F-22 question

Art- Weapons Review is usually limited to distribution to government readers, but one you might find interesting that is available is Air and Space Power Journal It is an online journal from USAF's Air University at Maxwell AFB in Alabama. There is currently an article there by someone who does not like the F-35 and there will undoubtedly be a future one countering his arguments.

Air and Space Power Journal

Aviation Week and Space Technology is available to anyone who can afford it:

Aviation Week | Aerospace Defense, Business & Commercial News

 

I was on the source selection panel for the F-22...I still feel the YF-23 was a superior plane, and selection of the F-22 was based on politics, not actual plane performance, or price, or logistics, and all the problems that the F-22 has had is vindication....

I remember goint to General Dynamics and watching how efficient their F-16 production line was, parts in one end of the facility, finished quality plane out the other end.. and how they sold the same concept to the F-22 team..to bad it never was the same...

 

Interesting. Not too different that a lot of large purchases in the private sector I imagine. Relationships frequently trump technical or sometimes economic factors.

The airshow displays I've seen at Oshkosh and over Milwaukee (in formation with a P-38) were certainly impressive, but it really that much faster/more maneuverable than Russian planes?
And really, how important is speed/turning radius these days?
It is ****ing cool to watch!

This was 8 years ago, you gotta expect the Russian's new plane to be significantly better:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bK1GChMOnrQ
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I believe the electronics, radar, jamming and missile technology will prove to be far more important in future air superiority scenarios than stealth or maneuverability.

A pure interceptor in the classic F-4 Phantom mode could prove plenty effective. Use them purely as high speed missile platform drones with remote pilots. Expendable, cheap and effective.

Picture large AWACs jumbo jets packed with the latest radar, jamming and countermeasures tech, targeting systems and such. These may be preceded by small numbers of stealthy fighters such as the F22 to ensure their safety, but the real punch in the air superiority sweep could come from long since obsolete jets packing as many long range air to air missiles as possible. The AWACs jams the enemy, tracks them, allocates targeting instructions to the F4s and then coordinates missile launches. The F4s are basically nothing more than missile platform drones that use high speed and expend-ability to reach missile launch position.

Which is more effective? A flight of 4 F-22s or 50+ F4 missile platform drones in conjunction with the key AWACs and/or satellite based electronic battlefield dominance technology? Now what is the cost / benefit analysis? Maybe we shouldn't be in such a giant rush to turn all the old fighters at Davis Montham into target drones!

5th Gen fighters certainly serve a purpose and have a key role, but they are too expensive to form the backbone of an air superiority solution. The winner will be he who wins the electronic battle and puts the most missiles into the fight.


Terry

 

Mission need and scope has changed...Drone's, Satellites, new technology etc. have changed the way we use weaponary...both offensive and defensive...and this is constantly evolving..
"I believe the electronics, radar, jamming and missile technology will prove to be far more important in future air superiority scenarios than stealth or maneuverability."

 

Kurt- All the aluminum framed fighters are pretty much limited to around mach 2.5 or you start weakening the airframe from heat soak. They are all pretty much limited to 9 gs because that is all a human can realistically pull and still function. Engines are so powerful now that supercruise is possible. So the advances will be mostly in avionics, LO, off-board sensors and sensor coupling. In the latter categories, we have a pretty good lead.

On the ATF competition, the pilots seemed to prefer the YF-22 and the stealth numbers tended to favor the YF-23. I worked on the ATF team at AFOTEC in the early 90s.

 

Old lessons sometimes forgotten. Remember the F4 wasn't originally equipped with a cannon because they figured all future engagements would be missiles. Yeah missiles have improved but even so..

 

The F-22 was originally intended to have a caseless 25 mm cannon, but that did not work out. Since the F-4E, all the USAF fighters have had a gun. Even the F-111 had a 20 mm cannon, with 2000 rounds, but never employed in combat because nearly all combat missions were in the dark. Replaced with the Pave Tack pod in the F-111F.

