Dr. Roper wants a return to the Century Series days

[vilters]

[/quote]It's just getting started. Worse, there are TWO players on the other side.[/quote]

So sorry to disagree.
- Russia does not have the tech yet, and at this point? No money either.

- China can rebuild engines, but can not build "new engines".

- India is the same as China. They can not build "new" engines either.

While Russia and China try their best at stealth, they are not even close.
India still has to Google what steath means.

We have time, lots of time. We are at least 50 years or so in the clear.


Europe should have kept some F-104.
That's more then good enough to go say "hallo" to wandering bears who's pilots are reading Playboy and drinking Coca-Cola.

[madrat]

The "F-110" was derived from a different lineage (Demon, not the XF-88/F-101).

viewtopic.php?f=38&t=54161&start=55

The only real resemblence is the F3H and F-4 both fired Sparrow missiles, employed a high appendage tail arrangement, flew with hydraulic controls, and had swept wings. The missiles available for F-101 during it's design phase was Falcon, and it was meant for internal carriage in F-101. The F-101 was probably more similar to the F-4 overall. Put the Sparrow missiles on the F-101 and we have more than a little passing resemblance.

The F3H design was experimented with on the drawing board and that led to the F-4 when they opted twin engines. But if that is it's qualifier that the F3H evolved into F-4, then I may as well claimed the F-4 was a copy of the Blackburn Buccaneer.

The "F-110" was nothing more than a number slapped on the side of an F-4C Phantom II for about five minutes. The USAF didn't call it the F-110. Nor was it one of the "Century series". And yes, the F-4 was very successful.

That's news, because the USN called the Phantom prototypes at the time the designation of "F4H-1". President Kennedy ordered the USAF to evaluate two prototypes under the designation of "F-110". So McDonnell repainted airframes 149405 and 149406 in USAF colors and provided them to Langley with that famous "F-110A" label on January 24, 1962. The USAF even called it 'Spectre', not the 'Phantom II' designation of the Navy. The Defense Department didn't begin the unified naming convention for fighters until September.

[marauder2048]

The Century Series would suffer a 100% attrition rate against LFT&E and DOT&E.

Nobody knew how to build supersonic fighters in the period (where nuclear offense and defense
were the main motivators) but the threat was such that large expenditures in money and lives were
deemed acceptable in the learning process.

Roper comes from a missile defense background where modularity and commonly in interceptors
and sensors are more readily attainable as are compressed timelines.

This is possible, in part because you have an agency that gets around LTF&E and DOT&E
and has large autonomy in terms of what it chooses to develop and deploy.

[sferrin]

The F3H design was experimented with on the drawing board and that led to the F-4 when they opted twin engines. But if that is it's qualifier that the F3H evolved into F-4, then I may as well claimed the F-4 was a copy of the Blackburn Buccaneer.

That's not how it works. Go read the history of the F-4. It didn't descend from the F-101. If you want to continue to insist it did that's your prerogative.

"The design of what was eventually to emerge as the McDonnell F-4 Phantom began in August of 1953. The McDonnell design team was headed by Herman Barkley. Initially, the goal of the team was to extend the production life of the F3H Demon single-seat carrier-based fighter by boosting its performance and improving its versatility.

Several quite different design concepts emerged, all of them being informally designated by the company as F3H-X since they were all viewed as a natural follow-on to the F3H Demon.

The first of these preliminary designs was the F3H-C or the "Super Demon". The F3H-C was to be powered by a single Wright J67 turbojet and was to be capable of reaching Mach 1.69 at high altitude. The J67 was a license-built version of the British-built Bristol Olympus turbojet engine, and was untried and unproven at the time.

The F3H-E project (also known as Model 98A by the company) was similarly powered, but dispensed with the nose-high attitude of the Demon and stood level on a tricycle undercarriage. It had a 45-degree swept wing of 450 square feet in area. In the event, the J67 engine never did materialize as a realistic powerplant for American aircraft.

The Model 98B (F3H-G) project was to be powered by a pair of Wright J65-W-2 (or W-4) turbojets rated at 7800 lb.s.t. each. The twin-engined configuration was attractive to many in the Navy, because of the increased amount of safety it offered over a single-engined aircraft. The engines were to be fed by a pair of side-mounted air intakes. A low-mounted swept wing and an all-flying straight tailplane were to be used. This wing was slightly larger than that of the F3H-E, with a 530-square foot area. The fuselage was to be designed in conformance with the area rule, in order that minimum transonic drag be achieved.

The F3H-G aircraft was to be equipped with an Aero 11B fire control system and an AN/APQ-150 radar. Armament was to consist of four 20-mm cannon, but provision for a retractable pack carrying 56 two-inch FFAR rockets was also proposed. A heavy load of bombs and fuel tanks could be carried on up to nine external stores stations (four under each wing and one underneath the fuselage). A maximum speed of Mach 1.52 was envisaged.

