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Aircraft Vs Thread 4


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They did upgrade. They just need to do it again.

Anyways----a further upgrade is certainly possible and has been studied many times, but nothing ever comes of it. Money I'd guess is the main reason. Until the engines literally fall apart, I think they don't see a need to replace them. Note that any retrofit will most likely be four engines. PW2037's would be a good choice, that's very similar to what's on the C-17. Or go up to 2040's. If they really wanted to keep 8 engines, they could probably use JT8D-217's----plenty of older MD-80's to get them from. JT8D-17R from 727's would be an even better fit (literally and power-wise) but really wouldn't be worth it, age/fuel-wise. But I don't even know if there's enough of those to go around---pretty rare option on the 727, and no other plane AFAIK used that version.

You'd need 4 MD-80's worth of engines for each B-52. Buying 4 larger, new engines would be easier (and more fuel-efficient and powerful), but cost a lot more.

Iirc retraining the ground crews, and replacing all of their equipment have made changing over to new engines uneconomical.
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as useful as B-52s still are. i just dont see the airforce actually doing the re engine program. they seem to want to tie their budget up on other toys. think of all the raptors that could be bought with the money of buying 350-400 jet engines for the B-52s :rolleyes: they would kill off the B-52s just like the f-14s were killed off if it meant better toys.

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I just tested the link and it works for me. What are you having problems with? Just getting the video to play? Could be your security settings.

I took a screencap. This is all I get, maybe it's a Firefox issue. No biggie, I'll look it up on youtube or I'll try it at work tomorrow.

post-3373-1189624516_thumb.jpg

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Just read about bomb big and nasty. In other news, about a week to 2 weeks ago, Airbus was showing off their huge plane in Thailand and while taxing it out to liftoff, they kinda sideswiped a building. Seems the plane wingspan was a little too big. Both plane and building took very minor damage. The flight IIRC was delayed about 4 hours as they examined the damage to the wing. Also

http://www.spacemart.com/reports/Skyray_48...Flight_999.html

About time they got this up in the air. Have seen photos of the sucker from Langley Research Center, nice to know she has taken to the sky.

Cruel Angel's Thesis

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Okay, here's a Youtube video showing a Russian news report on the "Father of all Bombs". It shows the Tu-160 Blackjack that allegedly carried it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z1ee_cDX7ys

Regarding the Fox News video viewer, I can view clips on there no problem at work, but when I try to watch the same clips at home, it will show the viewer but never show the video so I'm guessing it's something toggled on or off in the web browser security settings.

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First, this is a REALLY cool picture---darn watermark ruins it for wallpaper though. (And the shape's hard to fit)

http://www.airliners.net/open.file/1265696/L/

But--look at the F-22's. Do they actually have different canopies, or is the slightly different angle enough to totally change how they look? They're almost exactly the same position in relation to the camera.

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First, this is a REALLY cool picture---darn watermark ruins it for wallpaper though. (And the shape's hard to fit)

http://www.airliners.net/open.file/1265696/L/

But--look at the F-22's. Do they actually have different canopies, or is the slightly different angle enough to totally change how they look? They're almost exactly the same position in relation to the camera.

You're not going crazy. I noticed the same thing in this image from the USAF article on the 100th Raptor being delivered.

070817-F-0986R-005.jpg

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Maybe there is a newer transparency for the F-22's canopy that's being tested out. The gold tinting is a RCS reducing measure to prevent radar from bouncing around the cockpit; the cockpit on most aircraft tends to be one of the biggest RCS sources. Maybe a new tinting is being put to use. But then again the combination of material and that the shape of the canopy is designed for a lower RCS to begin with, even the slightest change in position could effect the visual appearance and transparency of the cockpit.

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Maybe there is a newer transparency for the F-22's canopy that's being tested out. The gold tinting is a RCS reducing measure to prevent radar from bouncing around the cockpit; the cockpit on most aircraft tends to be one of the biggest RCS sources. Maybe a new tinting is being put to use. But then again the combination of material and that the shape of the canopy is designed for a lower RCS to begin with, even the slightest change in position could effect the visual appearance and transparency of the cockpit.

