There is so much stress on a missile body & fins in flight that a laser causing structural weaknesses would likely cause the missile to lose control long before the laser burns through the casing.

This is absolutely true but a missile detecting such beamed energy (not that difficult) would fight accordingly such external heating by using some aerodynamics cooling trick (e-g per example axis-roll at appropriate rate).

Hence, a “fuel filled” missile would always be more at risk than an empty sledge.

Pls hve a look at the following images extracted from youtube videos:

[ATTACH=CONFIG]223030[/ATTACH]
Laser firing on a RC_type Drone. Fuel burst then burn

[ATTACH=CONFIG]223031[/ATTACH]
Interception of a Ballistic missile by an airborne laser. Fuel burst clearly visible (lower tear drop shaped glowing ball*).

*don’t tell Miley :p

[…]
There are no ‘fuel tanks’.

Yes badly worded from me.

[…]
The propellant inside the Meteor is in the form of a solid charge. But the important factor is the length of time that the threat needs to be illuminated in order to initiate destruction. If that is shorter than the time between initial illumination and the arrival of the BVRAAM, the missile wins.

Obviously. But my point was that the time of destruction depends of the highly reactive materials contained inside the missile body. Reactants… reacts rather well compared to a structural material. And shaped solid fuel might be difficult to dump (I know that the German company producing it hve worked on its gel to ease handling but Laser heating is diff).

There´s a description in this forum about the first encounter between the F-104G and the F-15B, it was written by the chap who actually flew it, it ended up with a pair of “dead” (and very surprised) Eagle pilots. The message was something in the lines of “if well flown”…

Found this on an other forum (<-link):

I don’t know when the first instance of the F-104 and the F-15 engaging in DACT happened…but I do know when it happened early on at Luke.

When the F-15 training operation began at Luke in the latter 70s, the initial squadron was the 555th, known as ‘the Nickle’. Sometime in 78 or so, the Nickle guys were looking for DACT with a variety of fighter types, and so they came down the street to the F-104 Fighter Weapons School in the 69TFTS, also at Luke.

They wanted to fly against us, and so we agreed to put up a two ship for a trial mission. Two FWS instructors were selected, one a German instructor (Hartmut Troehler) and one USAF instructor (me).

The Nickle hosted the mission. We briefed at their squadron with two of their instructors (both F-4 FWS grads). They were going to use the two seat model for the engagement. We would both have dedicated GCI. We were to simulate Floggers…not a bad idea since the G model that we flew was a good representation of the A2A capability of the MiG-23. Our simulated armament was to be Apex, Aphid, and the gun.

After the main briefing, Hartmut and I had our own briefing. I was the flight lead and intended to use as much deception as I could. We knew that the F-15 guys were really proud of their radar capabilities…the PD radar was new to the fighter community at that time. I thought that the two Nickle guys would be heavily relying on their radar to enter the fight…as it turned out, I was right.

My plan was to put Hartmut in close formation and run head on at the F-15 using GCI for vectoring. Our radar could search out to 40nm but we couldn’t lock on until 20nm.

We took the first GCI vector and accelerated through the mach. Intended to fight fast…high speed extensions and hook turns. At 20nm, the F-15 made a large blip on my radar and I was able to get a lock. The plan was to Fox-1 at about 16nm and then have Hartmut peel off into a hard 360 to follow me.

I called the Apex at 16nm, told Hartmut to deploy, and then pushed it up to over 700KIAS. My hope was that the Eagle guys would hold their lock on me and not see Hartmut separate. We could slave our gunsight to the radar lock on angle…this let me fly right at the F-15. I picked him up visually…he was high, to the right, and had started a conversion turn. I unloaded, and extended away figuring they would try to follow…and they did.

What that did, of course, was get them sandwiched between me and Hartmut. My guess was that they would get all excited and jump on me without asking where my wingman was. They found out soon enough as their GCI relayed to them Hartmut’s gun attack call.

I was looking back and saw their break turn that resulted. I went idle and boards, slowed to .85M, dropped my maneuver flaps, put my lift vector on the Eagle and then pulled the jet into a hard 7g turn using burner to hold my speed. I knew I could sustain that g at around 400KIAS.

I pulled into a lead snapshot position on the Eagle, closed in and went guns. The Eagle broke again as their GCI relayed the second gun call.

By this time, Hartmut was pitching back into the fight. He saw me extend away, went in for his second gun attack, and then extended away after me. I tallyed him, gave him a check turn to put us back into line abreast and then we became a dot.

The Eagle tried to call a Fox-2 as we separated but with us well over 700KIAS, it was way out of parameters.

The result was the two Fox-1s and three unobserved gun kills by us. They had no valid shots.

The debriefing was a hoot. I especially liked the part where the Nickle guy played his recorder and we heard the backseater say “Break, we just got gunned again”!

