Forget the F-22 upgrade the F-15

Was scanning through google for info on the F-22 and found a page which is pretty old but none the less very informative. I know we've been upgrading the F-15 with a new radar but this guy claims we could also upgrade its engine give the F-15 the same perfroman as the F-22. Does that mean super-cruise? Anyways here's the article.

article

Well the article is a bit old IMHO.

However:

Yes you could put the Raptors engines intot he F-15 and it would have better performance, but Im not sure it would supercruise as that also is a function of areodynamics to a certain extent. 9I mean with enough dry thrust you could get a brick to supercruise I guess)

The AESA radars are being fielded in the F-15's (Out of Alaska right now) But they will be used to provide back up cruise missile defence etc.

The F-15 is not and will never have a LRCS. No matter what you do to it. It is also marginal against the 4.5 and 5th generation fighters being fielded today from the Typhoon, to the latest offering from Sukhoi. The Raptor will have the ability to operate in airspace that the F-15 cannot and provide a variety of missions such as air superiority, SEAD, and even electrocic attack with the AESA radar packge.

Yes internal carrage presents a problem but external stowage also presents problms for the F-15 from increased drag to further enhancing its already 'big as a barn door' RCS

The computer comments really amuse me. Yes the computer power when the design was frozen are not what they are now. (The author points to 1.4 gHz that shows you how old the article is :lol. But the design has to be frozen at some point, and the variety of tasks performed may not be as intensive as requred to play say Doom III at high refresh rates.

Good points FredT. I was reading another article here on ATS about F-14 replacements and one that was suggested was the ASF-14 Super Tomcat. It would be basically an entire new aircraft using the F-14D as a starting point. It was suppose to have supercruise thrust-vectoring and a degree of stealth capability. It was proposed as a cheaper alternative to the NATF.

www.aerospaceweb.org...

I was wondering if any thing like that was proposed for the Eagle.

I was reading up in Integurl's Aircraft Projects Forum Library. In one of her responses say states.

Originally posted by Intelgurl
stealth has actually slowed the raptor down a bit because in order to be more stealthy, it has no variable geometry inlets which can force air into the engine faster than the airspeed of the plane

So in this case if the F-15 was upgraded to a new airframe it could handle supercruise if it was given the same engine.

Originally posted by danwild6
Good points FredT. I was reading another article here on ATS about F-14 replacements and one that was suggested was the ASF-14 Super Tomcat.

Actually back in the day, the USN and USAF had an agreement. The USAF would by the Avenger II stealth bomber and the USN would buy a navy version of the Raptor. But that who deal fell through with the cancelation of the Avenger II. (it was apretty cool plane. picture a raptor crossed with a Tomcat with the variable geometry wings on a Raptor body. It looked wild)

DW,

>>
Was scanning through google for info on the F-22 and found a page which is pretty old but none the less very informative.
>>

Lies based on a lack of information /knowingly/ promulgated without counterpoint remain just as treasonous.

>>
I know we've been upgrading the F-15 with a new radar but this guy claims we could also upgrade its engine give the F-15 the same perfroman as the F-22.
>>

The F-15's biggest problem is cost and age.
Depending on variant and usage, it costs between 10 and 14 THOUSAND dollars, per flight hour, to run the Eagle. MMH:FH is somewhere around 20 for home station MC rates on the order of 80-85 percent. Take that into the field where your utilization rates go up and, even with a fully funded spares locker, you end up with MMH:FH on the order of 60:1.
And why not? The jet is /old/. Contrary to popular fiction, the Services don't do PDM down to the 'zero flight hours' level. They do it to a level where military utility is no longer hampered. The USAF in particular has a bad reputation for running aircraft around with cracks and partial (drill out, strap over, patch the skin) 'fixes' which the USN does not permit. In any case, these jets have 'twice of everything' which, while it means we have lost fewer than a hundred F-15s compared to the 380 LGPOS that have been lawn darted, also means that you have to have incredible increases in your spares kits, often handed. We 'get by' doing this by exploiting depot remanufactured parts but in truth they so badly mishandled the spares issue in both the early Reagan and Clintonian years that there are quite simply a lot of parts that we can no longer /get/ for the Eagle, new or old.

