Boeing June 4th, 2013
Late this summer a new Super Hornet will take to the skies, first in St. Louis, then at PaxRiverWhat will set this F-18F apart from the airplanes already at Pax will be the non-functional conformal fuel tanks (CFT), an Enclosed Weapons Pod (EWP) and a mock-up of an internally-mounted infrared search and track system mounted along with a slew of radar cross-section enhancement measures.
According to Boeing officials, the Super Hornet will be at Pax to test the aerodynamic qualities of those representative shapes.They noted “the CFTs won’t add any cruise drag at high subsonic speeds, but it will have a negative impact on drag at transonic speeds–but the company has done a lot of engineering work to try mitigating that.”
Moreover, they went on to say that, “at low airspeeds, sometimes overall drag with the CFTs is actually lower than a clean aircraft.” They also added, “configured with the CFTs and EWPs carrying 4 AMRAAMs, the jet performs roughly the same as a Super Hornet carrying 4 external AIM-120s.
The CFTs will add an additional 3500 lbs, or about 538 gallons, of fuel and the EWP can carry up to four AMRAAM sized weapons, six Small Diameter Bomb sized weapons and two AMRAAM sized weapons, and several air to surface weapons up to the 2000lb class.
Boeing officials say the Conformal Fuel Tanks and the Enclosed Weapons Pods can be added as post-production retrofits or to new Super Hornets.* However, should “the Navy decide to retrofit some of its existing Super Hornets with the CFTs and EWPs, a modification line could be set up at a Boeing facility, a USN depot or at a USN Air Station.”
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