The military-industrial scientific research system of the academic master.

"I remember that the 14th Institute of Electronic Technology Group should have a sea-based phased array radar project, right?"

After the topic came to surface ship air defense, Yang Shuyu asked Guo Lin and others.

With his position, he naturally knows about the existence of these projects, but he may not be very clear about the specific progress.

Unless it is a key model in your field of competence.

Guo Lin obviously did not expect that the Electronic Technology Group he represented would be mentioned so suddenly, so he was stunned for a moment, but quickly nodded:

"Yes, we call this radar Star of the Sea. The specific model is tentatively designated as Type 346. However, it is still in the process of transitioning from technical pre-research to the official start of the project. Director Zhou Wanxing should be in charge. I roughly know that the current technical route is active phased array, and T/R components use bipolar silicon components. If it can be produced domestically in the future, or a stable channel can be found to import gallium arsenide, then gallium arsenide-bipolar components can be used instead. Extremely silicon hybrid devices.”

Star of the Sea is considered the No. 14 project among the current institutes. Guo Lin has also done work such as determining technical indicators, so although he is not involved now, he still knows some general parameters.

"What about the number of T/R components?"

Although the Chinese Navy currently does not have a phased array radar, it is obvious that there are naval officers who are ahead of the curve in the equipment and at least have some understanding of the relevant basic knowledge.

Of course, for a professional like Guo Lin, such a question was still too general and difficult to answer, so he lowered his head and organized his words for a while before speaking again:

"It is too early to discuss the number of T/R components now, and it is not too important, because first the specific size of the radar array must be determined based on the ship design given by the shipbuilding industry, which in turn involves your navy's future plans. The overall plan for an anti-aircraft destroyer is clear. The potential of a 5,000-ton ship and an 8,000-ton ship is obviously different in this regard."

"If we estimate based on the average that a single array is 4*4 meters square, then using bipolar silicon, the number of components can be about 3500-4000. After upgrading to gallium arsenide-bipolar silicon hybrid devices, it should It can be increased to about 5000."

Due to difficulties in engineering practice such as packaging, heat dissipation, and electromagnetic shielding, when the area of ​​the radar array increases to a certain level, it is difficult for the number of T/R components to grow simultaneously with the size of the array, so the Air Police 200 has 5 An array of more than square meters can contain nearly 2000 components, and the 346 square meters of the 16 is only twice as many.

Of course, there is also the factor that the working environment of airborne radar is more conducive to heat dissipation. In short, it is not a simple mathematical problem.

"Then this radar should be considered relatively advanced in terms of technical level?"

Yang Shuyu is relatively familiar with foreign military equipment. Especially since 1994, Lockheed Martin began to put the Navy's Advanced Distributed Combat System (DANCS) developed based on Aegis Baseline 5.3 into export, although it was impossible to sell it. It was given to non-allied countries, but many basic parameters were still disclosed, which gave China a conceptual understanding of regional air defense ships.

"Based on the previously determined overall performance, it is at least at the same level as the Baseline 7 version of Aegis, which is also being developed in the United States. The main reason is that there is a gap in the research and development level of our semiconductor components and the performance of data processing computer chips. It shows the mechanical advantages of active phased arrays compared to passive arrays.”

Although Guo Lin still had some regrets in his tone, it was from an engineer's point of view, and it was difficult to express his regret at not being able to transform technical advantages into performance advantages.

However, for these naval officers here...

This TM is simply a blessing from heaven!

China's newest warship, the Shimagi, which was put into service last year, is even slightly inferior to the second batch of Charles Adams-class ships after the No. 14 ship in terms of air defense capabilities alone.

The latter was a ship that entered service in the mid-60s.

As a result, someone suddenly said that they are developing an air defense system here, which can compete with the new version of Arleigh Burke in the future.

There is a feeling of deja vu as a poor boy who has been in poverty for twenty years suddenly learns that he is the only illegitimate son of a rich man.

"So... Engineer Guo, I wonder when this Sea Star system is expected to be finalized and put into service, or at least a prototype will be built?"