The Eagle's second biggest difficulty is penetration against a determined S2A defense.
Air to Air is about interdicting the /lane/ (approaches to a target area. If you don't have the positive airspace control (effective ADGE/GCI) you cannot choose the spacing and timing of your own fight. While 'defending' fixed targets is more a function of staking your boot to the ground and daring someone to run over you.
SAMs defend fixed targets, and with the S300/400 class missiles you have systems capable of engaging even an ALQ-135M (with front sector radiators) equipped Eagle at over 60km. Regardless of support jamming. And this situation will only get worse as the rest of the world develops the technology base to go completely over to ARH (active radar homing) systems because provided you can get /even a glimmer/ on your long range surveillance systems, you can throw a missile into the VOLUME of airspace where it's own autonomous seeker will lock up at very short ranges.
The other problem with penetration is quite simply what you do when you get there. The F-15 needs all three tanks /full/ to make anything like a 'clean up, ramp up, sprint up' intercept on _subsonic_ threats. And to carry this fuel means taking off with an empty centerline (nose gear issues), hitting a tanker and then proceeding into indian country. With absolutely no residual weapon capabilities in terms of Suppression or Direct Attack (air to ground) capability.

>>
Does that mean super-cruise? Anyways here's the article.
>>

Doubt it, wouldn't /want/ it if it did.

The F100 was a 220lb/sec engine. The IPE and EFE variants take this to above 250lb/sec (mass flow). The F119, though to some extent ameliorating increased flow requirements within a generally similar intallational envelope (about 34" at the front, 46" overall) by virtue of a much smaller bypass ratio (.2 vs. .32) is still going to need upwards of 270-290lb/sec worth of massflow. And that right there means retuning the entire inlet ramp system with _no_ guarantees that the reserve is there.

Next, you have to consider whether you want to retain the F-22's 2D nozzles, fit AVEN/PBBN or go with conventional nozzles as is current. If you do /anything/ to the back of the jet, you will have to rerig the structural load paths for pitch and possibly yaw variables as well as compensate for the mass displacement of the heavy nozzles themselves.

All before you start looking at the friction drag effects on everything aeroacoustic effects to aluminum thermal cycles on the wing. The F-15 primary airfoil being one of the most 'hostile' of any aircraft known because of the massive vortices that the conical camber spins up, leading to acoustic loads in the hundreds of db.

And for WHAT?

Supercruise, as I define it: dry penetration, 50% of sortie _sustained_ Mach numbers of no less than 1.35.

It's almost a guarantee that it won't happen in an F-15 where parasitic and tunnel effects on half your fuel: (13,800lbs internal + 12,400lbs external) are so extreme.

At which point, you have to ask what SSC (Sustained Super Cruise) /does/ that is valuable. And that comes down to three things:

1. It energizes the missile pole without delay/forced closure for acceleration lag.
2. It allows you to 'knock down the door' by quickly leaping /across/ the immediate fence-in air volume to the target area before the threat can react to a main force following behind at subsonic rates.
3. It allows you to TRANSIT between base and enemy territory at twice the rate so that you waste less time getting there and coming back.

Energizing missile poles on an F-15 is like playing chicken with a porcupine. Because they have the bigger (S2A again) missile and your own closure _extends_ their WEZ poles. AIM-120C5=12ft 7inches. 48N6E (principle S-300 missile)= 23ft. Without stealth, you're just hurting yourself.

Knocking down the door is increasingly less and less important because, for one, Stealth only achieves REAL improvements if it is sufficiently capable, in all sectors, as to allow you to attack multiple targets without direct escort or established (predictable) raid corridors. If you still have to mass like a conventional strike package, you end up hitting targets too slowly to make the cost of the airframes worthwhile. For another, the VLO platforms themselves are able to standoff and use radar imaging to attack relatively small targets, often with IAMs that have a glide kit. This means you don't have to come closer than about 12-15nm for JDAM and upwards of 25-30nm for SDB (50nm if no over penetration is required).

Rapid Transit to Radius (RTR) only helps if you can reduce the total number of aircraft in a raid so that you can nurse the shooters. Since the F-15C is not an (A2G) shooter and indeed /must/ be accompanied by aircraft which are designed solely to protect it. The slowest marcher sets the pace. And that tends to just guzzle gas at an /incredible/ rate (2-3 hits on the tanker per mission)

I won't address the majority of the articles outright lies except to state the following:

From Mach 1.93 and supposedly 60-70,000ft, an F-22 demonstrated a reverse immelman which greatly exceeded the G @ Q capability of any other aircraft extant. Indeed, while -all- aircraft have Q problems (aerodynamic pressure exceeding the strictly accelerative 'G' problems on structures) the difference between them and the F-22 is that it has the high-altitude 'tuned' airframe (840 square feet of area, engines that are probably still putting out well over 27,000lbf above 30,000ft ASL) which can exploit the thinner air at height. Most jets have strict placard limits at low altitude (as does the Raptor) but have no alternative to playing in the 'medium' arena (15-20,000ft) because they cannot summon the thrust nor the lift nor the gas to do sustained supersonic (massive Ps 'excess' energies) to improve their fighting capabilities.

