SchorschI think the gun should rather be a single barrel design as the M61 weights too much. Something like the 30mm DEFA cannon. Of course less suitable for a2a combat but still useful. Remember that MiGs and Mirages used that cannon with success.
Using hindsight we can say that a gun is important but majority of kills will be done with missiles.
When we use the J79 as basic engine we have a wet thrust of ~14 to 15klbs. That will set our aircraft to 18 to 22 klbs gross weight with half fuel and two missiles.
So, we are aiming at 5.5t empty operating, including 400kg for weapons and 2.5t of fuel. The engine itself is 1.75t, so the task of getting that airframe as light as possible would be the key. With the J79 6.5t OEW actually looks more realistic, boosting fuel to 3t to keep fuel fraction. In the end the aircraft would stay below 10t (=22lkbs) typical take-off weight. That would make it very sporty for its era, TWR for half fuel is close to .8, with full fuel we are at .65.
SchorschAs we are veering slightly off topic, and I identify myself as being partly responsible, I am doing a hard over into the topic.
The perfect 1960ies fighter.
First, what does that mean time-wise?
Program start sometime mid to late 1950ies with IOC sometime in the first half of the 1960ies. That is the time the USAF got the F-4C, the F-106 and still had F-104 in their inventories. And the Russians fielded MiG-21F and -MF. The French fielded the Mirage III. Generally we are looking for an aircraft that would have been available during Vietnam and 6-day war.
So, that should set our scope of technology.
We have turbo-jet engines, maybe very premature turbofans (which will probably suffer from reliability issues). The available turbo-jets (if we orientate on the technology leader USA) offer fairly good SFC and thrust (for a TJ). We have inlet technology for Mach 2 flight available.
We have analogue radar and avionics, no fancy all weather navigation system except we sacrifice lots of weight. No BVR capable radar suite that goes without a second operator. And of course no fly-by-wire stuff but real direct flying. Basic Control Augmentation Systems (CAS) were available and introduced in most aircraft (for example in the Starfighter).
We have quite some aerodynamics on the table: vortex lift was still premature, but the basics were available. We have leading and trailing edge devices, blown flaps.
Now, taking a big piece of hindsight, what would we want our fighter to be?
I guess from John Boyd and others we can decide that it should be small and fairly simple. That means we do not use radar guided weapons as the sacrificed weight does not compare to the added capability when we design our fighter to fight versus other fighters.
A simple radar should be included, something that allows the pilot to track targets he gets assigned via radio. Weaponry should be a cannon and infra-red missiles. The aircraft should be designed to carry 4 of them with the option to carry 2 more. The cannon, hmm, maybe an M61A1, but other options may be useful (don’t know how different designs have proven in combat).
Other external loads include the ability to lift some dumb bombs or rockets and to have 3 external fuel tanks when carrying its standard armament (4 AAM).
Performance-wise we should aim at giving it an useful field performance but nothing too fancy. But leading edge devices may be appropriate, especially as they help in maneuvering, too. No weight shall be sacrificed to lift the Mach number above Mach 1.5 with design weapons load (4 AAM). That most likely means we can go without an adjustable inlet.
Range should be sufficient to stay on station for a while and defend other things than the very own airport. Extensive usage of drop tanks (up to three with standard weapons load) is allowed and makes sense.
Lots of attention should be given into handling qualities. We achieve maneuverability by giving a modest wing loading with half fuel and standard weapons, but we don’t need more than 7.33g in the airframe. Thrust weight ratio should be as high as possible, but we have to be realistic about the available technology, I don’t think we can achieve much more than static 0.8 for combat conditions (half internal fuel, 4 AAM).
In the end, it would look a bit like a pimped and slightly upscaled F-5A with different engine, different cannon and better radar. If we put in radar guided missiles I hardly think we can get anything smaller than a Phantom due to the still very primitive electronics. Make IOC 5 to 8 years later and the situation looks different (see Mirage F1), but for something that has its first flight 1960ish radar guided missiles suitable for real a2a combat (aside interception duties via GCI) does not look possible.
