arquebusYou realise the Lavi used the PW1120 engine. You know, as in Pratt & Whitney, the US manufacturer.
And do you really think the Israeli would have sold the Lavi to Arab countries or Iran? Not that they would buy anything from Israel, but seriously, get a reality check.
Where do you think Iran was getting their spares for F-4s during the Iran/Iraq war at which time they were holding the US embassy hostages? I know you werent born then but Id at least think they would teach this at school or something.
arquebusI think that in a counter insurgency situation a light aircraft for attacking small pockets of hostiles is the perfect platform. In the war in Rhodesia they used the Cessna Skymaster in preference to their attack helicopters for ground attack.
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arquebusBut it will also provide less lift at similar sweep angle
no it wouldnt, the high aspect ratio wings provide more efficient lift compared with stub wings of equal area
No it doesnot ,the purpose of LERX is to create vortex and provide lift , the entire fusalage of F-14 doesnot create vortex
Youre taking me too litterally, of course the fuselage does not match the exact same purpose as LERX in that its not providing an over-wing vortex. But the fuselage area does provide lift forward of the CoL of the wings, and in that way provides increased leverage in a turn the same way the LERX on say the Mig-29 provide ahead of CoG lift in which to lever against.
I dont know why would you think F-14 have a small tail , its tail is massive
I guess I overemphasized the of the tail surfaces being small in proportion to the wings and overall size of a/c, I guess Im comparing it more with modern 5th gen fighters like the F-22.
I dont see how well balanced the aircraft is has anything to do with how much thrust required to overcome drag in a turn.
I never said the purpose of distribution of lifting surfaces reduced drag
arquebusIt is quite common that people are talking about weight penalty connected to the variable geometry configuration, however most of the books says that the VG was often chosen to allow weight savings. For example, probably we all know the story of Grumman 303F fixed wing design which was considered during F-14 development. In the words of the designers: “The 303B was modified to become the contract-award-winning E, which we then ran off against the fixed-wing 303F. The F lost for 2 reasons:
Also, in the book on the F-14 by David Baker there was a small discussion about VG design, here are some of the most important points:
So how it really is with the variable-geometry, was it a technological dead-end, or there was really something into it (let’s neglect the maintenance problems connected with this idea)? Or maybe just the introduction of FBW and other aerodynamic advances made the VG obsolete?
I was actually not aware of the 303F and Im surprised it performed so poorly compared to the swing wing version although my idea of a fixed wing F-14 would be freezing the wing geometry at mid sweep. Of course part of the idea of VG wings is to compensate for shifting CoL, especially at high speed. But I think that idea has been found to be a non-issue as the drag reduction for super sonic cruise by reducing tail surface downforce has been negligible. So my thought is that an F-14 with wings fixed at mid sweep would would work just as well as the full swing wing design, similar to how the wing angle is set to a stationary angle on a mig-23 for maximum manoeuvrability.
arquebusIf the F-14 used high aspect wings, while turning. Then both Str and ist would suffer, especially the latter.
what youre saying is not true at all, if it was then aerobatic planes would have stub wings which they obviously dont. There is a point where large wing area can outweigh the effects of aspect ratio which is why large delta wing fighters will turn well.
See SH for clues.
Youre comparing an FBW jet with non-FBW, subtract FBW from the SH and what are you left with? A VERY BAD FIGHTER
arquebusThe US had to cut the Lavi program, the Lavi would have wiped out F-16 sales as no one wants to buy from the embargo-happy US and Israel will sell to anybody including their own enemies. To answer the main question, I think that Chinese fighters would be close to equal to the Lavi or any other 4th gen FBW fighter. People here seem to assume that the eurocanards and F-16 are far in advance aerodynamically, but I dont see it, I think its easier to make a good FBW fighter than most people here are willing to admit.
