Superior stealth: Chinese drone wing design aims to raise the bar for radar-evading aircraft
- Technology harnesses compressed jet engine air and could replace mechanical flight components, researchers say
- Reduced radar signatures would benefit China’s long-range stealth bomber programme
The drone, which has no tail, appears to be a scaled-down version of the United States Air Force’s B2 Spirit bomber, and can fly without the use of elevators, ailerons or flaps – the hinged moving parts known as elevons that help control flight direction – according to the researchers.
“Our work is a first,” the team from the China Aerodynamics Research and Development Centre in Sichuan province said in a paper published on January 19 in the peer-reviewed journal Acta Aeronautica et Astronautica Sinica.
During a test flight, the drone climbed, rolled and adjusted to turbulence imbalances entirely by harnessing the compressed air inside the jet engine, while the aircraft’s elevons were locked in place, the scientists said in the paper.
The high-speed air flow, which was collected and distributed by a device called an actuator, formed a powerful but carefully calibrated layer of air around the drone’s wings that allowed the aircraft to pitch or bank just as effectively as planes that use mechanical parts to manoeuvre, according to the researchers.
But according to the researchers, mechanical rudders can disrupt the surface areas of the otherwise elaborately designed aircraft, significantly increasing the amount of radar reflecting area, therefore increasing the aircraft’s radar signature.