No, sometimes it’s just arrogance and stupidity. MacNamara did the same thing with the Blackbird. The thing about a next generation Tomcat (by that I mean going back to the drawing board to the degree they did when developing the “Super” Hornet) is they could have (and likely WOULD have) completely revamped it for lighter weight and better maintainability. Technology would have been twenty years newer. Newer more powerful engines (than even the D’s F110) an AESA, IRST, more composite parts, more reliable avionics, etc. And seriously, the only people who say speed isn’t important in a top tier fighter are the “Super” Hornet apologists. Performance wise an F-14E would have been better than the Super Hornet in every regard. The main weakness of an F-14E would have been price. And no, we’re not talking double the cost of a Super Hornet but it still wouldn’t have been cheap. If I had to guess my money would be that cost was the primary factor. Keep in mind also that when the “Super” Hornet was chosen it was intended to be a stop gap. So what if the USN had to have a few POSs on it’s deck until the A-12s and NATFs showed up? Had they known at the time that neither would be coming I imagine they’d have demand more from a new airframe than what they got with the “Super” Hornet.

OK, let’s do it.
We start with requirements.

Actually, this aircraft does neither exist nor does it seem possible to build. The USN will finally get something which comes close to above specifications (scratch supercruise and M2.3, as well as the 2 men crew).
It is called F-35C.
Reasonable choice.
If the Navy had developed the NATF, they now had the Navy’s equivalent of the F-22: overweight and overprice, not really procured in numbers.
But they did better: they bridge with a modest capability increase to take the fruits of the F-22 technology program for their next aircraft, that can do all the same things minus some flight performance show-offs.

Any F-14 based successor would have been yesterday’s aircraft.

I suppose the long statements you didn’t quote are more or less accepted.
Still, I would like you to show me how an aircraft like the F-14 can jump to M1.8 supercruise capability, something the (clean, modified, not serial standard test-)F-22 has demonstrated once (but it is not an operational Mach number).

So you claim modern fighters, that are defined by you as supercruisy… even though you also claim only two to your knowledge actually are supercruisy, are too advanced to be challanged by 1960s fighters with engine and avionics upgrades.

No Garry, I didn’t say that. The term “modern supercruisy aircraft” is not equal to the statement “all modern aircraft are supercruisy”. You have to read my statements properly.
I further said, that currently only two aircraft have operational supercruise capability. For your information: operational means a basic unmodified line aircraft with basic engine settings, a basic line pilot, normal operational weapons, can sustain supersonic speed without afterburner under different conditions (temperature, altitude). Gripen, Suchoi 27/33/35 (or whatever), Rafale have all demonstrated, that the aircraft can do that under some specifically controlled conditions, but it is not operational.
I further don’t say, that a modified 1960ies aircraft is never worth the investment, but it would be wrong to conclude that you can have 4.5/5th generation performance from an aircraft that didn’t even match 4th generation fighter performance, and that all with development costs substantially below those of the Super Hornet. I further don’t say that the F-14 was not good in its role as long range & long endurance fleet defense aircraft (it was no interceptor), but I think it fails in any modification to be the legacy multi-mission aircraft for the USN until 2020.

An interesting claim… and you have nothing more than what I have to back up my claims to prove it but it is my limited understanding of the topics I am talking about that gives me an advantage.

I have the fact to my support that the USN and the US Congress and Senate decided to procure and operate the F-18E in favor of the F-14 upgrade. You might call this decision stupid, political or whatever, but it is a hard fact.

If you are so opposed to talking about what might have been done… just because it wasn’t WTF are you posting on a thread called “What ifs…”.

Oh, I am going of topic. Something you would fortunately never do.
Go to User CP, Ignore List, add “Schorsch”, and you’ll be fine.

The Subpar Hornet was basically a new aircraft. Most of its components were not compatible with the original hornet. Are you telling me that “upgrade” would be cheaper than an SMT type upgrade on a Tomcat?

Once again, I didn’t say that. Fist of all, I have no idea what exactly this “SMT” upgrade is, but I guess it was supposed to bring the pathetic multi-role and range payload characteristics of the MiG-29 somewhere close to 1990s standard.
Second, I don’t say the SH-program was cheap. But at least it provided an aircraft somewhere close to specified time/budget/specifications, at least in a military sense. The supposed “do it all” F-14 had much more technical risk included.

The best thing about the Hornet was not its speed or range performance or its agility or anything like that. Its claim to fame was that it was a modern digital fighter that was easy to maintain and operate.

