Back in 1978, I was admitted to Northwestern Polytechnical University.

Chapter 182 Super 7 Mid-Air Refueling Noise? A matter of a few hammer blows!

Mr. Zhang's face was grim. He had originally intended to threaten the other party by leaving, but unexpectedly, the other party was the one who drove him away first!

He's never suffered such a loss before!

"Ahem, Mr. Zhang, I'm so sorry, Qin Liang is a bit spoiled. Qin Liang, sit down, please stop talking!" Director Duan quickly tried to smooth things over: "We'll report on your cooperation project later. Today, let's focus on receiving our McDonnell Douglas guests."

"Alright, then I'll stay silent. What I really want to know is, who would favor joint development with Boeing or the introduction of outdated McDonnell Douglas models?"

Mr. Zhang's face flushed red and then turned pale. In the end, he couldn't control his emotions: "Fine, if you're so capable, go ahead and cooperate with Boeing! Don't come crying to McDonnell Douglas when you get played by Boeing!"

After saying that, he stood up and strode out.

"Mr. Zhang, Mr. Zhang, wait! Don't go! Qin Liang, you've gone too far! How could you talk like that? Mr. Zhang, let me see you off!"

Old Cheng bowed and scraped as he saw Mai Dao and his group off, but when he returned, he stood up straight.

"Alright, Qin Liang, please continue your introduction!"

"Current passenger planes have too slow cruising speeds. Our joint development project with Boeing is codenamed Sonic Cruiser..."

Everyone listened with great interest; it was clearly more sophisticated than McDonnell Douglas!
The meeting didn't end until late noon, after which everyone went to the government canteen for lunch. At the table, Qin Liang sincerely admitted his mistakes, toasted the leaders, and apologized. The atmosphere was harmonious and pleasant.

After lunch, it was already past 2 p.m. Qin Liang yawned, knowing it was time to rest.

"Comrade Qin Liang, Elder Lin requests your presence!"

Qin Liang sighed helplessly, "Sigh, something's happened again!"
The capital city, the airport terminal.

"Liangzi, come on, quickly introduce the Sonic Cruiser. It sounds pretty good. If we modify it a bit, wouldn't it become our bomber?"

Qin Liang looked at the people present; they were all veterans, so they shouldn't leak any secrets.

"Sigh, leaders, to be honest, I don't think much of this project at all."

"why?"

"Passenger aircraft are something you can only develop yourself. Joint research and development? No one, no matter who it is, would be willing to genuinely cultivate a competitor," Qin Liang said. "Whether it's McDonnell Douglas or Boeing, they just want to take over the advanced technology we have because they see it. If nothing unexpected happens, Boeing will definitely find various reasons to abandon cooperation with us in the later stages of the research and development and then complete the research and development independently."

This kind of thing has happened before. Back then, when the civil aviation industry was going to implement a three-step plan, they lured South Korea and the island nation to join them in developing the AE100. Then Boeing came along. Boeing provided the aircraft blueprints, which turned out to be the Boeing 737-600. They didn't need to design it; they just needed to be responsible for production. Boeing would control all the quality. They only needed to pay a technology fee and a brand usage fee, which didn't need to be much—just a billion US dollars.

Thus, the independent project became an OEM production. Then came the financial crisis, and the other two companies withdrew. Only Orient persisted. After fooling Singapore, they joined forces with Europe to develop the project. The project specifications were all based on Airbus. When the research and development was almost complete, Europe abandoned the project and launched its own A318 passenger plane.

Easterners are furious! Isn't this just our AE100?
Now that I've been reborn, I certainly can't let this happen!

The people present had complicated expressions: "You made such a big fuss just to save the Y-10 project?"

"That's right, the Y-10 is the hope of our Eastern aviation industry!" Qin Liang nodded. "The Y-10 is also of great significance to the military. Aerial refueling tankers, electronic warfare aircraft, airborne early warning aircraft, and so on all require large passenger aircraft! Leaders, it's time for the Air Force to show its sincerity!"

The export order of only four aircraft is not enough; we also need domestic air force orders!

"The Super-7 has already been modified with a fixed aerial refueling probe," Elder Lin said. "Once the aerial refueling tests are completed, our Air Force will place an order!"

The Super-7 aircraft ordered domestically can only be equipped with a modified version of the WP-7 turbojet engine, which is insufficient in range and requires aerial refueling capability!
"Is it ready? That's great! When will the test flight take place?"

"We're just waiting for the Y-7! In a few days, let's go to Chang'an together and conduct aerial refueling test flights at the Flight Test Center!" July 15, Flight Test Center.

When Qin Liang stepped off the Yun-10, he saw a group of people surrounding the Super 7, looking worried.

"Old Wang, was it really that unbearable during the test flight?"

"Don't even mention it! I only flew up to Mach 1.3, and it sounded like there was a chainsaw in my ears. It couldn't go any faster. Not only could I not stand it, but my clients couldn't either!"

"That's strange. We only added this pipe and didn't change anything else, so how could it increase the noise?"

"Of course, there's something wrong with the aerial refueling probe!"

"What could be wrong with that? We designed it according to the Western model of aerial refueling probe. The front probe is imported, but this tube is made by bending an aluminum alloy tube..."

At this point, Old Tu suddenly realized something, turned his head and looked: "Qin Liang?"

"As expected, you only have eyes for Qin Liang! Can't you see me, a living, breathing person?" Old Lin said. "We heard in the capital that the test flight went smoothly, so how come there are problems again?"

Old Tu smiled wryly: "Sigh, there were no problems with the previous supersonic flight, but these past few days, during the test flight of the supersonic flight, problems have arisen! When the speed exceeds Mach 1.3, noise inexplicably starts to appear! Everyone suspects that it is a problem with this tube, but... this tube doesn't look like there is anything wrong with it."

Have you conducted wind tunnel tests?

"This... it's just a pipe, why would it need a wind tunnel test?"

Qin Liang smiled. This single pipe had troubled Eastern designers for ten years!

The first aircraft in the East with aerial refueling capability was the J-2. The designers simply and crudely stuck a round tube on it, and the result was that... the advantages of high altitude and high speed were gone, the maximum speed was reduced to Mach 1.8, and left turns were prohibited above Mach 1.6, otherwise the right engine would shut down. Moreover, the pilots had to wear noise-canceling headphones, otherwise they would not be able to stand the noise.

Fortunately, the plane in front of us has air intakes on both sides, not on both sides, otherwise the engine would have stalled. If a single-engine plane stalls in the air, it could cause a flight accident!
"Liangzi, what are you laughing at?"

"Bring the sledgehammer!"

"What are you going to do?"

"Smash it flat, then try flying up there again! It's just noise, a few hammer blows and it's over!"

Half an hour later, the voice of test pilot Lao Wang came over the radio.

"Mach 1.3, flight is normal, there is noise, but not much!"

"At Mach 1.4, the noise level increases slightly, but it's still tolerable!"

"Mach 1.5, the noise is starting to increase!"

"At Mach 1.8, the noise level is about the same as at Mach 1.3!"

Simply using a sledgehammer to flatten the detachable aerial refueling probe reduced the noise level once it was up there! The noise only became unbearable at maximum speed! Has this solved a problem that has plagued everyone for so long?

Qin Liang's single sentence is worth more than several months of research by others!
　P.S.: The top picture is of a J-8 fighter jet, the bottom picture is of a Rafale. French fighter jets generally have fixed refueling probes, so they have the most thorough understanding of this technology. It just goes to show... some people can't even copy homework properly.

　　
　
(End of this chapter)