That was my assumption as well. Gold isn't exactly inexpensive (it is gold after all) even in the extremely thin layers they use for aircraft canopies. I've noticed that the same is happening for other aircraft that used to have gold tinted canopies (F-16s, Super Hornet) it's likely we have just found a cheaper/more effective/easier to maintain canopy coating than frigging gilding our fighter canopies.

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AFAIK the main reason for the elimination of gold canopies on the F-16 and 18 is the increasing use of night-vision goggles. It interferes with them. You'll note F-16 Block 40's were the first to abandon it, and often just the front half of the canopy. But the F-22 isn't going to be night-bombing much.

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AFAIK the main reason for the elimination of gold canopies on the F-16 and 18 is the increasing use of night-vision goggles. It interferes with them. You'll note F-16 Block 40's were the first to abandon it, and often just the front half of the canopy. But the F-22 isn't going to be night-bombing much.

Well technically speaking they will be night bombing, but they won't have much use for NVGs at 50,000 ft. Still I doubt the DoD was willing to trade a sizable RCS increase for better NVG capability. I'm willing to bet that they came up with something that was both NVG compatible and still maintained the RCS aspects. It was probably installed in the Raptor for commonality sake, that and you never know when you might need to quickly integrate NVGs on a new airframe.

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In other news, an MD-80 operated by One-Two-Go, a budget arm of Orient Thai, just crashed on landing at Phuket.

http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/afp.../300192/1/.html

From the news report and video, it was an aborted landing in very bad weather, and it looks like the plane skidded off the runway, into a ditch and an embankment, broke up and burned. They hadn't recovered the black boxes yet, since rescue work is still on-going.

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Way too long since cool pics were posted. Gah, MW is the only forum I know that doesn't support A.net's own linking system---this took like 20 mins to write with thumbnails! Not going to do it again unless the board supports Java... This is messy but it works--click the link, then click on the pic the link leads to. Then you'll have to request the large version if you want to make a wallpaper out of it.

http://www.airliners.net/photoLink.inc?id=1256124

1256124.jpg

http://www.airliners.net/photoLink.inc?id=1266017

1266017.jpg

http://www.airliners.net/photoLink.inc?id=1268975

1268975.jpg

http://www.airliners.net/photoLink.inc?id=0716079

0716079.jpg

http://www.airliners.net/photoLink.inc?id=1225052

1225052.jpg

http://www.airliners.net/photoLink.inc?id=1260574

1260574.jpg

http://www.airliners.net/photoLink.inc?id=1255527

1255527.jpg

<a href="http://www.airliners.net/photoLink.inc?id=1250440" target="_blank">http://www.airliners.net/photoLink.inc?id=1250440</a>

1250440.jpg

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Thanks for the links, David. :)

BTW, I just plunked $50 down to get a ride on a 1929 Ford Trimotor this Saturday. This will be my first time on a plane.

http://www.airventuremuseum.org/fordtrimotor/

Indy!! No pilots!!

I believe thats the type of plane used in the first sequence of Indy and the Temple of Doom. I wanna say it was operated by the fictional Lao Che Ent.?

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Thanks for the links, David. :)

BTW, I just plunked $50 down to get a ride on a 1929 Ford Trimotor this Saturday. This will be my first time on a plane.

http://www.airventuremuseum.org/fordtrimotor/

Heh, reminds me of my first time on a plane. Not a Ford Trimotor, but a Westjet 737 (Ottawa to Vancouver). Kept my camera in my lap the whole time, and got some nifty shots out of it. We even had some nasty turbulence at 39000 feet, and it was fun! No worse than some of the roads in Montreal. Personally I think takeoff is the best part; really nice acceleration. Granted, there aren't any afterburners on a 737, but that plane can sure move...

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Hold on, 34 and never on a plane? Impossible.

Although if I could have had my first airplane experiance in a trimotor, I would.

It's just been the case that I've never needed to go anywhere by plane. Last Saturday a guy I know who works for Duncan Aviation in Lincoln gave me a flyer promoting that Trimotor being in Lincoln and giving rides over a four day period. I looked at the site this morning and decided that now was my big chance. I've had some previous opportunities to maybe go flying, but nothing panned out.

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