The development plan of J- 12 fighter was put forward in March 1969. In the proposal of the Air Force on the national defense research plan to the Commission of Science, Technology and Industry for National Defense and the Office of National Defense Industry, the idea of developing a small portable fighter is put forward, which requires the new fighter to be simple in equipment, low in cost, capable of flying at any time, attacking everywhere and taking off and landing on the highway.
The idea of developing this small portable fighter is not groundless. At that time, several local wars, such as Vietnam War and Middle East War, had just ended, and people gradually realized from the war practice that the design of fighter planes should not simply pursue flight speed, but also give them good maneuverability. People have seen this scene many times: American-made well-equipped fighters such as F- 105 and F-4 flying at twice the speed of sound are at a loss many times in front of subsonic MIG-17 fighters, and even advanced supersonic fighters are constantly shot down by fighters whose speed is obviously lower than it. 1On April 24th, 967, Song Yimin, a pilot of our People's Air Force, shot down an American F-4B supersonic fighter that invaded Guangxi Banxing area with a subsonic J -5 fighter.
The practice of air combat has repeatedly reminded people that even when air-to-air missiles are widely used, it is inevitable for fighters to fight with guns at close range. In combat, fighters need to go around the back of the opponent with the smallest turning radius or the fastest transition rate to occupy a favorable shooting position. The faster the flight speed, the larger the hovering radius and the longer the hovering time. In this way, aircraft with lower speed or lighter fuselage weight are in a favorable position.
However, the maneuverability required by fighters entering the air-to-air missile era is not limited to hovering performance. In order to get rid of the opponent's pursuit and catch up with the enemy plane quickly, the fighter must have certain acceleration and climbing performance, which is consistent with the design requirements of high-speed flight, only the hovering performance conflicts with the design requirements of high-speed flight.
While aircraft designers from all over the world are still stubbornly insisting on designing fighter planes flying at high speed, American pilots who have participated in Vietnam air combat strongly demand the relevant departments to design "fighter pilots' fighters" for their own safety, that is, to design fighters with air combat capability. To be clear, the relevant authorities are required to produce high-speed aircraft with low-speed performance.
Under this historical background, it is not surprising that China Air Force put forward the idea of J- 12 small portable fighter.
However, taking a look at the practices of all countries in the world at that time, most of them used variable swept wing technology to coordinate the contradiction between high speed and low speed, some added canards to improve maneuverability, and some explored the aerodynamic layout of unconventional aircraft to achieve this goal. At that time, China's aircraft manufacturing technology was still in the imitation stage, and the domestic political atmosphere in China was also in an extraordinary period. When the Air Force proposed to develop a small portable fighter (called "Little J- 12" at that time), it put forward the formulation of "adapting to the needs of the people's war and carrying out air guerrilla warfare", that is to say, it is required that this fighter can be mass-produced in a short time and be easy to operate. Through consultation between troops and engineers and technicians, such a design idea is determined: high flexibility, short take-off and landing, simple and convenient maintenance, low cost and easy to learn.
At that time, countries all over the world generally pursued variable swept wing technology, vertical take-off and landing technology and tightly coupled canard layout, that is to say, countries all over the world were developing future fighters with large airframe, complete equipment and complex technology. China is developing in the opposite direction, that is, by reducing the fuselage and the take-off weight, the maneuverability of the aircraft can be effectively improved.
At this point, some people may think that all this is caused by ultra-left thoughts. In fact, this can't be completely blamed on the idea of "air guerrilla warfare" at that time, because, as far as China's technical reserves are concerned, this may also be the only realistic way. At that time, it was impossible for China to develop its own variable swept-wing fighter and vertical takeoff and landing aircraft synchronized with the United States and the Soviet Union. Many terms were unheard of at that time, so it was impossible to develop fighter planes synchronized with the United States and the Soviet Union. Just because the development period of J- 12 was in the wave of the Cultural Revolution, it was extremely unfavorable to its development.