The person who asked this question obviously didn't know these details before, so even his voice was trembling with excitement.

"According to the plan when the project was established, it will be finalized in about 10 years."

Guo Lin answered without thinking, but then he looked up at Chang Haonan sitting opposite and hesitated:

"If we estimate based on a more optimistic scenario, probably... it can be shortened by a few years."

In fact, just recalling all the things that have happened since he met Chang Haonan, Guo Lin felt that if the other party could participate in this thing, it would be conservatively estimated that it would take four or five years to win it.

This time is mainly because the comprehensive test ship to be used for testing is still in the shipyard and it is not known when it will be delivered, and the time required for the intermediate modification, prototype manufacturing and other processes cannot be compressed, otherwise I am afraid Shorter.

But thinking about it, he couldn't go overboard and make this decision for Chang Haonan. After all, the latter seemed to be very busy now, and he was from the aviation industry system. It was impossible for him to abandon his job and devote himself to the great electronics and shipbuilding industry. Come...

"Ten years..."

Although intellectually speaking, this time should be considered quite reasonable. After all, it took the United States 12 years to develop Aegis. But after all, we have just drawn an almost perfect pie, and now we know that even the wheat used to make the pie is They haven't been planted yet, and they have to wait 10 years before they can be eaten, so there will be some disappointment.

Even Yang Shuyu feels this way.

So he asked with some reluctance:

"Then if we reduce some technical requirements, for example, we can temporarily use passive phased array antennas, is it possible to shorten some research and development time and let the troops have something to use first?"

This idea is basically to run quickly in small steps, and everyone here is familiar with it.

However, Guo Lin shook his head directly after hearing this:

"No, in fact, although the active array is more advanced than the passive array, they are technically branches in two different directions and are not on the same line. Our Electronic Technology Group has been in the field of electronic scanning since the beginning. If we go in the direction of active arrays and go back to passive arrays now, it will distract our research and development efforts."

"And the biggest problem facing Star of the Sea now is not actually the active array, but some more basic parts. For example, the most basic one, the antenna array structure requires a composite material box, which uses aluminum honeycomb sandwich panels and Aluminum alloy diaphragms separate thousands of honeycomb-shaped diamond spaces for T/R components. Large-diameter aluminum alloy fasteners are used to rivet composite materials and aluminum alloy parts. We have now completed all of these processes. No."

"Another example is the reflective panel of the antenna array, which is the benchmark for the entire phased array radar structure. To manufacture this thing requires a 4-meter by 4-meter aluminum alloy billet. The current solution can only be imported from the Samara Aluminum Plant, but Rusal’s grade is different from the Alcoa grade we are used to using in the past, and its mechanical properties need to be re-estimated, or we can use two domestic 4-meter * 2-meter δ70 aluminum plates for tailor-welding, but the welding requirements are not up to standard... "

Even just listening to Guo Lin describe these problems, all the officers present expressed their confusion.

Obviously, the engineering problems involved are far more complex than ordinary people think, and they are by no means something that can be accomplished by working overtime in a short period of time.

Wang Xiaomo and Chang Haonan mentioned it before when they talked about the design plan of the early warning aircraft. At present, the high-silicon aluminum alloy required for the phased array radar array can only be processed in China through manual milling. The processing efficiency and yield rate are average. For It is not satisfactory for a balance beam or wedge tail antenna.

Now the square antenna area of ​​the 346 radar is at least three times that of the Air Police 200, and a ship needs 4 sides...

I'm afraid it's not possible to do it by hand alone.

In fact, what Guo Lin did not say is that these processing problems can only be considered relatively less complicated among the difficulties faced by the Star of the Sea project.

The more troublesome part is the design.

However, those contents were more professional and profound. Even if they were spoken, few people present would be able to understand them.

And judging from Yang Shuyu's expression, what he just said has had a good enough effect, and there is no need to continue with the long speech.

So forget it.

After all, the protagonists today are our comrades from the Navy.