Burt Rutan

On Fri, 22 Aug 2003 20:48:02 GMT, "Ed Majden"
wrote:

As a test pilot at
Edwards he stated that some of the aircraft he tested in the past out
perform today's modern fighters. The F-104 was one of the examples.

At the eurofighter website
http://www.eurofighter.starstreak.ne...tech.html#eval
there is a model for comparative evaluation of the Eurofighter and 8
current fighters using 13 factors:

Twin Seat
Thrust to Weight
Twin Engines
Air to Ground Combat
Stealth
Air to Air Combat
Range
Agility
Electronic Warfare
STOL capability
CostMaintanence
Weapon selection
Supercruise

My guess is anyone making a statement favoring the F 104 would give
high weight to only three factors: Air Combat, Agility, and Thrust.
When applied to the Eurofighter model, the F 22 beats the rest,
including the Eurofighter, F15, F16, F18,

plane rating
Typhoon-89%
F22 - 100%
JSF - 70%
Rafale- 83%
Su35 - 80%
F15 - 73%
Gripen- 71%
F16 - 63%
F18 - 68%

Adjusting for advances in avionics and engine technology AND
eliminating differences resulting from today's tendency to want
multi-purpose platforms with the result that unfortunate compromises
are necessary--would the basic Starfighter platform result in a
superior weapon?

I cannot believe it would succeed based on its lack of agility
resulting from its extreme wingloading. Using John Boyd's criteria
for an effective fighter, the flying prostitute would not even come
close.

John Bailey
http://home.rochester.rr.com/jbxroads/mailto.html

"Les Matheson" wrote:

Snipped

I found an interesting statistic the other day in researching a
presentation to a group about my book. In Operation Iraqi Freedom, one
fixed wing US aircraft was lost for 18,190 fixed wing sorties flown.
JUST ONE!! For Desert Storm, we lost 37 fixed wing aircraft on 116,000
sorties for a rate of one loss per 3135 sorties. During Rolling
Thunder, the F-105 was losing one aircraft per 65 sorties during 1966.

Snipped

Ed, We lose more airplanes than that in a bad week at Red Flag. Comparing
the DS II rates to DS I or VietNam is apples to oranges. They hardly shot
back. Even in DS I the air defense wasn't as robust as around Hanoi,
because we were allowed to kill it.

All your statistics show is that a decent program of SEAD works to prevent
losses. Says nothing about the capabilities of the F-15E, F-16C, or the
A-10. It does say a lot about the AGM-88 and smart weaponry over the last
12 years of SEAD in Iraq.

I don't agree with the "apples to oranges" characterization. Iraq
boasted a concentrated Soviet-built integrated air defense system with
a load of radars, wide array of SAM systems and a lot of guns. While
clearly localized and probably badly mismanaged, those night-scope
videos of the fire over Baghdad were pretty impressive to this tired
Weasel-wingman's eyes.

While the IADS had developed over the years, so too had the
counter-measures, offensive weaponry and tactics. That along with a
political structure that was willing to let the pros do the job was
the key.

Which, of course, all goes back to the original purpose which was to
debunk the statements of Burt Rutan regarding the torpor of the
American military aviation industry. We've done quite well over the
years.


Ed Rasimus
Fighter Pilot (ret)
***"When Thunder Rolled:
*** An F-105 Pilot Over N. Vietnam"
*** from Smithsonian Books
ISBN: 1588341038

"Ed Rasimus" wrote in message
...
"Dudley Henriques" wrote:

Remember that there are TWO Rutans--Dick is the designer and Burt the
guinea pig in the cockpit usually. The innovation and creativeness
that gave us the Varieze, Voyager and a raft of other creations came
from Dick. Dick's the one that usually shows up at River Rats reunions
as well--seems to have a bit of Phantom in his background.....

Price of old age I guess. I'm always getting the two of them mixed up.
Bede's a lot easier. He looks like Pavarotti :-)))
Dudley

Ed Rasimus wrote
Snipped

While the IADS had developed over the years, so too had the
counter-measures, offensive weaponry and tactics. That along with a
political structure that was willing to let the pros do the job was
the key.

