F-117 Developments ??

TaiidanTomcat said:
The crewman was around when they were testing the gray dragon jet a few years before retirement and said it was extremely hard to spot.
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At various times there have been F-117s in (various shades of ) gray, silver (http://www.edwardsflighttest.com/images/ldp-023_lg.jpg), white, tan, green, primer, etc. There have been various reasons for this. Some internet sources say "The gray dragon" was the "only" F-117 in gray and/or the only to wear a two tone grey scheme. This is not really accurate, as 783 and 835 both wore that scheme. 835 is the aircraft that went to storage at TTR in gray, while 783 never went to storage and was not gray at the end of it's life. BOTH aircraft were nicknamed Dragon, with 835 being part of the Dragon Test Team at Holloman, while 783 was a Baja Scorpions dragon.

Some of these color schemes were more difficult to spot visually than others. Most of these were testing coatings that reduced visibility in other parts of the spectrum. For an example of visual signature reduction look at the Bird of Prey.
 
I don't buy that they were painted black on General Creech's whim. We probed their defenses throughout the cold war, and really "probing" is a nice way of saying "harassed the holy hell out of them".

I'm sure these also included daylight runs with exotic covert aircraft. The soviets were always deathly afraid of first strike weapons and I think painting the thing that really scared the hell out of the Soviets black was a way of making sure they would not interpret the other craft probing their defenses was part of a sneak attack.
 
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AFAIK, the paint used for the F-117 wasn't the standard paint, but developed to increase stealth characteristics,
containing conducting particles. For those purposes often materials based on carbon are used. It was quite an early
kind of such stuff and I can well imagine, that giving it anothre colour would have been as succesful, as making
medicine tasty and perhaps even the most wanted characteristics would have suffered ! So, if Gen. Creech would have
ordered it to be painted pink, well, he probably would have got a pink F-117, but maybe withan RCS increased by
several %. That it was meant as a pointer for the Soviets may be a bit too far fetched, in my opinion.
 
Jemiba said:
That it was meant as a pointer for the Soviets may be a bit too far fetched, in my opinion.
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My opinion exactly. No matter what paint was applied, when seeing an aircraft of such an uncommon shape, they would have known they were in the presence of some highly advanced technology anyway... ::)

Do you remember the time you saw the F-117 for the first time? That was late in 1988, in AW&ST. I was teaching English in a French Armée de l'Air pilot training center then, and the everyon's reactions, from simple student officer to colonel was:" What the f...!!!" It was simply unseen, and no-one could have guessed a shape like that beforehand. THAT was the basis of the strategic advance the U.S. got over the Soviets in terms of stealth. The paints were a bonus, but what truly reduced the RCS was the shape.
 
This image has been posted in this topic before , but CodeOne released it in a higher resolution yesterday. :)
Navy Nighthawk
In the 1990s, engineers at the then-Lockheed Advanced Development Projects group—better known as the Skunk Works—proposed a Navy variant of the F-117 Nighthawk stealth attack aircraft. The F-117N kept the basic fuselage design of the Nighthawk, but featured larger wings with reduced sweep that could be folded for carrier stowage; the addition of horizontal tails that necessitated a change in the engine exhaust; and a new canopy. Even with the aerodynamic changes, it was thought the aircraft would have similar stealth characteristics as its Air Force counterpart. The aircraft would have used modified F-14 Tomcat landing gear to reduce development costs. The F-117N, which never advanced beyond the concept stage, would have been an interim replacement for the A-6 Intruder.


Artist Concept By P. Benson Posted: 11 June 2015
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Source: http://www.codeonemagazine.com/gallery_slideshow.html?item_id=4312
 

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Found this video on Youtube about the F-117A, one of my favorite aircraft of all time.

[Video no longer available - Admin]

It is strange how the RAF never bought any given that we had pilots testing it.
 
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FighterJock said:
It is strange how the RAF never bought any given that we had pilots testing it.
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Not strange at all. The RAF (and other services) sends exchange pilots to fly all sorts of aircraft -- F-15s, F-22s, B-2s, you name it. It's not a sign of a desire to buy any of those aircraft.

The cost to maintain a small force of F-117s for the RAF would have been incredible -- how many squadrons of Jaguars or Tornados did you want to gve up?
 
TomS said:
FighterJock said:
It is strange how the RAF never bought any given that we had pilots testing it.
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Not strange at all. The RAF (and other services) sends exchange pilots to fly all sorts of aircraft -- F-15s, F-22s, B-2s, you name it. It's not a sign of a desire to buy any of those aircraft.

The cost to maintain a small force of F-117s for the RAF would have been incredible -- how many squadrons of Jaguars or Tornados did you want to gve up?
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Forgot about the maintenance issues.
 
Was there any way it could have been made to work, eg a pooled maintenance arrangement with the USAF? Would the RAF have wanted the F-117 if it was an option, and would the US have wanted the RAF to have it?
 
VTOLicious said:
Dont know if this was posted before
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Never seen it before. NEAT! This had a much more aquiline nose than the artist's concepts usually circulated.
 
Remember, no metal or carbon fibre or whatever was cut on this program. With that in mind, AMTs old 1/72 F-117 is a good starting point for a navalized version.
 
