Your Nation's Air Force Mark II:

[Axis Nova]

Bi-planes are best planes.

FOR ME TO POOP ON

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Just because im curious why do people get super specific with aircraft tech? I know its more realistic but i don't see anyone put a rating of any sort to make it matter in a RNG (random number generator) that are often used to dictate victory. Even if you could how would this be simplified so you don't spend 4 hours putting in design specs for every vehicle from both sides (assuming theres only 2 parties) into this RNG.

In the end it all seems so pointless to specify the tiny details like fuel capacity, payload, or max takeoff weight, max speed ect. because i have not yet seen anyone take this into account.

There are people on NS who only post in this kind of thread, pretty much.

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I'd go so far as to say that the concept of the classic dogfight is pretty much obsolete due to the advances in missile technology over the past 30 years or so.

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The US has been working on antimissile lasers and I was wondering, if we put that technology on a airship and gave it about ten years of refinement, could it be a practical missile defense system?

My idea is that it focuses on shooting down cruise missiles and possible air to air missiles. It would operate near ground and possibly naval forces to support them. I went with an airship, because it could stay in the air as long as the crew has rations. Now isn't going to defend against ballistic missiles the US already deemed it too costly, but offer a cheaper alternative and support to traditional anti-cruise missile systems.

I can't speak about airships as they're not my area of specialty, but on the laser end of things there's no reason whatsoever that this wouldn't work. For that matter, in ten years I wouldn't be surprised to see lasers capable of swatting aircraft as well as missiles.

As far as powering the laser goes, ordinary jet engines will do for this kinda thing. If you want to get fancy, I suggest reading up on some of the proposals for nuclear powered airships out there (I don't have a lot of info about this but it has been considered before). Finally, if you want to edge into PMT territory, there's that jet engine sized 500 MW fusion reactor that's currently under development by Lockheed-Martin. Though frankly speaking unless you're using a REALLY powerful laser (or lots of small ones) you probably arn't going to need that much juice and ordinary engines will do just fine.

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Why go for close ranges? Depending on how high you put one of these things, you could zap stuff incredibly far away.

Can't argue about the fission reactor downside, of course. I was just bringing it up as a potential option.

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Do you think the emergence of electromagnetic weapons like railguns and coilguns has any hope of bringing gunfighters back?

Those are better options for tanks rather than aircraft. The systems involved tend to be heavy, require large power generation and storage systems, and are (generally) incapable of automatic fire, at least on the level you'd want for an aircraft cannon.

And while we're on lasers - Same thing. To vaporise missiles will require too much power. Modern laser weapons run easily into the megawatt range, and they destabilize the missile, causing it to tear itself apart under the acceleration. Other laser systems serve to dazzle optics or maybe burn them - leaving the missile flying blind. If your missile defense lasers are dazzlers, then yes. They can go on acft. If they're vaporisers or destabilizers - then no. Unless you have a large transport acft dedicated to just the laser, then you could have a destabilizer. The US actually tested this, as a matter of fact - and it might be useful in theatre.

It's been posted, but you don't need a lot of juice (relatively speaking) to mess the surface of a missile or an aircraft up to the point where it tears itself to pieces. Also, solid state lasers are the new hotness-- chemical lasers are old and busted.

Solid state lasers have a lower output (for now, but this is an engineering issue that is being steadily solved) but you can fit them into damn near anything. Like, say, an F-22, or an F-35. The US plans to be cramming them in there by ~2020 or so. :3

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Not even with frickin fixed,forward-facing laser beams?

Lasers are worse than guns so.

No they arn't. Infinite ammunition and they hit instantly.

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snip

It's true that your sensors will be blacked out for a bit on re-entry, but you're unlikely to need them until you can slow down enough that it's not an issue.

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lol if you think the J-20 isn't complete crap

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IMO, if you're gonna use an SSTO as a bomber, it should be able to stop in orbit and refuel while on the way (or be deployed from a base up there in the first place). This simplifies the design considerably.

I have a multirole SSTO that can do the strat bomber thing and it is generally only deployed directly from space when it's going to do that in the first place, rather than launching from the ground, then flying somewhere and bombing.

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Plasma stealth is a nonsensical crock of shit that could never ever work. Even if it did making your entire aicraft glow brightly has obvious issues with remaining stealthy.

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Dogfights don't even matter on a modern battlefield. It's not like Vietnam where missiles were new and unreliable. Anyone fighting F-22s is never even going to see them before they get AMRAAM'd.

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Well, yeah obviously it's different in NS, I was speaking strictly about IRL. No one has anything comparable to the F-22 yet (whatever the chinese might claim about the subject, larf)

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Well, yeah obviously it's different in NS, I was speaking strictly about IRL. No one has anything comparable to the F-22 yet (whatever the chinese might claim about the subject, larf)

PAK FA?

You probably shouldn't buy into what the Russians say to try to get people to buy their garbage.

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99% of the people whining about how the F-35 is bad and terrible are not qualified to have an opinion on the subject.


(the F-35 procurement program, on the other hand...)

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So basically you want an aircraft that doesn't resemble the SR-71 in any meaningful way.

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There's also the matter that the SR-71's exhaust would probably melt the deck of any carrier ever built.

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No, that's stupid. You don't want to leave live explosives all over the outsides of your hangars most of the time, that's just asking for accidents. Also it won't even work in the first place.

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Apples and oranges. The explosives on the outside of a tank are intended to disrupt HEAT rounds, which, generally, aircraft arn't going to be dropping on your hangars. Also the outside of a tank tends to be well armored and it won't usually also be surrounded by many, many things that react poorly to fragments, unlike at an airbase.

[Axis Nova]

Also the cast of whichever is the latest Ace Combat game.

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TBH if there was a shooting war between the US and Russia these days and it didn't immediately go nuclear the US would probably just use anything that carries ground attack munitions rather than A-10s specifically. After they finished wiping their ass with Russia's air force, of course.

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Specifically, that it can do so without using it's afterburner (and thus disproportionately consuming fuel).

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A laser would be a far better choice in pretty much every way imaginable.

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Unsurprisingly, information about in-development weapon systems tends to be highly classified.

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First off The Uf-20 is just a ucav version of China's J-20 no change except in it not being manned.
The same with the UB-50 it is a ucav version of Russia's Sukhoi Pak-Fa except it's more of a bomber then fighter
The Uf-22 is just a ucav version of the F/A-22 raptor but this time its primary role is a space based fighter/orbital attack platform again no real change except it being unmanned and space flight capable

For a space fighter to work, you need a big airframe with jet fuel and rocket fuel. You must also add rocket engines, or use a SABRE. Having no change will make it suborbital at best, but the lack of heatsheilding will cause your UF-22 to burn in re-entry. And if you say that they were delivered up there by a lifter (rocket), then it would be cheaper to just use killsats and the wings are dead weight unless you are trying a SSTO (Single Stage to Orbit) or a Reentry vehicle. The F-22 is a terrible airframe for reentry because you want a stubby lifting body plane.

P.S Aerodynamic surfaces don't work in space, maneuvering thrusters must be added.

Or you can just design a craft that operates exclusively in space to get the job done. A craft that tries to be both a good atmospheric fighter and space fighter will be good at neither.

Strictly speaking the concept of space fighters doesn't really work in a realistic setting, because larger spacecraft will generally have more powerful engines, higher fuel capacity, and much more powerful weapons.