Now that the US Navy has the F-35C and the F/A-18 E/F Super Hornet and the F/A-18G Prowler, does the US Navy need a successor to the A/FX like the Boeing F/A-XX? Is Northrop Grumman likely to come up with an A/FX successor?
Triton said:Now that the US Navy has the F-35C and the F/A-18 E/F Super Hornet and the F/A-18G Prowler, does the US Navy need a successor to the A/FX like the Boeing F/A-XX? Is Northrop Grumman likely to come up with an A/FX successor?
F-14D said:Neither the F-35C, Super Bug nor Growler deliver what was intended with the A/FX. The Navy still needs something like that, but now that things have gone the way they have, the question is whether they will ever get it.
F-14D said:Certainly USAF will be opposed and lobby against it.
Dreamfighter said:F-14D said:Certainly USAF will be opposed and lobby against it.
Unless it would be optimised for A2A, and could also become a replacement for the Raptor. Yeah, I know the USAF doesn't want adopting Navy planes, but perhaps it could be vica versa (like with the F-22 -> NATF). Or USAF could be forced to by budget restraints... All depending on which design / development-efforts would start 1st; a F-22 replacement or a Superbug-one. As Boeing's released pics show, at least they have started thinking about the latter one....
F-14D said:Neither the F-35C, Super Bug nor Growler deliver what was intended with the A/FX. The Navy still needs something like that, but now that things have gone the way they have, the question is whether they will ever get it. Certainly USAF will be opposed and lobby against it.
Dreamfighter said:I agree with what you say. But looking to the future, wouldn't the Navy - assuming they have the F-35 strikefighter and an attack A-47 (an evolved X-47 or something, though not sure how long it's legs and how large it's payload would be) - become more interested in A2A again to a certain extent (fleet defense), then it was in the time of A/F-X ? (I'm thinking about what the F-14 was) And - though as meaningless as it might be - the prefix now seems F/A (-XX) again...
SDN said:F-14D said:Neither the F-35C, Super Bug nor Growler deliver what was intended with the A/FX. The Navy still needs something like that, but now that things have gone the way they have, the question is whether they will ever get it. Certainly USAF will be opposed and lobby against it.
Do you think it's possible that the F/A-XX requirements will, over time, turn more into requirements akin to A/F-X? I think so long as the Navy has carriers, they might have a chance at getting their desired A/F-X.
Abraham Gubler said:Triton said:I know that some authors were calling the US Navy aircraft derived from the F-22A the "Sea Raptor." I have not read any articles to suggest that the project was known as the Sea Raptor at Boeing or Lockheed Martin. Though it would have been interesting if the aircraft had been designated FA-22N.
Any use of the name "Sea Raptor" would be pure fiction. A/FX - the last gasp of a navalised ATF - was cancelled in late 1993 and the F-22 did not recieve the name "Raptor" until April 1997.
Triton said:The F-22 was named Lightning II by Lockheed when Lockheed unveiled the prototype, then briefly SuperStar. The US Air Force rejected these names and called the aircraft Rapier and then changed the name to Raptor when it accepted delivery of the first F-22.
Triton said:donnage99 said:Triton, all these images you posted are found in Matej's website, in which he linked to back on page 1:
http://www.secretprojects.co.uk/forum/index.php/topic,2150.msg20137.html#msg20137
True, but these images are larger and did not come from Matej's website. It is not my intention to waste bandwidth and storage space on the Secret Projects server. I understand that one of the goal's of the forum is that it can serve as an archive for years to come for drawings, artwork, and information concerning unbuilt projects. For example, Flateric has been encouraging that Members use attachments rather than hotlinking to a third-party image hosting site because these links may become dead.
If you believe that the images I have attached do not add value to the forum, may be common place, and/or waste forum resources, then feel free to report my post to a Moderator or Overscan. I will defer to their judgment.
Triton said:Abraham Gubler said:Triton said:I know that some authors were calling the US Navy aircraft derived from the F-22A the "Sea Raptor." I have not read any articles to suggest that the project was known as the Sea Raptor at Boeing or Lockheed Martin. Though it would have been interesting if the aircraft had been designated FA-22N.
Any use of the name "Sea Raptor" would be pure fiction. A/FX - the last gasp of a navalised ATF - was cancelled in late 1993 and the F-22 did not recieve the name "Raptor" until April 1997.
The F-22 was named Lightning II by Lockheed when Lockheed unveiled the prototype, then briefly SuperStar. The US Air Force rejected these names and called the aircraft Rapier and then changed the name to Raptor when it accepted delivery of the first F-22.
Source:
http://www.aerospaceweb.org/question/history/q0221.shtml
InvisibleDefender said:So, I could be wrong here, but as far as I can remember the USAF never officially named the F-22 the Rapier. It was one of the many names floating around. Just as many names were floating around for the F-35 before the USAF officially named the jet.