You forgot payload flexibility. And when I look at ferry range and strike mission radius, I see the Super Hornet ahead of the F-14D.

Apart from the swing wing of the Tomcat there is nothing they put in the Hornet that they couldn’t use on the Tomcat, which would have required the same maintainence. An AESA radar has an enormous MTBF. 5th gen engines should be lower maintainence too.

You are always forget to look at the basics: weight, lift, available thrust and the resulting parameters. The F-14D was already at 20t OEW, any upgrade would in best case hold this mark, never make it lighter. the MTOW could at best be increased by another 2t or so. You’re fighter just doesn’t have the reserves to go anywhere.
I wouldn’t say no swing wing aircraft could do the job, but taking the Tomcat as starting point is an epic FAIL.

But then again you could be right… I am sure F-14 equipped Iranian forces are shaking in their shoes at the prospect of coming up against Hornets

I think the Iranians – apart from their tough talking propaganda – know about the remote likeliness of winning an aerial war against the USN, and may it be a single carrier group. By the way, I wouldn’t expect the Iranians to generate more sorties with their F-14’s than the USN did in its best times. F-14A with AIM-7E Sparrow and AIM-9E (??) Sidewinder against USN carrier battle group’s air wing sounds pretty much one sided.

… and Americans never make mistakes… so what they did must have been the best thing for operational performance… and nothing to do with cost cutting or politics. Of course there was talk of a tomcat mafia and a hornet mafia within the US military… doesn’t really sound like open and fair decision making won the day.

Do I suppose right that mistakes of the US military and military-industrial complex are basically defined as those that oppose your opinion?

We could argue ages about things nobody knows, for example technical feasibility and development costs of an improved F-14. ruth is, that most proponents make improper technical assumptions and hail the motto of “the grass is always greener on the other side of the river”. That motto is flawed, I know, because I cross a huge river each day (the Elbe).

I am just taking the technical things …

The Su-27 with new engines (ie Su-27BM) became supercruisy. The difference in performance between the F-14A and F-14D is clear… the F-14D not even needing AB to take off from a carrier!

While we don’t know the drawbacks in other regimes and how it affects range and endurance. An overpowered aircraft is not really desirable.

The reality is that the combination of extremely low drag with a variable sweep wing with modern powerful yet fuel efficient engines actually probably makes the F-14 better aerodynamically than the aircraft that replaced it. The swing wing added cost and maintainence but who cares? The extreme low drag plus even more powerful engines would make it pretty much guaranteed to be a supercruiser. The benefits of that for an interceptor, or a strike aircraft are huge. With low drag belly mounted AAMs or bombs it would be an excellent weapon system.

“Extremely low drag” is nice to read but actually I doubt the difference is that large. You’ll see that a 45-50° swept aircraft can easily be supercruisy. The Hornet is surely not the best design when it comes to transonic drag peak and supersonic drag, but it carries missiles that a much faster than any F-14 ever could be.

Replacing all the old avionics/wiring and adding modern stuff that is more reliable and more compact and also adding the diagnostic and self testing equipment that the F-18 and F-16 had would make it much easier and cheaper to maintain and use. In many ways the original Mig-29 and Su-27 were maintainence dogs as well, and for the same reason. You try and get parts for a computer made in 1984 now.

At the same time you are criticizing aircraft to be overly complex. The dream of some “simple” “off-the-shelf” electronics making the aircraft 100% better over night is dreamed by designers all over the world. But it simply isn’t that easy. Latest example: the C-5M.

The F-14s crashes were often related to the A model with less than ideal engines. With all new electronics under the hood, including self diagnostic and self test systems plus modern radar and modern engines there is no reason to think there is a flaw in the basic airframe design.

The TF30 had reliability shortcomings, but the whole F-14 design has some less desirable characteristics. The F-18 is a generation ahead in flight characteristics, and I am not sure, an F-14E can be brought to that level with your assumed 1,50$ development bill.

Really? Tell that to the pilots of Australian F-18 fighters engaging Flankers over Indonesia… will mach 1.6 allow those aussie fighters to chose to enter the fight or leave it at their disgression? Don’t think so.