As to the idiocy of being detected with IRST, of course that problem exists but even if the 'promised' performance of Russian 2nd/3rd generation systems match those of the EuroFIRST and OSF (say 60km, FQ) the fact of the matter is that a Raptor is going to be FIRING at those distances and then handing off datalink guidance to an 'illuminator' who is as much as 100-150km further back.

You see, it doesn't /matter/ if they can see you. So long as they cannot shoot you. While you can do unto them.

In this, the F-22 will hopefully continue to enjoy the advantage of ACP assets so that it can be silent-vectored around as much as away from threats which means that, even if the enemy can field long range missiles able to support some kind of IR-through-Radar (uplink steering) that outreach the currently 50% pole (first impact) advantaged Raptor; they will still be challenged by the aircraft's ability to swing wide of their sensor cones and continue the conversion to stern quarter or crossing conditioned WEZ.

As goes the intercept, so goes the fight.

CONCLUSION:
Can the F-15 still be a dominant warrior? IMO, yes. But only as new build airframes with a host of new-development (better than Meteor) standoff weapons. And even then they will NOT be 'air dominant' in terms of taking the fight to enemy air and winning. Because they will be saddled down with conformal fuel to accomodate things-under-wings on the order of FRSW/JASSM and HSARM. In compensation for their inability to contribute more directly to the 'battlespace dominance' (Air To Ground slanted bias) fight, while carrying upwards of six VLRAAM, (probably based upon turbojet as much as ram or gel, high energy, propulsion) on the fuselage stations.

And with CFT, the Eagle flies like a bus. Not all the (F100-PW-232) 'reengining' or thrust vectoring (and new digital flybywire FLCS) in the world is going to change that, even as the provisiion of LANTIRN or Sniper will likely still dramatically reduce supersonics performance.

In effect then, if you purchase 200 F-15F (single seat, derived 15K-orean/15S-ingapore technology inserts across the board as well as 'cheap' APG-63V(3) AESA) instead of going ahead with the Golden Eagle program to essentially turn tired jets into weekend warriors and NORAD assets, you will be making one of these-

www.military.cz...

Which is not /altogether/ a 'bad thing' because if you are a sniper rifle in a shopping cart rather than knights-acharging with lowered long spears, you tend to be able to both stay out of trouble and mind more peoples business as a function of invisible sheep under a long crook.

The problem then becomes what happens when those fancy dual/hyperspectrum/hunting threats start 'seeing' your F-35s. Because with all of two AIM-120 aboard and you 60-80nm behind them, there is a significant reason to believe that they will be short-sticked when it comes to beating off truly A2A intended wolf paltforms (both for energy and for weapons as the JDAM bay is _not_ compatible with the AMRAAM.).

Dunno but that the final solution will still not be seen as 'okay, load half the JSF up with external weapons'. Because, again, they have much more F-16 like budgetary numbers due to later technology and 'only one of everything'. They may also prove to be superior missileers given their more convenient (and numerous) wing pylon arrangement.

Countries buying the F-15 today are looking to do area patrols with major requirements for a WSO driven need for target sureties and sanity check IMO. Either that or they want something big enough to carry mini-cruise (SLAM-ER as much as JASSM) in sufficient numbers as to hostage 'certain parties behavior'.


KPl.

Originally posted by ch1466
The F-15 needs all three tanks /full/ to make anything like a 'clean up, ramp up, sprint up' intercept on _subsonic_ threats. And to carry this fuel means taking off with an empty centerline (nose gear issues), hitting a tanker and then proceeding into indian country. With absolutely no residual weapon capabilities in terms of Suppression or Direct Attack (air to ground) capability.

So the F-15 can't take off with centerlines huh? Funny, these look like centerlines, and full weapons loadouts. I'd like to know _what_ nose gear problems with the F-15? Provide proof of this claim, besides just your word for it. I'd also like to know a bit about your qualifications to be such an expert on how every single weapons system is so bad, or has so many problems. You must be SOME kind of expert since you seem to know everything about everything, from war strategy, to tanks, to planes, and how bad everything was either fought, or truly is.

For the record, I've been involved in launching F-15s, with full internals, three full externals, four shoulder mounted missiles, two full travel pods. And there was *NO* concern about any kind of nose gear problem with ANY of the crews or crewchiefs.





F-15 Missile Launch
Otis F-15s

[edit on 2/6/2006 by Zaphod58]

I would rather buy F-15 single seaters and F-15E type with all new
Raptor equipment then wait for JSF if it comes.

