F-15N Sea Eagle

Originally posted by waynos
There's no question that you can navalise a land based fighter, its been done many times since the RNAS first took Sopwith Camels out to sea (and often left them there). The question is whether it would be worth it given that the fighter in question is over 30 years old and facing retirement itself in the foreseeable future.

Lovely model though, there's nothing wrong with speculating on possibilities in plastic, I've done it myself,

I've seen it mentioned before about the F-14 being derived from the F-111B and it just isn't true, I don't know where this comes from?

The basic fact of the matter is, in simplified form because I don't have enough facts to hand to type a detailed account, that after everyone realised that the F-111B was a bit of a pigs ear of a fighter, Grumman started from scratch to design a fighter that met broadly the samer spec. It was entirely new.

For a plane to have been derived from another the basic architecture of the original would have to be utilised in some form, however there is nothing of the F-111 in the F-14 aside from various items of equipment.



[edit on 1-11-2005 by waynos]

I know the F-15 is over 30 years old by now but i dont see the reason for it to be replaced. What about other planes for instance the C-130 ,C-47 Skytrain and the 'Future Proof' F-4 Phantom.

The Thai air force still use C-47s but they have been revamped to use turboprop engines, the same could be done with the F-15, they could just be revamped with thrust vectoring exhausts , front canards, blended wings and angled wingtips to deflect radar beams.

Well anyway looks like the F-15 is going to be future proof too, they say it will retire in about 2030ish.

Anyway here is another forgotten state of the art aircraft:
www.vectorsite.net...

[edit on 1-11-2005 by Browno]

What about those other planes? The C-130 and C-47 are transports, they don't need to be faster ands more manouverable than other transports to survive do they?

What about the F-4? is this ther 'future proof F4' that is almost extinct among the worlds major air forces, hmmm? How future proof is that?

Is this viewpoint coming from an appreciation of the F-15 and its likely future opponents standpoint or an 'I love the F-15, it rocks! standpoint because it appears to be the latter, if that is the case then I agree with you, it does, indeed, 'rock'.

However that will not make the USN buy it or the USAF keep more than they HAVE to.

Originally posted by waynos
What about those other planes? The C-130 and C-47 are transports, they don't need to be faster ands more manouverable than other transports to survive do they?

What about the F-4? is this ther 'future proof F4' that is almost extinct among the worlds major air forces, hmmm? How future proof is that?

Is this viewpoint coming from an appreciation of the F-15 and its likely future opponents standpoint or an 'I love the F-15, it rocks! standpoint because it appears to be the latter, if that is the case then I agree with you, it does, indeed, 'rock'.

However that will not make the USN buy it or the USAF keep more than they HAVE to.

If the NATO air forces are getting rid of the F-4 Phantoms , i think its becouse they are just getting bored of them becouse they has lasted for centuries. If i was a NATO Pilot ,I suppose i would get fed up of using the same aircraft over and over again, I guess it would wreck the pilots heads too, they would all start giving thier careers up becouse of the government not buying brand new classy jet planes and just using the same old 'out of fashion' plane.

I do understand other NATO countries for phasing them out of service but i still consider that they are practical workhorses and they are still affective jet fighters. Anyway i think the last user of the F-4 Phantom should be the new Iraq, becouse they are NATOs newest member and they are just in process rebuilding thier air force, Later on they could get more advanced planes(JSFs n stuff like that).

I guess the US and NATO should send every single phantom in the world to the new Iraqi Air Force and after that , That will be the last of the F-4 Phantoms Phore ever.

Mod Edit: Fixed Quote Tag.


[edit on 1/11/2005 by Mirthful Me]

However that will not make the USN buy it or the USAF keep more than they HAVE to.

Than you agree Waynos that the US Navy has no real Air Superiority Fighter., they need to develop one because the F-35 is not an air superiority fighter.

Originally posted by Browno

If the NATO air forces are getting rid of the F-4 Phantoms , i think its becouse they are just getting bored of them becouse they has lasted for centuries. If i was a NATO Pilot ,I suppose i would get fed up of using the same aircraft over and over again, I guess it would wreck the pilots heads too, they would all start giving thier careers up becouse of the government not buying brand new classy jet planes and just using the same old 'out of fashion' plane.

I do understand other NATO countries for phasing them out of service but i still consider that they are practical workhorses and they are still affective jet fighters. Anyway i think the last user of the F-4 Phantom should be the new Iraq, becouse they are NATOs newest member and they are just in process rebuilding thier air force, Later on they could get more advanced planes(JSFs n stuff like that).

