WZ-8 / BZK-008 CH-91 Hypersonic Drone Testbed

The WZ-8 [Wuzheng-8 = Non-Detect-8 ] may be an entirely real program, or some or all of this "program" may be "an obvious Commie trick". What has been seen to date constitutes little more than some artwork and aeroshells that could be easily fabricated fiberglass models, intended to mislead the Americans. At least some of what China has publicly displayed is surely deceptive, and this is a pretty good candidate for such deception.

A grand military parade was held in Beijing on 01 October 2019 to mark the People's Republic of China's 70th founding anniversary. China said the parade, the country’s most important political event of the year, which featured more than 15,000 troops marching through part of Tiananmen Square as jet fighters trailing colored smoke soared overhead, was not meant to intimidate any specific country. But it was a message to the world that China’s military prowess is growing rapidly, even as it faces mounting challenges. Military Parade Deputy General Manager Tan Min, at a press conference the week before the parade, 'All the weapons exhibited in the parade active service.' had used. This statement shows that the aircraft is actively used by the Chinese armed forces.

This high-speed Chinese drone, which reportedly first flew in September 2015 is launched from an H-6 carrier aircraft, the drone fired up its combined cycle turbo-ramjet engine to accelerate from subsonic to high-supersonic speeds. It could be equipped with a scramjet to test combined cycle hypersonic engines.

In mid-2018 a satellite image appeared online. The figure showed that four different types of unmanned aircraft lined up. The right-to-left suspects are respectively light yellow painted Pterosaur-2 large-scale unmanned attack aircraft, gray. The painted "Xianglong" high-altitude long-time strategic reconnaissance aircraft, a black painted mysterious multi-wave supersonic unmanned aerial vehicle that has never appeared before. On the far left, it is suspected to be a white Rainbow-3 drone with a "winged cap" (small duck wing = canard). The number is at least dozens. It may be used for unmanned cluster tactical testing. In March 2017, there were tests the "Pegasus" drone formation combat capability. This machine is a domestic model of China Rainbow-3 authorized for Pakistani production.

The most mysterious of these is the black triangle unmanned aerial vehicle, which has a very flat shape and seemed to some observers to utilizes the wave-rider design to facilitate high-sonic flight at the edge of the atmosphere. It is reported that the photo was taken on 07 June 2018 at a military airport in the northwest. After a few days, other aircraft are still there, and the black aircraft disappeared, which was mysterious. Some people said that this mysterious aircraft was a "Dark Sword", but the shape is obviously different, and the aircraft had been exposed repeatedly over the years. CCTV reported the JF12 hypersonic shock wave wind tunnel was being used for tests in October 2017 with a triangle-shaped wave-body hypersonic unmanned aerial vehicle that was similar.

The appearance of the WZ-8 is quite similar to that of the American UAV D-21 that the US stopped using many years ago. The D-21 was used by the United States in Chinese reconnaissance missions and many crashed with rubble that was scattered throughout China. A relatively intact D-21 was exhibited at the Beijing Military Museum a few years ago. From November 1969 to March 1971, a total of four actual missions were flown, all against the Chinese Lop Nur test site, but all four failed. Among them, the first three successful photographs were taken, but all of them failed to recover, while the fourth time the vehicle disappeared after entering China’s airspace. The wreckage exhibited by the China Aviation Museum was the last D-21 that went missing in 1971.

The D-21 program, although never operationally successful, left a critical legacy for other intelligence and national security programs. The D-21 drone incorporated a number of technologies that would mature in future defense and intelligence technology programs including: unmanned aerial vehicles, stealth design features, and ramjet engine technology. The D-21 drone vehicle is the reconnaissance vehicle developed and used in the TAGBOARD program. The unused vehicles were decommissioned and sent to the Military Aircraft Storage and Disposition Center in 1976, where they are visible to the public. At that time, the National Reconnaissance Office authoriz~d a very few statements which could be released in response to direct public query about the drone vehicle. These specifically declined to comment about denied area overflight missions.

