What you need to know: China’s quest to field a stealth fighter rivaling the US F-35 is facing setbacks due to challenges in materials science, particularly in the development of advanced radar-absorbing materials (RAMs).

-As former US Navy operations specialist Eric Wicklund explains, while replicating the F-35’s stealth design is possible, replicating the F-35’s RAM capabilities remains elusive. Wicklund compares China’s situation to reverse engineering Damascus steel without understanding the underlying process.

-This gap makes Chinese stealth fighters less effective at evading radar. At the same time, the F-35’s advanced avionics, sensor fusion and electronic warfare systems allow it to maintain an edge in situational awareness and networked capabilities.

Why Chinese fighter jets still lag behind the F-35: Materials science matters

A few months ago, Quora user Eric Wicklund, a former US Navy operations specialist, explain why the Chinese cannot yet present a real competitor to the F-35.

“Simply producing some form of stealthy appearance is only one part of the many aspects of stealth,” Wicklund began. “Even the internal structures and how they are configured matter. » According to Wicklund, China has gaps in materials science, and this gap has impacted Beijing’s ability to develop radar-absorbing material (RAM), capable of absorbing or dispersing up to 80%. incoming radar waves.

According to Wicklund, stealing a stealth form on a computer is simple enough, but developing cutting-edge RAM is a more difficult task. “I could give the Chinese a piece of RAM,” Wicklund wrote, “they could analyze it and realize that it is genuine, but the problem lies in reverse engineering. They know what it is, but wouldn’t know how to make it.

Wicklund explained that giving American RAM technology to the Chinese would be like giving a Damascus steel blade to an Egyptian sword maker. The Egyptian would recognize the superior quality of the blade but would not be able to reverse engineer it. This is the problem the Chinese are currently facing with RAM technology.

Wicklund compared China’s problems with RAM to their recent problems in developing the WS-15 jet engine. For years, the Chinese struggled to create fan blades that could withstand the heat generated by a jet engine. Eventually, Chinese materials science caught up and the WS-15 has since entered production. “The RAM is going to be another difficult stepping stone, and until they master it, China’s stealth fighters will be outmatched by the F-35.”

F-35 fighter: at the cutting edge of technology

The United States is currently the only country capable of developing and producing such an aircraft sophisticated like the F-35 or the F-22.

Designed for air superiority and strike missions, the F-35 is also equipped to provide electronic warfare and ISR functions. The most notable features of the F-35 are advanced avionics and sensor fusion, which give the pilot an unparalleled level of situational awareness.

Oddly enough, the F-35 was not designed to be as kinetically capable or as maneuverable as the fifth-generation F-22 fighter. Although the F-35 can keep pace with fourth-generation aircraft, the airframe was designed with stealth and sensor fusion as priorities, rather than maneuverability.

Key sensors aboard the F-35 include the Northrop Grumman AN/APG-81 active electronically scanned array radar; the BAE Systems AN/ASQ-239 Barracuda electronic warfare system; the Northrop Grumman/Raytheon AN/AAQ-37 distributed aperture electro-optical system; Lockheed Martin’s AN/AAQ-40 electro-optical targeting system; and the Northrop Grumman AN/ASQ-242 communications, navigation and identification suite.

The sum of all the advanced systems results in an aircraft with better situational awareness, better command and control capabilities, and better network-centric capabilities than any aircraft in the world. production.

About the Author: Harrison Kass

Harrison Kass is a defense and national security writer with more than 1,000 total articles on issues related to world affairs. A lawyer, pilot, guitarist, and minor professional hockey player, Harrison joined the United States Air Force as a trainee pilot, but was medically discharged. Harrison holds a BA from Lake Forest College, a JD from the University of Oregon, and an MS from New York University. Harrison listens to Dokken.

Image credit: Creative Commons.