David Hingtgen

::double post::

That was NASA's plan, but they never did. Sent them off to museums, engine-less after that. The engines went to separate museums. There's an ex-YF-23 F120 somewhere that's pretty easy to see, maybe the AF museum where the XB-70 is.

Most people (including me) accept the YF-23 as faster because: 1. Just look at the thing. 2. Northrop has historically built very sleek aircraft with awesome acceleration. 3. The early YF-22 designs couldn't have supercruised, they had to go to NASA and continually tweak it until the drag was low enough. Point two: This is more than a "notch" in the h.stabs.

Northrop/Grumman bought out Newport News, so they are #1 now. End of Northrop? Combination of A-12 and YF-23 losses, plus losing their OWN DESIGN, the Hornet. But how McDonnellDouglas legally acquired the rights to a Northrop design is another story. One I honestly don't know much about, only that it (like always) involves Congress, and "well it depends on who we export it to--is Saudia Arabia going to buy any?" If the Northrop F-18 (that's the original name) still was Northrop's, they certainly wouldn't be hurting for cash, and certainly wouldn't have partnered with Grumman, who had the anti-Hornets in the form of the A-6E and F-14. (The A-6 was in production longer than most people realize) Northrop still makes a LOT of the Hornet (and Super Hornet) parts, since it is their design, but the rights/money all goes to MDC (and now Boeing). Finally--Northrop never ever was even treated half-a$$ well by the govt. They ranked below Vought and North American and Rockwell, money/favors/lobbyist-wise. F-5, F-17, F-20, and F-23 were all never bought by the US. (Well, asides from like a dozen F-5E's for the USN and a tiny USAF F-5C order) Because you know it's practically impossible for congress to buy the best, sleekest, fastest, coolest-looking plane. Northrop relied mainly upon export sales, since every other nation was like "hey, this rocks, and is way cheaper than MDC/Boeing stuff". But as the 80's and 90's came along, having a "USAF" plane became more and more important. So if the USAF didn't buy it, nobody else really did either.

Minor changes in wing sweep? Not to mention a new underside, and completely redesiging the internal structure to accomodate the new gear. The main gear went from forward-retracting into the belly, to side-retracting into the wings. Adding a gear well into the wing's pretty major, and that's a LOT of systems to re-route and add. Also, changing the wing sweep means every other angle needs to be changed to match, if you want to keep the whole "parallel angle"-style stealth going. But since they were going to get new stabs and relocate the intakes anyways... Finally--a new fuselage is a lot easier (aerodynamically) than wing and tail mods. Heck, the A300-600ST is fine with practically a wholly new fuselage compared to an A300-600R, but keeps same wings. (And add simple end-plates and dorsal kinks to the stabs to compensate for blanking effects) But the same stabs overall. Also, the F-23A would have been notably even stealthier, due to the "optimized" back-end/nacelles. Yeesh, might be up there with the B-2 and F-117 at that point. PS--I love to point out that LOCKHEED said the YF-22 was more manueverable at low-speed/high-alpha. It was never mentioned or rumored or anything by anyone else. PPS--while we're here, why didn't they go with THIS design for the JSF: The Lockheed/Boeing X-32 JAST:

If you go to northgum.com, they don't even list aircraft as part of their business. JSF radar development is the closest thing. Northrop and Grumman's plane-building days are over.

Nied--c'mon, the Super Bug's 25% bigger overall. You think that only cost 1,000lbs? 99% of the sources I find list a 23,000lbs empty weight for the legacy Hornet. 29,000 seems way too high. Anyways---whoah, the YF-23 was a heck of a lot closer to a production plane than the YF-22 was, now that the F/A-22 is practically a whole new plane. The YF-23 was considered further away when they'd have to add a gun, radar, modify the back end, and stretch the forward fuse 2 ft for a Sidwinder bay. THEN, Lockheed decided to do a complete redesign of practically the entire -22. There's no way the mods to make a operational -23 would add up to the new wings/stabs/intakes/nose/gear/canopy of the -22.

Simple. Since they were pretty much forcefully kicked out of the plane-building business, they figured they might as well get a monopoly on the ship-building business. Now they build the carriers that the Super Hornets live on.