Speculative cutaway shared from Artwork, Motocar's Cutaway drawings

https://www.secretprojects.co.uk/forum/index.php/topic,23005.240.html
 
F-14D said:
The second F-117B was proposed to have a larger weapons bay, reduced sweep on the wings and tail and all flying horizontal stabilizers. They were also shooting for a 40% increase in range. The third F-117B envisioned taking the changes proposed for the second version and adding afterburning to the F-117s, an undercarriage more like that of the F-15, an 8,8000 lb. payload and range would be further increased.
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Has anyone ever been able to find any drawings of either of these Bs? They sound fascinating and, like the A/F-117X, could make for an interesting scale model project.
 
Cutaway Lockheed A-117 Navy, speculation that could have been the naval version of the stealth aircraft of the US Nav, author Mike Badrocke and modified by Motocar
 

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Windtunnel tests of F-117 with various external stores.

crgis.ndc.nasa.gov

NACA/NASA Langley: Celebrating 100 Years

NASA.gov brings you the latest images, videos and news from America's space agency. Get the latest updates on NASA missions, watch NASA TV live, and learn about our quest to reveal the unknown and benefit all humankind.
crgis.ndc.nasa.gov crgis.ndc.nasa.gov
 
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:cool:
F-117A Skunk Works, First Flight Chief Test Pilot, Hal Farley - FULL PROGRAM

Hal Farley, Director Flight operations and Chief Test Pilot, Lockheed Skunkworks (Retired).
Farley joined the Skunkworks as Project Pilot for the Top Secret Stealth Fighter Program. He flew the first flight and logged over 600 hours in the F-117A.
He served in the Navy from 1959 to 1967 and Grumman Aircraft from 1967 to 1979. He was assigned to VA-164 flying A-4 aircraft aboard the USS Oriskany. Farley attended the Navy Test Pilot School and was assigned to Carrier Suitability performing tests on the F-4, F-8, A-4, A-6 and RA-5C . He then joined Grumman, testing the A-6 and F-14 Tomcat accumulating over 900 hours in the Tomcat.
He is a Fellow in the Society of Experimental Test Pilots. He has 30 years flying experience. 5700 hours, 3600 of which were flight tests in fighter or attack aircraft. He is the recipient of the Ivan C Kincheloe award and the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics Octave Chanute Award both for work on the F-117A.
He was inducted into the Oklahoma Aviation and Space Hall of Fame.
In 2002 he and his wife Ellen completed an 8 year voyage around the world in their 44ft sailboat AIRBORNE. They served a two year mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints after which they continued their voyaging exploring British Columbia and Alaska until 2014. They currently reside in St George, Utah.
Production: John Farr. john@creativemediagroup.com
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Video:
Code: 
https://youtu.be/slYAVymZ99M
Dear mods and members,
if this video has been posted before, please let me know or feel free to delete this post. Thanks. :)
 
I've seen artwork of the F-117N engaging enemy aircraft with AAMs and those look like AMRAAMs on the weapons bay doors (hard to tell with that image resolution). Does anyone know if it was to be equipped with a radar and if so what type? Also, the image below does not show the prominent pitot tubes on nose, some artwork does, anyone know if they were to be removed in the definitive configuration?

F-117Xpainting.jpg
 
andy_d said:
Was there any way it could have been made to work, eg a pooled maintenance arrangement with the USAF? Would the RAF have wanted the F-117 if it was an option, and would the US have wanted the RAF to have it?
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How do you know the RAF didn't have it?
 
Pilot specifically says that this was possible on the return leg of the flight what points toward a stacked load with the sidewinders above the bombs. That way, you also could have a last resort defensive weapon.

EDIT:
What the pilot did actually say:
"Our secondary role was to shoot down the Soviet AWACS. So yeah, we were invisible to their radar and we didn’t want them controlling their airspace so, either on the way in or on the way out you could add a Soviet AWACS paint it to the side of your aircraft”
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My bad, I was wrong (from the link below)
 
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fightingirish said:
www.thedrive.com

The Stealthy F-117 Nighthawk Could Have Executed Nuclear Strikes Against The Soviet Union

The F-117 was built with the ability to deliver nuclear bombs and the Air Force didn't forget that during the last years of the Cold War.
www.thedrive.com www.thedrive.com
www.thedrive.com

No, The F-117 Never Had Air-To-Air Capability, But One Did Get A Radar

The "Black Jet" never got the ability to shoot down other aircraft, but not due to a lack of creativity on behalf of the Skunk Works team.
www.thedrive.com www.thedrive.com
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The larger B model of the F-117A was to have had a frequency jumping radar in the nose, but the USAF went with the smaller A model instead.
 
[The following refers to the alleged F-19, which was discussed previously in this thread, if this is not the right place for it, I ask the members and moderators to inform me to delete this part of the post. I will probably end up making a thread in The Bar to discuss this topic that I find interesting. Thanks for your cooperation]

Also, regarding the controversy over the alleged "F-19", which was discussed previously in this thread, I believe that it was a disinformation and misinformation project to fool potential enemies of the United States, similarly to what the designers of the SR-71 would do when Soviet spy satellites would fly over sensitive locations where development was taking place. Engineers would move the A-12/SR-71 prototype into a hangar and place large pieces of wood to form the shape of an aircraft to fool Soviet intelligence.
 
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I have a question: When did the US first have its fully operational wing of the F-117 aircraft? What year was that? If anyone knows, please post that date. Many thanks.
 
I believe the F-117A operated under the 4450th Tactical Group, which was deactivated in October 1989 and reformed as the 37th Tactical Fighter Wing based at Tonapah, NV.
 

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