From the appearance of Wuzhen-8, its aerodynamic shape is similar to that of D-21. Both adopt a tailless delta wing layout, which is obviously very suitable for supersonic flight. However, the ramjet used by the D-21, while the Wuzhen-8 seems to use a rocket engine. There are two side-by-side small nozzles at the rear of the aircraft, and the aircraft has no engine air intake, which means that the Wuzhen-8 is most likely to use a liquid rocket engine. If it is confirmed that the aircraft uses a rocket engine, Then it can be inferred that the flight altitude of the aircraft is very likely to exceed the atmosphere, because the combustion time of the rocket engine is relatively short, usually between 150 and 350 seconds, which is obviously not enough for the aircraft to fly. However, the rocket engine does not need to absorb oxygen from the atmosphere due to its own oxidizer, so it can adapt to space flight. However, if the No. 8 is flying outside the atmosphere and the rocket engine can be operated for more than 200 seconds, it is enough to ensure a maximum range of more than 5,000 kilometers.

Due to the heavy weight of the Wuzheng-8, it is obviously impossible to hang it on the wing of the Y-8 aircraft as it did in the past—because the Y-8’s wing strength is ultimately limited, and it is impossible to effectively mount such a large UAV. And our country is now the only suitable for mounting non-detection-8 aircraft, probably only the H-6 series of bombers. Because the Wuzhen-8 aircraft did not design the fuselage vertical tail, but added a small upturned vertical tail on the outer edge of the wing to control the lateral stability of the aircraft. In this way, it can be mounted on the ventral magazine of the H-6 bomber, but the outer door of the magazine must be removed when the H-6 is mounted on the non-detection-8.

From the aerodynamic point of view, the shape of Wuzheng-8 is very similar to the enlarged DF-17 ballistic missile. Its aerodynamic shape is obviously designed with a waverider structure, so it can carry out a fast flight similar to "water drift" at the edge of the atmosphere. At the same time, because Wuzhen-8 is mounted by the H-6 bomber and launched by airdrop, considering that China's H-6K and H-6M bombers have a combat radius of 2500 to 3000 kilometers, plus Wuzhen-8 With its own maximum range of 5,000 kilometers (expected), if the aircraft cooperates with the H-6 deployment, it is sufficient for effective reconnaissance of any target within 5,000 kilometers of our country, and if it is a H-6N bomber with increased air refueling capability If so, the combat radius of Wuzhen-8 can be further extended.

From a tactical point of view, even today when spy satellites are flying all over the sky, high-altitude high-speed drones still have important strategic value. First of all, due to the advancement of technology, most of today's UAVs adopt the "human-in-the-loop" control method, that is, the flight of the UAV is remotely controlled by a dedicated operator. When performing reconnaissance missions in this way, ground operators can perform repeated reconnaissance of the target based on their own understanding, thereby discovering some hidden intelligence. However, the early firebee and D-21 drones were pre-programmed and could only follow The program machinery conducts reconnaissance and does not have the ability to adjust halfway. Therefore, Wudi-8 has a huge tactical advantage.

Second, the high-altitude unmanned reconnaissance aircraft is fast and efficient in reconnaissance. Take the Non-Reconnaissance-8 as an example. The aircraft uses a rocket engine and can fly at high speeds outside the atmosphere. Due to the high flight altitude, anti-satellite weapons are needed to effectively combat the non-reconnaissance flight of the Non-Reconnaissance-8. This obviously greatly improves the interception cost and difficulty of Detective-8. At the same time, flying in a near-vacuum environment outside the atmosphere can greatly reduce drag and ensure the aircraft's range and reconnaissance range.

Third, the Wudi-8, which has the shape of a wave-riding body and the ability to fly in space, is no longer just a simple high-altitude high-speed unmanned reconnaissance aircraft. It can also dismantle the reconnaissance equipment and change it into various warheads, such as conventional high explosives. Warheads, EMP warheads, mother-and-child warheads and even nuclear warheads. Therefore, Wudi-8 is not just a simple UAV, it can perform a variety of combat missions by changing its payload, and even directly use it as a missile.