Yup, never heard about the last one. Can't really find any info, can't even really tell it's air-to-air. From what I could tell, the danshistory numbers I used were F-4's only. If you include the F-105, the numbers drop a LOT for the USAF. And the USN's easy to tally--the only things shooting were F-4's and F-8's. Well, asides from the lone lucky Skyraiders that occasionally bagged something.

PS, Ewilen--are you including the RF-8A loss? Because that's the only way I can see having "4" in the F-8 loss records. That shouldn't count. RF-8's were unarmed recon photo planes. They never ever engaged in air combat. That'd be like listing if a KC-10 was shot down. It's not an air combat loss. http://www.danshistory.com/airwar.shtml has a nice summary (for 65-68 vs 70+: For the F-4, USN went from 3.7:1 to 12.5:1. USAF went from 3:1 to 4:1. F-8 was 6:1 overall. So the USN got a huge boost from new tactics, USAF got a small boost. So what would the F-8 have gotten? And I always like to point out, the USN never got a gun for the F-4, the USAF did. The gun wasn't as important as was thought, it was the tactics.

Well, we are comparing post-Top Gun F-4's to pre-Top Gun F-8's. And the ratio is quite close. But imagine how good post-Top Gun F-8's would have done. And compared to pre-Top Gun F-4's. Basically: the best F-4 situation was as good as the worst F-8 situation. Anything else, I think the F-8 comes out ahead. And I'd love to see the USAF F-4 numbers, especially early war. Most places split the air war in to 65-68, and 70-74. There really wasn't anything from 68-70. I think 1 MiG was shot then. And the F-8 wasn't around for the later part.

Oh, it wasn't unfair at all. It was 6 on 6. 3 sets of 2 F-15's, but 2 sets of 3 Jaguars. F-15's expected pairs, and the Jags got all 3 F-15 pairs.

Whoa, hey, I have no formal credentials at all. Everyone always asks (and many presume) I have some degree or something. Not a thing. I just read a lot. I am most certainly not any sort of engineer or designer. I haven't even had a ground school class. Hmmn, supercruise definitions. Well, the Concorde is still #1, but it does use afterburner to accelerate past Mach 1, then shuts them off and "coasts" on up to Mach 2 on normal power. Much like the SR-71, it tries to avoid Mach 1 if at all possible. Even the SR-71 will enter a dive so as to get transit Mach 1 in a few seconds as possible. Concorde only uses afterburners for a few secs at a time, so as to not need a 25,000ft runway, and to not take too long to get through Mach 1. Mach 1=bad. Go faster or slower, don't hang around it. Mach 1.3 is the upper limit of transonic though, I'd say anything that goes past 1.2 is "true" supercruise. Super Bug drag: new intakes are huge though. And that's one of the big differences from the original YF-17. Intakes were spread apart, and now they're even bigger and further apart. The frontal area is just growing and growing as the Hornet ages. Also, the LEX's are almost totally new, and I would imagine they bleed energy at an insane rate during even moderate alpha. Sure, it's got a higher limit now, but I would imagine at the sake of duration. As for weight--I'm seeing a ~7,000lb empty weight increase, ~15,000lbs MTOW increase. 8,000lbs more thrust counteracts new weight when empty, but not at normal aircombat loads nor max loads. Yes, at an airshow when it's 99% empty it'll have superior ratio, but under no other conditions I'd imagine. Kind of like a Flanker--a Flanker at normal weights sees its ratio drop tremendously. Only at an airshow can it do half the moves it does.

I would guess the LACK of lobbyists, congress, and other governmental issues. They're left to their own devices to simply build planes. And not multi-multi-multi-role multi-nation ones either. If they need it to do something else, they make a new variant, or start from scratch.

A300 took a long time before it got acceptance. The early years had very few orders (even in Europe, single digits for quite a while), and they literally had to give them for free to Eastern before they got in the US. (Nice little lease deal--if EA didn't like them after a year, they were returned at no cost--if they wanted to keep them, they'd get a massive discount, basically equal to what it would have cost to lease them for that time) Still, it wasn't until the A320 came out that Airbus really did well at all. And of course, the early years were full of "American English" vs "British English" difficulties, mainly regarding tech manuals. In the famous paraphrased words of the head of EA maintenance: "WTF is a 30mm spanner and why would I use a torch in the avionics bay?"

