KJ-500 AEW&C Aircraft has Commissioned, has Performances as Good as KJ-2000

KJ-500 AEW&C is performance equal to KJ-2000

  Source: Via Top81 website



Though smaller than KJ-2000 AEW&C system that is fitted to an Ilyushin Il-76 platform, due to progress in electronic technology, KJ-500’s airborne early warning and control (AEW&C) radar has the same functions and performance as KJ-2000’s. 

First seen in early 2013, the KJ-500 is based on the Shaanxi Aircraft Corporation (SAC) Y-9 four-turboprop transport combined with a fixed phased-array radar developed by the Nanjing Research Institute of Electronic Technology (NRIET, or 14th Institute).
According to Chinese media, the radar is able to track 60-100 targets within a range of 470 km.

The KJ-500 radar's three arrays are apparently the same size and contained in a saucer-shaped dome with an apparent satellite communications antenna in the middle. Other imagery indicates SAC considered but rejected a teardrop-shaped dome that would have allowed for larger side-looking arrays. The KJ-500 also features two passive electronic intelligence arrays.

The KJ-500 apparently will succeed production of the KJ-200 AEW&C system, which uses a linear phased-array radar that is strikingly similar to the Saab Erieye radar but that allows only for a 240° field of view. huanqiu.com