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grigolosi

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  1. grigolosi
    Wear and tear on aircraft is a given. Most paint gets chipped and stained in areas of high maintenance. you can usually spot the most opened panels on an F-16(or any otherfighter aircraft) by the dark staining around it left by maintainers hands when opening/closing doors and panels. These Block 60 birds use a paint that bakes off especially around the engine areas and ECS exhaust. It actually bubbles and comes off in strips like leather in some cases. I can imagine with a VF and the temperatures the engines put out there would be some of the same wear going on with the paint. I know certain metals are a pain to keep painted because the paint just doesn't adhere too well to it even without enviromental factors. The XB-70 Valkyrie actually stripped paint off its verticals when 4 of the 6 J-79's were put into burner in a test flight. In the picture you could see the titanium underneath. Whatever paint they use on the VF's is some tough stuff. Now something interesting related to what Sildani said: Lockheed wanted to eliminate hydraulics form the F-35 in its development. At Edwards we actually tested electric brakes on an F-16. The brakes were hardwired with harnesses running along the top of the tension strut instead of the pressure and return hyd line usually there. The brakes worked like a champ. They also tried a fiber optic brake but the problem they ran into was dust contamination of the connectors when the brake was removed. Eliminating the hyd system in an aircraft saves a butt load of weight between the reservoir, fluid, lines and pumps. It also eliminates one more system to break or fail.
  2. grigolosi
    That's the pic! That exhaust is badass!
  3. grigolosi
    I imagine they have removed hydraulics as much as possible but regardless of what type of turbine you have the engine shaft will require lubricant to prevent it from seizing from overheating. So there is probably some forms of oil tank and sump system.
  4. grigolosi
    Yeah, look up F-119 on Google and then go to images.That is how I found it.
  5. grigolosi
    when I was there as a young Airmen...many many moons ago....the afternoon summer storm usually hit between 1500-1600. We could see it coming in sheets from across the base from teh 33rd side. But back to topic...... The low vis paint used on aircraft is extremely rough and porous. The reason for this is to supposedly help with radar wave absorption but unfortunately if absorbs a lot more than that. Unless you wipe or scrub your jet every day you end up with a grungy bird. Usually oil and other greases streak heavily from panel joints, seams and screws and anything remotely close to any frequently used system exhaust port get stained badly. Considering the amount of combat and environment the VF's operate in during combat, keeping them clean like they appear on the shows would be a pain in the ass. I imagine either scheme would look like crap after a couple of months of continuous flying.
  6. grigolosi
    That would be great if we could but HG won't allow it. But I just pulled off the greatest entertainment coup in my marriage. I got my wife hooked on MF last night from overseas. Now she wants to watch the whole series........now if I can just get the boy hooked also........mwahahahahahahahahaha.
  7. grigolosi
    The Master File for the VF-25 indicates that the sub inlet above the main engine intake is for heat exchange through the use of boundary air. That is the only term of heat exchange I have seen on the 25.
  8. grigolosi
    Yeah the voices drove me nuts. and they made me crazier after I watched SDFM and heard the difference in the voices. Someone tried to english dub SDFM and put it n youtube. I cringed when i heard Misa's voice and couldn't click it off fast enough when I heard Hikaru's english speaking voice. They dumbed down several characters lines too with Robotech especially Minmay's. I have tried to get my son to watch SDFM since I have the Animego box set but he saw Robotech and cringes at the word Minmay now.............thanks voice actors.
  9. grigolosi
    I can't imagine the heat produced by the subsystems of a VF. On our current aircraft heat dissipation is issue. The Blk 60 F-16 has 2 ECS packages in it to deal with cooling the avionics and radar now. Couple that with flying low level training missions here in in the summer with an engine that puts out 32,000 lbs of thrust, the aircraft gets extremely hot. So much so you have to wear gloves to touch the surface especially around the engine section. The pilots have actually burned their hands on the canopy when they have touched it flying these missions. All the heat from the internal systems gets dumped through ECS exhaust on both sides of the fuselage but that system works off of both ram air and bleed air from the engine. It is run through a heat exchanger, cooled, run through the various compartments back to the heat exhanger where it is dumped overboard. What is wild is that up in Alaska when the jets fly in the middle of winter the engine intake are like meat lockers even right after shutdown. the blades are so cold you have to use gloves or you will get a cold burn from them. The rest of the engine feels like it was never run either. The heat buildup/dissipation correlates directly to the environmental temperature the aircraft operates in as far turbine engines go.
  10. grigolosi
    The lightning at Eglin is insane. we used to watch it hit the light towers on the 33rd FW side of the base during thunderstorms. People who came from bases that didn't get lightning within 5 constantly didn't quite understand how dangerous it was on a an open ramp. The hail could be very painful. I remember one day at Misawa we kept getting rained on and then suddenly while we were turnig the jets for the next go it just dumped hail on us, damn that hurt. I got stuck under the wing of my jet needless to say for about 20 mins.
  11. grigolosi

