posted on Apr, 27 2016 @ 01:38 PM
a reply to:
weavty1
As described above, this explanation makes the most sense of all: "This is the RCS test fixture that was used by Boeing to evaluate making the
F/A-18E/F weapons pylons and tail assembly to have a smaller RCS."
It is simply a partial F/A-18 model for RCS testing of the tails and weapons pylons. It was never intended to represent a complete airframe.
There have been examples of this sort of thing in the past. Look for pictures of partial A-12 models (nose section only), etc. I remember seeing a
partial B-1 on the Rockwell RCS range near Weed Patch, California in the late 1980s, and an even stranger test article at the McDonnell Douglas Grey
Butte facility in 1994.