The J65 was a license-built version of the British-designed Armstrong Siddeley Sapphire engine, and was already in production at the time. Although at that time the Navy was experiencing a good deal of trouble with the J65 engine installed in its North American FJ-3 Fury single-engined fighter, the McDonnell team fully expected that these problems would be resolved by the time that their F3H-G proposal was ready for production.

The F3H-H was similar in overall configuration to the F3H-G, but was to be powered by a pair of higher-thrust General Electric J79 turbojets. The J79 was at that time a new and untried engine. Assuming that the J79 performed as promised, a maximum speed of Mach 1.97 was envisaged.

The Model 98F was the photographic reconnaissance version of the Model 98C.

Models 98C and D were to be fitted respectively with delta and straight wings, and were to be powered either by a pair of Wright J65s or two J79s.

The Model 98E (F3H-J) was to have been similar to Models 98C and D, but with a larger and thinner delta wing.

Herman Barkley's design team decided that the Model 98B with its twin J65s offered the best potential and they abandoned work on all the other configurations. A full-sized mockup of the Model 98B (F3H-G) was built. The company hedged its bets by designing the right side of the mockup for a J79 engine and the left for a J65.

On September 19, 1953, McDonnell submitted its Model 98B project to the Navy's Bureau of Aeronautics (BuAer) in the form of an unsolicited proposal. Since the Navy as yet had no official requirement for such an aircraft, McDonnell tried to cover all bases by developing interchangeable single- and two-seat noses that could be accommodated to widely different roles. Noses were designed that could carry search radars, missile fire-control systems, mapping radars, cameras, or electronic reconnaissance equipment.

Although the Navy was favorably impressed by the Model 98B proposal, the Grumman XF9F-9 Tiger and the Vought XF8U-1 Crusader which had been ordered respectively in April and June of 1953 appeared to satisfy all the Navy's immediate requirements for supersonic fighters. Nevertheless, the Navy encouraged McDonnell to rework its design into a single-seat, twin-engined all-weather attack aircraft to compete against designs being worked on by Grumman and North American.

McDonnell submitted a formal development proposal for the F3H-G/H to the Navy in August of 1954. The Navy responded in October of 1954 by issuing a letter of intent for two prototypes and a static test aircraft. The Navy assigned the designation AH-1 to the project, reflecting its intended ground attack mission. The AH-1 was to have no less then eleven weapons pylons. Armament was to consist of four 20-mm cannon.

On December 14, 1954, the multirole mission of the aircraft was formally abandoned by the Navy, and McDonnell was requested to rework the proposal as an all-weather interceptor. McDonnell was instructed to remove the cannon and all hardpoints except for a centerline pylon for a 600-US gallon fuel tank. In addition, troughs were to be added for four Raytheon Sparrow semi-active radar homing air-to-air missiles. A Raytheon-designed APQ-50 radar was added, this installation being essentially that installed in the F3H-2 Demon. A second seat was added to accommodate a radar operator.

On April 15, 1955, in a formal letter from the BuAer to the Commander of Naval Operations, the J79 engine was formally adopted, and all work on the J65-powered version was dropped.

On May 26, 1955, after further review of Navy requirements, the BuAer requested that the designers complete the two prototypes (BuNos 142259 and 142260) as two-seat all-weather fighters carrying an entirely missile-based armament. On June 23, 1955, the designation was changed to YF4H-1, a fighter designation. A day later, McDonnell issued a new model number for the project--98Q."

Do you see anything about the F-101 in there anywhere? Me either.

The "F-110" was nothing more than a number slapped on the side of an F-4C Phantom II for about five minutes. The USAF didn't call it the F-110. Nor was it one of the "Century series". And yes, the F-4 was very successful.

That's news, because the USN called the Phantom prototypes at the time the designation of "F4H-1". President Kennedy ordered the USAF to evaluate two prototypes under the designation of "F-110". So McDonnell repainted airframes 149405 and 149406 in USAF colors and provided them to Langley with that famous "F-110A" label on January 24, 1962. The USAF even called it 'Spectre', not the 'Phantom II' designation of the Navy. The Defense Department didn't begin the unified naming convention for fighters until September.

You'll note the "F-110" was not painted on F4H-1s. So yeah, the "F-110" was nothing more than an F-4 with "F-110" slapped on the side. It was certainly not part of the "Century series". And neither were the F-111, -112, -113, -114, -115, -116, or -117.

[blain]

I really don't know if you can repeat the approach of the Century Fighters in today's environment. Even if you took an incremental approach to certain expensive technologies - avionics, engines, and stealth developing and producing fighters today is much more expensive proposition than in the past - even adjusted for inflation. Small production runs are also a recipe for disaster.