You could call the SUPER EAGLES.

Zaphod,

Go to ACIG.org and ask there. I am repeating what another man told me about issues with qualifying the center station for JDAM or SDB on the Golden Eagle upgrade based upon weak nose gear. His name is Eric L. Palmer and he is both a moderator there and works or worked at one of the depot organizations (Ogden I think) in refurbishing the aircraft.

While the aircraft you posted are indeed Eagles and they did indeed fly with all three stations tanked in DS and the early ONW/OSW, they are all ten+ years older now.

By the time any CCIP equivalent followon (now that we have abandoned MSIP, half done) could complete, they /will be/ 20 years older.

As for the rest of your rant, what do you want, the problems have always been there, if you just choose to look at them through reputatively-rosey glassed over eyes, that's your fault, certainly not mine. Definitely not that of our enemies and competitors who know, full well, the weakness' of our current inventory and doctrinal employment of same.

On a related note, the F-15 actually has better drag conformance with two wing tanks than it does with a single centerline. The difference being the Mach point you can safely jettison them without worrying about the tails.

Now, just to screw with your head. 'Everybody knows' that the F-16 actually has a higher fuel fraction and that it can make better range than the F-15, right?

This is one of the _big_ arguments of the fighter mafia and oh-so-precious Boyd in particular in damning all things big.

Yet what people don't know is that the F-15's which escorted the Osiraq raid flew the _same_ profile (as the F-16s) of lololo all the way across Saudi, Jordan and Iraqi airspace, with 2 610s, 2 CFT and a centerline ALQ-119 in addition to their quad of AIM-7F and AIM-9D. Roughly 13,300lbs on A-mod airframes with the lowest of all allowable grossweight thresholds. They never dropped a single item of ordnance while the F-16's cleaned the entire formation as soon as their wingtanks were empty, dropped their 4,000lbs worth of Mk.84 and came home with only an empty 310 and wingtip weapons.

Yet despite flying burner zoom climbs to BARCAP stations on the four major Iraqi baselanes. Indeed, despite flying 'high cover' into a 70 knot headwind so that the Vipers wouldn't be bounced 20,000ft lower down.

The F-15's came home with enough juice (6-8,000lbs according to most) to 'drop off' their charges before heading back North to Tel Nof at the other end of Israel. While the podunk F-16s came in on a straight approach to the very base they left with and average of 900lbs and as little as 400lbs remaining. All declared emergencies with the fire trucks rolled and waiting.

There now, do you feel better? Does it help you to understand that, just because I appreciate the fact that almost everything is wrong with our current military posture, doesn't mean that I don't see the capabilities and technologic lead it engendered, _25 years ago_?

The F-15, like the F-22 today, represented a 'coulda woulda shoulda' better dream. In that the LWF and it's latest conceptual cloned hellspawn, the F-35, are NOT the way forward.

The same'ol story being that an 'expensive asset', given the right spectrum of capabilities, would be able to do the job with 500 new-build airframes what 2,500 cannot do, in sum or alone, because they cannot be brought effectively to theater, in time.

Yet those 2,500 airframes mean a lot of filthy lucre to the defense industrial base and Congress. While the 500 represent merely a 'High' starting point better served by existing (F-4 'multirole' then) and conceptually more specialist (A-45, bomber only, now) CHEAP platforms.

Again, do I 'shock you'? To think that I would endorse the Rhino over the LGPOS as 'better in Europe'? Because the Rhino could mount a 32" radar dish, carry ECM, targeting pods AND BVR weapons, along with three tanks AND two PGM. Something which the F-16 could not muster until after the last Cold War crisis had long since passed (10 years, more or less). A shortcoming in capability that was infectious in what it made the 'real fighters' put up with in terms of '350lb BVR!' fantasies, also ten years late?

Yet which was necessary because we could not send F-15's over a WARPAC level IADS to escort lolo'ing Lawn Darts amongst the incredibly dense missile thickets. Because they couldn't carry ARM.

On Purpose.

Don't fool yourself, the military exists not to serve our nation but to further their own benefit. Under the law, their massive fraud would be deemed a RICO Act violation of a 'corrupt organization -in business- solely to further their own criminality'. And Congress has long since rolled over and 'bought in' to the concept of technology for sales sake to the extent that there is seemingly no end to the waste.

In this one case, military utility and debased profiteering might actually cross paths in that F-15's are an incapable asset for today's wars, let alone tomorrows. And purchasing more of them (to lower the fleet age if nothing else) would increase the number of spares and training pipes we had to fund. Which would (be still oh my heart) cut into the number of 'cheap' (91 million and counting) F-35s being purchased.


