Chinese military industry is developing a producing a myriad of products for its massive land, sea, and air forces and this has included a large collection of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs). The drive in this section in multi-fold - attempting to keep pace with the United States, showcasing its technological prowess to its neighbors, and promoting a position of self-reliance in various fields. As a long time export customer of the Soviet Union, the Chinese now take in-house products from the design stage through the development phase and can handle production locally. The reliance on outside help has become, over the decades, largely about more complex individual systems such as engines.
NORINCO of China - primarily recognized for its small arms and armored vehicle manufacturing - is heading a new Unmanned Combat Aerial Vehicle (UCAV) under the "Sky Saker". The UAV no doubt is influenced by the successful General Atomics MQ-9 "Reaper" line of the United States, the Reaper itself born from the unarmed Predator. Indeed, the NORINCO product certainly showcases many of the design elements of its American counterpart including the bulbous nose section, straight wing mainplanes, rear-mounted propulsion system (in a "pusher" arrangement), wholly retractable undercarriage, and outward-canted vertical tail fins. As a UCAV-class system, the Sky Saker is being developed with an ordnance-carrying capability in mind from the outset, the stores to be mounted along underwing hardpoints in the usual way. As it stands, the Sky Saker will support the carrying and launching of air-to-surface missiles as well as precision-guided drop bombs.
The Sky Saker is based on the earlier Wing Loong UAV detailed elsewhere on this site. It is intended for the export market.
Beyond the promoted attack capability will be the now-standard ISR (Intelligence, Surveillance, Reconnaissance) quality consistent with many modern UAVs/UCAVs. This air vehicle will be able to take on this role alongside its attack role making it a true battlefield "hunter-killer".
Due to the early design and development stages of the NORINCO Sky Saker, this article will be updated as new information allows. Our presented performance and dimension numbers are purely estimates.
(OPERATORS list includes past, present, and future operators when applicable)
✓Ground Attack (Bombing, Strafing)
Ability to conduct aerial bombing of ground targets by way of (but not limited to) guns, bombs, missiles, rockets, and the like.
✓Unmanned Capability
Aircraft inherently designed (or later developed) with an unmanned capability to cover a variety of over-battlefield roles.
Length
36.1 ft (11.00 m)
Width/Span
65.6 ft (20.00 m)
Height
12.5 ft (3.80 m)
Empty Wgt
4,409 lb (2,000 kg)
MTOW
9,259 lb (4,200 kg)
Wgt Diff
+4,850 lb (+2,200 kg)
(Showcased structural values pertain to the base NORINCO Sky Saker production variant)
Installed:
1 x Conventional turboprop engine driving three-bladed propeller unit in "pusher" configuration at rear of fuselage.
PROPOSED:
4 x Air-to-Surface Missile carried externally under the wings.
Supported Types
(Not all ordnance types may be represented in the showcase above)
Hardpoint Mountings: 4
Sky Saker - Base Series Deisgnation
Ribbon graphics not necessarily indicative of actual historical campaign ribbons. Ribbons are clickable to their respective aerial campaigns / operations / aviation periods.
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China (possible); Pakistan (possible)