Gain valuable design experience
The development task of J- 12 was formally handed over to Nanchang Aircraft Factory at the meeting of 1969 on August 25th, and this "Little J- 12" was officially named in March of 1970. As early as June, 65438+July, 0969, before the task was officially issued, Nanchang Aircraft Factory started the scheme design, and the chief designer was Comrade Lu. Lu is the deputy director of the design room of Nanchang Aircraft Factory. He once designed and developed the first generation single-seat twin-engine jet fighter in China, which was called "Eagle Strike" 302 at that time, and was later renamed Qiang -5. 1In August, 1967, the general plan of J-12 fighter by Lu et al. was approved by the superior. Subsequently, through the efforts of scientific and technical personnel 1 and 5 months, the detailed design, main wind tunnel test, airframe production, strength test and system simulation test were completed, and three prototypes were manufactured. 1970 65438+On February 26th, a prototype was successfully launched for the first time. 1973 September 10, the J-12 aircraft gave a wonderful flight show to Marshal Ye Jianying and other heads of the Central and Military Commissions. Its flexible flight characteristics drew applause, and Marshal Ye Jianying happily called it "Li Xiangyang in the air". At that time, the film Guerrilla in the Plain was being staged all over the country. Li Xiangyang is the hero and guerrilla captain in Guerrilla in the Plain. He is famous for sneaking behind enemy lines to carry out guerrilla warfare. ).
However, because J- 12 is the first fighter developed by China, and the main development time is only 1 year and 5 months, some necessary tests have not been done in detail. Therefore, in view of the problems existing in the flight test of three prototypes, Lu et al. conducted necessary tests and made 10 major modifications to the aircraft, such as using area rule to reduce flight resistance. After remanufacturing, the improved first aircraft successfully flew again in July 1975. From July 1975 to June 1977, the improved J-12 flew 135, with 800 aircraft.
It should be said that the development of J- 12 is successful, as the first new machine independently developed by China after getting rid of the Soviet MIG aircraft series. Measurement and flight test show that J- 12 is the lightest aircraft in the world so far, and its geometric size and maximum cross-sectional area are the smallest among similar aircraft. Someone summed up the outstanding characteristics of J- 12, namely "light, short and agile". The so-called light is that the normal takeoff weight of the aircraft is only 4.5 tons; The so-called short, that is, the take-off and landing distance of the aircraft is within 500 meters; The so-called spirit refers to the climbing, hovering and maneuverability of the aircraft, and its follow-up is better than that of similar aircraft.
Today, the pilots who participated in the J- 12 test flight praised its flexibility, and its agile figure and heroic spirit in the air are still imprinted in the minds of all those who have seen it.
Looking through the flight test records of J- 12 100, we can easily see that when J- 12 was born, its performance was superior. To this day, these data also give us confidence in developing and producing our own fighters. Let's look through those flight test records together!
The maximum climbing rate of J- 12 at sea level is 180m/s, while the American F- 14 fighter plane that first flew in the same year as J- 12 was only 200m/s, which was specially used to deal with the American F-5E fighter plane of the Soviet Union MIG -2 1.
The maximum hovering radius of J- 12 at the altitude of 5000m is 1 140m, while that of the J-6 fighter with outstanding maneuverability at middle and low altitude in China is 1200m, and that of the F-5e fighter specially developed by the United States to improve its hovering performance is 1080m.
J- 12' s takeoff and landing taxiing distances are all within 500m (otherwise, the takeoff taxiing distance is 500m and the landing taxiing distance is 5 10m), while the subsonic fighter J-5 with the same weight as J- 12 has a takeoff taxiing distance of 590m and a landing taxiing distance of 825m. It is extremely difficult for supersonic J- 12 to reach a shorter running distance than sonic J-5. Moreover, J- 12 has a dustproof device, which can take off on a short soil runway and is of great value.
One of the prototypes, 歼 12, has no shock cone.
One of the prototypes, 歼 12, has a shock cone.
The maximum solo speed of J- 12 at the altitude of 1 1000m is 1.5 Mach, which is obviously superior to J-6. In fact, the ceiling is equivalent to 歼 6, which is 174 10 meter; Its high-altitude cruising speed is Mach 0.95, which is not supersonic, but close to sonic cruising. This performance was excellent at that time.