SchorschJa, looking at the Buccaneer, Tornado is an embarrassment.
One really has to wonder about the non-political justification for the Tornado.
I just got hands on a British publication about the Tornado, covering some texts from people inside the program in the 60ies and 70ies. It reads like the British were unable at that time to do anything productive and more or less got picked up by the “Starfighter Replacement Group”, who wanted the short take-off, low-level, fully all weather nu-cu-lar Über-NKF*. Neither Britain nor Germany had anything that could strike in any weather with “high precision”* and potentially even come back. The Buccaneer could have been modernized, but in Germany the Starfighter needed replacement.
The people inside the British industry and military were obviously kind of traumatized by the government hitting the cancel-button once a year on major programs.
TSR.2, F-105, F-111, Tornado – all primarily made for nuclear war, in a conventional war not even as precise as a Stuka, just faster.
One must admit that they enjoy a higher level of survivability than the Stuka.
And you should add the Su-24, which as only feature misses the Mach 2 capability.
All conventionally armed, low-level penetration, pre-PGM fighterbombers had (or still have) severe problems with “real-world” missions.
As always I like your style of writing, but we should be fair that in the days before these fighter bombers, the things weren’t any better. A flight of Skyraiders and Corsairs would have a complete FAIL against fairly modern air defences.
My bottom line is that all mentioned aircraft have a common shortcoming: Wrong priority in high speed flight, they would have been equally lethal with a low level M.95 top speed and a modest supersonic capability (<1.8) at altitude. The B-1B was the first aircraft where this shortcoming was corrected.
—————
*
NKF: Neues Kampfflugzeug, name of the Starfighter replacement out of the days when Germany gave German names to its indigenous weapon systems.
“High precision” in nuclear terms, means you kill the target using a B61 and not dialing the highest yield.
SchorschI’m afraid I have a bit of a thing about the Bucc. I see it as one of the great wasted opportunities. A huge amount of money was spent developing the TSR.2, which was probably too expensive to buy or operate in useful numbers, even if we could have completed development, when a fraction of that money spent on refining the Buccaneer would have produced an aircraft capable of performing much of the same role, & also a lot more. The worst waste was that equipment already developed was discarded along with the platform it was intended for, instead of being re-used on the already existing, suitable, platform – the Buccaneer.
No fighter, but it could have filled a role for which we ended up using a semi-fighter.
For me as an engineer I always try to figure out why a 1950s aircraft like the Buccaneer can beat the over-engineered Tornado in key figures like payload-range and low level speed (dry thrust only).
Buccaneer and Tornado have similar empty weight and even comparable MTOW.
My premature conclusion is that the Tornado (alike the F-111) suffers from Mach 2 performance and Mach 1.2 low-level speed requirement. While more speed is always more welcome, it is purely academic in case of the Tornado as it never ever flies clean* (an F-16 may fly clean with only Sidewinder, but a clean Tornado is a useless Tornado). Additional pain is the required short take-off and landing run, while this is not academic and indeed very realistic (the specifications for American aircraft [except F-111] show that they never really intended to go to war with their aircraft, at least not against the Soviets).
As such, the Tornado will in my eyes always be the over-engineered and gold-plated European Collaboration Aircraft 1.0.
While I at the same time think it is the best aircraft to drop the bomb on Frankfurt/Oder in a 1980s environment.
Take comfort in the fact that all air forces in the world were hot on swing wings and Mach 2 performance, and that all air forces have paid dearly for it.
*clean also excludes pylons
SchorschThe Starfighter is not a really inspiring design. I also had what Multirole had in mind, an F-5 stuck with a J-79 on its back.
The Starfighter is better than its heritage, which is mostly based on the USAF unwillingness to procure it (and rather rely on over-engineered fighter bombers) and the Germans downing their own aircraft by the hundreds. Both not really representative.
I agree that the F-104 was not really maneuverable by its aerodynamics, but it had some other advantages. Around 6.1t empty (F-104A), 2.7t fuel, ~750kg (4 Sidewinder, cannon ammunition) weapons, you have a fuel fraction of .28 and a static sea level thrust-weight ratio of 0.7, up to .82 when half empty.