    20150725 191532 1

    grigolosi posted a gallery image in Macross Fan Art

    20150725 191532 1

    From the album: Untitled Album

    New drawing in the works, the VF-25 has a very unique shape to the nose. Getting the length right is troublesome.
  12. grigolosi
    As far as heat dissipation goes, a logical area to dissipate heat into would be the integral fuel tanks. Especially if the hydrogen slush used is kept at sub-zero temps due to the nature of liquid hydrogen. This would also provide a means to raise the temperature of the reaction fuel for even and precise dispersal into the reactor and atomizing the fuel from the spray bars into the AB while operating in the atmosphere. Modern aircraft also use the fuel cells to absorb heat from the engines by placing the fuel cells directly over the "hot areas" of the engine (the F-16 design uses this) also with any type of jet engine you will have to have a lubrication system for the fan/compression/turbine shaft. Again in modern aircraft the fuel system comes into play. The engine oil and hydraulic fluid are sent through a FOHE (fuel oil heat exchanger) for cooling. This heat exchanger is located within a fuel cell. I have looked at the cutaway on the VF-1 and the mass reactant tank is located directly over the combustion section of the turbine which would be a logical location.
  13. grigolosi
    Driver you are right about location for the USAF when it comes to wash and anti corrosion requirements. When I was stationed at Misawa Japan from 92-98, the FW requirements were a wash every 30 days, couple that with an average of 24 aircraft per squadron and we were washing jets every day. When I was at Edwards AFB the requirement was every 120 days since we were in the high desert (I did 1 wash in the 2 yrs I was there). Eglin where I retired from it was every 30 days also due to the proximity of the Gulf.
  14. grigolosi
    Yeah I am working with AMMROC on the F-16 platform here. The country isn't bad at all. Hell the most dangerous part of living here is driving. One of the drawbacks though is not being able to get any pork products in the restaurants but believe it or not we can get pork here in certain grocery stores you just can't get pork bacon or sausage in the restaurants here. The heat though is insane. This isn't just a dry heat either since the country sits right on the Persian gulf we get LOTS of humidity with the 100+ degree temps. Here they get so little rain that the Emiraties never have to deal with lightning within 5 NM like the USAF does. That day we had torrential downpours and thunderstorms. They also don't understand how a little static can ignite 11,600 lbs of jet fuel in a flash so we had to explain to them and the fuel truck drivers.
  15. grigolosi
    This comes directly from the Macross Mecha Manual..... Design Features: 3-mode variable transformation; variable geometry wing; vertical take-off and landing; control-configurable vehicle; single-axis thrust vectoring; three "magic hand" manipulators for maintenance use; retractable canopy shield for Battroid mode and atmospheric reentry; option of GBP-1S system, atmospheric-escape booster, or FAST Pack system. It is used for both since the frame section aft of the cockpit is not long enough to cover the canopy completely in Battroid. As you can see in the picture below.
  16. grigolosi
    I first saw it in 1986 as Robotech when a few friends of mine in art class told me about it. I missed episode 1 and caught episode 2 and I was hooked at that point. I then found the Jack McKinney books at the school book fair and read them so fast that I was finishing a book in a day and a half. I didn't know it was Macross until I bought the Robotech art books and there in the back it gave the full blown explanation of where Robotech came from. It wasn't until I was stationed in Japan from 92-98 that I became a true Macross fan. I saw Macross Plus commercials on TV there around the time it came out and watched it after it was released on video with english dub. I also found tons of Macross models in the hobby shops there and started building the kits. Since then it is my favorite anime and now my son has started watching it too but i think he likes Gundam more.
  17. grigolosi
    The F-16 and some other designs have gotten around the shock wave issue by using curved intakes. The intake on an F-16 slopes upward and then slightly down as it nears the the engine fan frame to act as a shock wave dampener. The actual fan frame has IGV's (inlet guide vanes) to angle the airflow even more and slow it down and further back in the compression section it uses VSV's (variable stator vanes) to assist in airflow direction. My guess is that the VF-1 engine would use IGV's to angle the airflow also to slow it down. But the cutaway picture I have seen of the FF-2001 also shows that the front fan section as expected is separate from the engine due to the design of what is the upper leg in Battroid and is connected by the flexible ducting system as mentioned earlier. The front shock wave dampening would depend on how far back from the intake lip the front fan is situated. The leg ducting could also act the same as the angled intake on the F-16 and F-18 in slowing down the airflow.
  18. grigolosi
    Here is a very good photo of the PW F-119 engine being used in the F-22. It shows the true extent of how far a real 2D vectoring exhaust opens when in full afterburner and how cool the burner flame looks. I didn't realize after 20 yrs of fixing fighter aircraft that I missed this in the animation of the VF's in the older Macross series. All jet engines equipped with an AB open their nozzles to 80-100% in burner. I must be getting old......
  19. grigolosi