AeroFranz said:How are the names selected these days anyways? I have vague memories of it being decided by polls in the services. That would explain why you get (and here it's just my opinion) idiotic names like Reaper and Raptor, which seems more like the selection of Xbox-playing youngsters than say, a naming committee trying to preserve tradition.
I mean, which one would you rather name "Lightning II", a ground-breaking twin engine fighter designed for long range and high speed (F-22), or a single engine ground-pounder (F-35)? end of rant.
Triton said:The issues with what to name a new weapon system is a matter of taste, association, tradition, and politics. In the end though does it really matter what a weapon system is named as long as the services have it in sufficient numbers and it operates as it was designed and advertised?
Triton said:In the end though does it really matter what a weapon system is named as long as the services have it in sufficient numbers and it operates as it was designed and advertised?
Evil Flower said:I personally don't like the "II" suffix as to me it just screams uninspired. There certainly is no shortage of potential names for new planes.
silkmonkey said:I hate to be a johnny come lately but can any one tell me if this aircraft was to be equipped with a super cruise engine of any type? Was it to be equipped with a built in LANTERN pod? Also what would the possible weapons load out for this type of aircraft be for both air to air and air to ground operations using modern precision weapons (such as JDAMS and small diameter bombs)? Also can the wings be equipped with turnable externalweapons pylons at the expense of stealth so the aircraft could carry an extra warload to target? All responces would be greatly appreciated.
flateric said:moar Boeing AX from freshly updated http://www.advancedtechnologiesinc.com
O'RLY?JFC Fuller said:Courtesy of Dave Majumdar
LEG said:F-14D,
Forgive this necroposting breakin but I feel there are problems with your argument that are too multifaceted to ignore:
1. I don't believe the USN did or does know as much about LO as the USAF does.
They certainly didn't during the A-12 program when their approach created massive problems in both resonant dipole and optical scattering areas due to a mis-apprehension that RAM, layered on like the latest layer of linoleum in a 30 year old apartment, could solve for every issue. It doesn't. It never did. It is useful solely as surface coating to help blend discontiguous material junctures and as a deep channel 'circuit' to spread the impedance load around the airframe periphery. The USN broke both of those rules with the straight TE which scattered traveling waves as Rayleigh all across the front sector and with the nose which was so bad with multi-surface junctures around the inlets that they had to affix a bra to it like on a high end sports car. They showed similar errors in judgment with the design of the buried engines and in particular with the exhaust scheme which didn't provide for the active cooling as materials adjustment which LM was doing almost two generations earlier in the F-117. It was, bluntly, a _very bad_ idea to put a lower hemisphere exhaust on a VLO penetrator intended to operate in the heart of the trashfire because the USN flatly refused to believe that stealth could work, out of the clutter. Their experience with the A-6 drove part of this but it was still something which they should have known more of before they dared to set RFP specs for an airframe which was weight critical. Since the Navy was also going the cheap route and insisted the contractors break standing rules (after 1988) for a Fixed Price program by buying in on a spec'd airframe that it was essentially purchasd for 73 million instead of the 130 that even GDM originally requested, it became -essential- for them to kick down compartment doors into the ATB and 117 efforts and the USAF essentially said: "No, I'm bigger." the USN forced the companies to work both the weight reduction and the signatures issue while already in over their head from Concept Formulation onwards with freeby services. This is what put the program out of cost and it was obvious to everyone, including Elberfeld, from the outset, largely because men like Ben Rich were _telling them_ that they were not going to get away with cheap skating.
2. The F-22 is a Fuel Cooled LE airfoild platform.
Which is also Top Coated to shift the IR response into a band which has high attenuation. The IR signature rise of supersonsics derives from the oblique shock which comes off the nose. At Mach 1.4 it's hardly noticeable. By Mach 1.7 it is predominant. Slow Supercruise is still better than subsonics when it comes to both getting to radius quickly withing a given fuel usage. And controlling fight geometry in the intercept phase.
Modern IRST like the PIRATE and ORLS-30 looking up at a hot spot at 60K from 40K 'with no radar return' may well be excused for shooting at the target on-assumption. But the problem is that the target has a dominant F-Pole advantage over them of a dozen miles or more and THEY will be at burner to hold even that much leverage. It's the SR-71 game.
3. The A/FX is inherently flawed in it's design as an SC&M Fighter.
When you retract the wing you drastically change aspect ratio, center of lift and total wing area. This means you effectively can go faster for any given thrust increment but your Ps is going to be in the basement because you are robbing lift and making some bad trades in terms of trim. The F-14 with it's glove vanes (and .6 higher Mach) is an illustration of what you have to do to get a 6G turnoff extension from a VG platform. Even then you are in a winddown condition, not a constant maneuver one.
4. The utility of Supercruise
Doesn't lie in it's mechanical use as a threat avoidance capability. It never did. It's greatest use, especially today where we are facing threats like the Klub and DF-21D, is simply in getting from A to B (1,000nm radii, minimum gas pass tanking) on a given amount of gas without taking 5 hrs, each way, to do it.
