Volume One, Chapter 55: Conservatism

One week later, the final assembly workshop.

The fuselage of the JY1 was covered with fine, white patches and micro-sensors, making it look like an old, heavily patched garment. Hundreds of orange data cables extended from various parts of the airframe, converging into a specialized pod beneath the belly. The entire aircraft looked bloated and bizarre.

"It looks like a hedgehog now," Lu Bingzhou walked around the plane, reaching out to tap one of the sensor housings. "A hedgehog stuffed with wires, at that. Is this thing going to fall out of the sky and land on my head?"

"Every sensor has undergone 20G overload testing and aerodynamic heating tests," Shen Qingyun replied, holding a data pad without looking up. "Unless the aircraft disintegrates, they are going to stay firmly glued to it."

"The aircraft disintegrates?" Lu Bingzhou raised an eyebrow. "That sounds deeply reassuring."

Vice Plant Director Wang stood not far away, his face livid. Behind him, two safety engineers were checking the modification checklist item by item. "Where is the structural strength report? Where is the electromagnetic compatibility report? With so many new electronic devices added, won't they interfere with the aircraft's critical avionics?"

"The report is right here." Du Yuze emerged from beneath the wing and handed over a thick stack of documents. "All newly added equipment has independent power supplies and is physically isolated. We've even added three layers of shielding. Its electromagnetic leakage is cleaner than the phone in your pocket."

Vice Plant Director Wang took the documents and flipped through them page by page, reading every word extremely slowly, as if picking bones in an egg. "Has the clearance application for the designated airspace been approved? Do the meteorological conditions meet the minimum standards? Ground crew, control tower, logistics—have all aspects been confirmed?"

"Director Wang," Lu Bingzhou interrupted him, "my pre-flight inspection is already done. This plane can fly. My ground crew will answer your questions. Right now, I just want to ask my 'brain' one question."

He turned to Du Yuze.

"Kid, are you sure you can see what I want you to see down there?"

"I can see what you cannot feel," Du Yuze replied. "Every maneuver you make, and every square centimeter of airflow change on the wings, will be converted into data. I don't want your feelings; I want the aircraft's 'feelings'."

"Good." Lu Bingzhou said no more, turning and walking toward the cockpit.

Vice Plant Director Wang closed the documents and shoved them back to the person beside him. "Full video recording, and all communications must be encrypted. The moment there is the slightest deviation, abort the mission immediately."

His words were directed at Shen Qingyun, but everyone heard them.

Ignoring him, Du Yuze turned and walked toward the passage leading to the command center.

The command center was dead silent, save for the low hum of the server racks.

The massive main screen was divided into dozens of small windows, displaying real-time information transmitted from the control tower, weather radar, logistical support, and various other units. The central screen was pitch black.

Du Yuze sat down at the main console and put on his headset. Shen Qingyun sat beside him, responsible for communication coordination with the tower and other units.

"Control tower, this is the 'Flying Wind Tunnel' command center. Requesting connection to the JY1 data link."

"'Flying Wind Tunnel', data link connected. Signal is stable."

Du Yuze tapped a line of code onto the keyboard.

The central black screen lit up, and countless streams of green data cascaded down like a waterfall. They were not chaotic numbers, but rather converged in real-time on the screen, outlining a three-dimensional wireframe model of the aircraft. Every line and every curved surface of the model trembled slightly as the data refreshed.

[Initializing "Flying Wind Tunnel" data stream...]
[Sensor array online... 172/172]
[Real-time aerodynamic model construction commencing...]

"JY1, you are cleared for takeoff," the tower's voice came through the headset.

On the screen, the small dot representing the JY1 began to move along the runway, accelerated, and then soared into the air.

Vice Plant Director Wang stood behind Du Yuze, his hands clasped behind his back. He could not understand the complex data on the screen, but he could read the attitude indicator and altimeter.

"Altitude five thousand, speed 0.7 Mach. Arrived at the designated airspace," Lu Bingzhou's voice came through the headset, clear and steady. "Comrade Xiao Du, it's all yours now."

"Maintain level flight," Du Yuze said, his entire focus fixed on the three-dimensional model. "Execute the 'Cobra' maneuver data collection package. Group one, angle of attack thirty degrees."

"Angle of attack thirty? Are you out of your minds? Routine test flights require filing a report if the angle of attack exceeds twenty-five degrees!" Vice Plant Director Wang blurted out.

"Director Wang, this is a test flight, not sightseeing," Lu Bingzhou chuckled in the communication channel. "Besides, in my manual, the maximum angle of attack is seventy degrees. Thirty degrees is just a warm-up."

