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CR500 Golden Eagle unmanned helicopter

NORINCO's Golden Eagle CR500 unmanned helicopter is the latest unmanned attack helicopter developed by China North Industries Corporation. In modern warfare, unmanned helicopters have very high use value. The unmanned gunship is small, with a take-off weight of only a few hundred kilograms, but it can carry two small missiles. If calculated proportionally, it can carry more ammunition than a manned gunship. Due to technological advancement, it can also carry more ammunition. Specifically, the ability of fully automatic strikes is not restricted by take-off and landing sites, and can follow the troops.

The Golden Eagle CR500 adopts a coaxial anti-propeller and tailless structure. The design of this coaxial helicopter is the most famous of the "Ka" series helicopters of the Soviet Kamov Helicopter Design Bureau. We know that in a helicopter with a normal layout, when the main rotor rotates at a high speed, the body of the helicopter will also rotate with the rotor torque. In order to overcome this problem, a conventional helicopter with a single rotor must install a tail rotor at the tail. , The tail rotor rotates in the opposite direction to offset the rotating moment of the fuselage, thereby maintaining balance. As a result, conventional single-rotor helicopters have many drawbacks. For example, the tail rotor needs to consume about 10% extra power. The tail boom and tail rotor will cause the helicopter body to be too long, which is not conducive to take-off and landing and narrow space operations. Especially shipborne helicopters.

The coaxial anti-propeller helicopter has two upper and lower blades that rotate in opposite directions, one clockwise and the other counterclockwise, which directly offsets the rotational torque of the rotor. Because the coaxial twin-rotor does not need to consider the tail rotor and tail beam, there is no tail rotor. With regard to the power consumed, all power can be used for lift and propulsion. Therefore, the body of the Golden Eagle CR500 can be made very short, is less affected by crosswinds, and has good stability and hovering performance, which is very important for the flight performance of the unmanned helicopter. Due to the two upper and lower rotors, the diameter of the rotor of the Golden Eagle CR500 can be smaller and the overall size is more compact, which is especially suitable for narrow spaces on land and naval ships.

The Golden Eagle CR500 is equipped with a photoelectric turret under the nose, which is the "eye" of the machine. There are three optical windows on the photoelectric turret, which are the visible light camera system, the infrared thermal image night vision system, and the laser ranging and irradiation system. It can be used to perform all-weather reconnaissance and ground attacks.

The weapon pylon of the Golden Eagle CR500 unmanned helicopter is particularly particular. It is a short wing design with wing-body fusion. The short wing is integrated with the fuselage, which can increase the fuselage space and can accommodate more fuel and equipment. Another advantage of the wing-body fusion design is that it can reduce the radar scattering area, increase stealth, and improve battlefield survivability.

A weapon hanging beam is installed under the short wing of the Golden Eagle CR500, which can mount two Blue Sword-9 air-to-surface missiles. The Lanjian-9 missile is a light model of the Lanjian series of air-to-surface missiles developed by China. The Blue Sword series missiles are mainly used for armed helicopters and for attacking unmanned anti-tank combat missions. The semi-active laser conductor system was adopted. In the early development of the Blue Sword missile, the entire laser guidance head referred to the localized "red earth" laser-guided projectile technology imported from Russia.

Due to different operational concepts, the former Soviet Union did not develop semi-active laser-guided airborne anti-tank missiles, and had a special liking for anti-tank missiles guided by laser beam steering, while the Chinese military believed that laser beam steering was vulnerable to interference and required the entire process. Control and accuracy drop sharply with the increase in range. Since laser semi-active guidance has inherent advantages in non-line-of-sight launching, laser semi-active guidance and millimeter-wave active guidance are highly respected, which is similar to the thinking of the US Army.

The Blue Sword missile is divided into two series, the heavy Blue Sword-7 and the light Blue Sword-9 missile. The Blue Sword-7 missile is the standard missile of the Zhi-10 armed helicopter. The model is the AKD10 air-to-surface missile. The missile is heavier, has a longer range, and is more powerful. The ball diameter is 170 mm, which is higher than the 178 mm of the US Hellfire missile. Slightly thinner, the weight of the 46 kg projectile is the same as that of the Haierfa missile. The projectile is 1775 mm long and has a maximum range of 8 kilometers. The static armor penetration power reaches 1,400 mm, and the dynamic armor penetration power 400 mm/68°.

As early as the end of November 2020, the North Industries Co., Ltd. (NORINCO ) Announced that its Golden Eagle CR500 vertical take-off and landing drone has completed the delivery and acceptance, and delivered it to an undisclosed customer. Now it seems that it may be the UAE. It was reported 10 May 2021 from the ongoing Abu Dhabi Defense Exhibition that China North Industries Corporation (NORINCO) CR500 "Golden Eagle" drone helicopter may be sold to the UAE. A local official who asked not to be named said: The UAE military plans to purchase a batch of new Chinese unmanned aerial vehicles. The official said: These transactions may include 10 to 15 Golden Eagle CR500 unmanned helicopters equipped with Red Arrow 12 missiles; and 20 MR40 UAVs equipped with BBE2 bombs. The costs of these two transactions are approximately US$9 million and US$7 million, respectively. He also added that the UAE will also receive "thousands of related missile systems."