Himat

The F35's stealth is only effective when not using external stores, surely you could target the aircraft carrier or airbase or refueling aircraft its going to need?

The F35 is only really "STEALTHY" against mono static radars in the high frequency range. And the STEALT properties perform best when the radar is straight in front of the airplane. Search around and you find sources that show that there are radars that can find, track and identify the F35 at useable ranges. Radar guided air to air or surface to air missile will maybe not lock on before closer than 4nm, but if the missiles have a waypoint closer, they can still lock on.

 

 

And one more paper on the impact of radar development:

 

http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a515506.pdf

 

 

And a link to some of what is going on in radar development:

 

www.dtic.mil/cgi-bin/GetTRDoc?AD=ADA506106

 

 

 

Can't turn, Can't climb, Can't run: F35 Problems

 

Lets add: Can't hide

 

 

 

New anti aircraft system are going to be fielded that minimize the adventage of STEALTH, the F35 will then have to go low level, as have been done before. But the F35 was by design not optimized for low level strike.

 

 

Correct. What the boffins finally decide to do will come out of various warfare schools. But when you are beat, you are beat. Sending the wrong warfighter when you know it's wrong is the behaviour of another century.

But buying the wrong fighter is obviously advocated this century too.

 

The F-35 do from what can be found in unclassified information have one good virtue, the radar. Low observability in part of the radar spectrum is a plus, but that is a feature that is being contested. For ground attack use the F-35 will then soon have to switch to low level. Will it then work any better than the Tornado that was purpose built for low level work?

 

You state that the F-35 is no air to air fighter, then what is it (going to be)?

 

 

Post #144. JSF and pretty much every other multi role fighter won't be sent into contested airspace where the engagement described was possible.

And if air defence of own territory is the task? That is a possible scenario for at least Norway and probably Denmark as prospective buyers of the F-35. Also to the enemy the point is and will always be "use the advantages and avoid the pitfalls" of the scenario. Are the F-35 fighters then not to be sent out when own airspace get contested?

 

Next, do the same apply for bombing missions?

 

The F-35 will not be sent into an area with a credible air defence system?

 

Against low frequency, “passive” and multi static radar the F-35 “STEALTH” is not that good, at least not that good that the air defence cannot put a waypoint guided missile close enough to the F-35 to get missile seeker look on.

 

As you say; "These inconvenient facts aren't going away.", then what to do?

 

 

A lot have been said here and elsewhere about the dogfight capabilities of the F-35. The biggest problem may show up first time the F-35 is fielded for ground attack against a reasonable capable and prepared foe. A shoot and scout air defence with low frequency and passive radars combined with IR tracking may detect, track and direct fire at the F-35 almost as effective as the current generation bombers are by older radars. If the air defence missiles have suitable seekers, maybe waypoint navigation the losses can get large. Throw in some fast firing medium and heavy artillery to and the air defence might wreck havoc among the bombers. The F-35 is not designed for going in low and fast, at medium altitude it may become easy an easy target.

 

 

While we are at videos on why aeroplanes fly, I do like this one:

 

 

 

http://io9.com/5977095/why-we-should-switch-to-a-base-12-counting-system

Thanks for the link!

 

Actually, I do think that when the discussion stray into base number a lot of people fall off.

 

Now, how many aviators know that after turning 359 degrees and turn one more you have turned 1 000 degres?

 

 

you could always convert to decimal.If the frogs were real mathematicians they would have declared the metre to be 1/2000 of a nautical mile rather than a very poor approximation of the distance from Paris to the north pole (or was it the length of the kings hip).

 

Base 12 is actually very good because it is much easier to package a dozen (4x3, 6x2) than decimal (only 5x2) and 1/8ths are easy to estimate - just keep folding in half - very hard to do for 10ths

No, base 12 is difficult when counting on the fingers, base 8 is quite easy even with 10 fingers.

 

If the meter was a fraction of the nautical mile would have been a good idea.

 

 

Yes, it is possible to do a 1G descending turn, but probably not a sustained 1G descending turn. At least not for very long if the turn is to be coordinated.

 

The reason is that whatever turn rate measured in fractions of G is then also the acceleration down against the ground. The 1G descending turn is not only descending, it accelerating downwards. The plane will all the time be accelerating downwards, descending at an all the time increasing speed. Quite quickly the plane will either run out of height or reach Vne.

