Why jet engines aren't made in China • Hacker News Board

Re: Why jet engines aren't made in China

#231

Post by nradov » Thu, Jul 02, 2026, 2:23 PM UTC

Veedrac wrote: post #203

shalmanese wrote: post #74

The more parsimonious explanation is that commercial jet engine production is downstream of commercial airbody production and China's currently limited by COMAC's scaling woes. All the money and talent in the world can't replicate real users generating real data that you can use to improve. I'd argue the opposite that jet engines have a market structure that's uniquely terrible for traditional free market societies.…

The simplest explanation is surely that China is new to having a highly educated workforce and the ‘failed for some fifty years’ claims the article makes don't mean much given it. I don't think you need to entrain market arguments or whatnot to this, when it's only in the last decade China was a strong advanced manufacture player, and turbines are the kind of project that you probably wouldn't expect to go much faste…

Exactly. Advanced turbine manufacturing is largely a chemistry and metallurgy problem. The Great Leap Forward and Cultural Revolution killed off China's intellectual capital so they had to start from scratch in 1976, and only really got moving in 1992. They've been way behind but will catch up eventually.

Re: Why jet engines aren't made in China

#232

Post by nradov » Thu, Jul 02, 2026, 2:30 PM UTC

MichaelZuo wrote: post #215

wahern wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think a lot of the jet engine manufacturers are seeing this same corporate rot process, the number of high profile scandals across the industry and reports of insiders on how the number crunchers are taking over the business are strangely reminiscent of what we heard out of Boeing and Intel. And there's the opening for China. The 90s and early 2000s saw alot of innovation by engine manufacturers. Boeing and Airbu…

Modern high bypass jet engines are already pretty close to maximum possible thermodynamic efficiency, given realistic constraints such as weight, wing clearance, noise, and so on. Even if all constraints were relaxed, the absolute limit might be another halving of fuel consumption. (with trillions of R&D) And beyond that, there literally can never be jet engines significantly more efficient, until the end of the univ…

There is still the potential for significant efficiency improvements with open rotor ultra-high bypass propfan designs.

https://www.geaerospace.com/news/articles/shape-things-come-...

And for short flights, battery electric or hybrid power could boost efficiency even further. Although that will depend on developing batteries with better safety and power density characteristics.

Re: Why jet engines aren't made in China

#233

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Jul 02, 2026, 2:32 PM UTC

MichaelZuo wrote: post #215

wahern wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think a lot of the jet engine manufacturers are seeing this same corporate rot process, the number of high profile scandals across the industry and reports of insiders on how the number crunchers are taking over the business are strangely reminiscent of what we heard out of Boeing and Intel. And there's the opening for China. The 90s and early 2000s saw alot of innovation by engine manufacturers. Boeing and Airbu…

Modern high bypass jet engines are already pretty close to maximum possible thermodynamic efficiency, given realistic constraints such as weight, wing clearance, noise, and so on. Even if all constraints were relaxed, the absolute limit might be another halving of fuel consumption. (with trillions of R&D) And beyond that, there literally can never be jet engines significantly more efficient, until the end of the univ…

[deleted]

Re: Why jet engines aren't made in China

#234

Post by philipallstar » Thu, Jul 02, 2026, 2:39 PM UTC

shalmanese wrote: post #74

The more parsimonious explanation is that commercial jet engine production is downstream of commercial airbody production and China's currently limited by COMAC's scaling woes. All the money and talent in the world can't replicate real users generating real data that you can use to improve. I'd argue the opposite that jet engines have a market structure that's uniquely terrible for traditional free market societies.…

> The free market fundamentally doesn't have a good response to this problem, excess capital is taken out of these companies during good times and then they run to governments seeking bailouts during bad times

This isn't a free market problem. Companies move money out to avoid corporation tax, and government bailouts are what stop the free market from operating as it should.

Re: Why jet engines aren't made in China

#235

Post by baybal2 » Thu, Jul 02, 2026, 2:40 PM UTC

bigcat12345678 wrote: post #204

... They are making Jet engines. Lots of them. This article is full of laymen's inaccuracy that indicates the author is not anywhere close to the depth of the field. > China’s first fifth-generation fighter, the Chengdu J-20B, relied on a thirty-year old Russian AL-31 for a full decade until its domestic WS-15 program, which was started in the 1990s, was deemed ready for production. There is no J-20B J-20 has been us…

[dead]

Re: Why jet engines aren't made in China

#236

Post by leonidasrup » Thu, Jul 02, 2026, 2:41 PM UTC

Zigurd wrote: post #178

leonidasrup wrote: post #142

Jet Engines Aren’t “Made In China” because companies are not allowed to outsource jet engines manufacturing to China. Gas turbine engines and associated equipment are seen as military technology, which is subject export controls by International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR) of U.S. Department of State. https://precisionam.com/articles/precision-machining/itar-re... https://aircraft.zone/navigating-the-rules-a-g…

This plus subsidizing R&D via military contracts is how jet engines for passenger aircraft remain a US and European pursuit. Will jet engines never be made in China? Don't bet against them. There's no guarantee that the legacy of the Cold War technology race will continue to subsidize western jet engine development. There are reasons to think this subsidized moat will hold for a while: geared turbofan engines will de…

I would not bet against China. All the R&D done in US and Europe could be done also in China, but R&D takes time.

