Author: Rainbow Kursk
On September 28th, the 13th China International Aviation and Aerospace Expo was grandly opened in Zhuhai, and more than 20 types of products from the Third Academy of Aerospace Science and Industry of China made a brilliant debut. Among them, the unmanned combat system built by its subsidiary Seahawk Company with the goal of "reconnaissance-strike-damage effect evaluation" has attracted wide attention.
As the most core of the system, the detection and reconnaissance unit, the approach reconnaissance and surveillance unit, WJ-700 "Falcon" and "Skyhawk" these two jet UAVs have the characteristics of wide flight airspace, fast flight speed, long endurance, large load capacity, high system scalability and strong rapid response capability, and can be equipped with a variety of mission loads and weapons and ammunition, that is, they can be used as information nodes in the combat network to provide target data information to the command headquarters and friendly forces through strong perception capabilities. It can also be used as a firepower unit to directly use air-to-ground ammunition to launch attacks outside the defensive zone and completely eliminate the target.
Image: Seahawk's unmanned combat system and WJ-700 jet drone.
Seahawk Company's full name is Seahawk Aviation General Equipment Co., Ltd., formerly known as the military UAV research and development team established by the Third Academy of Aerospace Science and Industry of China in 2002. The history of the Third Academy of Aerospace Science and Industry can be traced back to the formation of the Chinese People's Liberation Army Artillery Teaching Brigade on December 9, 1957, which is the first comprehensive missile professional training institution of our army and the earliest unit in China to contact missiles.
On September 1, 1961, the predecessor of the Aerospace Third Academy, the Fifth Branch of the Ministry of National Defense, was formally established on this basis. Since the establishment of the academy, the three institutes have carried forward the aerospace spirit and the spirit of "unity and progress, heavy struggle, scientific truth-seeking, and dare to be first-class", and in accordance with the guiding ideology of "basic type and serialization", they have embarked on a successful development path from imitation and modification, self-design to independent innovation, and have become the only development, production and support department of flight (cruise) missiles in China.
Among the many products, the C201 and C601 missiles, known in the West as "Silkworm", and the C801 and C802 missiles of "Chinese Flying Fish" are recognized by users as classics of China's flying missiles. At the exhibition, the three hospitals also exhibited a large number of new missiles, and paired with the "Falcon" UAV, so that it has a sharper claw.
Photo: Various types of missile weapons of the Third Academy of Aerospace Science and Industry, paired with the WJ-700 "Falcon" UAV.
With the continuous upgrading of weapons and equipment technology, the military use of unmanned aerial vehicles continues to expand, in terms of reducing casualties and improving attack efficiency, unmanned aerial vehicles have a unique advantage over manned aircraft.
The three institutes also regard the research of unmanned equipment system as an important part of supporting the construction of the world-class flight technology research institute, and set up a "national team" for the development of high-end unmanned aerial vehicles - Seahawk Aviation General Equipment Co., Ltd. The company is currently the only overall unit of unmanned aerial vehicles and UAV industry platform of China Aerospace Science and Industry Group, focusing on the pre-research and innovation of unmanned aerial vehicles and the technical grasp and guidance of the whole life cycle of UAV product development, production, testing and service.
Photo: Concept map of the unmanned combat system of aerospace science and industry
At present, UAV operations have developed from low and medium altitude to medium and high altitude, high speed and high mobility, and the development of large and medium-sized jet UAVs has become an inevitable direction.
Seahawk's WJ-700 Falcon high-altitude high-speed cha-ta integrated UAV was born in this context. The aircraft debuted at the Zhuhai Airshow in November 2018 and successfully completed its first flight test on January 11, 2021, and its development was basically completed in just over two years.
The UAV can be expanded to 11 configurations and 9 combat forms as needed, mount a variety of airborne weapons, perform reconnaissance, surveillance and early warning tasks on the opposite side (land/sea); perform long-range anti-ship, anti-radiation and anti-zone precision strike tasks; perform electronic reconnaissance and interference tasks, and truly achieve one machine multi-type, one specialized multi-functional, and one-machine multi-purpose.
Image: Pretty WJ-700 Falcon drone.
The WJ-700 UAV has a maximum take-off weight of 3.5 tons, a 20-hour leave-time, and a small turbofan jet engine is installed on its back, with a speed of 600 to 700 km/h.
In contrast, the speed of the CURRENT MQ-9B "Grim Reaper" UAV is only 480 km / h, which is obviously much inferior, and in terms of flight speed, only advanced jet drones such as the "Avenger" UAV under research in the United States can match it. The strong power not only allows the "Falcon" to fly faster and higher, but also further improves the tactical response ability and mission flexibility of the UAV, and better completes the reconnaissance and strike missions of time-sensitive targets.
