that the tail is easily scratched on the deck when landing. Moreover, the layout of the tail also determines that it is not suitable for installing arresting hooks. Many people are worried that the rear fuselage will be pulled off directly, after all, the front and rear of the aircraft are connected by bolts.

The landing gear and other parts also need to be strengthened. In short, the improvement will be very complicated and cumbersome. Therefore, in later generations, many people thought that the navy's carrier-based trainer would choose the L-15, an advanced trainer from another competing unit. This trainer has a more advanced design, such as leading-edge extensions, a twin-engine layout, and fly-by-wire operation. The aircraft will be more flexible. However, the development progress of this aircraft was delayed, and the engine was not yet localized. Various reasons led to the abandonment of this aircraft by the navy, because what the navy needed was time. As a result, the JJ-7 was launched and became the navy's carrier-based trainer.

Now, since there is a better choice, of course, we must work hard. Anyway, the Americans have agreed to bring over the advanced T-45.

Yu Ximing looked embarrassed: "Chief Qin, we've spent a long time developing our own trainer. If we help improve an American trainer, it will probably take longer. After all, we don't understand it."

Among the domestic research institutions, the R\u0026D capabilities of their 011 base are the lowest. It's so difficult to modify the JJ-7, let alone improve an American trainer.

We don't understand!

Qin Yang smiled: "I understand."

You understand?

Yu Ximing's eyes lit up. That's right, how could he forget Chief Qin? Just because he can't do it doesn't mean Chief Qin can't. Chief Qin is the best!

Hearing Qin Yang's words, Yu Ximing was completely relieved.

"Chief Qin, how should we modify it?"

"The Americans and the British encountered the most complicated death dive problem when they jointly developed a carrier-based trainer." Qin Yang began to introduce: "You should know about this death dive, right?"

Yu Ximing thought for a while: "I know. Back then, a certain batch of parts for our J-6 had problems, and we also encountered this situation, which also caused the sacrifice of two pilots in the fighter unit. After the dive, the plane couldn't be pulled up."

The J-6 was the aircraft with the largest number of equipment in the troops. This aircraft made great contributions to the troops, not only for air combat but also for ground attacks. When attacking the ground, it is necessary to dive, and because it is very close to the ground, once a mechanical failure occurs, it cannot be pulled up after the dive, and terrible things like the destruction of the aircraft and the death of the people will occur.

Yu Ximing has a fresh memory of this accident. After all, he was a witness.

"That's right, similar to our J-6 failure, but the American plane is not a quality problem, it's a design problem." Qin Yang said: "They have encountered this technical problem, but they can't solve it, so they come to us for help."

Yu Ximing's eyes widened. The Americans and the British can't solve it, but we can solve it? Chief Qin, you are really amazing!

"The tail and wings of this aircraft are on the same plane, so the tail will be affected by the downwash of the wings, and the airflow of the tail will stall, which causes the death dive. No matter how the pilot pulls the control stick, it's useless, and the fighter will still dive uncontrollably." Qin Yang said: "The Americans have difficulty solving this problem, so they are treating a dead horse as a living horse and asking us for help."

The United States and Britain are both major aviation countries and have developed many advanced fighters. What about us? We don't have successful experience in independently developing fighters. The only J-8 is just a twin-engine enlarged version of the J-7. They actually come to us for help!

Yu Ximing's heart was shocked.

Qin Yang smiled: "In fact, it's very simple to solve. Just add a small strake in front of the tail."

There are now a large number of third-generation aircraft. In the development of this type of aircraft, an important aerodynamic technology is the leading-edge extension. A strake extends from the front of the wing, and this strake can pull the vortex, thereby improving the aerodynamic efficiency of the wing.

The American F-16, the Russian Su-27 and MiG-29, all effectively use vortices to improve their performance. However, leading-edge extensions are used in front of the wings. Adding a strake in front of the tail? No one has ever heard of this!

Many times, what engineers need is this kind of innovative thinking. No one has heard of it, but if you use it, you may find that it is very useful!

This strake was invented by British engineer Barry Pegram. He is not on the T-45 trainer project team, but after hearing about this death dive, he expressed an opinion: Can the strake originally installed on the leading edge of the wing be installed on the tail to delay the stall of this aircraft?

At that time, it was immediately opposed by everyone: What a joke! The T-45 is an all-moving tail, which is different from the wing. How can you install a strake in front of the tail? Do you want to redesign the tail?

This old man solved it with another sentence: Since it is not suitable to install it on the tail, why not install the strake on the fuselage?

So, such a simple and cheap solution was solved. Just two simple metal sheets successfully solved the T-45's death dive. However, this was already in 1986.

Now, Qin Yang only needs to tell Yu Ximing the shape, size, position, etc. of the strake so that he can act as an expert at the appropriate time.