I guess the US and NATO should send every single phantom in the world to the new Iraqi Air Force and after that , That will be the last of the F-4 Phantoms Phore ever.



[

Hmmm, yes, right. Its all so clear now. What fool I've been, get those Spey Phantoms back and sod the Typhoon Tony!

Westpoint, yes I do agree with what you say. I know the F-35C involves a major redesign of the type to meet the needs of the USN but it will never be a dominant fighterin the way the F-15 and F-14 are/were.

I guess the Navy must either feel it doesn't need to be or else they might feel they are getting shafted as they see each new F/A-22 delivered.

shafted eh? they had their chance to join in on the program and the USN said no. As for not being able to do the job of the 15/14 the 35 will have other things on it side say stealth uptodate electronics etc. The 35 wont hurt the USN but i do agree it will never preform speed wise to the 14 or 15. its a middle ground F/A plane which the USN has but in the 18E/F.

Originally posted by WestPoint23

However that will not make the USN buy it or the USAF keep more than they HAVE to.

Than you agree Waynos that the US Navy has no real Air Superiority Fighter., they need to develop one because the F-35 is not an air superiority fighter.

Why dont aircraft conglomerates (Major Corporations) just make a naval variant of a particular fighter plane when they are first released. ok they may not enter service or production but you knever know they may one day come useful, they may lead to aircraft designs in the future or just to experiment the capability with naval use. this should have been done from scratch, at leased they tried with the F-111B. Also the Rockwell/North American A-5/RA-5 Vigilante(As posted above) was a naval aircraft, they even wanted to manufacture an Air Force Interceptor variant.

The Russians made an effort with thier MIG-29s and the Sukhoi SU-27 Family. Why didnt they do this with the ATF Programme , well anyway i heard the USN actually wanted the YF-23 Black Widow 2 as a replacement for the F-14 Tomcat but OH NO the government wouldnt let them have it

I guess it was also the USN who also tried to save the YF-23. Poor old Northrop Grumman always seem to loose with Lockheed Martin. I dont care if Lockheed Martin is the biggest defence contractor, i will still be on Northrop Grummans side no matter how many times they lose.

I hope one day Northrop-Grumman will smash Lockheed Martin once and for all.

NORTHROP-GRUMMAN 4EVER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[edit on 2-11-2005 by Browno]

Planes don't just get developed on a whim any more. The days when such as the Spitfire was developed privately and then presented to the air ministry as a finished article with a note saying 'you might like to buy this' are sadly long gone. No company will risk billions of dollars developing a naval version of their new air force fighter in the hope that the Navy will like it, first the Navy has to ask for it and then outside funding has to be secured otherwise you end up with nothing but lots of drawings, just like here in Britain for the last 50 years.

The Russians navalised the MiG 29 and Su-27 because the Russian Govt and Navy wanted it doing and put up development funding, not because Sukhoi and MiG thought it wasa neat idea.

[edit on 2-11-2005 by waynos]

Originally posted by waynos
Planes don't just get developed on a whim any more.[edit on 2-11-2005 by waynos]

unless your like the company that is developing the jet taxi or the areocar (i think that one is more a hobby project though). I like the idea though of submiting an idea you patent on your own though to a company. like give boeing or airbus the jet taxi idea and take 'some" aka hell of alot of cash for the idea?

Originally posted by Off_The_Street
As many of you know, before the merger, I worked for MD, and we went through the same hoo-raw with what we called the AH-64B, a marinized version of the original Apache. The cost to marinize the aircraft was enormous, and was based on blade-fold concerns, changing the intakes to eliminate water ingestion, and re-examining every single part of the helicopter to ensure that it wouldn't fail due to corrosiveness. It wasn't worth it.

Now inasmuch as my company builds it, it would certainly do wonders for my 401(k) is there were a huge attempt to marinize the F-15, but the costs are so high (based upon all the items mentioned by sminky, shattered, et. al.)in relation to the benefits that it's never been seriously considered.

In other words to say, how can navalization ends...

Originally posted by COOL HAND
There is no need for this aircraft to be brought to life. The thing would take up too much room on the flight deck and would require an almost total redesign.

The F-15's days are numbered, stop trying to save it.

The F-15 Eagle and the F-14 Tomcat are sort of the same size, The F-14 actually has a bigger wingspan then the eagle when spread and if they could navalise the F-15, it would have folding wings so it wouldnt really make any difference about the size.

Also IF the F-15 days ARE numbered for this revampment, why dont they navalise the F/A-22 Raptor?.