Handling is a bit rough, though but neither late 1950ies aircraft was truly a winner in this arena.
SchorschWas there ever any plan to make a fighter version of the Blackburn Buccaneer?
Nic
The Buccaneer was a bomber.
Equipped with 1970ies electronics (instead of late 1950ies) it would have made a Tornado look bad most of the time, especially considering payload range and (now, that’s a surprise) speed at low level with payload.
The “not a pound for air to ground” theme of the F-15 would probably bring one to a twin-engine (either British Sapphire or the Wright J65-W-20) fighter equipped with a moderately sized fuel tank and no more than a pair of AIM-9E backed up by a nice rotary cannon. Low chord wing. Twin tail arrangement like on the current F-15. Add in minimal radar for its time; AN/APG-56? Provision for a big centerline fuel tank and a pair of wing tanks for ferrying. No extra weight for bomb racks. An affordable air superiority fighter for its time.
Than we can agree on an F-104A. Not a pound for air2ground, biggest engine in smallest aircraft, small fuel capacity. Lifts 4 Sidewinders and 2 fuel tanks along with an M61.
Although the F-104 is not the most maneuverable aircraft ever conceived, I think it would give quite a good air superiority fighter.
The other alternative (my favorite) is an F-5 with a dedicated engine designed for it. The F-5A to F had the J-85, actually designed for a cruise missile. The engine was light and small, but thirsty.
In case of the re-engined F-5 we had 4 AIM-9, two fuel tanks, <6t OEW. Range comparable to Phantom, probably more. Could have been an excellent aircraft to help the F-105 over North Vietnam.
SchorschOlympus, to take advantage of having the same engine (roughly at least) in it as on the TSR.2 🙂
Looks like a ******* child of a Engilsh Electric Lightning and a Supermarine Swift.
SchorschI once made a similar comment to a French Mirage F1 pilot, and you should have seen him laugh! Turns out, F16As were no match for Mirage F1s, even as recently as the early-1990s…
Why? Because electronics and weapons systems are usually more important than raw performance in air combat. And before the MLU/ADF update, F16As had no BVR capability. Meanwhile, the Mirage F1 had Matra Super 530Fs (comparable to AIM-7s). Additionally, he told me that in exercises the Mirage F1’s ECM systems (presumably he was talking about the offboard Barax) would greatly disrupt Belgian F-16s, which rarely carried ECM systems.
So even though the F-16A had the better engine and FBW, it was often at a significant disadvantage. Don’t believe the “conventional wisdom”…
Correct.
Although I wouldn’t credit the F1 with real modern autonomous BVR capability (radar not automized enough, only monopulse in the beginning), but it has the ability launch a missile outside the missile envelope of an F-16A, especially when helped by a ground station. I would assume that within visual range the F-16A have an advantage, but as you say, raw performance rarely decides an engagement.
SchorschBasically, the airframe/engine combination ment the potential performance improvement from a more powerful & efficient (much better SFC, better T/W) engine was only partly realised, & in some aspects performance was actually degraded. But that doesn’t mean the engine itself was problematic, as Tinwing suggests. The F-4K problems would not have materialised in an airframe designed for the engine. And in any case, as Schorsch says, it spent most of its life in the range where the Speys advantages outweighed its drawbacks. In practice, the UK got an aircraft with higher usable performance – but probably not worth the extra cost of the redesign & setting up a new production line.
I always had the impression that the changes in performance that resulted from the different engine were misunderstood by the general aviation public (overrating top speed, not looking at more operational figures). In most books the Speys are not really looked at, just a word is given that top speed was reduced.
It surely received bad press as it was British, and at that time anything British in aircraft was apparently considered worse than anything you could get from America, at least in the UK.
Finally, I don’t think the writers of the history of the F-4 Phantom (who are in their majority Americans) really have any real interest in the F-4/Spey.
You know how it works, write some crap into a book, attach a few nice pictures and people start thinking you actually know stuff about aircraft.
