Nikephoros
Banned
Thank you sir.
I figured that this thread needed the input from someone who has practical experience in the field.
I figured that this thread needed the input from someone who has practical experience in the field.
My mistake, sorry.Seraph, the AIM-54 is active homing, although it can take a mid-course correction from the AWG-9. The AMRAAM's guidance system is superior in that it calculates and follows a collision course to the target rather than the target itself.
The YF-17 was a land-based fighter designed and built by Northrop for a fly-off which was won by the F-16. End of career. The Navy subsequently ordered up an aircraft based on the layout and called it the F-18. M-D was prime and Northrop second contractor. The F-18 shared no parts or dimensions with the YF-17, just general configuration. De-navalizing was then easy. The change to F/A-18 was another story.
To get back to the original question, if I understood it, the "what-if" was that the USAF ditched the Eagle and we got a dual use Tomcat for the AF and USN, right? Not all that bad an idea, but the basic matrix was that the cost savings of common use parts was just not sufficient for the loss of performance in the Central European and Korean Peninsula - which were the main games in those days. Lot of computer time and skull sweat went into those decisions, believe me.
That help any?
Ed
Thank you good sir. I think you got the WI essentially correct (I was thinking more like the AF buying into the Tomcat before they start the FX program, but yours is pretty much the same thing). I'm curious about the performance penalties that the AF thought they would have in Europe and Korea, so if you can give any more info on that, it would be nice.
Interesting take. True the pressure to do multiple missions same day would be much higher in Europe; Korea not so much since we would almost certainly have control of the air from day one. On the other hand dealing with mass waves like the WP would send being able to salvo 54's beyond their range would be interesting; not likely the individual aircraft would be able to tell who is being targeted. You would get a lot of kills while being far beyond their range.