    Max's Valk

    grigolosi posted a gallery image in Macross Fan Art

    Max's Valk

    From the album: Untitled Album

    My first VF-1 drawing since I was in High school so I am getting back into drawing them. (I used to be able to draw them in my sleep practically). I will not discuss the background which I covered since I was so disappointed in it.
  20. grigolosi
    This is copied and pasted directly from the Macross Mecha Manual. It does site a partial BDI system installed on the Queadluun Rhea. Design Features: Quimeliquola inertia vector control system; 1 x optional independent Shinnakasu Industry/L.A.I FAB-1000 fold booster; 1 x main cockpit screen; active stealth system; fold navigation is possible with updated avionics system for use with independent fold booster; energy converting armor is adopted for the cockpit in addition to a simple cold-sleep function; two circuits of the flight control system were doubled to four (a primary and secondary) to improve survivability; a BDI system is partially introduced to the operation system I also agree with Valkyrie Driver.......I definitely think Klan is all natural........Also I do believe neither gender would be able to use the Micloning/Macronization chambers if they had any artificial cybernetic implants installed on their bodies. But this is specutlation.
  21. grigolosi
    Actually if you want to hide an aircraft in darkness the best color to use would be the F-15 Strike Eagle gray. It is almost purple because they discovered in the late 80's earl;y 90's that dark purple/gray actually blends into darkness far better than black. Strike Eagles usually do most of their work in darkness during actual combat operations for this purpose.
  22. grigolosi
    Driver you are correct on the paint schemes we have used in the past. One point you did miss though was the corrosion factor. Bare metal simply corrodes far quicker especially if the aircraft is based on a carrier ( the USN and USMC both require washes on their aircraft every 14 days to control corrosion regardless of where they are stationed). Also Another reason for the paint schemes was also spot on. If you were to see a modern fighter stripped of paint it would resemble and abstract painting due to the use of both composite materials and and metal (mainly aviation aluminum for the frames). On the F-16 when it is stripped completely to the surface, the stabilators and vertical are a brownish black colors due to the use of composite graphite used in making them. The rest of the frame is an aluminum color. i personally prefer the DYRL schemes myself since they tend to be more realistic in the markings for military aircraft. I like the fact that there are pictures of the Vermillion team VF-1's that show actual tail flashes and squadron designation markings on the ventral fins. This probably stems from my yrs in the USAF as a crew chief. That off color on the F-15 is a corrosion coating that is applied to the frame prior to applying the primer. It gives the aircraft a gold/bronze tint. When the aircraft is stripped completely the true color of the aluminum comes out.
  23. grigolosi
    Yup I spent 23 yrs in the USAF as an F-16 crew chief. I have seen a lot of real world stuff on fighters. That is probably one of the other reasons of many I like macross so much. I love fighter aircraft. Kawamori has designed some beautiful aircraft over the past 30 yrs. Thanks for the welcome!
  24. grigolosi
    The HOTAS is strictly a cockpit configuration designed to ease the load on the pilot so he can focus on flying and fighting. The FLCS is a seperate system, when they introduced the HOTAS Blk 6 mod to the VF-1 it more than likely had no impact on the actual flight control system in use on it. Even now we use a HOTAS configured cockpit in most of our 4th and definitely the 5th gen fighters. Most FLCS system computers are programmed with the aircraft frame and flight control limits like you mentioned. In the case of an aircraft like the VF-1 built with an already stronger than normal frame and the ECS to provide further reinforcement, the flight control envelope must be beyond what our pilots now could estimate. This would mean the pilot of a VF would have to be literally attempting to crush the frame to push the FLCS beyond its limits. This is just speculation but it seems these frames were built to push even the tech in Macross to its limits.
  25. grigolosi
    The jet fuel in use now is on the same lines as kerosene or diesel. You can throw a lit cigarette or match in it and it won't even spark. Now if you bring an electrical spark into play, say goodbye. when we refuel fighters we worry more about static discharge than anything else........Try changing a tire on an F-16 while the knuckleheads in the bay next to you are trying to refuel in a thunderstorm......gotta love foreign AF's.
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