Contrary to the popular conception, there is no 'WEZ Bubble' condition-
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-DeD3FURlcPw/TYRKd9j_i2I/AAAAAAAAC7A/jA6HFDidIeU/s1600/LIBYA%2BALL%2BLAYERS.jpg
It is a single wedge of a TallKing/Nebo/Vostock type system-
http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_0HCJq6B1wZA/SgJm8zs3UjI/AAAAAAAACG0/3YEgIRE6BVk/s400/WEDGESST17.jpg
With all the forward placed sites in an EMCON condition _until engagement_.
You overfly a well designed IADS layout at high Mach and altitude, you are giving weapons like the SA-4/5 let alone SA-10/20/21 easy shots. Because they have the impulse to make the cutoff on anything short of an SR-71 and they are going to use the low band EWR to provide the initial cue signature from a _non emitting_ ambush condition. As you reach your point of closest approach, they will searchlight you with high PRF in a tight beam and, 'LO or no' you are gonna get tracked because the ERPS off a modern EPAR like the Flap Lid or Tombstone are enormous.
Blundering about at intermediate SSC under these conditions is like knights riding across a thicket of hidden punji stick traps. You won't see'em until you are engaged and then they will grow in front of you like Jack's beanstalk.
Which brings me back to argument 3. Because if the A/FX has a compromised set of signature values at anything but full sweep (where all the planform angles align) and it's aerodynamic configuration is such that, at height, it cannot penetrate at more than M=.85, it is NOT going to be either quick enough to goose-thru or sectored-return stealthy enough to ghost-thru.
You cross into the beam at 500knots and <40K and the threat shoots. You break and instantly lose 150 knots as the wings come out. Past which you are a flat plated, conventional signature, target drone with no more EM than a Hornet.
Which should tell you a lot about why the A/FX's weapons bays, far from being as _small as_ those of the Raptor are in fact a minimum of 16 feet (to accomodate the 14ft GBU-24 and 15ft AGM-84E) and 13.5ft long (to accomodate the AIM-120).
Skinning around a weapons bay volume larger than you need to deliver precision gliding or boosted ordnance (MMTD and FOG-S, both in the 6-10ft and <1,000lb class) was a mistake the USN also made on the A-12. One which ended up costing them the program in terms of weight vs. cost issues. I think it significant that the USN was still using LGBs (<6nm at altitude) and standoff missiles (>60nm, turbine powered) as threshold delivery metric rationales for A/FX platform design, as the USAF prepared for a mass-shift towards 2.65m CEP IAMs.
This is not a LO-knowledgeable design driver decision.
CONCLUSION:
As a collectivized argument for or against the A/FX supercruise in an 'otherwise LO' penetrating interdictor, I think it a pretty damning argument against the Navy that they could not see the /how/ of Raptor multi-layered mission performance achievement as being integral to the -why- their own assumptions of integrating the capability within a VG CVTOL platform design was never going to work.
The F-22 has an 840 square foot wing area for a reason. The F119 has a 50% higher SFC than the F100 for a reason. A Raptor pilot can tweak back those monster engines to a dull rumble and not stall out while it 'hovers' at 60K, EMS vacuuming the ether and still have a 30 nm flyout on GBU-53 as an IADS killer at 250KIAS. Or it can gain massive sprint lead from a strike package as presweep time to a BARCAP offset -beyond- the target, giving crucial leverage in the mission persistence as threat reaction window. And finally, as a penetrating interdicator itself, it can treat radials as leg segments which allows it to make 1hr transits from an A2AD protected base to tank well beyond the fence, fly another 300nm into the target area and back, gas up again and be home in another hour. Across an 1,100nm total radius. Try that in an F/A-18E/F or an A/FX and you will have AfG mission times on the order of 10-12rs. Minimum.
Subsonic VG doesn't give you LO with carrier capability because VG adds enormous weight and CG penalties of it's own which functionally takes away supercruise -as heighting- (thrust minus drag) automatically.
Even as the residual subsonic envelope (<40K, <1.2M) you are left with inevitably means you are transiting emitter lines at such slow-low numbers that you are bound to be picked up when you pass through your optimized front-sector protected cone. This in turn means that, whatever the optimum planform sweep alignment, the defenses will see you long enough to get the lock and when they do, your wings will be coming full forward to try and put more area under lift because the baseline area of a VG straight airfoil is just too small when swept to be useful. And thus any evasion at all has you bleeding E and mirroring a wider return aspect like a chrome plated stuck pig.
The F-22 wins in all three areas of thrust trust, optimized LO and optimized lift because it takes all three together to ghost through, high-fast, and keep the engagement window narrow enough to prevent the threats from forcing the evasion which brings you down into their ideal engagement envelope.
LEG