Both issues were highlighted in Rand report on the rising cost of fixed winged aircraft.

https://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/p ... _MG696.pdf

A smarter approach might be to make derivatives of existing aircraft like developing an F-35 with a counter air focus if you rearrange the weapons bay to carry more AAMs. Could LM develop a longer range derivative of the F-35 like General Dynamics did with with the F-16XL?

[marauder2048]

Even YF-16 delivery to F-16 IOC was nearly 7 years. And that was for an F-16 variant that didn't live very long
and wouldn't have lived very long in the ETO had war broken out.

F-16XL from SCAMP to first flight was 6 years. The estimates for F-16E FSD were at least 5 years from there.

A smarter approach might be to make derivatives of existing aircraft like developing an F-35 with a counter air focus if you rearrange the weapons bay to carry more AAMs. Could LM develop a longer range derivative of the F-35 like General Dynamics did with with the F-16XL?

I think the core issue is Lockheed's dominance which is just reinforced daily by more data coming in from an
ever expanding 5th gen fleet.

Lockheed ran away with ATF and JSF and the ensuing years have not shown that NG or Boeing can credibly
build a modern fighter for the high-end environment.

And you have Lockheed's near complete dominance of hypersonics; both munitions and future air vehicle concepts.

The only way to get the other entrants (including say General Atomics) competitive and credible would be
small production runs of air vehicles.

[crosshairs]

Even YF-16 delivery to F-16 IOC was nearly 7 years. And that was for an F-16 variant that didn't live very long
and wouldn't have lived very long in the ETO had war broken out.

F-16XL from SCAMP to first flight was 6 years. The estimates for F-16E FSD were at least 5 years from there.

A smarter approach might be to make derivatives of existing aircraft like developing an F-35 with a counter air focus if you rearrange the weapons bay to carry more AAMs. Could LM develop a longer range derivative of the F-35 like General Dynamics did with with the F-16XL?

I think the core issue is Lockheed's dominance which is just reinforced daily by more data coming in from an
ever expanding 5th gen fleet.

Lockheed ran away with ATF and JSF and the ensuing years have not shown that NG or Boeing can credibly
build a modern fighter for the high-end environment.

And you have Lockheed's near complete dominance of hypersonics; both munitions and future air vehicle concepts.

The only way to get the other entrants (including say General Atomics) competitive and credible would be
small production runs of air vehicles.

NG and Boeing haven't shown they can credibly build a modern fighter? How many fighter programs have their been in the USA in the last 35 years? 2. SH hardly counts as a competition. And of the 2 programs NGs concept for the ATF would have been better suited to today's and tomorrow's needs than the raptor. And the Lockheed artwork for 6th gen is essentially a ripoff of the yf23 outer moldline.

You make sound as if NG and Boeing have failed at a number competitions other than ATF and JSF. I would take the NG JSF over the flying hippo any day. That was a stupid decision to choose Boeing in the JSF despite Northrop's use of a lift engine.

Lockheed is a powerhouse, but there is a lot of things we don't know about that I would imagine has at least been demonstrated someplace in the desert. You can't hardly evaluate these suppliers capabilities on 2 programs, one of which could have easily gone to the company that wasn't Lockheed.

Northrop is also currently smaller with fewer engineers and can't go after everything under the sun.

Boeings ATF entrant could have easily made it to the Dem val phase. They were very advanced with stealth more so than most people widely know.

[sferrin]

Boeings ATF entrant could have easily made it to the Dem val phase. They were very advanced with stealth more so than most people widely know.

Boeing's was ranked fourth. Hardly an endorsement of superiority.

[marauder2048]

NG and Boeing haven't shown they can credibly build a modern fighter? How many fighter programs have their been in the USA in the last 35 years? 2. SH hardly counts as a competition. And of the 2 programs NGs concept for the ATF would have been better suited to today's and tomorrow's needs than the raptor. And the Lockheed artwork for 6th gen is essentially a ripoff of the yf23 outer moldline.

Concepts are just that. So is Dem/Val where you are really demonstrating the maturity of your tools to
predict the performance of your prototype; NG failed there and their final submission had elements
of the YF-22 on it.

McAir dropped the ball there as well and many of the same issue with respect to poor predictions
(wing drop, stores separation) would e-emerge on the Super Hornet.

I'm sure the 6-gen concept artwork is about as representative as the concept artwork was for ATF.

You make sound as if NG and Boeing have failed at a number competitions other than ATF and JSF.

Boeing and NG didn't even place in LRSO. And Lockheed ran away with X-59.
Same with hypersonics. That really goes to the maturity of design tools and processes
for a wide variety of flight envelopes and threat environments.