arquebusThere is nothing wrong with the data, the Tomcat is aerodynamically the most efficient fighter ever. The plane was so aerodynamically efficient due to the fact that it had high aspect ratio wings contributed to its turning efficiency so it wasnt producing as much drag as stub wings would at high AoA. The airframe itself contributes a lot to lift and its turning ability is the result of its wings and tail surfaces worked in conjunction to how the lifting area of the fuselage was distributed, the entire fuselage acted like a giant LERX. The fact that the Tomcat could get away with such small tail surfaces indicates how well balanced the aircraft was in the way that the wings and tail surfaces leveraged the large lifting area of the fuselage. So lots of thrust was not needed to maintain energy in a turn like jets with high wing loading like the F-16, it was aerodynamically able to project speed through the turn. If FBW did not exist the Tomcat would still be the top fighter in the world. The main problem with the Tomcat besides the engines were that it was overweight due to the complex fuselage structure to accommodate the swing wing and the weight of the pivot mechanism of the swing wing. The Fuselage suffered from a lot of cracking and was overly complicated to maintain. It should have been designed as a fixed wing and would have been equal or better to the F-15 if it was.
With FBW it is a common now to make fighters with barn door sized tail surfaces that are almost as big as the wings, this layout that is definitely not as efficient without FBW. Even the F-15 used electronic stabilization making it semi-FBW, without it it would not have flown very well.
arquebusSource? Because it is not true.
yes of course its true, I shouldnt have to give you sources, you can find it anywhere, you might start at wikipedia. I remember in 79 when they initial layouts for the contract proposals for all 3 eurocanards were shown in Aviation Week magazine (obviously I dont have those sources still around), the contracts were started in the early 80s for all 3 and they didnt enter service till after the turn of the millennium (Gripen was did manage to enter service in the late 90s). Most the guys on this forum werent born yet so you probably all believe they eurocanards were designed in the 90s or some such nonsense
arquebusequates to a contradiction
how?
(ps – Check the Gripen development timeline…)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saab_JAS_39_Gripen#Controversies.2C_scandals.2C_and_costs
arquebusThe only way that american and european aerospace industries will ever revive to make viable fighters again is to award multiple contracts and enter all aircraft into service. This is why Russia and China have superior development going on is that they have multiple companies working on projects all of which will see fruition and enter service unless they turn out really bad. The F-22 would have turned out better and on budget if the F-23 were developed along side it. Its stupid to develop a fighter on budget when you know the DoD will pay and and all cost overruns all with the excuse that cutting edge technology has more problems. The fact that the F-35 was originally intended to be a low cost alternative to the F-22 is a joke now. All the eurocanards took over 20 years to develop, all were over budget. Having a joint venture again is just spreading out the waste.
arquebusThe best way to jam radar is with chaff, Im suprised they dont have drones with the sole purpose of creating chaff clouds in front of a aircraft formation. Incidentally Hollywood actress Hedy Mamarr was the first to design frequency agile jam eluding radar.
arquebusThe Boeing T-X is very similar to the T-38 giving a hot lead-in to full size fighters. So I think that still opens up opportunity to take the same role as the A-37 Dragonfly had doing primary training as a second phase to the T-6
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arquebusThe only thing that makes 5th and 6th gen fighters significantly different is stealth technology. If you take that away there is not much at all that makes a difference beyond 4th gen except maybe more engine power for larger fuselage to carry more systems. Both the F-22 an F-35 have proved to be a disappointment by being poorly engineered and so over priced that they are a money sink. This results in the USAF if extending the life of 40 year old F-16s and F-15s to continue to be the main frontline fighters. As for europe, the eurocanards are way overpriced at $100M+ so I dont expect any european nations to develop anything new when they cant afford to buy current technology. A more realisic solution is for countries to build 4th gen fighters under license to bring unit costs down to something reasonable.
arquebusF-14 got it right on all counts. The intakes dont blend in with the fuselage and take up fuel space. Angle of intakes handles high AoA and is low drag. The upper part of the intakes blend in with LERX. The engines are not part of the fuselage and so the fuselage forms a lifting body that greatly stabilizes the a/c in high AoA. The space between the engines form a channel that prevents side slipping. And of course the russians copied all of this with their Mig-29 and su-27 series.
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