CVW-7 Completes History-Making Missile Shoot

The Navy is going ahead with plans for KF-18 and EF-18 variants. If I were in the White House, I'd be taking a long hard look at the people I have in the Pentagon, who are stupid enough to take an eleborate Boeing sales pitch at face value while dismissing any naysayers as "not being team players".

This is a classic example of what happens when you have management that was educated in business school. They think they can apply the latest Deming-style management fad to aerospace engineering and they won't listen to anybody who says something won't work. It's not always bad to think outside the box (apologies for the cliche), but there needs to be some basis in reality.

Yep, sounds like somebody went to the McNamara school of management. The Pentagon people who think that the F-18 can serve as a refueler and EW platform are off in the night. If I were in charge, I would be looking at piss-testing some senior people. Maybe they're taking bribes or being just plain stupid.

I'd like to quote and article written by Bob Kress and Rear Adm. Paul Gillcrist:

"The F-14 will be replaced by the F/A-18E Super Hornet, which attempts deep-interdiction missions. Though it's a whizzy little airshow performer with a nice, modern cockpit, it has only 36 percent of the F-14's payload/range capability. The F/A-18E Super Hornet has been improved but still has, at best, 50 percent of the F-14's capability to deliver a fixed number of bombs (in pounds) on target. This naturally means that the carrier radius of influence drops to 50 percent of what it would have been with the same number of F-14s. As a result, the area of influence (not radius) drops to 23 percent! No wonder the USN is working on “buddy tanker” versions of the Super Hornet.

"By the way, now that the A-6 tanker has gone, how will the Hornets get to deep-interdiction targets? Contrary to what we're officially told, a tanker variant of the Hornet is simply not the answer. In an attempt to make it supersonic, the F-18E has been given a low aspect ratio, razor blade of a wing. This hurts subsonic drag and carrier takeoff payload when compared with a KA-6 tanker, which is an aerodynamically efficient solution. Equally silly is the proposal for an EW version of the F-18E. The same aerodynamic reasons apply for this airplane, plus it has an external stores dilemma. To get sufficient range to support a deep-interdiction mission, the EF-18E would have to use up precious external store stations with fuel tanks rather than ECM pods as carried on the EA-6B. Perhaps the Navy should consider putting the EA-6B back into upgraded and modernized production and build some of them as tankers? Or more Super A-6s?"

I've been attending SAE's Aerospace Landing Gear conference this week. The latest word is that the Super Hornet, in addition to its other horrendous problems, are having major wheel & brake issues including numerous brake fires. It's pretty late in the program to be having these kinds of issues.

I've also talked to several individuals privately who have told me that NAVAIR is positively stoned to think that the Super Hornet can fly the Tomcat's fleet defense missions, as well as be effective in electronic warfare and refueling missions. The Super Hornet has major unsolved aerodynamic issues and is the slowest fighter programmed since the early 1960's.

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