Lot technological development in China in the last two decades was result of US and European companies outsourcing manufacturing to China and most importantly, sharing know-how with Chinese companies.

I recommend the book "How China Captured Apple" by Patrick McGee

https://www.thewirechina.com/2025/05/25/patrick-mcgee-on-how...

This outsourcing development path for jet engines in China is not possible because ITAR.

Re: Why jet engines aren't made in China

#237

Post by 542354234235 » Thu, Jul 02, 2026, 2:44 PM UTC

bruce511 wrote: post #169

foldr wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In a military context, the main technological gaps relating to jet engines are supercruise and maintenance hours. Both are potentially quite relevant in a ‘local’ conflict.

I'm not sure about maintenance hours. That matters as a function of proximity to maintenance staff, parts, new supply and so on. Flying from home bases, with no shortage of skilled labor can cover that. Supercruise also matters a bit less when the distance to combat is shorter. Less fuel expended on "getting there" is more fuel for "on station". Plus, assuming more-or-less unlimited supply of machines and pilots mean…

I think you vastly underestimate how maintenance requirements impact how rapidly you can bring forces to the fight and how long you can keep them there. While that is exacerbated by long supply lines, it is an extremely important factor in any combat scenario.

Re: Why jet engines aren't made in China

#238

Post by Merad » Thu, Jul 02, 2026, 2:45 PM UTC

ragebol wrote: post #225

shalmanese wrote: post #74

The more parsimonious explanation is that commercial jet engine production is downstream of commercial airbody production and China's currently limited by COMAC's scaling woes. All the money and talent in the world can't replicate real users generating real data that you can use to improve. I'd argue the opposite that jet engines have a market structure that's uniquely terrible for traditional free market societies.…

I'd expect the competition for these companies to come in not from someone using the same technology, but a different technology that serves the same purpose. Eg. what happened to Kodak and Nokia. For jet engines, the only thing that comes to mind is electric aircraft. No single-crystal turbine blades needed at all. I may have picked a bad example, but the principle stands. EDIT: China has an extensive high-speed rai…

Serious electric aircraft are really gated behind major advancements in battery technology or some alternative power storage tech. The energy density of batteries is an order of magnitude less than fossil fuels, and you have to carry the heavy batteries with you the entire trip (vs burning off fuel as you fly).

Re: Why jet engines aren't made in China

#239

Post by nradov » Thu, Jul 02, 2026, 2:46 PM UTC

coderenegade wrote: post #194

rbanffy wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I can endure buggy software but I don’t want to deal with buggy planes A plane built for resilience against defective engine components would be very different from the airliners we fly today. I would assume more engines for redundancy, better protection against catastrophic failure, different designs to allow engines to function even if parts flew out, and so on. It’s an interesting design exercise to build from r…

The philosophy in aerospace is more to build a better engine rather than to have more engines, and this extends to every aspect of aircraft design. Engines are already built to contain catastrophic failure, and the planes themselves remain functional for all but the most extreme situations. We're at the point where essentially every lost aircraft is a compound failure, with significant human factors contributing to t…

There's no reason think that removing pilots altogether would enhance safety. Military experience has shown that mishap rates for unmanned aircraft are significantly higher than similar crewed aircraft. Routine flight operations can be automated pretty well now but where human pilots really earn their pay is with handling emergencies and other unexpected situations. The variety of potential emergencies is effectively infinite so it's simply impossible to write and test code to handle them in advance. Instead pilots have to improvise in real time based on intuition and first principles logic. Current AI technology still isn't capable of that.

Re: Why jet engines aren't made in China

#240

Post by notahacker » Thu, Jul 02, 2026, 2:47 PM UTC

ralph84 wrote: post #98

ifwinterco wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you want to sell commercial jets to anyone who isn’t Chinese, 20Y old engines aren’t good enough because modern engines are slightly more fuel efficient. The difference isn’t huge (I think it’s 10-20% or something), but when fuel is your main cost that’s enough to make older engines undesirable

The GEnx which powers the 787 is a 20 year-old engine design. There are thousands of jets flying around with 40+ year-old engine designs, especially in operations like charter and cargo where the aircraft spends more time on the ground than in the air. At the right price a 20 year-old design would be quite viable. Which indicates China is much more than a decade behind.

I mean, the "right price" for a 15 year old 787 (with a fresh new set of life limited parts and maintenance checks) is around a third of the cost of a new one and they're now starting to be parted out for their components (newer 787s have updated GEnx engines with better fuel economy, which is a big part of their higher value). And Boeing reckoned they needed to sell 1100 units to break even on the programme, which is a lot aircraft to sell if your design is only competitive with 15 year old aircraft airlines are trying to get rid of. People are already starting to breaking up old 787s for scrap because there are more buyers for spares than old 787s...

China may or may not be much more than a decade behind in their engine technology, but there's no commercial case for designing a new aircraft with engine variants so outdated they wipe >$100m off the sticker price of the aircraft....