I want to be emperor

Chapter 1164: Airships and airplanes pay equal attention

The newly established Air Force is not large in scale. It currently only has hundreds of aircraft of various types, and it cannot be said to be deployed in actual combat.

The aviation industry of the Dachu Empire is still in a state of exploration and development. Various aircraft are still relatively primitive, and they still have many shortcomings when used in combat.

One of the more critical issues is that the accident rate of aircraft is still very high, making every flight a challenge.

The high accident rate in aviation is due to a combination of factors.

On the one hand, contemporary technology is still relatively limited, and the performance of the manufactured aircraft is not very good, because the research on many aspects of fluid dynamics and aircraft design is still at a relatively early stage, so the manufactured aircraft is actually Some problems may arise out of nowhere.

For example, the plane is flying well, but after making a slight movement, either climbing, descending, or turning, the plane suddenly loses control... and the pilot can't even figure out why it suddenly lost control.

And technicians cannot understand various situations through various modern detection equipment of later generations, so they cannot solve them.

The design of aircraft, especially the aerodynamic design, is a very technical knowledge. It does not mean that after you understand the principle of lift, you can just make an aircraft that can fly smoothly and perform various maneuvers. of.

The situation in the air is far more complicated than on the ground. The problems encountered by aircraft in different situations are many and different.

When an airplane is flying, it is affected by the changing surrounding airflow all the time... Coupled with the high speed of the airplane, slight changes in the airflow will cause huge body changes and eventually lead to loss of control.

These problems have been plaguing the aircraft designers of the Chu Empire in recent years.

Improving flight safety as much as possible is the core and most important design goal of the contemporary aircraft designers of the Chu Empire.

As for range, speed, and load capacity, we have to move back.

Why is the Heiyan aircraft designed and developed by Tangshan Aircraft Company, a subsidiary of Tang Machinery Group Co., favored by various aviation fleets and even private administrative agencies? It is not because of how fast this aircraft is, let alone its range. No matter how far it is, it's not because of how good the load is.

It is because it has the best flight safety performance, is very easy to control, and has the best adaptability to airflow at different heights in the air. At the same time, its good controllability allows pilots to make adjustments quickly and conveniently when encountering various airflow changes. , ultimately ensuring flight safety.

Easy to fly, this is why the Black Swallow series aircraft have received a large number of orders and have become the main training aircraft of the Army Air Force, Naval Air Force, and Guards Air Force.

As for data indicators such as range, speed and payload, they can only be said to be average, and are even slightly inferior to some new aircraft.

However, this still failed to shake the market position of the Heiyan series single-engine aircraft.

The first thing the newly established Air Force did after integrating the Army and Navy Air Forces was to eliminate all the other messy land-based single-engine aircraft, leaving only more than two hundred Heiyans. series of aircraft.

These Heiyan aircraft include the most important Heiyan trainer aircraft, as well as the Heiyan single-engine two-seater reconnaissance aircraft that is an extension of this trainer aircraft.

As for the reason? Generally speaking, pilots only accept Heiyan aircraft and are very resistant to other single-engine aircraft... Heiyan aircraft are safe to fly, but as for other single-engine aircraft, they will fall down at any time.

It is worth noting that when Tangshan Aircraft Company wanted to learn from the experience of Heiyan Aircraft and tried to develop a twin-engine aircraft that also had good flight safety performance, it encountered great trouble.

Even though they also used the same control system as the Heiyan aircraft and similar design ideas, the final twin-engine aircraft was still not very safe.

In other words, they were unable to replicate their success on the Heiyan aircraft... In the final analysis, it was because even though they made a very safe aircraft like the Heiyan aircraft, they still couldn't figure out why their own Heiyan aircraft Safer than other companies' single-engine aircraft.

Without knowing the whole story, Tangshan Aircraft Company did not even dare to make design changes to the current Heiyan aircraft. The so-called upgrade research and development only increased the engine horsepower and strengthened the structural strength of the aircraft, which did not affect the overall design of the aircraft. degree of structure.

Well, it’s not like they haven’t made changes... They actually made changes, but during the test flight of the so-called upgraded model after the changes, the aircraft suddenly lost control within ten minutes of taking off for the first time, and the test pilot was forced to parachute...