KPl.

I find it interesting that the Golden Eagles, which are just F-15Cs with the AESA would suddenly have nose gear problems, when they didn't BEFORE AESA. The Golden Eagle is simply a REFIT of existing F-15Cs from what I read, which means they're exactly the same as was shown in those pics, except for the radar. But now suddenly they have weak nose gears?

What about the Super F-15, I forgot its model name which has thrust vector and canards which augments the F-15 to match against any present or future fighter aircraft that are owned by potential enemies? It may not be stealthy, but we can't afford to have the whole entire U.S. Air Force to afford an expensive stealth fighter that is heavy maintenance to keep its stealth, kind of like the B-2 that requires special care.

ch1466

Could you please stop posting such rediculously long replies. I never read what you write, only the first 2-3 lines.

It's nothing against you personally, I like reading your point of view, but taking 30 minutes to read each post gets alittle boring.

Back to topic.

The F-22 is so far ahead of the f-15, its not even worth mentioning each advantage. The f-15 is still the best fighter ever built. Until it is fully replaced by the f-22. I would upgrade the f-15 with all the newest computer hardware and upgrade the engines to still maintain the high top end, but increase quickness and power to weight for better sprints.

The F-15 is still an excellent fighter and should lst another 25 years.

As far as your title suggests, scraping the f-22 would probably be the biggest mistake in military history.

Train

Originally posted by deltaboy
What about the Super F-15, I forgot its model name which has thrust vector and canards which augments the F-15 to match against any present or future fighter aircraft that are owned by potential enemies? It may not be stealthy, but we can't afford to have the whole entire U.S. Air Force to afford an expensive stealth fighter that is heavy maintenance to keep its stealth, kind of like the B-2 that requires special care.

Deltaboy, you are referring to the F-15 ACTIVE. This is not an upgraded model F-15 as you seem to think it is. It was an experimental one off conversion of an ex service airframe used to develop technologies for future fighters like the F-22. There was never any intention of incorporating any of that tech into the service F-15.

Originally posted by waynos
Deltaboy, you are referring to the F-15 ACTIVE. This is not an upgraded model F-15 as you seem to think it is. It was an experimental one off conversion of an ex service airframe used to develop technologies for future fighters like the F-22. There was never any intention of incorporating any of that tech into the service F-15.

Maybe experimental, but it sounds like a good compromise to save costs to augment the U.S. Airforce. Imagine F-15s with ACTIVE technology as well as technology that is currently present at this time that can improve the planes' performance.

Maybe so, but it would still take time and money to develop a serviceable fighter from this test bed, with the Raptor already better and already in service what would be the point? Never go backwards.

Originally posted by waynos
Maybe so, but it would still take time and money to develop a serviceable fighter from this test bed, with the Raptor already better and already in service what would be the point? Never go backwards.

I would never say go backwards, but using the F-16s as examples that have improved or upgraded from Block 60 to so on. So using F-15s as upgrades. Yes the F-22 is an awesome plane that can do all capability, but there is so few. Thats where the F-15 could come in. Its not like we are starting from scratch.

Waynos your probably right it is to late to change our minds now. One of the reasons I posted this thread was to find out if we really had anyother options than the F-22. I remember back in the nineties funding for the F-22 was actually stop for a period of time by congressional republicans. They claimed it was to expensive an aircraft. I was wondering if anyone now of any alternatives proposed to take the place of the F-22.

Could you please stop posting such rediculously long replies. I never read what you write, only the first 2-3 lines.

I have to say, after getting acclimated to his jargon-rich writing style, and having to some extent overcome acronym shock, I am starting to really enjoy KPl's posts.

I still have trouble tracking some of the referents though.
LGPOS?

(I think I get the POS part)

As to the F-22. After the decades and billions spent, and with an extremely capable (if extremely expensive) aircraft starting to enter service, it seems like a bad idea to give up and throw it all in the dumpster now.

Originally posted by danwild6
Waynos your probably right it is to late to change our minds now. One of the reasons I posted this thread was to find out if we really had anyother options than the F-22. I remember back in the nineties funding for the F-22 was actually stop for a period of time by congressional republicans. They claimed it was to expensive an aircraft. I was wondering if anyone now of any alternatives proposed to take the place of the F-22.

A USAF order for 350 Typhoons would be enormously well recieved but really I don't think there is another option.

Yeah I'm pretty share thats not going to happen. Typhoon is a great plane but outside of the Harrier I can't think of another aircraft we've gotten from across the pond.