The wireframe model on the screen abruptly pitched its nose up. The data streams on the surface of the model instantly shifted from green to yellow and orange, especially near the leading edge of the wings and the vertical stabilizer.

"Did you see that?" Du Yuze said to Shen Qingyun beside him. "A small-scale flow separation appeared on the upper surface of the wing, three percent earlier in the angle of attack than predicted by the wind tunnel. Our airfoil design is still too conservative at high subsonic speeds."

Shen Qingyun rapidly scribbled notes in his notebook.

"Group two, angle of attack forty-five degrees," Du Yuze ordered next.

"Understood."

The nose of the wireframe model continued to rise, and the orange areas on the wings rapidly expanded, even spawning a few wisps of red data streams representing severe turbulence.

"The airframe is starting to vibrate," Lu Bingzhou reported.

"Data matches," Du Yuze said. "Your senses were 0.2 seconds faster than the onboard sensors. Continue."

"You want to continue?" Vice Plant Director Wang couldn't help speaking up again. "We've reached the limit! Any higher angle of attack and it will stall!"

"I want it to stall," Du Yuze's voice was as cold as ice. "I need to know under what attitude it stalls, how it stalls, and what the airflow looks like after the stall. Wind tunnels can't blow this out; only the sky knows."

"You are playing with the pilot's life!"

"No," Lu Bingzhou's voice cut in once more. "He is trading my life for the life of this aircraft. Continue, Du Yuze. I haven't reached my limit yet."

Ignoring Vice Plant Director Wang entirely, Du Yuze issued the next command.

"Angle of attack fifty-five degrees. Prepare for recovery."

The wireframe model on the screen stood almost vertically erect. Large patches of red data streams spread across the wing surfaces like a plague. Piercing alarm sirens wailed within the command center.

"Stall! Stall!" Shen Qingyun shouted.

Almost simultaneously, a blood-red warning popped up on the system interface before Du Yuze.

[Warning: Left wing stall depth exceeds critical value, trending toward a spin!]
[Model prediction: Uncontrollable spin in 3.1 seconds.]

"Captain Lu! Right rudder! Push the stick! Now!" Du Yuze roared into the microphone.

His command was even faster than the aircraft's own stall warning system.

"What?" Lu Bingzhou's reaction was also extremely fast, but his initial reaction was confusion, as he hadn't yet felt the tendency to enter a spin.

"Don't ask! Execute!"

Up in the sky, just as the nose of the JY1 began showing the slightest sign of deflecting left, Lu Bingzhou had already slammed his foot down on the right rudder while simultaneously pushing the control stick forward.

The heavy airframe traced an ugly, tottering arc through the air, like a tripped behemoth. A few seconds later, the nose pointed downward once more, and the aircraft recovered from the stall state, regaining control.

In the command center, everyone held their breath.

Vice Plant Director Wang's forehead was drenched in cold sweat. He stared fixedly at the screen; just a moment ago, he had thought he was about to witness a fatal crash.

"Damn..." Lu Bingzhou's heavy breathing came through the headset. "Kid... you're a devil. The plane barely showed any sign of yaw, and before I even registered it myself, your command arrived."

"My system is faster than your nerves," Du Yuze stated a fact, watching the data streams on the screen gradually return to green. "It simulated what your plane would look like after entering a spin before it actually did."

Lu Bingzhou was silent for a few seconds.

"I take back what I said earlier. You're not a devil, you're God." He paused. "What's the next subject?"

"There is no next subject," Du Yuze said. "We have enough data. Return to base."

This time, Vice Plant Director Wang offered no further objections.

When the JY1 landed smoothly on the runway, the entire command center erupted into long-suppressed cheers. Shen Qingyun excitedly punched Du Yuze in the arm.

Du Yuze did not smile. He simply took off his headset and silently looked at the fully constructed three-dimensional aerodynamic model on the main screen, now dotted with countless data points.

This was the true appearance of the JY1. Ugly, yet incomparably precise.

Vice Plant Director Wang walked up behind him and remained silent for a long time. Finally, he asked dryly, "What use is... all this data?"

"Of immense use," Du Yuze stood up. "With it, I can write an entirely new control law for the JY1. A control law that allows it to dance on the edge of a stall rather than panicking and triggering alarms."

Without looking at anyone else, he walked straight out of the command center.

He needed a quiet place to instill the massive volume of data obtained today into his true "central brain."

What he had harvested today was merely the most primitive skeletal data of this aircraft.

Next, he would begin breathing a soul into this skeleton.