It would be even better if the test aircraft are brought to full-rate production standards - since nothing would be a "well, that only applies to the test aircraft" item.
You need extra instrumentation on the test aircraft, and what you find during testing may influence the final production standard (cf the F-35B needing a redesigned bulkhead). The only way to build test aircraft to final production standard is if you have a time machine. You can update them later, but some of the changes may not be cost effective.
aviationweek.com
Which was why I edited myself (I did misread it initially) to note it may not be cost effective. But if you've drilled and wired the aircraft for strain gauges and the like, then ever getting them to production standard may be difficult. In any case, you're likely to have a continuing need for test aircraft, cf the Eurofighter test fleet adding three new Instrumented Production Aircraft in recent years, so converting all aircraft to production standard may not make sense.
I wouldn't expect a B-21 to carry more than 8x SM6 sized weapons, and they'd need to fold the tail fins while stored on the rotary launcher.
One thing I've questioned is whether the launcher will be the same length, given that there's only one and it's on the centreline, which would theoretically make having a longer one easier.
Which is why watering down NGAD's performance with a smaller engine is dumb.
He suggests that it could fill in some roles along with the 'RQ-180'... in fact the 'NGAD' part of 'NGAD.' Er... to clarify, an ability to establish an overall dominance of the battlespace through comprehensive situational awareness over a wide area and the ability to launch strikes from long range as a hub directing other platforms (such as CCAs, F-35s etc.) that are part of the system to actually fire the ordnance, do the jamming, recon etc. It might have a laser for self-defence.
I assumed the same length as ALCMs, since B52s carry them internally.
It helps that it's not designed for any low altitude BS like the B-2 got redesigned for, which added a lot of weight.
Did I miss something? When was the B-21 MTOW published?
which is exactly why its viable. Consider this... forward deployed CCA's lobbing missiles as well as being sensor nodes with the B-21 safe far behind via other CCA's acting as relays and or satellite uplinks controlling ops not unlike an Awacs and therefore not detectable as a launcher.
Got the figure from Wikipedia, and I saw the same elsewhere.
Yeah, while the B-2 is a lot heavier than it should be due to the low-altitude redesign, an MTOW of 82 tonnes is way too light, IMO.
What is CB2015 ?
They are being built using production tooling. It would seem the minor instrumentation could me removed eventually, if necessary.
+ CCAs for magazine depth, why not? At 60k feet, Link-16 should be good for at least 500 miles. Plenty of elbow room.
Crud, you could probably stick 32x AIM260s into a B-21's bomb bay. 2 missiles per face of the rotary launcher, and the rotary launcher is long enough to hold two of those twin-racks.
The beauty of the CCA conceptual structure is you can design a UAV around that anti air mission and offload the emissions bloom of that salvo to a platform(s) at an arbitrarily large distance.
