Q? We don't need no stinking Q!

Three armchair thoughts:

1- The need for speed going into a dogfight is increasingly irrelevant.
Speed = life was the motto before modern engines. It still applies, but to
a lesser degree IMO. The thrust of the F-22 is sick. You can regain energy
unlike the Camel, P-51, F-86, F-105, F-4, or even the F-15. You absolutely
still need energy, but with better enginges, you have less need for
pre-existing speed to provide that energy.

2- "lleged reason: It's cheaper to design a missile that'll kill anyone
giving
chase than it is to design an airplane that can egress." Ideally, that
makes very good sense. Let the missile do the dogfighting. In reality, I
don't think missile technology is there yet, so you still need the agile
jet, with the ability to disengage.

3- Speed shrinks tail-on missle envelopes. Both S-A, and A-A. I bet the
Iraqi's wish they were all flying F-111s when they tried to run on the deck
to Iran! Might not have saved them all, but it would have probably saved
some of them. Speed increases head-on envelopes. The hit and run tactics
of Mig-21s and -25s have proven to be among their better options probably
because speed decreases detection time and hence increases surprise.

So I think it's clear that speed is, and always will be, an important asset
even if engines and missiles continue to improve. It matters for a lot more
than just egressing dogfights.

TV

TV wrote:

Three armchair thoughts:

1- The need for speed going into a dogfight is increasingly irrelevant.
Speed = life was the motto before modern engines. It still applies, but
to
a lesser degree IMO. The thrust of the F-22 is sick. You can regain
energy
unlike the Camel, P-51, F-86, F-105, F-4, or even the F-15. You
absolutely still need energy, but with better enginges, you have less need
for pre-existing speed to provide that energy.

I respectfully disagree (But then, I'm an Engineer/Pilot, not a Fighter
Pilot)
Speed's still important - It allows you more options when positioning
yourself before the merge. The extra velocity does really, Really nice
things to your missile kinematice - the faster the launch speed, the more
range and maneuverability your missile has. Being whopping fast means that
if somebody's trying to intercept you, they've got to pull a lot of G,
bleeding of their energy, to try and pull lead. If you can go fast for a
long time, like the F-22, you're a whole new type of target. Especially
since the -22 is,on radar, a very small airplane.

2- "lleged reason: It's cheaper to design a missile that'll kill anyone
giving
chase than it is to design an airplane that can egress." Ideally, that
makes very good sense. Let the missile do the dogfighting. In reality, I
don't think missile technology is there yet, so you still need the agile
jet, with the ability to disengage.

Well, you can make a missile airframe that accelerates quickly, but
sustaining that speed takes a lot of fuel. Which takes up weight and space.
There's tradeoff all around, in that area - look at the way the Sidewinder
diverged. The original AIM-9B had a motor that put out about 4400# of
thrust for a shade over 2 seconds. After that, it's coasting - and it's
pretty short ranged. The mk 36 motor used on later Sidewinders puts out
about 3,000# of thrust - but pushes along for 4-5 seconds. This gives you
a higher speed at burnout, and more distance downrange at burnout - all good
things for longer range.
The French, with the R.550 "Sidewinder Compatable" went with a higherthrust
motor with a roughly 1.5 second burn time - great for a high speed right
off the rail, but lousy for range, since the missile starts slowing down an
eyeblink after it's launched.
After you've figured out what tradeoffsyou want to make, you've then got to
stick a guidance system in it. Now you've got to package sensors that can
see the target at a long range, and is smart enough to figure out what's
the target and what's trying to convince the seeker that it's something
else, and then fit it into a 5" - 8" diameter package. (12.7 cm - 20.3 cm)
That will get your missile more or less there. Now you've got to set off the
warhead far enough away that the fragmet cloud (Think of it as the outer
skin of an inflating balloon) hits the target. Fire too soon - too far
away - and the fragments are too dispersed to do much damage. Fire too late
- too close - and the fragments don't get there at all. Simple enough for
a single aspect and set of missile and airplane speeds, but now the fuze
has to figure all this out for all combinations of intercept geometry and
relative speeds. Proximity Fuze design is hard - when a manufacturer
claims that their missiles are so accurate that they don't need a Prox
Fuze, (Such as the AIM-4 Falcon, or the Rapier SAM), what they're really
saying is "We can't make the blasted fuze work on teh best day we ever
had!"

So - don't bet on a "Kill everything" missile - consider that an F-22 type
target coming at you head on is a very fast, very small (to the missile's
sensors - it's only big in visible light) target. Going away, it's still a
small target, and the missile's going to have to run long and hard to keep
up.

3- Speed shrinks tail-on missle envelopes. Both S-A, and A-A. I bet the
Iraqi's wish they were all flying F-111s when they tried to run on the
deck
to Iran! Might not have saved them all, but it would have probably saved
some of them. Speed increases head-on envelopes. The hit and run tactics
of Mig-21s and -25s have proven to be among their better options probably
because speed decreases detection time and hence increases surprise.

Yep. It makes the targeting/interception problem a lot more difficult, both
for airplanes and missiles - any sort of aimed fire, really.

So I think it's clear that speed is, and always will be, an important
asset
even if engines and missiles continue to improve. It matters for a lot
more than just egressing dogfights.

Definitely. Getting to the target and getting back out of the defense in a
short a time as possible means that they get less shots off at you.
Which is generally considered a good thing.

--
Pete Stickney
Without data, all you have is an opinion