Ask anything Thread (Air Force)

TerraN_EmpirE

Tyrant King
If I am not mistaken all "dog fights" are at sub sonic level and the notion of supersonic maneuvering is really not relevant to the topic of maneuverability.
I just want to get this correction in. Air to air engagements are normally called a dog fight.
However many of the maneuvers can be accomplished at super sonic velocity the critical question in this regard is relative velocity. IE the speed of Interceptor to Target. Maneuvers like barrel rolls can be used to increase the distance of travel vs the target well keeping increased velocity.
 

AndrewS

Brigadier
Registered Member
The DoD report says lots of things. Some are more credible than others, while some are of little relevance at all.

There's enough of a history of DoD reports to compare with information we have had in the past, to be able to judge it.


In any case, it is entirely reasonable for us to expect supersonic deployment of weapons from an internal weapons bay to be a very baseline requirement for a 5th gen fighter.

Yup.

We know that the J-20 is designed to target large airborne surveillance aircraft, along with other aircraft.

Launching air-to-air missiles whilst at supersonic speeds is a requirement, as the additional launch velocity significantly increases range and potentially the powered no-escape zone.

And that matters against an AWACs that can detect fighter sized stealth aircraft.
 

Brumby

Major
Brumby do you (in last two pages) perhaps say
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(check Design part)
would be limited in use to subsonic launches?
I was simply asking whether weapon separation had been tested while flying at supersonic speed. The question wasn't missile dependent.

yet another question is if the J-20 has
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capability
anyone?

I believe LOAL requires a two way data link capability. As such it is a missile design issue rather than a host aircraft issue. Essentially when launched the missile has no target coordinates. The host aircraft subsequently acquires a lock which then pass on the coordinates to the missile but the missile trajectory itself is worked out based on its own location which is fed via the return relay link.
 

Deino

Lieutenant General
Staff member
Super Moderator
Registered Member
Guys ... are we now again all over in aerodynamics!???
 

Brumby

Major
I just want to get this correction in. Air to air engagements are normally called a dog fight.
However many of the maneuvers can be accomplished at super sonic velocity the critical question in this regard is relative velocity. IE the speed of Interceptor to Target. Maneuvers like barrel rolls can be used to increase the distance of travel vs the target well keeping increased velocity.

I don't have facts on it but I am leaning towards the idea that dog fights are conducted at sub sonic level rather than supersonic. Maybe their merging combined speed is equivalent to supersonic but not individually. If you have a link of examples that prove otherwise it would be useful.
 

TerraN_EmpirE

Tyrant King
There have been engagements where one or more has been in the Super sonic mode.
There was one case of an F4 in Vietnam who made a supersonic gun kill.
Typically when using the term we are talking about close in fights.
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Brumby

Major
Quote it with a link and let's all have a look.

Right off the bat, my initial thoughts are

1. What does the US DOD know about China's radar efforts?
2. If they knew anything, it would have to be from espionage; is it is smart to publish the results of espionage to alert your rival? 3. "Having difficulty" can mean a wide array of things, ranging from being unable to make it work at all to facing challenges making an already superior design leapfrog its rivals generationally.
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Page 58
 

Equation

Lieutenant General
As I have already stated the aerodynamic forces arising from compressibility changes with speed.

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View attachment 52909
When the weapons bay door open besides drag it has an airflow effect. The effects cannot be assumed to be business as usual when we are talking about weapons separation at supersonic speed because compressibility kicks in.

An article on weapons separation that did not go so well.
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n

OK, so with the extremely vague statement from the DOD, refer to points 1-3 of post #5301.

And I don't understand why you keep posting all these different diagrams first comparing F-15 and F-16 (both of which can release weapons from supersonic speeds) and now of some aircraft wings and some failed weapons releases from external pylons. They don't support your argument at all. What would support your argument is if you found some reliable aerodynamic study that showed a vast increase in the forces sustained from a weapons release from inside a bay than from an external pylon at supersonic speed. That would indicate that there is at least a new challenge that the Chinese had to overcome, (which they in all likelihood did, but at least raises the remote possibility that they didn't). Currently, there is nothing to support even an increase in technical difficulty launching from a bay than from a pylon.

If it's no big deal, then drop it. If you keep posting diagrams to try to convince people, that kinda says that you think it's a big deal.
 

taxiya

Brigadier
Registered Member
The comment about engines and radars is buried in the last line of the paragraph (Attached below). It is a very vague sentence. What do they mean by radar diffculties? Is it about raw performance or does it relate things like LPI and other advanced features?? Regarding the engines, well that that is nothing new.

By the way, what the heck do they mean by " although production is unlikely to begin until at least 2019." o_Oo_Oo_O

Are they suggesting the FC-31 is going into production? :eek::confused:

ExZ7iVV.jpg
He apparently was too lazy so he copy pasted his old texts from 2018 or earlier because nobody would say "until 2019" when he is already in 2019 in any language.
 
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