SU-47 concept?

I found this rather interesting image while browsing the internet. The site where it was hosted appeared to be of Chinese origin, and not being able to read Chinese I couldn't really understand "what" exactly this picture was. Maybe it was a flunked concept for the SU-47/37 or some kid who got bored and decided to alter a picture of one. The aircraft in this image seems to merge the F-22 (note cockpit,) SU-37/47 and the experimental F-35 (I think that's the correct name, however I am not sure)



This is the "hybrid"



The F-22 of course.



Heres the F(/A?)-35 (I think it might be the F/A-18's replacement... just a theory though)




And of course the SU-47 (Personally one of my favorite planes)




And last but not least the SU-37 (I got my ass handed to me by these in Ace Combat 5 ha!)

Nice post, however I disagree with your thought that the F-35 would replace the F/A-18... The hornet is a great plane, and newer models of it are on the draawing board as we speak, The F/A-18 G should come out soon, and The super Hornet is also a brand new plane... The F-35 will replace the F-14... That is fact...

[edit on 17-12-2005 by Figher Master FIN]

[edit on 17-12-2005 by Figher Master FIN]

The aircraft you're referring to is called Switchblade.

As far back as 1989 the buzz inside aviation circles was the Pentagon was developing a variable swing-wing aircraft to replace the aging fleet of F-111s which was retired for good in 1995. The F-111 was a medium sized bomber also capable of defending itself as a fighter and then speeding away at over 1600 miles per hour.

When reports of a new swing wing aircraft sighted near Cannon Air Force Base, New Mexico and at Langley Air Force Base, Virginia, surfaced Popular Science investigated. High ranking officials are said to have gathered in secure hangers at two air bases to be given a sneak peek at the new aircraft. In September of 1994, it was observed circling high over Amarillo, Texas, for several minutes at midday. These reports to an exclusive story on this aircraft in 1995.

New Evidence

Since then Popular Science has learned that the aircraft is not a standard variable swing-wing aircraft as first reported but instead employs a unique forward sweeping wing mechanism that enables the aircraft to become an advanced attack aircraft capable of precision weapons delivery, super maneuverability (for air combat) and MACH 3 dash capability.






SWITCHBLADE LINK

The F111 fighter bomber..performed neither role well as a fighter or a bomber. The swing wing mechanism ruined this airplane for either role. The same could be said for the F14 series of airplanes.
The performance data crunched by the research of John Boyd confirmed this whenever these swing wing planes went up against planes like the F15 in Maneuvers.
The very heavy construction necessary to house and maintain the swing wing mechanisms turned out not to be the advantage for which it was advertised. The same thing was discovered in the B1 series of bombers. They just could not quite get the performance out of the planes as advertised.
If you look closely ..the militarys are tending quietly away from swing wing geometry for reasons of expense and lack of certain performance necessitys. These drawbacks also keep these planes from being available for export sales. To expensive to purchase and maintain.

Thanks,
Orangetom

The F111 fighter bomber..performed neither role well as a fighter or a bomber. The swing wing mechanism ruined this airplane for either role. The same could be said for the F14 series of airplanes.

Yikes! I'll agree with you when you say the F-111, but i HAVE to disagree with the F-14. The Tomcat was quite possibly one of the greatest interceptors that the US has ever had. Yeah, it's outdated now, but it had too many strong points for it to be considered as a 'ruined' airplane. The F-14 had 4 variants, all of which performed admirably during service.

Originally posted by orangetom1999
The F111 fighter bomber..performed neither role well as a fighter or a bomber.

Well the F111 for its day was in a class of it's own. It carried a very lrge bombload and could range thousands of km's. When it first came out it along with the A-6 were the only planes possessing a devastating blind first pass attack.
During the intial deployment to Thailand several F-111's crashed due to structural faults. After these were rectified, the F-111 showed its mettle with an impressive record in Vietnam .

Haha, now i know why that switchblade design looks so familure. I saw those jets they flew in stealth (one of the worst possible names for that movie I swear.) They could adjust their wings in to reach speeds of what? Mk 5? That made me laugh.

In the book on John Boyd by Robert Coram the author goes to great lengths to show by Boyds calculations that the United States had the wrong airplanes in the Vietnam war for the various roles for which they were used based on performance data. Boyd also went on to crunch confidential data on the designs of Russian aircraft of the era and was able to demonstrate that the performance envelopes of Russian designs were superior to American Aircraft. Generals were astonished and speechless. However they could not debate or disprove the validity of Boyd's data. This made many enemies for Boyd in Pentagon procurement circles.
As stated his data proved the validity particularly as pertains to swing wing designs. The Russians to this day seem to have caught on to this knowlege too as they are not producing swing wing designs and are tending away from this.
As I recall the main problem data wise with swing wing is the inability to bleed off energy in maneuvers and then recover from it quickly as do some opponents. This is where the Vietnam era Russian jet designs excelled over the American designs. This was born out over and over in air combat. Also this lack of maneuver and maneuver doctrine made our aircraft vulnurable to missles air to air and ground to air. Once the maneuvers were perfected our pilots were more often able to break missle lock.
Nevertheless you see a quiet attempt to get away from swing wing designs.

Thanks,
Orangetom

Orangetom, every aircraft design has it's faults, but to go as far as saying something like swing wing ruined the F-14 design, that's ludacris, the F-14 under all circumstances was a great interceptor, never before have I ever seen anyone say the F-14's design was ruined by swing wing, that's what made it so great.

Anyways, the F-111 I'll agree with you on, but the F-14 thing, not so much.

Shattered OUT...