This is very embarrassing!

The reason for this embarrassing situation is that the current basic technology of the Chu Empire is still relatively limited, the understanding of various basic theories is relatively shallow, and there is not enough experience.

Tangshan Aircraft Company is like this, and the other four aircraft companies are also facing similar problems, so the aircraft can be produced. However, the aircraft produced are still relatively primitive and have a high accident rate.

In addition to the problems of the aircraft itself, what makes it difficult for the aircraft to be used in large-scale military or commercial applications is also related to the lack of accumulated experience with the aircraft.

Chu State had not invented the airplane very long ago. There were not many pilots, and the pilots' flying hours were also few.

The flying technology is still very shallow, and it is impossible to summarize a large amount of effective experience in various aircraft technologies.

In the end, it led to the Chu army having an air force for some time. Now even the air force has become an independent army, but it is still difficult to put it into the battlefield on a large scale for actual combat applications.

It's not that it can't be used, but the risk of non-combat losses is relatively high... Military senior officials will not insist on letting the aircraft appear on overseas battlefields unless it is absolutely necessary.

After all, it is not necessary for pilots to risk their lives, go to overseas areas that lack logistical maintenance and repair support, and then perform combat missions in unfamiliar airspace environments...

The Chu Empire did not have an all-out war with any big country, and there was no emergency situation. It had to use immature and risky weapons and equipment.

Nowadays, the Chu army can solve 99% of the threats overseas by relying on the army's existing weapons and equipment. Even if aerial reconnaissance and support are needed, the current airship force can also provide certain support.

Relatively speaking, the Chu army has been using airships for a longer time and has accumulated more experience.

And to be honest, contemporary airships are much safer than airplanes... Don't think that airplanes using hydrogen are very dangerous and can explode at every turn. In fact, for now, airships are far safer than airplanes.

By the way... Today's airship force is also under the jurisdiction of the Air Force. Therefore, the Air Force's military strength in overseas areas mainly consists of several airship brigades. Currently, the Air Force is in the Canal Zone of North Africa, Cadiz in Europe, and Dover, England. An airship brigade has been deployed in each place, with several airships under its jurisdiction, mainly used for aerial surveillance and reconnaissance missions in surrounding areas. The Da Chu Empire Air Force developed aircraft, but it did not give up on airships. On the contrary, they advanced hand in hand... After all, aircraft and airships have their own advantages.

For example, airships can stay in the air for a long time, have a large load capacity, and have a long range.

Aircraft are more flexible, lower cost, and can better perform some medium and low-altitude missions... The airship cannot risk lowering to a height of several hundred meters to perform missions, because the maneuverability of the airship is almost zero, and its size is also small. It is very huge. When it is at low altitude, it is simply a living target. If it is shot down by the indigenous guns, wouldn't it be funny?

However, the aircraft is fast and maneuverable, so it is safer to face ground firepower when performing medium and low-altitude missions.

At the same time, because of its high speed, when the aircraft is needed on the front line, it can quickly respond and arrive over the war zone to perform reconnaissance missions, and quickly bring back the news.

It's not like an airship... After slowly arriving at the predetermined area, the enemy had already run away.

Even if the enemy is discovered, it is not easy to send the news back. After slowly sending the news back, the enemies have already fled.

Therefore, airships and airplanes each have their own advantages.

Especially for the Chu Empire, which has no air threats and whose potential enemies have poor ground-to-air firepower, airships still have considerable tactical value.

After the First World War broke out in the original time and space, the reason why countries quickly abandoned airships was because airships could hardly protect themselves in the air and were a living target when encountering an airplane... At the same time, because of their extremely poor maneuverability and large target size, When intercepted by ground anti-aircraft guns and anti-aircraft machine guns at medium and low altitudes, it turns into a fireball in minutes!

Airships during World War I were used as targets by aircraft at medium and high altitudes, and as targets by aircraft and ground firepower at low altitudes...

Airships that could not survive on the battlefield naturally lost their tactical value and were eventually quickly replaced by aircraft.