Picture: The US Military Death UAV with a turboshaft engine can't keep up with the WJ-700 Falcon drone in speed.
WJ-700 "Falcon" UAV has an elegant shape, the fuselage adopts a streamlined layout, the engine air intake is set above the fuselage, and the intake tract adopts S-shaped bending, which can also play a certain radar stealth effect while ensuring the best intake efficiency of the engine.
The fuselage is heavily made of carbon fiber composite materials, making the drone light and strong. The leading edge of the straight wing has a certain swept angle, the wing and the lower edge of the fuselage are perfectly integrated, and the nose resembles an eagle's beak, which minimizes drag and enhances the overall lift of the wing while meeting the high speed. The tail wing adopts a flat tailless V-shaped vertical tail design, which has good handling. These designs ensure that the WJ-700 UAV can balance high speed and long flight time, and perfectly achieve the relevant combat technical indicators.
Image: WJ-700 drone with a small turbofan engine, the all-electric aircraft design greatly reduces the difficulty of operation and ground maintenance.
In addition, the all-electric aircraft design concept is also one of the characteristics of the WJ-700.
The aircraft cancels the hydraulic system of the traditional aircraft, realizes the one-key self-test, one-key take-off cruise, and one-key autonomous return landing of the UAV, which greatly improves the reliability of the system, reduces the difficulty of the crew air crew and the maintenance intensity of the ground crew.
Image: The WJ-700 UAV has 11 configurations and 9 combat forms.
The WJ-700 UAV exhibited this year is its actual combat configuration, which can be modularly replaced with a variety of models of airborne optoelectronic equipment, SAR radar, electronic reconnaissance radar and other early warning and surveillance equipment, and flexibly changed to reconnaissance configuration, attack configuration and detection and attack integrated UAV platform. The aircraft has a total of 6 external points under the wings, which can carry glide guided bombs, air-to-ground missiles, anti-radiation missiles, anti-ship missiles and other types of airborne weapons, and carry out long-range ground strike, anti-radiation operations and long-range anti-ship operations.
The airborne weapon can quickly reach the mission area to carry out strike and clearance tasks, and can rely on the high-altitude and high-speed flight characteristics to maximize the weapon projection energy when dropping gliding guidance bombs, easily reaching a range of 50 to 80 kilometers, and destroying key targets such as enemy missile positions, airports, and command posts outside the defense zone.
Photo: In addition to a single-handed strike, the WJ-700 UAV is also capable of networking and fighting in formation.
The advantages of UAV formation operations determine that after some UAVs in the formation fail, other UAVs can quickly re-plan the task, fill the task vacancy, and greatly improve the success rate of the task. Whether it is a single machine or a formation, it can achieve rapid response and fight a network center battle under modern conditions.
Picture: From the front, the WJ-700 UAV's back air intake is designed with a half-buried design, taking into account the intake effect and stealth performance.
In addition to the WJ-700 Falcon UAV, this time Seahawk also exhibited the Skyhawk flying wing jet drone. The "Skyhawk" UAV is designed according to the best stealth effect of wing fusion and flying wing layout, there is no horizontal tail and vertical tail of the traditional aircraft, the fuselage and wing are highly integrated, and the engine air intake and tail nozzle are located above the fuselage, making it difficult for ground radar to illuminate. In addition, the whole machine is also coated with absorbing paint.
These designs greatly reduce the overall radar reflection area of the aircraft, and it is estimated that the radar reflection area of the aircraft can reach the level of 0.01 square meters, which will greatly improve its battlefield survivability and concealed penetration capabilities.
Photo: Seahawk has also developed a "Skyhawk" UAV with a wing-body fusion flying wing structure, which has strong stealth ability and aerial perception ability.
The high-tech characteristics such as flying wing layout, high stealth, and high-altitude high speed make the "Skyhawk" UAV become a falcon that hovers and flies in the high air and searches for prey at all times. The aircraft has a maximum takeoff weight of 3 tons, can carry a variety of mission loads, has a strong perception ability, and carries out infiltration or approaching tactical reconnaissance of important targets in a high-threat battlefield environment.
In the UAV combat system, the "Skyhawk" UAV relies on its own stealth and high speed to perform reconnaissance and guidance tasks, while the "Falcon" UAV carries attack ammunition outside the defense zone, obtains the enemy target coordinate parameters obtained by the "Skyhawk" UAV through the data link, launches a long-range precision strike on the enemy's deep target, and achieves the combat effect of 1+1>2, perfectly showing the charm of the UAV system operation!
Image: The Skyhawk UAV with its highly stealthy design can be used as an aerial sensor for covert penetration over enemy positions in systematic combat.