One of the problems with the F 14 series of fighters is that it is a very large platform. It takes up alot of space on the flight deck and below in the hanger decks. I believe the Navy is trying to get away from this in the F18 series of jets. Having worked several aircraft carriers in the yards this is obvious by the size of the wrecked F14 hulls they use to tow around to different stations in training the deck handling crews.
The F14 is a jet designed for Cold war applications. Long range standoff missle encounters. Multiple target acquisiton etc. It was not originally designed with ACM in mind. If I also understand correctly ..the missle designed around this plane..are they not also phasing this out too?? I think it was the Phoenix missle?? Like the F 15s the Air Force has.. F 14 maintnence costs are rising as is time on the ground verses time in the air on missions or training.
The one feature I hear the F14 has going for it in its newer versions ..carrying bombs and such is range...it has a longer range than the F 18s. I dont know how effective it has been in this role..in Iraq or Afganistan..perhapsed some of you can fill me in on this. I would imagine time over targets was limited due to range constraints. To my knowlege most of this was done by longer range bombers of the Air Force.
I am also thinking that the F 18 ,too, is not all the Navy wants in a fighter but they are making do with what they have. Makes me wonder what the next generation is on the drawing boards for the US Navy in fighter development. I dont think this Joint Strike Fighter will meet stringent shipboard requirements the US Navy has for carrier born aircraft.

Thanks,
Orangetom

Orangetom, you're right. The F-14 was pretty much designed around the AIM-54 Phoenix, a monster missile that could blow multiple people out of the sky from around 200 miles out (someone correct me if i'm wrong). However, both the F-14 and the Phoenix are pretty much phased out. I believe that the F-14 has seen its last cruise, and the Phoenix is so old that most of them are developing cracks in their solid fuel. I hate to see them go.....

As for the F-14B, I did a little research and found a couple of things. It was first used against Iraqi targets in 98 after Saddam threw out the UN. It was also used extensively in Kosovo, as well as (possibly) in the latest US invasion of Iraq. The 'Bombcat' was also fitted to carry JDAM's, which made it a lot more accurate of a bomber.

Just a little background, hope it was helpful.

The F-14B Bombcat

the aim-54 hasn`t really been carried for a while - at $1million USD per shot its kind of understandable why - the AMRAAM is nearly as good - althought the AIM-54 has longer range (about 100 miles @ M4)


oh and heres your swing-wing airplane on a carrier deck:

The regularity with which that photo, and ones very much like it, keep surfacing on this site is starting to irritate me now, why does it keep coming up in so many discussions? Its as if people think its real or something.

Originally posted by waynos
The regularity with which that photo, and ones very much like it, keep surfacing on this site is starting to irritate me now, why does it keep coming up in so many discussions? Its as if people think its real or something.

Yea, and sometimes I get the image that my name is General Eisenhower and I just won the Normandy invasion for the American side.

But seriously, all of those photos should have a caption that reads "This is not real, if in any shape or form you think it is real, here is the number for a psychiatric physician."



Shattered OUT...

Originally posted by waynos
The regularity with which that photo, and ones very much like it, keep surfacing on this site is starting to irritate me now, why does it keep coming up in so many discussions? Its as if people think its real or something.

i must have forgotton the icon

That picture and sketch just strikes me as really dumb to buy into that stuff about a switch wing fighter.

When you look at the sketchs of the wings extended straight out...the flaps and alierons are on the back of the wing. They have a range of motions so far down below the horizontal at the alierons on the outer portions of the wings and above the horizontal a certain amount. The Flaps on the inner portion of the wing would have a range of motion from horizontal to a certain distance below horizontal as do most flaps.

When you see the wings folded foreward the flaps and alierons are now on the leading edge of the wing. Any misposition or failure of the hydraulic system would be a disaster at any speed in this design ..particularly at very high mach speeds. These control systems would have to be constructed of very high strength material and be mounted or locked very ridgedly in the wings foreward positions.
When you look at most fighters ..any leading edge control surface is designed with a limited range of motion..unlike the range of motion pictured in these drawings.
Having worked hydraulic systems for a number of years this is something which occured to me when studying this sketch.
It just occurs to me that you dont put a control surface on the leading edge of a wing with that much range of motion.
One more thing..our fighters to day have a very high speed capability. Speed is not the problem...it never was. Fuel consumption and heat generated are the main limiting factors...not the speed itself. Once I understood this I never again got excited over speed figures.

Just something that occured to me in looking at these pictures.

By the way..I am located about a mile outside the main gate here near Langley Air Force Base. They do get some wild looking planes here occasionally but I've never heard of this design. The neatest plane I saw other than at the air shows..was a crank delta winged F16 in a hanger at NASA across the field from the Air Force base. I really liked the looks of that bird. It was used mostly for wing design research by NASA.
Also they are begining to get the new F 22s here at Langley so its intresting around here. Alot of the F 117s would stop here enroute to overseas bases...especially during the Desert War. Plus they always manage to get one for the yearly air show at the base.

Thanks,
Orangetom

you mean teh F-16 XL

Yep...thats her..and she is a beautiful looking bird. She just looks so graceful in design. I imagine she has more range than the standard F 16 too. Probably more internal fuel capacity.

Thanks for the picture.
Orangetom

It was a concept for the same project which was eventually won by the F-15E

Hmm... Switchblade. Hey you said you got your face beaten by Sukhoi-37s in Ace Combat Five... Do you remember the fictional aircraft that had those flip out wings... what was it... X-02 Wyvern? Its wings also flipped out but only so far as the angle of the wings on the Sukhoi-47 Berkut (Golden Eagle) Unfortunatly that aircraft was way to thin to actually hold any weaponry, and um... flip out wings... in an aircraft that tiny, wheres the fuel?

The F-35 will also partially be taking the position of the F-22. Its just as good if not better than the F-22 and its carrier based. This is sad, cause we all love the F-14 and F-22. Wah...