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The F-15 Eagle: Origins and Development, 1964-1972 [pdf]
- tomohawk 3y agoThe F15-EX has been in the news recently. Interesting comparison and contrast with F35: https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/buying-just-80-f-15exs-makes-no-sense https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/buying-just-80-f-15exs...
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- knolan 3y agoI don’t think I’ve ever seen the competing designs to the McDonnell Douglas design before. Were these public at the time like with later aircraft competitions? I’m thinking of the YF-17, YF-23 and X-32.
- belter 3y agoLooks like this is the best you are going to get, some photos in the answer: https://www.quora.com/Did-the-F-15-fighter-plane-have-any-competitor-prototypes-and-what-were-they https://www.quora.com/Did-the-F-15-fighter-plane-have-any-co... Fairchild Republic F-X: https://qph.cf2.quoracdn.net/main-qimg-5032893d14a8556ef65b40dd92f3a393-lq https://qph.cf2.quoracdn.net/main-qimg-5032893d14a8556ef65b4... General Dynamics F-X: https://qph.cf2.quoracdn.net/main-qimg-725ce5a1fe83a987224ca04bc399e822-lq https://qph.cf2.quoracdn.net/main-qimg-725ce5a1fe83a987224ca... North American Rockwell NA-335: https://qph.cf2.quoracdn.net/main-qimg-aad2b19e0e947f1cc2a4aafdbd7f23f1-lq https://qph.cf2.quoracdn.net/main-qimg-aad2b19e0e947f1cc2a4a...
- icegreentea2 3y agoThere are drawings of the Fairchild and North American ones in the PDF (page 60) as well. The Fairchild one looks incredibly Ace Combat (I think it's the super wide engine pods).
- knolan 3y agoThat’s what I meant. The PDF is the first I’ve seen.
- Stevvo 3y agoThe "Dissent and Decision" section is fun. Reads very much as a battle over egos and personalities rather than the technical merits of a particular aircraft.
- icegreentea2 3y agoThat tends to happen because military procurement is always a set of compromises, so there lies a tremendous amount of room for basically arguing about how to weigh the different requirements/criteria/mission sets. Also while the article vindicates Sprey's want of having a lightweight fighter, the reality is that while lightweight fighters did come, they quickly became exactly what Sprey would not have wanted (once the F-16 entered service, it quickly gained BVR capability for example) because the mission that Sprey envisioned (pure within visual range air combat) wasn't nearly as significant in the 90s and onwards.
- sandworm101 3y agoThe 16 wouldnt exist if not for the 15. It, and the 18, were a direct reaction to the size and complexity of the 15. The 16 even shared the same engine, making it very much the little brother of the 15.
- VLM 3y agoWikipedia disagrees and claims the last BVR missile engagement at BVR range was 30 years ago and BVR missiles are usually combat ineffective. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beyond-visual-range_missile https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beyond-visual-range_missile BVR is kind of a cold war tech; "its WW3 shoot down all the soviet bombers" it doesn't have another mission at this time. To risky to use.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- mlyle 3y agoRussia has been nibbling at and slowly attriting the Ukrainian air force with R-37's. BVR is a tricky technology. If your rules of engagement let you indiscriminately kill something without being sure of its identity, it's capable. But you need to not have normal air traffic in the area or not give a shit about the consequences or both.
- RcouF1uZ4gsC 3y ago> OSD, however, refused to tolerate this kind of intransigence and in May 1966 McNamara ordered a joint review of the commonality issue. Conducted over the next 18 months, the review confirmed that the needs of the Air Force and Navy could not be met by a single airframe. The two services argued that attempts to merge their requirements would produce, at exorbitant cost, a grotesque mutation with increased weight, and reduced performance. The truth of this is again illustrated by the Joint Strike Fighter F-35 with its massive cost overruns and its reduced performance.
- u320 3y ago"F-35 is bad" is just an internet meme with little to support it.
- belter 3y agoWe can revisit it after it is proven in combat, something that still has to happen.
- chiph 3y agoThe Israelis have released footage of shooting down two drones, so they have the first kills with the F-35. Obviously this was not against a maneuvering human pilot, but still important. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AdSFEpqwA6Q https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AdSFEpqwA6Q
- FridayoLeary 3y agoThey also have multiple (unproven but everyone knows who did it) strikes against iranian positions in syria and even in iran itself, it is rumoured. The ability to be invisible to radar is an absolute gamechanger.
- belter 3y agoThat just make it difficult to lock on with weapons. They are not invisible and any radar operator would tell you that if they would be allowed... "...Stealth designs minimize an aircraft's radar signature, delaying and sometimes even preventing detection, but because of the physical requirements for tactical jets, stealth fighters can be easily spotted by certain low-frequency radar bands. In fact, it's not even uncommon for air traffic control radar to be able to spot stealth fighters on their scopes. And we're not just talking about when these aircraft are carrying external munitions or fuel tanks, rather, even in full-on "stealth mode," F-22s and F-35s aren't as sneaky as you might think." - https://www.businessinsider.com/radars-can-see-best-stealth-jets-but-cant-stop-them-2022-7?international=true&r=US&IR=T https://www.businessinsider.com/radars-can-see-best-stealth-...