SchorschKinda like a poor man’s F-108 isn’t it? 😉
At least they flew it around the block.
For the perfect 1960s fighter F-106, F-108 and the Avro Arrow were equally useless. Their benchmark were Su-11, Su-15 and MiG-25P.
SchorschSchorsch i think you are misundestanding my opinions, i do not say the Russians had always excellent designs, they had the best in some terms for their needs, many western analysis rarely see the good qualities of the Russian designs, they always belittled the soviet aircraft industry and compared old Soviet aircraft with newer western aircraft.
In engine technology the Russians got good designs by 1961 they already got the R-15-300 engines, however reliability is not only a Soviet/Russian issue, if you compare a R-11 with an and F-100 or a RD-33 of course the modern engines will always beat the older ones.
The issue of the M-4 is another typical example of western claimed supremacy, it is true the M-4 was not as capable as the B-52, but the Tu-95 was more than a match for it and it was a turboprop (still has a turbine) so if the M-4 was a failure, the Tu-22 or Tu-22M were not niether the Tu-160.
Comparable desigsn always existed.
The Russians built the MiG-21 the americans the F-104, it is obvious the MiG-21 was better, the Americans designed fighters like the F-106 the Russians the Su-15, the F-4 with its J-79 was not a supermachine, was a fighter with good and bad points.
It was not more agile at low speeds than the MiG-21 and was mostly a match at medium speeds and only at high speeds beyond Mach 1 and high altitudes had some degree of superiority, but in general was not better as a dogfighter and was armed with the same weapons.
conclusions was it better with the J-79? no it was not, its performance was not better and the MiG-21 was only a light aircraft without the BVR armament the F-4 had, the Russians rectified their mistakes with the Mig-21 making the Bis family but in general the R-11 and R-13 delivered what it was needed.
You are missing the mark.
The Russians only had limited engines for choice at that time. The MiG-21 was minimum airframe around maximum engine, like the F-104 was. Both had different design philosophies, while the F-104 was in some areas “better” than the MiG-21, in some worse. The MiG-21 suited its customer more than the Starfighter did its intended customer, who actually didn’t want it. If you compare F-104A/C versus an MiG-21F-13 (both 1960), there is a clear gap in technology, which doesn’t mean, that a Starfighter could have performed the mission of the MiG better.
Anyways, engine technology was always a limiting factor for the aircraft designer. Funny you mention the R-15. That is a designated supersonic engine. If you really take a look at engine technology, you see that designing such engines is actually easier than making engines that work well subsonic and supersonic.
SchorschThe Spey that went into the Phantom was larger (heavier?) than the J79. This being one of the reasons its high altitude performance was degraded, Mach 2.1 vs 2.3?; as it required major reworks of the aft-fueslage.
Or perhaps the J79s static TWR wasn’t the whole story? Perhaps in dynamic conditions, it enjoyed performance advantages in certain envelopes of flight?
Turbofans have different thrust at higher Mach numbers. Additionally the additional drag you mention. As the Phantom spent 90% of its life between Mach 0.7 and Mach 0.95, a region where the Spey excelled in SFC and available thrust, where it almost never touched the Mach 2 limit (which can only be exceeded with at max 4 Sparrows anyways), the Spey looks like the better choice. But problematic is the disadvantages that come from adapting an existing airframe to a new engine.
I would refer you to the service history of the F-14A to relate just how unsuitable the TF-30 was for a high performance fighter. Similarly, the Spey 202 was very problematic in RAF Phantom.
While I wouldn’t reason this with the fact that the TF-30 was a turbofan. It was a good engine, but it lacked the robustness required for such an aircraft. Additionally, at least in case of the F-111, it was gifted with a quite miserable inlet design.
I guess the Mirage F.1 excelled by being the best compromise between capability and cost (at its time). It was supersonic, moderately agile, small, had a useful radar, could be used for ground attack. Compared to its American counterparts at that time (F-4, F-5) it was either clearly less expensive or clearly more capable.
It was no match for the F-16A.