However, this problem does not exist in the Chu Empire... First of all, the enemy has no aircraft, so theoretically, as long as the Chu army's airship flies a little higher, it will not be threatened by any enemy firepower in the mid-to-high altitude area.

In addition, the enemy's ground firepower was very weak. These indigenous people did not even have machine guns, let alone rifled artillery. All they had were some single-shot rifled rifles, and then they would get some repeating rifles from the black market when they were exhausted.

These primitive rifle firepower poses little threat to airships even at medium and low altitudes, so as long as they don't foolishly drop directly over the enemy's head to a height of several hundred meters, the threat from ground firepower they face is extremely limited.

It is even an exaggeration to say that as long as the combat altitude remains above one thousand meters, the Chu army's airship will not face any threats...at least not now.

This, coupled with the airship's long range, ability to stay airborne for a long time, and huge load capacity, give the airship a certain tactical value.

Apart from anything else, it can still be used for aerial surveillance and detecting enemy movements... It is just that the speed of transmitting information back is slower, but the country is also currently studying the lightweight and miniaturization of wireless telegraph machines. In the future, such small It was also possible for telegraph machines to be mounted on airships or even airplanes.

Since the current airships are still available, the Air Force officially issued a tender after its formal establishment, hoping to obtain a military airship that is safer and faster at the same time... Of course, the hydrogen airship is used. The reason why it is not used Helium is safer because the contemporary Chu Empire has discovered that it can even refine helium in the process of oil and gas production.

However, the supply of raw materials is very limited and the preparation is very difficult, which also leads to the extremely high price of helium.

In the contemporary Dachu Empire, helium is a very regular rare gas. If it is used to build an airship, the entire helium reserve in the empire will not be enough for one airship.

Therefore, it was helpless for the Dachu Empire Air Force to use hydrogen to make airships... People also know that hydrogen is very dangerous.

The reason why hydrogen airships continue to be used today is because contemporary aircraft are more dangerous!

From the perspective of accident rate, current airships are much safer than airplanes...

In the Da Chu Empire, if airplanes want to replace airships, other aspects are not important. What is important is to reduce the accident rate of flight. As long as the accident rate is reduced, then airplanes can replace airships in a matter of minutes.

Therefore, on the one hand, we continue to use airships to maintain air mission needs in overseas areas; on the other hand, we provide large-scale support for the development of the aviation industry and promote the rapid upgrading and iteration of aircraft.

The large-scale procurement and equipment use of Heiyan series aircraft is a typical example.

And Tangshan Aircraft Company has lived up to the trust of the Air Force, although their company has not been able to figure out why the flight performance of its own Heiyan aircraft is much better than other aircraft, and it cannot be copied.

But this does not prevent them from continuing to upgrade the Heiyan aircraft by upgrading the engine, replacing the body materials, and upgrading to a better control structure.

To put it simply, it is to ensure that the overall aerodynamic layout remains unchanged and to carry out internal upgrades as much as possible.

Not to mention, this effect is quite good.

In the 54th year of Chengshun, Tangshan Aircraft Company began to deliver a new generation of Heiyan training and reconnaissance aircraft.

Due to the replacement of a more powerful engine and the improvement of the fuel tank layout, the range of this single-engine, two-seater training and reconnaissance aircraft has been greatly increased to 500 kilometers.

This is already a pretty good figure. After all, this Heiyan aircraft is a single-engine aircraft, and too much weight has been paid to the dead weight of the aircraft structure for flight safety. In the end, this aircraft is still a two-seater aircraft and needs to carry two people. The weight of a pilot.

Under such circumstances, it can still achieve a range of 500 kilometers, which is already quite outstanding... Well, this is actually not the credit of Tangshan Aircraft Company, but the credit of the brother company Tangshan Power Company.

The reason why the new Heiyan trainer reconnaissance aircraft can have a range of 500 kilometers is because Tangshan Power Company has comprehensively upgraded and modified the previous engine. In addition to increasing horsepower, the main upgrade direction is to reduce fuel consumption. .

And this also relies on the advancement of fuel consumption and energy-saving technology in automobile engines.

(End of this chapter)