USAF not F-35 thread

The US Navy’s new autonomous refueling drone takes historic first flight

So a 12 missile loaded F-35 is something becoming real. Too bad for the F-15X and other heavily loaded 4th Gen.

Loyal Wingman coming along…(and armed)

https://www.flightglobal.com/news/articles/payload-tests-for-xq-58a-set-for-early-2020-460947/

And here’s info on the missile.

https://www.flightglobal.com/news/articles/raytheon-unveils-peregrine-new-medium-range-air-t-460891/

F-35 and U-2 working together for early missile launch detection.

https://www.flightglobal.com/news/articles/u-2-channels-f-35-sensor-data-in-ballistic-missile-460897/

Air Force announces newest Red Tail: ‘T-7A Red Hawk’

The Air Force’s all-new advanced trainer aircraft, the T-X, has officially been named the T-7A Red Hawk.

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Congratulations, no naming shenanigans this time. :applause:

Well, sort of, as the USAF has two training aircraft designation sequences… the one where the T-6 Texan II is the latest before T-X, and the one where the Cirrus T-53 is the latest. :sleeping:

[USER=”58228″]mig-31bm[/USER] – Hard to say. There is very little that is known about it at this time.

Another science and engineering outlook article from flightglobal…this time focusing on coming scramjet engines.

https://www.flightglobal.com/news/articles/analysis-3d-printing-brings-scramjet-engines-closer-459857/

Bring on the SWARMS!

https://www.flightglobal.com/news/articles/analysis-usaf-eyes-revolution-in-small-jet-turbines-459858/

Talking about drone, does USA has anything similar to Dark sword drone

Ultimately, engine developers need to create low-cost options. Suder says that may present challenges to manufacturers because eliminating non-essential engineering while maintaining high reliability for expendable engines is not something the jet turbine industry is well set up to do. “I only need this thing to last for 20h, I don’t need 10,000h of life in it,” he says. “The tools aren’t sophisticated to really accurately predict only a few hours of life, so we actually overdesign everything.”

very good summary of a remarkable analysis. We have posted the acquisition announcement at the time.

Bring on the SWARMS!

https://www.flightglobal.com/news/articles/analysis-usaf-eyes-revolution-in-small-jet-turbines-459858/

Raytheon delivers NGJ-MB to USN for testing

https://www.flightglobal.com/news/articles/raytheon-delivers-next-generation-jammer-mid-band-po-460125/

Meanwhile…
U.S. Air Force’s F-22 Raptor stealth fighters return to skies of Syria

Source:
Defense-Blog.com

Levsha, the data is there to be read: if a plane whose assembly line closed in 2012, in 2018 still has a 50% availability rate, one cannot justify it neither saying that it is still too recent (like in the F-35 case) nor that it is too old (like is in the F-15C case-NOT), so there would be another reason and not a positive one.
.
Making comparisons between planes from different air force is always difficult, we are talking about mission capable rate here, average flight hours/years is another completely different parameter.

Maybe is the metaphor that i used that made it look harsher than intended: raw ,ripe and rotten are here to be intended like referred to fruit and vegetables process of maturation, that sometimes just doesn’t work the right way.

F-35 is still really too early to judge but Raptors seven years after their assembly line closure have clearly passed from raw to rotten without ever being ripe…

That seems like an unduly harsh thing to say about the F-22. Most of the Eurocanard fighters ever put into service by European air forces probably aren’t flying every day either. I’d love to know what the combat readiness rate for the Su-35 in the RuAF is these days?

interesting the F-15s are consistently more ready than the smaller F-16s

I have made an half humorous post before but you have to consider that only a fraction of the F-15C is still in regular units, majority are in ANG instead.
So they have surely a less requiring schedule.
Most worrying one about the legacy fighters is IMHO the sudden fall of the F-15E rates instead.
F-35 is still really too early to judge but Raptors seven years after their assembly line closure have clearly passed from raw to rotten without ever being ripe…

…if that damaged section of RAM represents the length of the surface wave suppressing treatments required to prevent diffraction at surface discontinuities…

It doesn’t. Every material has its own intrinsic resistivity and the total sheet impedance will also be determined by material thickness. And this is done for each layer. All of these factors are under the control of stealth designers and there are many possible solutions towards the same goal. So there is no single “length” and it also means that there might not be any “discontinuities” like you are suggesting either.

…then the canopy frame airgap of the Su-57…

Ah, yes, the supposed air gap measured by your meticulously calibrated eyeballs…only 429,988GHz removed from the main frequencies of interest. But no worries, right, close enough? What this photo does show is what I’ve been telling you. The main attributes which provide for stealth are not something you can see.

So I am assuming the cracks were intentionally being displayed to offer the audience at the airshow there an explanation or what? Although cracks happen time to time I wonder if some coating jobs have improved to lessen this effect.

Who knows the thinking behind this particular bird being displayed at an airshow. The ones used in other airshows have generally been well looked after.

It’s known that the old F-22 RAm needs lots of care and environmentally controlled hangars. Certain unit’s don’t have those hangars.

Also known that the F-35 uses a completely different type of RAM which doesn’t require the special treatment. I believe they started reskinning F-22s with the new coatings years ago, hence my comment about why they’ve left this bird look like crap for almost 2 years.

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Source:
https://www.airforcetimes.com/news/your-air-force/2019/07/26/aircraft-mission-capable-rates-hit-new-low-in-air-force-despite-efforts-to-improve/

interesting the F-15s are consistently more ready than the smaller F-16s

So I am assuming the cracks were intentionally being displayed to offer the audience at the airshow there an explanation or what? Although cracks happen time to time I wonder if some coating jobs have improved to lessen this effect.

Ah, one of the non-combat capable ones?

RAM application is the same as combat-capable birds though? They just are not bothering upkeeping it as well?

Interesting photo, shows some of the RAM patch material that’s usually covered by paint. The conductive and possibly magnetic substrate under the matching layer looks iron-based as it seems to be rusting at the cracks.

Apparently this particular F-22 has looked like this for a year and a half now. One of the threads from a blog discussing the issue shows early 2018 photos of the same aircraft exhibiting the same skin damage.

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There could be all sorts of reasons they’ve stopped maintaining the surfaces. Perhaps the unit’s been told to hold out for the new surface treatment developed on the F-35 program.

As a side note, if that damaged section of RAM represents the length of the surface wave suppressing treatments required to prevent diffraction at surface discontinuities, then the canopy frame airgap of the Su-57 is indeed a large RCS issue.