Two things are wrong here:
First, the “F-14E” wouldn’t an interceptor but a maritime multi-role aircraft, basically an aircraft that performs fleet defense in the morning and air refueling in the afternoon (and can actually fly two missions a day).
Second, to disengage a quick acceleration is needed to M1.2 and probably M1.5. Then it’s over. Even a Suchoi 27 (with worthwhile external payload) will need ages behind M1.5 to get to M1.8 and later to M2.0. Your examples here are flawed. The missions where such speed is needed are easily counted on one hand, and actually if you save a few bucks per airframe and make it 10% more reliable, the chance is high you have more aircraft in the air that day and simply don’t need the speed.

The only reason to cut top speed is to save money on the design. With new more powerful engines the F-14 would probably supercruise easily at mach 1.8 with its wings swept and a reasonable warload of AAMs.

I am surprised you are making such statements without any idea what you are talking about. The only aircraft that can supercruise behind M1.7 is the Concorde. Have you ever really looked at supersonic drag and thrust? Influence of payload?
You haven’t, as easily conceivable by your statements above.
By the way: aircraft are not designed for M2.0 any more because it is not required any more and saves lots of weight and makes the aircraft more efficient in transonic speeds. Maybe you figure that out one day.

For the Subpar Hornet it will be full burners all the way with a full missile load and it will probably be flying at mach 1.6 a fraction of the distance the F-14 can fly.

The F-18E is not an interceptor.

What is the point of having such powerful sensor, from AWACS to satellite to AESA etc etc if your main SAM can probably hit targets 360 degrees around your carrier group before you can get you CAP into position?

Range of SAM: at best 100nm for very cooperative target (high alt, incoming).
Range of F-18E CAP: minimum 300nm 1h after take-off with subsonic optimum cruise, then able to engage everything from 0ft to 60000ft. Incoming targets most likely at 0ft, and subsonic speeds.

Why bother with a CAP if it has short range and relatively low speed?

Why short range? With 3 drop tanks I doubt the F-18E has a shorter time on station than the F-14.

The area an F-18 takes on a carrier you could have a VLS with a dozen long range SAMs that are cheaper, require no maintainence and are ready to go 24/7 in sea states where aircraft can’t be launched.

Who well can these VLS be used to drop a bomb on a “suspected terror camp” 500nm from the carrier with the option to call it back just until it gets there?

Aerodynamics have not exactly moved that far, whereas engines, radar, avionics etc certainly have.

Strange, I have 500 colleagues working on aerodynamics. I gonna ask them why they are still working when nothing exactly moves.

Useless? Another set of eyes can be very useful for most missions.

The price tag of another set of eyes is ~300-500kg in direct weight (eyes, human carrying these eyes, seat, cockpit, structure) plus at least 3000kg to lift these extra weight with your stated performance requirements (I guess you wanna have 9g, M1.8 supercruise, M2.3 reheat dash, with AIM54-like missiles).
Your resulting fighter weights 20-22t empty equipped and tops out at 35t MTOW for carrier take-off. For a worthwhile fuel fraction of .3 you’ll sacrifice 10t of the MTOW (still unknown where to stuff these 12500l of fuel, I guess external tanks are bad for your M1.8 supercruise), leaving another 2t for payload (basically 4 AIM54-like MR-AAM and 2 average MR-AAM and 2 IR-AAM, plus pylons). Then your fighter is maxed out. Any ground-attack mission would require it to start half fueled and get topped up after take-off.
Welcome reality.
By the way: it lands with maximum 24-26t, basically OEW + reserves + pylons & a2a missiles.

The difference is that those that decided that a stretched F-18 could do the job the Tomcat does were told it would be cheap.

Now you are telling me, that bringing a 1960ies aircraft up to standard is cheap. So you are lying and doing the same mistake everybody does: underestimating problems, simplifying technical issues and put over-reliance on “new” technology.

You could certainly claim I have nothing to base my claim that anything they put into the Subpar Hornet could have been put into the F-14.

Yes, I claim that.

I don’t see where I said something like that.

here:

Between the design of the F-14 (mid sixties) and modern supercruisy aircraft (end 80ies, early 90ies) something happenend, and you cannot retrofit that into an existing aircraft.

I didn’t say the F-18 is supercruisy (it actually is, but only for a very irrelevant clean config in a very very limited corner of the flight envelope). i am just saying, that bringing a 1960ies fighter to the level of modern supercruisy aircraft (I think the only truly operational supercruise aircraft are Eurofighter and F-22 by now) is not that easy.

The belly mounted missiles are very low drag, and the wings swept means high speed should be relatively easy with the D models engines providing as much thrust in dry power as the A model engines in full AB I would suggest that adding more powerful modern 5th gen engines and it would supercruise with weapons.