F-16 rules at high speed, F-18 is better at low speed. It's always been that way. 300-500kts: my money's on the Falcon. Below that, Hornet. As I compare to cars often: F-18 has a good 0-60, but the quarter mile sucks. At 200kts, there's simply not that much air moving very fast to create drag--the Hornet will get to that speed pretty quickly on raw power. But above that--drag starts building very quickly, and the Hornet can barely accelerate (relative to other modern jets), while the F-16 just keeps going. The F-16 will hit Mach 1 LONG before the Hornet does. F-16 is the fastest-accelerating jet overall, and in most any circumstance. YF-17 not far behind. Except the YF-23, which blows it away. Though the F120-powered YF-22 would almost certainly beat the F-16 at supersonic speeds.

I just ordered my flight-line seating tickets for the airshow, I will be watching the Super Bug's demo VERY closely. I've decided not to tape it, only take a few pics. You get a better sense of it that way. Staring through a camcorder's eyepiece is the worst way to watch a demo, and it's easy to lose track of the plane. Yes, low-vis greys are VERY effective camo! And I will be watching the acceleration out of low speed moves VERY closely. There's no doubt the Super Bug can move, it's the other things I don't like. PS--Nied--did it do anything resembling a tail-slide?

Well it's not like I get ANY coverage on the Eurofighter here in the US! Reports from biased Scotsmen are better than nothing... PS--Boeing reports (yesterday) the first F-15K is in final assembly.

Yes, that was one of the great embarrassments of the USAFE, brand-new F-15C's losing to Jaguars. I have no idea where the full story is, I don't think it's in one of my books. Basically, the F-15's expected everybody to operate in pairs, like almost everybody did nowadays. However, the Jags were operating in threes, and the third guy got the F-15's every time.

A Harrier's hovering ability is really only for take off and landing. Control/manueverability when hovering is quie slow, and tactically useless. Also, it can't aim its guns downwards like a chopper can. It'd have to point its nose down--at which point it can't hover.

The N-156F (F-5 prototype) exceeded Mach 1 on its first flight. And it didn't even HAVE afterburners. And that was long before the YF-17 existed. Northrop makes sleek planes, it's that simple. Most Northrop jets can supercruise if they're not weighed down with too many weapons and drop tanks. Nobody's surprised the YF-23 was much faster than the YF-22, especially when supercruising. The F-18L is basically an F/A-18 without the carrier-specific equipment. But it's more an F-18 than a YF-17. None were ever actually made.

From what I could see, later US Phantom ops in Vietnam only tied the F-8's ratio, didn't surpass it. If you find a 7-1 or 8-1 ratio, please let me know. Anyways--the YF-17, like most all Northrop jets, rocked for a simple reason: It weighed nothing, was sleek, and had power. It had tremendous acceleration, good speed (it was much faster than a Hornet, 150mph or more), even better high-alpha, better pitch control, and could just generally be "thrown around the sky". It only weighed a little bit more than an F-16, but had 2 engines. The USAF went with the F-16 for the simple reason that they really wanted more F-15's. F-16A and F-15 use the same engine. If you have to buy some cheap planes, might as well buy the one that uses the F-15 engine. That way, the F-15 engine becomes cheaper, and you can buy more F-15's!!! That is THE main reason, AFAIK. Navy will almost always go for a twin-engine plane, and they've never liked chin intakes. However, the YF-17 was not suitable for carrier ops. So Northrop teamed up with MDC to make the F-18. At that point, the idea was to sell Northrop YF-17's as F-18L's to land-based operators, while the US Navy would get the McDonnellDouglas F-18A. Well, it's a long story, but basically MDC (political clout) got to sell carrier-equipped F-18's to everybody, and more or less got to prevent Northrop from selling their own design. Ever wondered why Candian and Australian and Spanish Hornets have nearly full US Navy carrier equipment? That's why. They should have bought the better-performing lighter-weight non-carrier-capable version, but Northrop was basically barred from selling YF-17/F-18L's. So anyways, to make it carrier-capable: 1. They stretched and widened the fuselage, and enlarged the spine. More fuel, but a LOT more drag. Kinda pointless IMHO, as well all know the Hornet has NO range anyways, and too much drag. 2. New gear. Can't get around it, need stronger gear for a carrier. But trying to fit it into a now-modified YF-17 fuselage lead to problems, and you get the very funky, over-engineered monsters the F-18 now has. 3. New h.stabs. Old ones were a bit too wide to make for good parking on the carrier, so they're shorter with greater chord now. Not as good as the originals. 4. Modified ailerons, stiffer wing. The one way the F-18 is better than the YF-17: roll rate. 5. Modified nose (main "uglifier" of the F-18) to accomodate new radar so as to have both air-to-air and air-to-ground modes. YF-17 was a dogfighter, only needed basic air-to-air. Also note that pretty much all non-US Hornets are operated as F's, not F/A's. 6. With all these drag-inducing mods, MDC had to cut the drag from "insane" to "way too high". So they rehaped and filled in the slots in the LEX's. Cut drag, but also cut down high-alpha performance. It's still high, but not as high as it was. The original YF-17 was so sleek, it could afford the high-drag LEX's. 7. I'm sure the flaps were modified, but I don't know specifics.