Of course, all of this should not have happened. The F-15 should have had us for lunch. But they didn’t, and it was all because they didn’t play to their strengths…and they severely underestimated their opponents. They didn’t do that again and that was a good thing.

If you’re still seated firmly, scroll down the window and read the following allegation (I am not responsible for the bestial scream you’d pull in the dark of the night – so keep the kids away):
MACH1.8 Flaps on T.O position

Anyone to confirm (I cld check the flight manual by myself I know…) ?

I can understand your frustration.

Regarding the French and UK mil offer, what do you do if you want to hear day long the little birds tweeting around you and not in your neighbor’s courtyard?

Feed them…:apologetic:

1) Do you have a description of what that contract contained? How many training hours, spares, logistical backup, etc, etc?
2) Do you have any other contract wich can be directly compared to this one? The only one that i remember that could be directly comparable would be the UAE Air Tractor acquisition, but the details are not public.

Do you really believe that Embraer would be able to squeeze out Pilatus of the light striker role, beat Beechcraft in a Pentagon competition, twice, get orders from ten diferent operators and goble up the entire (well, almost) market for this niche mission if their offer was not competitive?

If there´s one aircraft that does not offer “a credible offer” thats the Textron Scorpion. Imagining that a combat jet bigger than an AMX, not ordered (or even asked for) by the Pentagon is going to be ordered by Colombia (or anyone else) is wishfull thinking.
If Textron convinces the Pentagon to buy it, it has a future, if not, forget it no one else picks it up.

Dear Sintra,

I do reply to your post simply as I see you generally as a respectable poster. But fact is that I do no like the way you finger pointing me here.

To get a full description of the deal, you’ll probably hve to makes some search as I did especially for you on the above post. But let me say that I did read the story in the local news paper and made my own arithmetic to get the price per plane.

You have to understand that the plane is tailored around the user specs like most others deal and this create some discrepancies on the overall cost. But you know that alrdy. And this is really what annoy me the most regarding our overall ability to debate in a constructive manner.

Also, quantity factor in the overall price. Buying 6 plane is way different than buying 200 (US) or 25 (Colombia – first deal from my own mem).

yes, Colombia did makes good use of its A29. But not because of the plane, but because of its more up-to-date system.

Please understand that in my view, Embraer did not upgrade the plane perfs to makes it more competitive. Kinetics perfs were left aside when the next step was obvious: lighten the structure, reduce the overall nbr of parts, increase max speed/max TOW (they could, for example, hve cut that long tail and compensate for the loss of stability via FBW – which wld hve been a good exercise for their industry – but they did not forgetting that Kings are their to be overthrown).

Yes, 20M is a lot of cash in a competitive world. That some like Denel, Cessna are bullying in, does not surprise me. The world belong to the discontented.

Regarding teh scorpion and the Pentagon, I do not see any useful use of the bird by the Pentagon*. Unless they expect to deal with counter insurgency on their own ground, the plane does not bring some cap that they haven’t alrdy. And when the USAF hve to deal with COIN, usually it’s abroad, simultaneously with a larger deployment where they alrdy hve packed everything they need to to the job.
The Scorpion is worth-full IMOHO only for long term COIN type of engagement on a vast territory, at range or to private defense contractors,… Exactly where the A29 may show some difficulties (a turboprop is more maintenance intensive in term of spare parts you hve to bring with you during a deployment).

*Except border surveillance/Drug smuggler

I don’t want to write a long comment that will lean toward a long exposé (I’ve alrdy edited and deleted most of my above post) but to make it short:

The Scorpion needs development[…]

That’s where the fruit is.

This is a carbon fiber design (fuselage). A lot of the work can be outsourced to low wages country with no needs for aerospace background. So, on one hand you hve Colombia, on the other Cessna, a company with huge needs in the civil market.
:rolleyes:

Could you elaborate? The A29 has orders from ten operators, severall of them bought it to replace precisely the A-37, and if the reports of the chaps that actually flew them in combat are any worth, them the Super Tucano is quite a machine. And on costs, are you sure that you are not thinking on some twenty aircrafts that were suposed to be built in the USA? Because an “off the shelf” Brasilian made Super Tucano is vastly less expensive to acquire…

here it is:

El costo de los Super Tucanos asciende a US$133 millones, indic� Escobedo, y adem�s se invertir� la suma de US$37 millones m�s para adquirir los radares primarios con la empresa espa�ola Indra.

The deal concerns 6 units + 3 radar and 1 control station (radio I guess) to Guatemala

source (originaly from Wiki): http://www.infodefensa.com/?noticia=guatemala-recibira-los-primeros-dos-radares-de-indra-y-dos-aviones-super-tucano-en-2014

Given that Embraer did set the bar relatively high enough regarding its price tag, the competition will be tough with a lot of competitor able to pack a credible offer. This is why I had in mind the Scorpion.

Britain sharpens its claws in the UAE fighter deal

source: CNN