LowObservableSomething something Nato membership? Is that MadRat’s point?
LowObservableFD – There is no logic at all behind the LHA plan, that I can discern. Just a panicked effort to support bigger/heavier/thirstier aircraft by ditching the well deck, followed by an equally panicked recognition that the well deck is an essential complement to the ground forces held aboard the ship. The America/Tripoli class will have to depend on the LPDs to carry LCACs, but that leaves only two LCACs in the group versus five.
LowObservableAnyone who can’t understand that 20 F-35Bs and 2 MH-60s on an America class LHA would be an intimidating force to almost any potential adversary short of Russia or China doesn’t have a clue what they are talking about. There are only a handful of navies in the world that could claim to have a capability even roughly comparable.
Where in the whole of military history is it written that only equivalent force can deter or defeat?
Can you explain to the class how an America-class task group can be sent against modern SSKs, road-mobile ASCMs and a minimal ISR capability (all of that well within the reach of many nations), without a significant risk of losing one or more combatants outright?
LowObservableRather obvious point 1 – the MEU cannot do its job from outside threat range, even against littoral targets. The LHA/D becomes a very small aircraft carrier with (particularly over max range) very low sortie rates, and a whole lot of Marines on board doing nothing.
So, argue the advocates, the F-35Bs go in first and beat up on the defenses. The problem is that the most severe threats to the MEU are SSKs and ASCMs. The latter can take the form of small ground-mobile shoot-and-scoots that are very difficult to detect and eliminate.
Let’s put this very simply: nobody would ever send an LHD/LHA full of Marines, fuel and munitions within range of ASCMs, without (at the very least) AEW cover, and ASW cover if appropriate, In the USN, most defensive ASW and all AEW is on the carrier.
Regardless of the capabilities of the F-35, the Marine unit will not go up against any technically sophisticated defenses without a carrier behind it.
LowObservableHarrier… had pitiful range on internal fuel.
Pitiful range?
http://www.history.navy.mil/planes/av-8b.pdf
See page 6. All-hi-alt, four AAMs, gun pod, 425 nm radius. So shall we describe the F-35B’s range (2 bombs, 2 AAMs, no gun, all-hi-alt) as “pitiful x 1.06”?
LowObservableObligatory – The A-10 would not work off a carrier, but could be well suited to expeditionary operations. And Marine air’s sea-based, non-CV element is limited in size, with only small units attached to each deployed LHA/LHD.
FAXX – just try learning to read. It might help.
LowObservableInternal AAMs, obviously carried for reasons of stealth and supersonic cruise. Or because someone was worried that the newfangled AAMs wouldn’t stand the external environment.
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LowObservableRD – No, I can’t “eyeball” the CG any better than anyone else. But I can look at where the wing is, and where the major pieces are, and compare to an F-22 or anything else.
You are correct that stealth requires internal weapons (or some form of conformal carriage, at a different level). This involves a sacrifice of performance at a given size and cost level. Not hard to understand except for dimwit fans.
LowObservableYes, if you prioritize stealth, and are willing to pay the price, go for internal weapons and fuel. Just don’t delude yourself that you can also beat a classic multi-role fighter on performance and versatility, let alone cost. When you see the Russians stop building Su-35s and Su-34s, and the Chinese shut down J-10s and J-11s, give me a call.
The worst for me is to see such low-key argumentation now even mixing with democratic processes.
Semi-literate blather with no counter-argument, following the presentation of an irrelevant video as evidence. Welcome to my block list, fool.
LowObservableTVIP – That’s the X or Y airplane. I am not sure whether the production aircraft, let alone the very different G/H, ever had any provision to drop the wing tanks.
One problem with this argument is that the F-35 enthusiasts – in their zeal to prove that their jet is better at everything than anything else – get the argument backwards.
Drop tanks and CFTs are a form of morphing that adapt the airplane to different missions. Consider a normal multirole fighter and what it does. Its two driving missions are long-range strike (lbs of weapons and nm radius and CAP (time on station + air combat parameters such as sustained g and transonic accel).
Let’s give it enough internal fuel for the LRS mission. What that means is that it arrives on CAP with empty fuel tanks, the volume and weight of which now must be dragged through transonic accel and maneuver. This sets off a nice spiral of more thrust, bigger wing = more weight, rinse and repeat.
Hmm. Why not make the jet smaller and use drop tanks more or less sized for the outbound CAP leg and loiter requirement? The driving requirement is to start combat with no excess weight of volume and enough gas to fight and bingo.
Next: With lower gs required for LRS, all I have to do is get off the ground and climb with bigger tanks and bombs. Compared with the clean all-internal-fuel airplane, I may not be as efficient – but I can upsize my tanks or even carry CFTs to raise my fuel fraction and compensate for that factor. (As a low-wing-loading, high-powered tac fighter, I can haul a lot of **** in level subsonic flight.)
And the above, kiddies, is why we can even argue about the ability of an F-16 to haul as much/as far as a far larger F-35. Not to mention a lower-OEW aircraft that has a practical six-AAM, six x 750lb-guided bomb loadout. Show me that on an F-35 and we’ll talk.