X-44 is "test of concept", FB-22 would be the real thing. And I'd rather have a 1/32 YF-23, for it looks cooler and actually flew.

Depends on how you define "Orient". Usually means east Asia, but can be central and even western Asia if you want. It really only means "East of Europe". Could include India or Australia if you really want. Thus, Euro-centric, by most definitions.

::gets out F-8 in Vietnam and F-4 in Vietnam books:: (BTW, Osprey has some great books out nowadays) Also gets "the big F-4 book". From what I can see, F-8's score is 19-3. During the same period until the F-8 was taken out of service, so this is the first part of the war), USN F-4's scored 13-5. USN overall is 32-8. USAF F-4's did a bit worse, 59-15. USAF overall was 87-43. That's NOT good. But the F-8 sure was! (note: the above numbers are only for the period that the F-8 was in service--the numbers improved later on, as explained why below) Overall, in Vietnam: F-8's flew less (there were simply fewer of them), shot down 50% more MiG's proportionately, and got shot down themselves less often. Though I will mention that F-8 pilots always had practiced dogfighting, while many F-4 crews were tought only how to intercept with a missile, and had never even gone beyond 3G in the plane, and literally had no idea how to fight close in. The USN had F-8 crews teach their F-4 crews how to dogfight, basically. Then the USN formed Top Gun, and F-4's did even better. Taught all their F-4 crews all the dogfighting stuff they could. USAF thought that their training/tactics couldn't possibly be the problem, and added guns and got the F-4E. SLIGHT improvement, while the newly Top Gun-taught Navy F-4's started rocking. Navy never ever got guns for their F-4's--not gunpods, and not internal. Just got really good at dogfighting with missiles. Even the F-8 used missiles, gun kills were basically non-existant. But when it needed a gun, it had 4! Eventually, after losing to both the USN F-8's and F-4's in mock combat (5-1 against USN F-4,s 10-1 against F-8's I think, I can't find it, and I'm not looking into a 4th or 5th book tonight), and MiG's in real combat, the USAF eventually started flying/fighting like the USN. Combined with the new tactics, and actually having a gun, the USAF started racking up 5 or 6 MiG's for every loss at the end of the war. But all that time, Navy F-4's and F-8's were putting up those kinds of numbers from the beginning. PS--the X-29 IS an F-20 with FSW. (or d*mn close). The first X-29 was actually converted from an F-5A. New cockpit and FBW and an F-18's engine. And the F-20 is basically an F-5 with a new cockpit and an F-18's engine. And check out the tailfins of both, with the distinctive ram-air inlet section at the base. If you really want, you can kit-bash an X-29 from an F-5E kit and an F-18 kit. The basic design of the F-5 is an incredibly good one--became the F-5E, then the F-20, and the P530 which went into the YF-17. Then McDonnellDouglas whapped it with the ulgy stick, doubled the drag, and made the F-18 from it, and basically ruined the design. So much for the F-17's amazing acceleration and low weight and super-amazing high-alpha. PPS--the real F-15ACTIVE is an F-15B, that's why it's a two-seater. It's literally "what NASA had sitting around". It's actually the FIRST F-15B. There's almost nothing in the rear cockpit of an F-15B/D. Makes it easy to model! Don't know where you'd put the gun in a production model, honestly.