 

Yeah instead it got one that shoots bullets wrapped in carbon fiber. It's an expensive option ;-)

 

what the... I didn't know Ferrari was involved in the T-50 program!
This Is What A BBQ'd Russian 5th Generation Fighter Looks Like

The video shows they certainly aren't afraid to throw an early example around the skies.

 

The YF-22 borrowed a lot from the YF 23 program..more then just stealth..
the R&M proposed process were so bad for the YF-22 that it had to leverage the process and program the YF-23 had proposed and developed...to bad the F-22 program never properly executed those processes as it should, hence the problems existing...
There is a lot more to a weapons system and platform then performance...
I did work for the SPO office..and every F-111 and A-10 that flew, came through our rework facility at some time in their life...

 

I supported the ATF program in the Skunkworks as an Aerodynamicist. At that point, the future YF-22 borrowed exactly nothing from Northrop's YF-23. Northrop committed the fatal error of presenting the USAF what they thought was the best airplane, rather than delivering on the published requirements. It looked to me to be an excellent interceptor (nice looking plane). But that's not what the customer asked for. ADP executed a flight test, including maneuvers and weapon release, that demonstrated critical requirements. Northrop's low observables were no match, as evidenced by the AF approaching ADP to design/build new edges for the B-2.

 

To me, the problem with the YF-23 is that it simply didn't look very maneouverable. It may have been faster and perhaps stealthier, but it didn't look like a "fighter-pilot's airplane" - whether that was even a factor I don't know, but the old saying that "if it looks right it is right" may have entered into the decision.

(That almost certainly was a factor in the JSF decision - I doubt if any fighter pilot would have really wanted to fly Boeing's "pregnant guppy".)

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mxDSiwqM2nw

Pierre Sprey is not a fan of the F-35. lol

 

Airborne..you didnt see the whole picture of the procurement, nor were part of the award, as the customer we had access to both proposals and prototypes and specified exactly what we wanted or didnt want, of each.... The F-23 team did stumble that is for sure they didnt have the big $$ behind them and the partnerships that the F-22 team had.....And dont get me started on the B-2...

 

Affirmative, you specified what part of the programs you liked, but that did not have anything to do with the basic design of the aircraft. Northrop had all kinds of proprietary processes and materials partially developed with the B-2. No way they were going to give those to L-M/Boeing.

 

It's a testbed, go look at the YF-22

Engines aren't finalizes = "bulky jet nozzles"

One piece coated stealth canopy is also not ready

along with all non stealthy protrusions.

It's still very early days and numerous changes and additions are taking place every week.

I've been closely following from before maiden

 

Patrick- The Russians have a long history of "good enough" that has worked fairly well for them. We predicted titanium leading edges on the Foxbat, they used steel and put in bigger engines. We will just have to wait and see how she evolves.

 

Just saw this:

Everyone Who Wanted More F-22s Is Being Proven Right

 

Will the F-22 run out of missiles ?


do not underestimate your enemy.

 

They carry 8, 2 AIM-9s and 6 AIM-120s. More like we run out of F-22s, since they are far too few.

 

NextGen?

Laser Fighters: 100 kW Weapons By 2022 « Breaking Defense - Defense industry news, analysis and commentary

 

Wade- Affirmative, AFRL and other labs and contractors have been working hard on high power electric lasers after it became apparent chemical lasers like the ABL's COIL laser were not suitable for fighter or even bomber aircraft. One of these multi-kilowatt or even low megawatt class lasers will be able to provide nearly unlimited shots as long as the aircraft can provide sufficient electrical power. Time between shots will get very small as technology progresses. Requires VFR conditions to work, however, and still requires radar, lidar, or IR cueing.

 

Isn't there some plan to put some sort of laser weapon platform on the AC130 gunships?

 

If you check out that I posted above there's a good description of the technology to include the AC-130.