Internal weapons, by the way, are a loser for a fighter-size airplane. At best it’s like moving house and having only one size of box to carry your books, clothes and fishing poles. Internal AAMs without folding fins are particularly bad – conformal/semi-conformal is better from all efficiency viewpoints, particularly considering the heavyweight ejection mechanisms required.
LowObservableI would not be surprised if the F-35 were moderately unstable at the point where it would need maneuverability. But look at the airplane, take a guess at CoP (half chord lines from tip to wing-body join, connect at midpoint of said lines). Half the heavy bit of the engine, the entire landing gear, the weapons by, the gun are all ahead, and the forward fuselage and its 5000+ pounds of fuel in the lift-fan bay are far ahead of the CoP. Part of the engine, the lighter jetpipe and nozzle, tailbooms and empennage are behind it. Of course it is nose-heavy with weapons and full gas. That layout (with a fixed fan instead of gas) is also why the biggest vertical-thrust element of the B is behind the cockpit.
As for “using afterburner far less”, depends on the mission profile. The F-35 can’t lose a bunch of its empty fuel tankage when it wants to go transonic.
And enough rubbish about retaining tanks or not. On an all-subsonic, largely high-altitude mission, the drag of the empty tanks (versus that of a high-wing-loading aircraft weighing 55,000-40,000 pounds) is not going to make that large of a difference.
It’s not a “crippling deficiency” by the way, merely a fact of F-35 performance. If your baseline design relies on internal fuel, externals simply aren’t going to be as beneficial because (in relative terms) you don’t reduce your weight and drag so much when you ditch them. That’s why most bombers don’t carry drop tanks (the B-52’s underwing tanks are fixed slippers).
LowObservableSpit IX – LockMart keeps promising that the price will come down, so someone figured out that it made sense to not buy any LRIP jets. LM thinks that it will have the world’s only fighter by then, so it will have the Canadians over a barrel. More basically, however, Harper’s machinations have made the JSF toxic in this election, but he promised Washington he’d buy it, voters be damned. So, punt.
What is really funny is that if they hadn’t tried to rig a sole-source selection in 2010 they would have finished the competition and have a going program by now. Of course, in that case they would have had to explain real-money (see Korea) prices and estimated operating costs to the voters, compared with what Boeing or Dassault would have offered, and backed up with service experience.
LowObservableLukos – You are quite right about the drag variation, as long as you are talking about a transport-type aircraft that has its fuel tankage equally distributed around its CG, and does not carry bombs. As it is, most of an F-35A’s fuel and weapon load is ahead of the CG, including a huge gas tank right behind the cockpit. If as some people think the jet is always unstable, even fully loaded, how tail-heavy will it be at low fuel, bombs gone?
Which comes to the second point. Wing lift does not equal weight in level flight. Net upforce equals weight. Suppose you are nose-heavy and have a very short tail arm. The stabilizer is pushing down trying to balance out that fat kid on the other end of the seesaw = induced drag. (The fat kid being inter alia the tons of fuel in the forward tank). Lots of induced drag because the tail is short in span and highly tapered. Now the wing has to lift the weight plus the tail downforce. More induced drag.
Now add fat tanks, forward of CG. More trim drag. Interference with the wing flow (by the way, the lift distribution is far from ideal, but that’s another story). Double ugly.
LowObservableFirst, we know that the aircraft will burn more fuel in the first 110 nm than the average specific range for the mission.
Second, there is no reason for the relationship between the first 110 nm and the second or third 110 nm &c to be linear.
And there is no “theory” here – it’s a question of explaining the numbers as given by the manufacturer. Hanging on to the empty tanks for the balance of a medium-altitude mission would make some difference, but not enough to explain the tiny range increase for c. 20 per cent fuel.
LowObservableLukos – You have a wing loading above that appears to be derived from Sprdlyscotsman’s “analysis” over at the kiddie board. The problem is that the guy uses an “equivalent” wing loading for his comparisons, in which he adds tail area to wing area, on the basis that (in photos) the tail has positive incidence (angle relative to aircraft datum), while subtracting tail area from wing area for the F-15 and others.
The problem is that the tail has highly negative alpha (angle relative to airflow) because it is in the immediate area behind the wing and immersed in a downflow. In fact, the clean and fully fuelled F-35A/C is nose-heavy and carries a lot of trim drag. Its net wing area (the size of the wing) is also an unusually small fraction of gross area (the normal quoted 460 sq ft) and the span loading for the A is high (it’s the same weight as a Super H but almost ten feet shorter).
Adding tanks makes the nose-heaviness worse. What the Norway data is telling us is that when you put the tanks on, the aircraft becomes both heavier and less aerodynamically efficient (tank drag, trim drag, wing at high loading = even more energetic vortex loss at the tips). This could also result in a lower initial cruise altitude (less efficient again) and there could be other factors (eg greater weight mandates more afterburner time).
It’s really simple: Stealth costs money and results in performance trades. Is it worth it? The answer is mission-dependent and, of course, dependent on the threat.
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