Once again guesswork. The extra pylons you talked about, plus the necessary external fuel will ruin your bill (remember: the F-14 never flies without external fuel, and it already uses every cubic inch of volume).

Might even have cost more than the Subpar whorenet upgrade, but the result would have been a more capable aircraft.

Might, could, would. Your advantage is that you can tell everything and don’t even need to give the slightest prove. And that with your limited understanding of the topics you are talking about. Very convincing.

There was nothing wrong with the basic version. Its avionics and systems were outdated by newer design concepts of modularity and the whole concept of self diagnostics systems didn’t exist when the F-14 was designed and made.

The F-14 narrowly escaped cancellation in the 70ies, actually the F-18 saved it.

The Chinese F-7 fulfilled exactly this role of a rather primitive, yet cheap and what’s most important, factory-fresh fighter with full life expectancy. The demand was quite reasonable – Iran, Bangladesh, Namibia, Pakistan, Myanmar, Tanzania come into my mind. But even Chinese have now moved on, let us see how the FC-1 (JF-17) fighter sells.

The difference between the legacy F-5A/E and the current F-7 is probably that most nations got theirs for free back then, as little trade for continued support for the right side of the world.

From my vague memory, supercruise was one of LocMarts key criteria for the “5 gen fighter”.

Does this make the JSF a 4,5 gen fighter ?

Saw 1:1 scale mockups of the Gripen NG, and JSF, at Bodø Airshow this weekend. Gripen looks ok, but the JSF…

You start by looking at the nose, working your way back to the inntakes, you can sort of make it work. But as your eyes moves further back, there is just more, more, and more ass on that thing.

I am sure that a big ass is wonderfull for stealth and all, but boy that thing is ugly.:D

Weight-wise (OEW) the JSF equals two Gripens, possible with room for another Porsche Cayenne.

The bulky electronics are probably part of the reason on earlier Fencer variants in particular and the Su-24M has both an interal gun and an internal laser designator installed at the same time. Meanwhile the F-111 carries either one OR the other in its internal bomb bay, optionally foregoing both in favour of more fuel. AFAIK, in practice the bay was rarely used for anything other than those loads, except on the FB-111 where it actually housed weapons (SRAMs).

Not sure how much this eats into the volume available for fuel, but it will have had some effect.

The bomb bay was planned as the F-111 was required to make the last 180nm supersonic. It actually never achieved that mark.
For delivering the nuclear bomb a bomb makes sense, for anything else it is not very useful (except for stealthy aircraft).

Fitting a gun into such an aircraft seems doubtful.

As I said, the F-111 was slightly overengineered.

Anyone have Cd and face area values around for both planes?

Wasn’t here someone around that used ANSYS for a living? What about plugging some HQ 3D models of both planes into it and getting at least an estimate on drag coefficient and face area for both?

All speculation is just speculation really.

I think any desktop analysis won’t bring you much further, as especially transonic drag is the key (and that is difficult even with modern CFD).

I think the F-22 will have lower drag (esp transonic) in any practical configuration as it carries its weapons inside and thus have a favorable thrust/drag ratio. Anyways, I assume that the stealthy design demanded compromises in other design areas.

About the Su-27. Neither the MiG-25 nor the Su-15 did fullfill the range demands of the PVO in coming close to that.
With a similar NTOW (2*R-27+2*R-73 + 5270 kg internal fuel) of 23,4 tons to the F-15C, the fuel fraction of the Su-27SK is 0,23, when with full internal of 9400 kg it does rise to 0,29.
http://www.sukhoi.org/eng/planes/military/su27sk/lth/

Actually, I was losely remembering a similar assessment I made once. There I figured a fuel ratio of .35ish, but I have to check the exact numbers I used. Astonishing that the huge Suchoi 27 doesn’t score better here.
I also wondered from time to time why Suchoi didn’t use semi accessed missile placement. With all these stuffed pylons the transonic regime shouldn’t look too bright.

So basically thats the long winded way of saying you don’t have any hard facts at all, not even one to support your statement apart from an astonishingly arrogant attitude that comes down to you thinking your clever enough to know for sure and no-one else is. Interesting.

I didn’t say no one else does.

But, please, tell me what exactly you think let’s the F-22 have substantially lower drag?
I actually haven’t really seen a big difference between F-16’s and F-104’s drag, at least when we limit it to 1g flight.
If it has so much lower drag, how come they install even more static thrust?