 

There is some special cases where the plane can keep its height in a 1G turn, one is an aerobatic airplane with the power, rudder and side area to fly sustained knife edge. But then the turn is anything but coordinated.

 

 

Interesting.

 

One major question, why retracts?

 

A more general comment, most pusher designs cries out for an inline engine with all ancillaries placed at the opposite end relative the propeller.

 

 

To operate under maritime regulations is intriguing. Different nations have different rules, but maybe you are allowed to operate at least a class A ekranoplan.

 

The real trouble is that scaling work against a small ekranoplan (WIG). At least that is what I have found when studying different sources. As the ekranoplan get smaller the ground clearance diminishes and the hull will touch the waves on everything but glassy waters. Fly higher and the efficiency gain of a WIG craft is lost. (And it practically and probably legally becomes an airplane.)

 

 

Hi guys. Thought you might like to see what others are designing. Love this guys work.http://www.alexandershevchenko.com/49489/gallery-galereja

 

Enjoy.

Thanks for sharing Doug!

I browsed the different designs and found them nice. Being an engineer I do see the difference in designing something that look good and designing something that do work well. Both acts can be described as designing, but one is closer to “styling” and the other to “engineering”. Anyway, to sell the “styling” part is important too. And as an engineer it is a good idea to have a look at what others come up with, an industrial designer might be less constrained than an engineer as he/she are less aware of the boundaries of the “box”. It is easier to think outside “the box” when you are not aware of it. The fin mounted propulsion on the canard airplane is one example here.

 

 

 

Most part of the research is Google and how to use it. The difficult part was to find the original patent, then with Google Patents it’s just searching previous art and referring patents or academic citations.

 

To get a design that look good I think partly is down to size. A manned airplane of this configuration must have a certain size to get the proportions right. A small single seat would probably end looking ungainly. With a large two seat or a four seat airplane the proportions would probably work out much better. I think John Mac Donald, macboffin, mention both a single seat and a seven seat aircraft of this configuration have been built, but I have not been able to find any more references to this.

 

About the design being structural efficient with a compact size and large load volume I do agree. From some of the pictures it looks like the design gives STOOL capabilities. With a not to large wing area the cruise speed and efficiency might be reasonable too. Maybe this is the configuration for my next unorthodox model airplane?

 

 

Thanks HITC!

 

Another search and I found it; it is this I think, Aircraft with paired aerofoils, US 4856736.

 

http://www.google.com/patents/US4856736?dq=JOHN+MACDONALD+uav&hl=no&sa=X&ei=XTkDUuu1Os7E4gSkhICgCg&ved=0CDUQ6AEwAA

 

The follow up patents I guess are these:

 

US6626398, Mission Technologies, Inc. Unmanned biplane for airborne reconnaissance and surveillance having staggered and gapped wings.

 

US7014141 12, Mission Technologies, Inc. Unmanned airborne reconnaissance system.

 

US7210654 23, Mission Technologies, Inc. Unmanned airborne reconnaissance system

 

Sorry for not being very precise, I was referring to a Google search on the Outrider UAV.

 

Thanks for the update on Synergy too, I do hope that they get in the air and can provide test data.

 

 

C'mon folks, there must be some other wannabe design commentators and theorists here...? This is a very interesting and compact configuration with good internal space, access and lots of potential in these days of ever more limited hangar space. Any ind. designers out there want to draw up a prettier version?

One joined the forum due to this remark:wave:.

 

I do think the idea do have it merits. Reading this thread and the patent it point to I do consider if it is applicable to a seaplane that is designed to not rotate on takeoff. The hull design could then maybe be optimized. At http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1438226 there is a thread with some interesting information. I have not been able to trace down the patent macboffin mentions. Searching “Outrider UAV” and there is some more information and pictures to be found. Actually the patent shown in this thread was interesting and showed the way to both some interesting patents on previous art and references to newer patents.

 

 

Hi!

 

I'm new to this site, but some others should recognize me from other aircraft and model airplane sites. Why Himat? Well I did see a picture of the Rockwell Himat back in the 1980'ies and the airplane fascinated me. My interest is very much all kind of airplanes, but I do constrain myself to building and flying model airplanes. RC (Remote Crash) is convenient when trying out unorthodox designs.