PL-15 export version data officially released by China

[Pak Nationalist]

I have a few questions.

1. Now that the range has been officially stated, this 145km range would be effective for slow-moving targets like AWACS and Tankers?

2. Its effectiveness would be seriously diminished for fast-moving acs like fighter jets at the upper limit of the range envelop as is the case for other BVRs?

3. What is the expected NEZ with this range and how does it stand against the expected NEZ of Meteor?

 

[Song Hong]

I am thinking the future of bvr combat may be suicide slave drone under the command of master fighter

 

[iLION12345_1]

So question:
How is the PL-15 achieving significantly greater kinematic performance than the PL-12 while basically being the same size?
PL-12 PL-15 difference
Length: 3934 mm 3996 mm +62 mm
Weight: 199 kg 210 kg +11 kg
Dia: 203 mm 203 mm nil
Max Range 70 km 145 km 75 km

This has to be some revolutionary progress in rocket motors. Or PL-12 was undersold or the PL-15 is being oversold.

Wouldn’t the dual pulse rocket motor significantly improve the range? Added to that better aerodynamics and fuel management (as well as new propellant), I think 145 is realistic, but i‘m not an expert. If anything it’s much more realistic than the 200+ people were always hyping it up for.

 

[Dustom999]

So question:
How is the PL-15 achieving significantly greater kinematic performance than the PL-12 while basically being the same size?
PL-12 PL-15 difference
Length: 3934 mm 3996 mm +62 mm
Weight: 199 kg 210 kg +11 kg
Dia: 203 mm 203 mm nil
Max Range 70 km 145 km 75 km

This has to be some revolutionary progress in rocket motors. Or PL-12 was undersold or the PL-15 is being oversold.

It has new synthetic rocket propellant.

 

[iLION12345_1]

10 years ago this might be the truth due to slower speed. But with Ramjet, Scramjet and then Hypersonic missile systems, 300 KM is not that big of a deal in the next ten years. These missiles will become essentially drones or hunter-killer vehicles.

I follow this site a lot. They post great military news. Boeing is revealing a concept of such hunter-killer vehicles soon. It may blow our mind when the true range is disclosed to the media.

Boeing unveils Long-Range Air-to-Air Missile concept – Western Media

westernmedia.org

Parabolic paths and larger missiles, that’s how 200+ KM range is accomplished, as with R37M and PL-21, when they choose that flight path they are not going to be effective against fighter aircraft, this is specifically done to target larger, slow moving targets like AWACS and Tankers, we are still a fair bit away from a smaller BVR missile that can achieve such ranges with a straight trajectory and a maintained speed.

 

[serenity]

If you know a bit about missiles, Then the range is about what was always expected, it’s unlikely non-export version has a much longer range than this one either.

First of all, BVR range is a rather Useless and arbitrary figure because the range varies so vastly depending on the launch conditions.
The altitude, weather, aircraft speed, angle at which it is fired, aircraft capability, size of enemy aircraft, And so many more things come into play, the same missile that can go 200KM in ideal conditions might not even reach 100KM in bad conditions.

The “145” KM range they have estimated is likely under fair-good conditions, under ideal ones it would go a fair bit beyond that, in bad conditions it wouldn’t go 2/3rds that. It’s just how BVRs work.

That's why at the end of the day range is a rather poor factor to judge a missiles capability, in that regard we don’t know anything about any modern BVR missiles thats concrete, I’d expect a similar range from Meteor and AIM120D under the same conditions And I wouldn’t say one is better than the other until any of them get a combat record.

Now to be absolutely clear, 145+ KM is a massive range and with the other upgrades they’ve likely added to the missile It’s very likely Comparable with the best of the rest of the world (Meteor, AIM120D). Anyone who thought this thing could go over 200KM was sadly getting baited by fake numbers that someone had made up and then everyone started quoting. The missile is simply not big enough.

The only missiles currently getting ranges beyond 200KM are the ones that follow a parabolic path to achieve them, something they usually specifically do to target larger airplanes like AWACS and Tankers, PL-21/PLXX is known to be able to do this (and the Russian R37M with its quoted range of nearly 400KM). PL-15 , Meteor and AIM120D cannot do this.

Accurate answer to question of BVR and how it really is like.

These people think a number of range is everything and then pump it.

There are so many things behind a good BVR missile and I bet the Indians are actually not even aware of how to best evaluate and test BVR missiles. I think they just fire at some targets and say barat success. In real war, their missiles may not even be able to engage their targets and they will not understand why then their IFF will fail and the will be shooting other barats. These cheap trolls online don't know anything about military technologies and think their baratielectronics is impressive. It is like a shit student being proud of achieving 70% when class average was 99% lol.

 

[JamD]

Wouldn’t the dual pulse rocket motor significantly improve the range? Added to that better aerodynamics and fuel management as a newer and smarter missile, I think 145 is realistic, but i‘m not an expert. If anything it’s much more realistic than the 200+ people were always hyping it up for.