Originally posted by Browno
The F-15 Eagle and the F-14 Tomcat are sort of the same size, The F-14 actually has a bigger wingspan then the eagle when spread and if they could navalise the F-15, it would have folding wings so it wouldnt really make any difference about the size.

Which would require hinge points which would alter the top speed and load capacity of the wings. There would also be manuevering limitations imposed by it.

Also IF the F-15 days ARE numbered for this revampment, why dont they navalise the F/A-22 Raptor?.

Because the Navy uses Cruise Missiles for its first strike. There is no need for a stealth strike platform for the Navy at this time. We learned our lesson from the A-12 program.

Originally posted by COOL HAND

Originally posted by Browno
The F-15 Eagle and the F-14 Tomcat are sort of the same size, The F-14 actually has a bigger wingspan then the eagle when spread and if they could navalise the F-15, it would have folding wings so it wouldnt really make any difference about the size.

Which would require hinge points which would alter the top speed and load capacity of the wings. There would also be manuevering limitations imposed by it.

What is this thing with these UCAVs? ok they look good but why carnt they be manned?. Instead of joining the air force to be a pilot, we may as well fly RC planes or computer flight sims for a living instead!.

Also, The USN had the best aircraft from the 1970s to the 1990s and now(F-14s n stuff).
It always seems to me the good things are from the past.

If i could go back in time and assasinate someone, I would assasinate the person who said 'all good things must come to an end'.

I think it would be pointless to "navalize" (sp?) the F-15.

The F-15 is to land as the F-14 is to sea... similar to the F-16 (land) and the F-18 (sea)... It might be a good idea but it would not be cost effective. The F-15N weighs way to much to be a feasable carrier craft. Adding the long range weapons that a 14 can carry only adds to the weight that a 15N would be.

"F-15N
During the development phase of the Eagle, the US Navy was instructed in July of 1971 to take a look at a possible navalized version of the Eagle, provisionally designated F-15N. At that time, the Navy was perfectly happy with its Grumman F-14A Tomcat, which was then in its flight test phase, and was less than enthusiastic about a "Sea Eagle".
The tailhook-equipped, navalized F-15N would weigh some 2300 pounds more than the USAF F-15A. The Navy was unhappy about the fact that the F-15N aircraft would be unable to carry or launch the AIM-54A Phoenix long-range missile. Inclusion of this missile would have increased the weight even further. Consequently, the F-15N proceeded no further than the concept stage.

The US Senate briefly revived the carrier-based Eagle idea in March of 1973. However, the Navy decided instead to go with a mix of F-14 Tomcats and F/A-18 Hornets, and the F-15N was never ordered. "

I would love to see them continue or upgrade the F-14 program, I just don't know if Northrop-Grumman has it in them. All the original F-14 factories (here on Long Island) are shut down (well not sure about the one in Bethpage). Man I miss the days as a kid when my dad would take me down to Calverton to watch the F-14's and A-6's take off and land all day long. Alas.. all we have now is a mothballed F-14 and A-6 sitting on the ground as a makeshift museum.



My dad and my son at the old Calverton Grumman field.

[edit on 11-11-2005 by DerekJR321]

I keep hearing from alot of posters that the F-15 is heavier than the F-14!?!? Where are you getting this information from. The F-14 is the heaviest fighter that we have. Its maximum take-Off weight was HUGE! The weight of the strike eagle (81,000 lbs) is for bombing missions.

In Fact:

F-14 - Maximum Takeoff Weight 72,900 pounds (32,805 kg)

F-15 - Maximum Takeoff Weight 68,000 pounds (30,600 kilograms). 81,000 lb (36741 kg) In the E/F Model, which is a strike platform.

F-18 Maximum Take-Off weight of around 25,000 kg's

As you can see, the Tomcat is the heaviest fighter.

Train

I may have misread other posts but my belief is that the claim is not that the F-15N would be heavier than the Tomcat, but that the conversion to naval ops would make it much heavier than the land based F-15 and thus adversely affect its performance.

There is no chanse that a project like this would ever reach its destination. First of all the F-15 is namde under the label "All weather air superiority fighter" not as the Tomcat "Multi-role fighter for carrier operations" or as the Hornet "Carrier based strike fighter" You must understand that when a plane is designed it's designed to operate under that label that it has. An ordinary fighter can't suddenly be changed to be a carrier fighter, just because it has been succesful otherwise. And when the Tomcat was planned, it was designed to be good in carrier operations. Its weels, engines, wings must be suitable for that sort of action. An F-15 doesn't fill those criterias. That means that if the plane would ever make it to the carrier stage, it would have to go throw a new planning stage, wich would change the plane totally, and therefore the plane wouldn't be an
F-15 anymore.