I would take the NG JSF over the flying hippo any day. That was a stupid decision to choose Boeing in the JSF despite Northrop's use of a lift engine.

Northrop couldn't convince anyone that their tailless lambda was structurally buildable. And I'd argued that
actually MDC's gas-coupled lift fan was the better architecture than anything other than shaft-driven.

Lockheed is a powerhouse, but there is a lot of things we don't know about that I would imagine has at least been demonstrated someplace in the desert. You can't hardly evaluate these suppliers capabilities on 2 programs, one of which could have easily gone to the company that wasn't Lockheed.

The competitions were not even close. And demonstrated someplace in a desert is a far cry
from the maturity level that would convince anyone that they are capable of producing and sustaining
something at reasonable production volumes.

Northrop is also currently smaller with fewer engineers

A point Boeing made in the GAO protest over the bomber.

[XanderCrews]

I flew the AV-8A for several years. Few things scare me...

I get it. They wanna go faster and (for the sake of learning) profess a willingness to accept the risk that comes as a consequence. Engineers know how to do that; bureaucrats/politicians do not. When we start talking MDAPs (instead of what amounts to small science projects), there are some things that 'going faster' programmatically does not resolve -- like keeping the training systems aligned with the systems and capabilities in the aircraft, and shortening the timelines necessary to bring humans (whether they be pilots or maintainers) up to speed in those systems -- all in the context of fielding combat-ready, deployable units. There's no Cold War and there is no major air war going on the other side of the planet (yet). Thus, if there is any compelling need, it is certainly less evident to the average tax-paying/voting American.

Of course there are the two large elephants standing in the corner -- money and the ubiquity of public information sources about what's being built, why and at what expense. Together they drive limitations on the art of the possible wrt the pursuit of any 'shiney new thing' and the amount of risk acceptance that the government tacitly asks the public to accept. Much different than the 40s, 50s or 60s...

Yep. We can go full century series, you just have to be willing to spend gobs of money and not mind crashes and fatalities. you also have to have some balls on your politicians so they don't cancel the whole shebang when something like Apollo 1 happens. bipartisanship is a nice thing to have to so it continues with changes of power.


I don't know if people realize just how risk averse everything is. The massive amount of testing on modern programs and the long development times are consequences of the "wild west" days. The pendelum swung back, the cold war ended, programs became fewer and far between and companies disappeared or conglomerated.

One of the things I'm not noticing all around, are people and politicians calling for these big times in history to emphasize importance, but none of the other factors are involved. Maybe one of the reasons things don't have the urgency of world war II, is because there isn't a world war happening. when people call for these big urgent moments without urgency I just go back to scratching my balls and surfing my phone.

[XanderCrews]

SH hardly counts as a competition.

SH hardly counts as Boeing. McD won that contract. McD did all the leg work. Boeing just bought the company up.

[sferrin]

I flew the AV-8A for several years. Few things scare me...

That was a good one.

[h-bomb]

SH hardly counts as a competition.

SH hardly counts as Boeing. McD won that contract. McD did all the leg work. Boeing just bought the company up.

LOL This is great. I remember the "Boeing Innovations Commercial"

BAE/MCD AV-8B, MCD F-15, F/A-18, C-17 and Delta Rocket family
Rockwell B-1 and Space Shuttle
Boeing 777

If you cannot innovate, purchase those who did!

[mixelflick]

I made this GIF is hilarious.

Thanks for the chuckle

[USMilFan]

As hornetfinn has pointed out, the prevalent trend in the history of aircraft development has followed a path of increased complexity, and has required ever more time and expense to implement. It is logical, therefore, to expect that future systems will continue to increase in complexity, and will very likely require exponential increases in time and expense. Hoping to change this trend seems as improbable and impractical as reversing the flow of the Mississippi River.

While a more incrementalized approach would likely reduce the risks associated with longer development phases, it does nothing to solve the problems introduced by increased complexity. Solving those problems inevitably takes more time and more expense. And though increased complexity is extremely expensive and risky to design, develop, test, build, and make operational, it offers the kind of revolutionary advances in capability that easily justify those efforts and their substantially greater costs and risks. A more incrementalized development process merely forfeits the chance to capture those revolutionary advancements in capability that ultimately save both lives and dollars when wartime comes. These considerations motivate the historical evolution towards ever lengthier and costlier phases of development and implementation.

Finally, we should keep in mind that every time that our people and institutions avoid taking risks and bearing costs, those risks and costs ultimately fall upon the shoulders of the soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines who take the ultimate risk to do our bidding. It is our responsibility, therefore, to eliminate as much risk and cost to them as possible. That is the unfair bargain (to them) that military members make with us when they sign up.