I'm not an expert either so I'm asking for someone more knowledgeable to discuss. From what I know based on my know-how in guidance going from 70 to 145 cannot happen just from aerodynamics and trajectory design. The propulsion has to be radically different. Which is what I don't know much about.

 

[Song Hong]

Got it. Long range bvr is useful against awac, tankers or bomber

 

[JamD]

It has new synthetic rocket propellant.

What is that? Can you speculate on some details?

 

[serenity]

For super long ranges, hypersonic glide is one method but requires powerful rocket and they are not that available or if so are going to take 10 times more time to make each one and 100 times more price. If it is that easy to boost to hypersonic for a missile sized rocket which can be loaded onto most fighters, then that is something we will be new to see but if it can, gliding vehicle using aerodynamics is possible. Other best HGV method is scramjet or new propulsion something China has leaked before. 2016 era leaked new better type of scramjet tech and 2020 leaked totally new type of hypersonic engine tested. In fact combined cycles have also been tested and hypersonic aircraft landed too for one of the tests this year. Never once did these official information announcement have ever been wrong or said something untrue. In fact they announce these achievements late.

Other experiments I think would involve launch cannisters like I mentioned years ago. Delivering many missiles basically like a drone with own missile payload but that requires bomber sized aircraft to carry many of and that means also lower launch speed.

Other easy methods are booster rocket which I think China and USA are already using since this is cheap and easy compared to many methods and doesn't require huge changes to fighters at all. Can also be loaded onto fighters.

So many big picture factors like price, production rate, time cost, how many people need to work on this and so on. Maybe the most effective solution is swarming or cheaper low cost but lower performance drones.

It also all depends on what others are using and what direction they are taking. Each counter is dynamic and changes the system totally.

 

[Dustom999]

What is that? Can you speculate on some details?

New cocktail of chemicals, that burns hotter yet slower.
Some European paper a few years ago touted this Chinese New rocket propellant having 20-22% more energy density and improved temperatures.
Higher the combustion temperatures, more the gasses expand while coming out of Rocket nozzle and thus better thrust.

 

[F-6 enthusiast]

The “145” KM range they have estimated is likely under fair-good conditions, under ideal ones it would go a fair bit beyond that, in bad conditions it wouldn’t go 2/3rds that. It’s just how BVRs work.

True
That is true of all missiles. officially The range of R-77 is 80km but the effective range is way less than that. DCS isn't real life , but its the closest civilians might get to knowing the capabilities of missiles.

In this experiment the mig only gets the ''Launch Authorisation'' when the hot targets (Diamond and Cross) are within 23km of the R-77

Everything depends on launch conditions. The Altitude, speed of the aircraft launching the missile and the target aspect hot (heading towards you) or cold (heading away) or flanking. The altitude and speed of the targets also matter. ECM is not taken into account here

the fat bars on the left are Rmax, Rlethal and Rmin



There are many factors that determine range which i have left out , i will leave that to the experts to explain.

 

[serenity]

So question:
How is the PL-15 achieving significantly greater kinematic performance than the PL-12 while basically being the same size?

	PL-12	PL-15	Difference
Length	3934 mm	3996 mm	+62 mm
Weight	199 kg	210 kg	+11 kg
Diameter	203 mm	203 mm	Nil
Max Range	70 km	145 km	+75 km

This has to be some revolutionary progress in rocket motors. Or PL-12 was undersold or the PL-15 is being oversold.

Using this for data:
View attachment 780497

Better fuel technology. It is also wider circumference missile. Electronic components will be more modern and also of much more expensive types. For example a $50 smartphone vs $2000 dollar one has different components but both have a purpose and place.

Smaller electronics will give more space for fuel. Possibly also better engine and certainly a different type of engine.

New cocktail of chemicals, that burns hotter yet slower.
Some European paper a few years ago touted this Chinese New rocket propellant having 20-22% more energy density and improved temperatures.
Higher the combustion temperatures, more the gasses expand while coming out of Rocket nozzle and thus better thrust.

Yes and one reason why it is not standard for example also applied for PL-12 is because PL-12 is required as the missile you make a lot of very quickly and can cheaply maintain and train with. For most cases, most countries do not even have 100km+ BVR missiles. It is good enough and it is unrealistic to have PL-15 as the main missile.

A similar comparison like Type 96 tank and type 99. Type 99A would have many equipment that is not even on Type 96. Just because the same supplier makes the equipment doesn't mean they should just include it on all tanks. Sometimes it is a waste.

For example all the old PLAAF 4th generation fighters like J-11 and J-10A or Su-30MKK, cannot give PL-15 good enough guidance and sight since radars are much older.

 

[doorstar]

I would be shocked if Pakistan didn't get the original weapon. What benefit there is to be probably the ONLY real Chinese ally, if they can't even get the original weapon for their security? Take a look at Israel, the US provides almost the same version of US weapon systems to Israel.

in the case of China and Pakistan interoperability is the reason

 

[alee92nawaz]

Don't worry Khan saheb. India's SFDR missile with 340 km range is under testing.

Not really bothered after the success of stuff like tejas, arjun etc