Besides, what use would that plane make...?? Now that the F-35 and the F/A-18 G will come in use... No use what so ever, there is no room at the carriers for a new fighter type, there just isn't, believe me, this project was sentenced to death from the beginning...

[edit on 12-11-2005 by Figher Master FIN]

[edit on 12-11-2005 by Figher Master FIN]

Originally posted by Figher Master FIN
There is no chanse that a project like this would ever reach its destination. First of all the F-15 is namde under the label "All weather air superiority fighter" not as the Tomcat "Multi-role fighter for carrier operations" or as the Hornet "Carrier based strike fighter" You must understand that when a plane is designed it's designed to operate under that label that it has. An ordinary fighter can't suddenly be changed to be a carrier fighter, just because it has been succesful otherwise. And when the Tomcat was planned, it was designed to be good in carrier operations. Its weels, engines, wings must be suitable for that sort of action. An F-15 doesn't fill those criterias. That means that if the plane would ever make it to the carrier stage, it would have to go throw a new planning stage, wich would change the plane totally, and therefore the plane wouldn't be an
F-15 anymore.

Besides, what use would that plane make...?? Now that the F-35 and the F/A-18 G will come in use... No use what so ever, there is no room at the carriers for a new fighter type, there just isn't, believe me, this project was sentenced to death from the beginning...

[edit on 12-11-2005 by Figher Master FIN]

[edit on 12-11-2005 by Figher Master FIN]

There was even a proposed Naval Eurofighter but the Royal Navy has turned this down for the F-35 JSF. Arent the British MOD supposed to have two Nuclear Powered Supercarriers at the start of the next decade?. The Eurofighter is a good plane but coudnt it be designed more 'stealthy' like the F/A-22?.

I also thought that European countries want thier own Aircraft Industry now instead of buying 'US' Planes all the time.

www.royal-navy.mod.uk...
www.eurofighter-typhoon.co.uk...


[edit on 12-11-2005 by Browno]

The 'Sea Typhoon' was rejected because the RN wanted to retain STOVL capability and the F-35B is the only option for this, but there are reports that the Navy is now having a rethink about this, but it concerns buying the F-35C in its place, not the Typhoon.

Dont forget also that BAE is a full partner in the F-35 and UK versions will bbe about 40% UK produced.

As for making the Typhoon more stealthy like the F/A-22, the point here is that the Typhoon meets the RAF's requirements and we need to be able to afford it, Britain is not a superpower and expenditure on an F/A-22 type fighter is unjustifiable.

Also I don't think the RN 's new carriers are going to be either nuclear powered or 'supercarriers' really. They will be about 2/3 the size of the US carriers, which is big enough for us and much bigger than the current carriers we have.

Originally posted by waynos
The 'Sea Typhoon' was rejected because the RN wanted to retain STOVL capability and the F-35B is the only option for this, but there are reports that the Navy is now having a rethink about this, but it concerns buying the F-35C in its place, not the Typhoon.

Dont forget also that BAE is a full partner in the F-35 and UK versions will bbe about 40% UK produced.

As for making the Typhoon more stealthy like the F/A-22, the point here is that the Typhoon meets the RAF's requirements and we need to be able to afford it, Britain is not a superpower and expenditure on an F/A-22 type fighter is unjustifiable.

Also I don't think the RN 's new carriers are going to be either nuclear powered or 'supercarriers' really. They will be about 2/3 the size of the US carriers, which is big enough for us and much bigger than the current carriers we have.

Ok they are not 'Supercarriers' as such but they would be to Britain becouse we never had anything like this before(Exept the HMS Ark Royal Maybe). They would be about the size of the French Foch/US Essex type carriers but with a wider deck?. If they do, I cannot wait till they enter service.

Wasnt Britain in the 1960s discussing about a carrier before, The CVA 01?
www.hazegray.org...

www.airpower.at...

images.google.co.uk...://seaveemodels.com/pics/big_117.jpg&imgrefurl=http://seaveemodels.com/browse_117&h=600&w=800&sz=77&tbnid =CSahCHHJxEIJ:&tbnh=106&tbnw=142&hl=en&start=8&prev=/images%3Fq%3DCVA%2B01%26svnum%3D10%26hl%3Den%26lr%3D%26sa%3DN

[edit on 12-11-2005 by Browno]