The empty weight of J- 12 is only 3 100 kg, which is equivalent to the weight of a medium-sized car. The normal takeoff weight is 4450 kg, and the maximum takeoff weight is 5295 kg. It is equipped with a turbojet -6 B jet engine, with afterburning thrust of 39.72 kN and thrust-to-weight ratio of 0.9 1, which was not easy at that time. J- 12 was realized because Lu and others boldly adopted many new structures, and creatively adopted new technologies and materials, such as the integral fuel tank in the middle wing of the fuselage, large-area hyperboloid metal honeycomb panels, carbon fiber composite panels, titanium alloy panels, aluminum alloy landing gear, integral windshield and so on. These new technologies were very innovative in China at that time, and accumulated rich experience for the development of China light fighters.
But J- 12 is too small, too light, easy to operate and can be mass-produced, so it also brings some disadvantages. If its oil storage capacity is 1.250kg, it can carry two 400-liter auxiliary fuel tanks with a maximum range of 1.385km. After a flight, it is a short-range aircraft, which is not suitable for future air combat. Another example is its airborne weapon, which only has 80 rounds of ammunition 1 gun, 1 gun 120 rounds of ammunition and two infrared guided air-to-air missiles. As far as its flying weight is concerned, its firepower is not weak, but it is weak compared with modern fighters all over the world. Moreover, the nose intake mode adopted by the aircraft is not conducive to the installation of advanced fire control equipment. If it is changed to the two-side design, although advanced fire control equipment can be installed, the weight and resistance of the aircraft will increase obviously, and its maneuverability and flexibility will also be significantly weakened. In addition, the J- 12 engine uses the turbojet -6 B used on the J-6 aircraft, but the J- 12 fighter is equipped with two such engines, and the J-1 2 is only equipped with the1engine, so the thrust is obviously insufficient and it is extremely difficult to achieve the expected design performance.
However, although J- 12 fighter decided to stop further development due to these obvious shortcomings and the equipment system adjustment of 1978 in February, it was still successful. At that time, because the development cycle was too short, no more pneumatic experiments were carried out and no more advanced pneumatic measures were taken, there was still great potential to be tapped in aerodynamic shape. For example, the wing leading edge slotted wing and trailing edge double-slit flap were originally designed, but they were simplified due to time problems, and only the trailing edge Fuller flap was installed. There are many cases like this, so J- 12 still has great potential to be developed. As for the problem of insufficient thrust when it uses the turbojet -6 B jet engine, experts from the famous British rolls royce Engine Company visited the China Aviation Museum and thought that J- 12 was the best designed aircraft in China. As long as the advanced turbofan engine is replaced, it can not only solve the thrust problem, but also reduce the fuel consumption by nearly half, thus doubling the range. The engine mentioned by foreign experts cannot be produced in China and can only be purchased abroad. The expert from rolls royce even thinks that if J- 12 is replaced by a turbofan engine with low fuel consumption, it will definitely become a popular aircraft in small countries.
In recent years, with the overall rise of armed helicopters, many domestic aviation experts believe that J- 12 can be used as a special attack helicopter with a little modification. Experts believe that J- 12 will become an effective nemesis of armed helicopters as long as it is willing to give up the supersonic design requirements and increase the wing area to further improve the maneuverability except acceleration.
J- 12 only produced five prototypes, two of which were kept in China Aviation Museum, 1 in Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics and two in Nanchang Aircraft Factory. Interested readers might as well make a special trip to these places to have a look and witness the first fighter designed by China people with their own wisdom.
Main technical data of J- 12
Captain10.644m.
The height of the machine is 3.706 meters.
The tail height is 7. 192m.
Empty machine weight 3 100 kg
The normal takeoff weight is 4450 kg.
The maximum takeoff weight is 5295 kg.
Engine 1 turbojet -6 B, thrust 30.4 kn, afterburner thrust 39.8+06 kn.
Maximum solo speed (h =11000 m)1472 km/h.
Service ceiling17410m
Maximum voyage 1385km (with auxiliary fuel tank) 1 167km (internal fuel).
Weapons 1 30 mm cannon, 80 rounds of ammunition, 1 23 mm cannon, 120 rounds of ammunition, and two infrared guided air-to-air missiles can be hung.
Crew 1