SchorschOf course the Western reports usually compare the F-16 with the MiG-21 or MiG-23 and usually overlook that the Russian engines were designed as easy to make products.
However if you look the real facts, the J-79 was a late 1950s design, same the R-11 so both engines were more or less comparable, while the R-29 is a 1960s design and the R-35 is a 1970s design, so if you are fair all those engines reflect their time period, and as a conclusion are comparable none is superior or inferior all have cons and pros and none is really the best
The J79 was designed and first deployed in the mid 50ies. It was widely used in the 60ies. The R-35 was first used on the MiG-23ML, which made its debut nearly 20 years after the F-104/J79.
Anyways, believe what you want. Any self-respecting analysts of the Russian aviation in the time period 1945 up to the late 1970ies will find that engines were one of the major weak spots in many projects, such as the M-4 Bison, the An124 or the fighters. The reasons for this (production issues, lack of R&D, different requirements) are beyond my knowledge.
SchorschThe F-106 did the same job at the same speed but only on one engine.
And was as useful as a air superiority fighter as the Su-11.
Both are interceptors.
SchorschAll of that is subjetive, all those aircraft were very similar and the engines used in the F-106 and MiG-21, the R-11 and the J-57-P-23 to put an example had similar SFC http://www.airwar.ru/enc/engines/r11f.html and http://www.aircraftenginedesign.com/TableB1.html, the R-35 and the J-79 had similar SFC and consider that both engines weighed the same but the R-35 has a higher TWR of 1:7 contrary to the J-79 with a mediocre 1:4 TWR
Specifications (J79-GE-17)
General characteristics
Type: Afterburning turbojet engine
Length: 17.4 ft (5.3 m)
Diameter: 3.2 ft (1.0 m)
Dry weight: 3,850 lb (1,750 kg)
Components
Compressor: 17-stage axial compressor with variable stator vanes
Performance
Thrust: 11,905 lbf (52.9 kN) dry; 17,835 lbf (79.3 kN) with afterburner
Overall pressure ratio: 13.5:1
Turbine inlet temperature: 1,210 °F (655 °C)
Specific fuel consumption: 1.965 lb/(h·lbf) (200 kg/(h·kN)) with afterburner, 0.85 lb/(h·lbf) (87 kg/(h·kN)) at military thrust
Thrust-to-weight ratio: 4.6:1 (45.4 N/kg)now see the R-13
Specifications (R-13-300)
General characteristics
Type: Afterburning turbojet
Length: 4,605 mm (181.3 in)
Diameter: 1,095 mm (43.1 in)
Dry weight: 1,205 kg (2,656 lb)
Components
Compressor: Two-spool axial compressor
Performance
Thrust:39.9 kN (8,970 lbf) military thrust
63.7 kN (14,320 lbf) with afterburner
Overall pressure ratio: 8.9:1
Turbine inlet temperature: 1,005 °C (1,840 °F)
Specific fuel consumption:95 kg/(h·kN) (0.93 lb/(h·lbf)) at idle
213 kg/(h·kN) (2.09 lb/(h·lbf)) with afterburner
Thrust-to-weight ratio: 52.8 N/kg (5.4:1)conclusion the J-79 had a mediocre TWR and only offered a better SFC because it had an inferior TWR, even the R-11 offers a higher TWR and only a slightly higher SFC
In fact having similar specifications to the J-79 of weight, SFC, overall preasure ratio and turbine inlet temperature the R-35 offers a TWR of 1:7 and the same is with the R-29 however the later is less impressive than the R-35, facts the MiG-21 was more agile than the F-4 and the MiG-23 only used a single turbojet to achieve the same or better performance a F-4 had
Taking test bench and static sea level data still doesn’t serve your point, only if you want to assess the taxi performance. Publically available data indicates that Russian turbojets weren’t first class in the early 60ies. Google “Have Doughnut” for an opinion about the MiG-21F13’s engine.
The overall pressure ratio tells you the story much better, but again: Engine performance in supersonic jets is not really accessible from single point, static data.
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