Genius of the Rules-Style System

Chapter 866: Chapter 452: Doesn’t This Logic Seem Flawless?_2

J-31, also known as the design by the Kunlun Group II, is the targeted fighter model.

The latter half of the meeting revolved around the J-31, with its chief designer Li Jianming giving two presentations and sharing his design opinions. However, it was evident to everyone that Li Jianming’s work on the J-31’s design was at most halfway done; many aspects were incomplete and problems could be easily identified.

Take, for example, the wing issue.

The design of the J-31 involved a composite one-piece wing structure, which was immediately met with concerns: "F-2 was equipped with a composite one-piece wing and faced numerous issues, such as poor performance in resisting shear stress and other impact loads, and extremely low tolerance to stress concentration and catastrophic degradation of structural strength due to damage."

"As a carrier-based aircraft, it operates much lower than land-based airfields and under harsher conditions. If it’s difficult to perform aggressive maneuvers, do we expect it to take off as tamely as the F-2?"

All Li Jianming could say in response was, "At present, we are still researching and improving..." freёwebnovel.com

Without a doubt.

Up to this point, there were still issues with the design of the J-31. Fortunately, the focus of the meeting was on engine problems, and after a series of discussions, Liu Jiankun finally announced the results.

The design work of the Kunlun Group II was divided into two parts, one was handed over to the Kunlun Engine Group, which, in combination with the original design of the Kunlun Group, eliminated those new designs likely to cause issues and improvements, to merge into a brand-new engine design. Prototypes were then to be manufactured, still targeting the J-10 fighter.

This engine was named the WZ-A2 type.

Meanwhile, the Kunlun Engine Group continued with their original tasks, which were to keep tuning the Kunlun engine, striving to make it suitable for third and third-and-a-half generation fighters, ensuring the Kunlun’s thirty years of development bore fruit.

The Kunlun Group II was renamed the ’Warhawk’ Group, aiming to develop cutting-edge engines. Prototypes for the J-31 fighter were the target, and the engine codenamed WZ-A1.

WZ-A1, WZ-A2, the codes revealed the origin of the design.

...

The meeting concluded.

With the renaming from Kunlun Group II to ’Warhawk’ Group, it meant a clear division from the original Kunlun Group. Even the latest research work of the Kunlun Group was utilizing designs from the ’Warhawk’ Group.

Of course, the initial R&D of the Kunlun Group II was based on the foundations laid by the Kunlun Group’s research and development.

The two could be said to have benefited each other.

Zhao Yi walked out of the meeting room and was escorted by a staff member to another small conference room to meet with Gao Mingfu from the Aeronautical Materials Research Institute and J-31 designer Li Jianming. His main purpose was to communicate with Li Jianming.

Gao Mingfu was there to familiarize himself with Zhao Yi, as a representative of the Aeronautical Materials Research Institute in charge of the manufacturing process of the WZ-A1 engine. The construction of the engine prototype was closely related to aeronautical materials.

In this aspect, the Aeronautical Materials Research Institute was the expert, while Zhang Hongtao and Li Rongmao were laymen.

Zhao Yi and Gao Mingfu had met before, so their greeting was merely an exchange of familiar pleasantries before waiting for the belated Li Jianming.

Li Jianming was indeed busy.

Regarding the design issues of the J-31, he needed to communicate with various departments, even with military ones. The purpose of designing a fighter jet, after all, is to enable it to serve and complete missions. The J-31’s design had to consider the requirements of its future service obligations.

For instance, some fighter jets are designed and manufactured to serve as a deterrent to the weaker military power of southern neighbors, which doesn’t necessitate high-end designs and extra costs are pointless.

Other fighters are designed to counter the power of eastern countries, backed by M Country, which means that their technological performance needs to be sufficiently intimidating, requiring a high-end design and manufacturing process.

The J-31 was like this.

The problems facing the J-31 were not the limitations of use, but the fact that it was required to be too versatile and too advanced in technology. It had to accommodate an array of performances, and yet there was also a need to... reduce weight?

Li Jianming found this to be an exceedingly difficult task.

He felt that other departments probably hadn’t considered the design requirements of the J-31 thoroughly enough; they just kept adding new design demands. But how could it be possible to meet all of these? Though China’s fighter jet design and manufacturing experience and technology had certainly developed some unique features, it had to be acknowledged that there was still a gap with the international standard. With many technologies not supportive, it simply wasn’t possible to enhance performance through design alone.

Li Jianming entered the small conference room feeling dejected, but upon seeing Zhao Yi, a smile appeared on his face. Shaking Zhao Yi’s hand, he said, "Academician Zhao, I truly didn’t expect you would come to design engines. With your participation, we won’t have to worry about engine performance issues in the future."

"You’re too kind!"

The two exchanged a few pleasantries.

In reality, Li Jianming was doing most of the talking, and Zhao Yi really didn’t know much about him, likely because a fighter jet designer wouldn’t get much publicity. They didn’t exactly work in obscurity, but they certainly weren’t highlighted by the media too often.

The conversation quickly shifted to the WZ-A1 engine.

The Warhawk Group needed to know the J-31’s engine parameter requirements to know how to make necessary revisions to the design to manufacture the prototype for the WZ-A1.

Faced with this question, Li Jianming complained repeatedly, "It’s tough to finalize the design. Academician Zhao, as you’ve seen, there are still many unresolved issues with the J-31’s design and even the design requirements haven’t been finalized."

"We will have difficulty finalizing the design in a short time, which means we can’t provide specific engine parameter requirements."