Snipped
Exactley my point. We fought a different war against a less organized
opponent and did better. Only comparison possible on a meaningful level is
to say, let the military do what is designed to do, "Break things".


--
Les
F-4C(WW),D,E,G(WW)/AC-130A/MC-130E EWO (ret)

"Ed Rasimus" wrote in message
...
Remember that there are TWO Rutans--Dick is the designer and Burt the
guinea pig in the cockpit usually. The innovation and creativeness
that gave us the Varieze, Voyager and a raft of other creations came
from Dick. Dick's the one that usually shows up at River Rats reunions
as well--seems to have a bit of Phantom in his background.....



Ed Rasimus


Sorry Charlie,

It is just the opposite. Burt is the designer. Dick is the test pilot.

Tex Houston

On Sat, 23 Aug 2003 14:39:48 -0400, av8r
wrote:

Hi

The wing loading on the Canadair-built F-104G (MAP) was 148 pounds per
square foot.

And for the F22 it is 65 lb/sq ft.
ref:http://www.airtoaircombat.com/compare.asp
also:
http://www.fighter-planes.com/ (337 kg/m^2) vs 643 kg/m^2 for the F104

The F22 has about a 2 to 1 advantage over the F104 in wing loading,
which translates into maneuverability/agility--in spite of its
horrible weight: 36308 kg vs 13170 kg for the Starfighter. (My F86
only weighed 6123 kg.)




John Bailey
http://home.rochester.rr.com/jbxroads/mailto.html

In article ,
Ed Rasimus wrote:

Remember that there are TWO Rutans--Dick is the designer and Burt the
guinea pig in the cockpit usually.

Ed, it's the other way around. Burt is the designer in the family,
Dick is the test pilot and used-to-be Phantom driver. Dick flew the
Voyager around the world with Jeana Yeager, Burt designed and built
it.

The innovation and creativeness
that gave us the Varieze, Voyager and a raft of other creations came
from Dick. Dick's the one that usually shows up at River Rats reunions
as well--seems to have a bit of Phantom in his background.....

He also flew 325 missions in Vietnam, IIRC flying mostly F-100.

Certainly the F-104 was an aeronautical marvel. It was an incredible
achievement. But give me an F-22 (or for that matter, an F-15, or -16)
and I'll promise to mort the Zipper long before the merge--even before
he knows there is going to be a merge.

This reminds me of my good friend who was flying F-15's at the time out of
Eglin. He was thinking of applying for an exchange tour with the Italians to
fly F-104s, which we both agree is about one of the coolest things built.
I was encouraging him to go for it but then he brought up a good point...he
goes "John, I would kill to fly a -104, but I sure as hell wouldn't want to
take one into combat these days!"


-John
*You are nothing until you have flown a Douglas, Lockheed, Grumman or North
American*

"Only" 88 psf (BTW, that sounds suspiciously low) versus the Phantom's 76.
There's a lot more too it than wing loading. The F-104 had superior
specific excess power than the Phantom at one G, inferior at five,
significantly inferior at seven. The F-4 was not noted as an agile machine,
but it was superior to the 104 (and that's based on perhaps limited but
nevertheless real world personal experience).

Based on your method of comparison, many highly maneuverable aircraft would
appear to be less capable than they are.

R / John

"Ditch" wrote in message
...
Certainly the F-104 was an aeronautical marvel. It was an incredible
achievement. But give me an F-22 (or for that matter, an F-15, or -16)
and I'll promise to mort the Zipper long before the merge--even before
he knows there is going to be a merge.

This reminds me of my good friend who was flying F-15's at the time out of
Eglin. He was thinking of applying for an exchange tour with the Italians
to
fly F-104s, which we both agree is about one of the coolest things built.
I was encouraging him to go for it but then he brought up a good
point...he
goes "John, I would kill to fly a -104, but I sure as hell wouldn't want
to
take one into combat these days!"

It's the equivilent to bringing a knife to a gunfight.