Where the hell did I say it was? It wasn’t you in any way I was referring to, so quit being so defensive!

Paul

As said in PM (thanks for that), I apologize.

@all:
I picked the last 30 years as the comparison is more valid (purely civil programs with a pure commercial target). I am concerned the industry gut more stupid. The B787 was worse than the A380 so far, but the A380 wasn’t good by any standards (all program-wise, the resulting aircrafts seem to be good).

Here we go again… I wondered how long it would take for those who can’t avoid such things to turn this into an AvB thread, and it took 6 pages so I guess it did well to last as long as it did.

Very sad indeed.

Paul

Sorry, I didn’t wanted to to interrupt the “I am so happy the aircraft flew” parade. Just thinking who actually gives a s##t about who likes the wing flex and who doesn’t. I consider discussions touching the future of this industry to be of higher interest.
And I am not the one who brought up A380 or anything else, ask Bmused55 who is circling like hawk for any minor sign for disrespect by “Airbus”.

And the A380…. two halves not coming together correctly!
Ok, it was only the wiring looms, but it still delayed the project.
And the Tail cone too. Causing some concern that apparently prompted a quick re design to fix it.

A tail cone is no primary structure.
The cables were not safety critical, but “product” critical (you can’t sell an aircraft without a cabin).
The A380 wing failed at 140ish % long after it successfully demonstrated limit load.

Although both programs have wet feet, from the aviation engineering perspective the B787 is a new low in civil aviation history, at least when we pick the last 30 years. And the fact it flies doesn’t mean we are now in the land of endless dreams. Some remember the news situation when the A380 made its first flight, there wasn’t even a delay announced back then.

The B787 will have all the teething troubles other aircraft had before. When serial productions starts many things come on the surface that could be ignored before. The real problem is that even without these frictions the B787 already burned 2.5 years. I wouldn’t bet on the B787 being in service next year’s Christmas, I’ll rather put my money on I or II/2011. And that’s includes some optimism.

It may be but I’m sure you know that both Military and Civil A/c obey the same laws of physics.

I hope they do. I think just people didn’t care that much.
Structural simulations wasn’t that great in the late 1960ies, today I would consider the confidence in computer simulations much higher, while it still has its limits (as shown by the B787, half a year delay due to severe structural flaws).

The finest Lift to Drag ratio (~12) allows supercruise without AB. I wonder what about SR-71’s military thrust cruise ?

I can’t think of an airframe that has an LoD about 8 in supersonic. The one that has the mentioned 8 is the Concorde.
The SR-71 didn’t do anything in Dry Thrust, but don’t overrate that: the engine of the J-58 was special. Although it needed A/B for anything but taxiing, it still achieved better specific range at Mach 3 than at Mach .9 (that’s why the SR-71 went to Mach 3 when possible, even on ferry flights).

Of course that F-104 is fine aircraft, with its limits. At transonic speeds (above say Mach 0.8) every airframe experience some shock buffet that is heaver with higher lift (or alpha, G). The Starfighter turns fine at low altitude, above 450 kt speed. But limitations are instantaneous turns, speed loss in turns at lower CAS (that is even at higher speed at medium to high altitudes) and handling, especially because unfavorable pitch/yaw to roll inertia ratios, not to mention high tailplane effects.

More demanding to fly. When we consider the F-16A as the perfect dogfighter, then the F-104 is the perfect opposite.

Not necessarily.

After studying some EM data, it seemed to me that the F-104, when flown properly, could perform well in a turning fight under certain conditions.

When I was a F-104 FWS instructor, I had the chance to attend TOPGUN as a USAF observer. One of the maneuvers taught to the TOPGUN students (in the F-4) was how to beat a MiG-21 in a horizontal turning fight. The maneuver wasn’t taught as a tactic…it was designed to show the importance of energy levels. Sitting through that class, it occurred to me that if the F-4 could do that, so could the F-104 since our low level EM numbers were relatively similar.