- skeeterbug 3y agoMegaprojects just did an episode on the F15: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pgI7jDd7hww https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pgI7jDd7hww
- mulmen 3y agoThat video is loaded with inaccuracies. They make an inexplicable Top Gun/Tom Cruise reference which suggests they don’t seem to know the difference between the F-15, F-14, or F-18. Or perhaps even between the US Navy and USAF. I’m not aware of any plans to send F-15s to Ukraine. I have only heard of F-16 and maybe F-35. The video thumbnail shows F-15s with a single (offset?) rudder. There’s a reference to the F-11 which seems to actually mean the F-111. There is a reference to an F-22 Megaprojects video that doesn’t seem to exist. They may mean F-35 here. They claim the F-15 was active in Vietnam when it didn’t enter combat service until 1976. This may be another mistaken F-14 reference. The video claims the F-15 C and D are no longer in service with the US military but they are. The gun is not in the nose, it is in the wing root. The AIM7 and AIM9 were not new for the F-15C. Both are from the late 1950s. F-15E weighs more than the F-15C/D. The video suggests that the F-15EX and F-15 II are different planes but the F-15EX is the “Eagle II”, the same plane. The F-15EX is not claiming to go mach 3+. It is mach 2.4 capable, similar to the F-15C/D. Jordan didn’t have Mig-25s, the Syrians did. It’s so egregious I unsubscribed from the channel before my Gell-Mann amnesia could subject me to further incorrect information. It’s a shame because I enjoyed these channels but now can’t trust them.
- formerly_proven 3y ago> That video is loaded with inaccuracies. > It’s so egregious I unsubscribed from the channel before my Gell-Mann amnesia could subject me to further incorrect information. It’s a shame because I enjoyed these channels but now can’t trust them. Kinda curious that a lot of people complain about "videos replacing text" yet these "inaccurately paraphrase Wikipedia out loud while playing a Powerpoint made from Wikipedia/Commons and other images" channels like the one you linked, Asianometry and so on are huge and popular. And those at least write a (highly derivative or essentially plagiarized) script and read it, there's channels that do the same thing but with GPT for the script and TTS for the voice, and even those are pretty big. edit: Funnily enough both kinds of channels have the "GPT issue" in that they always want to sound confident and authoritative, so they never point out if they are unsure about something. Compare this to channels like Applied Science or Breaking Taps where they very clearly point out when they don't understand something or are unsure of their understanding.
- chiph 3y agoFor those of you using CA Harvest Software Change Manager, it has it's origins with Hughes Aircraft and the software written for the F-15. It was sold commercially as CCC/Harvest by Softool Corp starting in the late 1970's. Looks like Broadcom is the newest owner. It's still being used - the last time I encountered it was in 2009 at a large bank.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- smcameron 3y ago> CCC/Harvest Now that's a name I've not heard in a long time. A long time. (Was working at McDonnell Douglas at the time (mid 1990s), ISS related, had no idea about the F-15 connection. I do remember thinking CCC/Harvest seemed like a really strange choice at the time, but this F-15 connection... alright, so that's probably why.)
- YZF 3y agoI got to see F-15s flying every day for almost three years pretty close up. They are amazing machines.
- mpclark 3y agoI get to see them flying at low level pretty much daily, as I live on the Mach Loop in Wales where they practice. The howl as they go over never gets old, though I guess I’d feel very differently if they weren’t just training.
- fm2606 3y agoYou are right the sound never gets annoying. But... In the early 90s I was a crew chief on the F15. I worked nights (what we called swing shift) and so slept during the day. Depending on which runway they were using the landing pattern would go right over the dorms. Some airmen in the dorms had car alarms with the sensitivity set so low that when the jets flew over the car alarms would go off. THAT got annoying!
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- justinator 3y agoDeath From Above
- 29athrowaway 3y agoThe Soviets had better aircraft, then pilots defected to the US and Americans reverse engineered them.
- chiph 3y agoCertain aspects were better, yes. That's because the Soviets made different trade-offs in the design -- variously because of doctrine, time constraints, availability of exotic materials (and the ability to use them in manufacturing), and "helpful" direction from Moscow. The MiG-25 "Foxbat" is a famous example. To succeed in it's role as an high-speed interceptor it should have been made from titanium. But it's a very expensive and difficult metal to work with, so temperature critical parts were instead made from stainless steel. In the west there were lots of jokes about it rusting in the rain and the use of vacuum tubes, but tubes allowed it to have a very powerful radar. Plus that's what they had to work with (the Soviets having great difficulties making high-current semiconductors).
- jojobas 3y agoMig-25 is 80% stainless steel, compare to SR-71 which was 85% titanium.
- bee_rider 3y agoI don’t know if that is true or not, but if so, I guess it is a stirring endorsement of the idea of being a nice liberal democracy that people want to move to.
- zokier 3y agospoiler: its largely not true. There was single significant defection before the introduction of the "teen" fighters, codenamed HAVE DOUGHNUT, and even it was not actually Soviet (an Iraqi pilot defected to Israel). All the other defections (which there were several) happened using old/non-fighter aircraft (iirc there were several MiG-15/17/19 which were essentially Korean War era designs), or happened after the teens were designed.
- The_Colonel 3y agoI'm kind of fascinated how these deadly machines can be so good-looking / elegant.
- justinator 3y agoI've worked at Wings Over the Rockies a bit, and they have an old F4. It's not good looking/elegant. It just looks like a bunch of giant metal cylinders welded onto each other that holds a lot of very explosive liquid with mounting points to put smaller cylinders on with more explosives. I get that the status quo has marketed fighter jets as sexy, but they just are there to do a job and that job is to kill.
- The_Colonel 3y agoI agree regarding the older jets like F-4. But e.g. F-15, F-22, MiG-29 or B-2/21 look great. Interestingly, the newer F-35 less so (it's a bit "chunky").
- mhh__ 3y agoHence "Fat Amy" for the F-35