I proposed to TOPGUN that we test the idea. They were interested, so I asked the bosses back home if we could try it out. We got the OK, and one of the other FWS instructors and I flew back to TOPGUN to test fly the maneuver.

There was considerable doubt with the Navy guys that this was going to work…after all, the F-104 turned like a brick…right??!!

Much to their surprise…and ours, I suppose…the F-104 performed just as the TOPGUN maneuver said. In my engagement, I entered a level, hard turning scissoring set of reversals with the TOPGUN pilot flying the F-5E ( a close simulation of Fishbed C capability). After about 6 reversals, I pulled into the vertical, the F-5 couldn’t follow me, and I rolled into his six. Done deal. The other F-104 pilot enjoyed a similar outcome.

The point of this was to demonstrate relative energy bleed performance…under these conditions, the MiG will lose speed about four times faster than the F-104…the only way to get behind the F-104 is to slow down…that means lose energy…and that means lose vertical performance.

It was pretty neat!

But as you noted in the comment about the F-15 engagement…yes, we basically flew in high speed straight lines and only slowed to around 450KIAS to use our maneuver flaps to generate a relatively tight hard turn.

Thanks for that inside, I think your comments are one of the very few positive comments about the F-104’s dogfight capability.
But when I remember Boyd’s work in the 60ies and 70ies (I read his biography), many negative statements about the F-104 were due to using old tactics.
I guess half of the performance of a jet comes from the perception of the pilot about his aircraft (like: when the USN conducted tests of state-of-the-art Navy fighters versus the MiG-17, basically all pilots lost their first engagement; they tried to outperform it in level flight turning contests, which is a bad choice versus the MiG-17; overconfidence was cited as a primary factor).

One question: you are always referring to the F-104G. Now, the G-model is basically a fighter bomber with INS and stuff. Did you fly the basic F-104G or was it modfified … like reduction in equipment. After all, I am a little bit surprised that I never read any German accounts concerning the capabilities of the Starfighter, especially considering that you taught them. Didn’t they get the message or was the training focussed on fighter bomber missions?

Again, thanks for the comments! Keep up good and insightful posting.

Bull****. Turning, unless at or near stall AOA, doesn’t include buffeting. We were quite adept at max performing the jet at max AOA without worrying about buffet. In fact, we taught that buffet meant that you were pushing the jet too hard…and it was time to back off…btw…there was no buffet in the F-104G, only the F-4.

I think buffeting is also connected to Mach number and more likely when you max out the aircraft (lift-wise) in transonic regime. However, buffeting is in the end an in stationary airflow, means the airflow separates and re-attaches in short succession. That happens to many aircraft, but not necessarily. Especially in the F-104 I would think that the airflow just develops from normally attached to fully separated. But just an educated guess.

When flying well above corner velocity you normally need not to worry about AoA or buffeting (at least in theory). I guess you didn’t do continuous turning contest but rather relied on quick instantaneous turns and “hit’n run” style attacks? Otherwise you should quickly run out of energy in an F-104G when doing sharp turns, right?
[remembering your story about you versus the 2 F-15s I think it was rather a quick engagement using a number of short turns, all at rather high airspeed/Mach number].

I was just being tongue-in-cheek about the 20 min separation. But as we all know, there have been several fatal accidents involving small planes behind medium aircraft (B727 etc) so they will have to look at the current separation criteria, although the A380 probably generates a similar amount of wake turbulence to the 747:)

All the test conducted with the A380 for the certification and wake vortex limits showed how limited the system of fixed seperation is. Sometimes it works well as the seperation is normally quite large, but sometimes it doesn’t. I don’t know if the ICAO requires seperation for aircraft which are not on the same flight path. Theoretically, with given wind conditions, there alsways exists a “no-go-area” behind an aircraft changing its shape with wind and weight-relation between the aircraft. An 380 could pass behind a B737 with 5m distance, while a CRJ200 may need a 3 minute seperation on a parallel or crossing flight path when an A380 leads.

The A380 produces on average 20% stronger wakes than a B747, although it is about 50% heavier. The B757 is known to have particularly nasty wakes (for its size).