Strykaas

I have read in recent mags that F117 shall be retired within two years ? How come ? Is that true ? I've heard maintainance is expensive... are they that much outdated ? And I bet the JSF is not as stealthy anyway ... so which jets will replace them ??

erbroens

Well, I don´t know if this is just a internet legend, but seems that are electromagnetic field techniques that turned obsolete the radar deflector shape of this kind of aircraft... who knows for sure?

But yes, the F-117´s will be retired soon.

Enrique

Chasing Fear

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True,

[link=http://www.defenseindustrydaily.com/geographical-focus/americas-usa/us-plans-to-retire-b52s-c21s-f117-u2-for-more-f22s-01736/]Defense Industry Daily Story[/link]

-Allan

Strykaas

Thx for the link Allan. It will be retired more than ten years before planned retirement date (2018) [sm=omg_smile.gif] !

B58

My Feedback: (43)

The 117's will be gone from Holloman AFB by the end of 2007. There has been a lot of concern here in the local community about lost jobs. The Raptor is coming in to replace them, but there will be a little gap before the Raptor wing is operational. The Raptors are training here now. The 117 is pretty old stuff. Generation one stealth technology, and we are about at generation3 now. We flew against the 117's with the F-16 back in 1983, and they weren't new then. Once they were declassified, we all figured there was something better out there at Tonopah. Scram jet? Who Knows. Bob

MustangAce

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The F-22 Raptor has better stealth abilities than the 117 and goes faster and carries more armament than the F-15.

John Redman

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MustangAce, you had better check your references on the armamrent capabilities of the Eagle and Raptor. I would beg to differ on your analogy here. The Raptor does not carry more, just some newer technology. The eragle carries an arsenal when rolling into the arena. The Raptor has some incredible capabilities that no other bird has.

As for the Black jet, well it was more than expensive to keep in the air back when I crewed it, late 80's through the late 90's. The Air Force was always looking for a cheaper alternative back in the day. If someone truly had the ability to detect the old girl, it wouldn't be flying right now. She is still the most invisible thing out there if my sources are correct.

P. Richards

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I Agree with John The F-15 carried everything external
giving it the ability to carry more weapons, where as
the F-22 is all internal no match as far as weapons armament goes.

P. Richards aka Swat Team

MustangAce

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No that's not true. It can carry weapons externally on missions that don't require a stealth attack.

John Redman

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Thanks for the correction on that Mustang Ace. They hadn't released that info back when I left Edwards in 2003. As I read the sheet I found it can carry the same load as the Eagle. Internal hardpoints on the wing are for external tanks only. They are also listing the AIM-9X, this is great if it is in production. That is one bad ***** heat seeking missile. You cannot fool it at all, period.

I used to watch this thing perform and test on a daily basis as our birds flew chase for it every day, well when it could get in the air. It was truly incredible and almost unbelievable in many aspects of flight. Either way, it is great it is on our side.

WhoDaMan

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there's a lot of them

PhilLin

How much did the one shoot down in the Balkans compromised the Nighthawk?

Phil

John Redman

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Hey Dave, nice pic. I am down there somewhere. That was a stop over at Langley in route to Desert Storm. Good times back then.

Phil,

As for the one that was lost the Air Force never confirmed it was shot down, just lost (gonna take it for that statement). The aircraft was 806 and that was out of or sister squadron, the 8th fighter squadron. As for what was compromised, I doubt there was much. By that time the shape and design was out in the plastic world and was pretty darn close, not to mention what was on the internet. Anyways, there wasn't a country around that could develope anything like it just based on cost. There is a true cost reason as to why these birds are going away. No worries, I doubt anyone will be knocking at our front door with them.

Just a littel trivia for you F-117 lovers. Keep in mind it was designed from documentation written by the russians in mid 1965. So you could say the Russians wrote the info that brought the design to life 10 years before it began here in the US with the Skunk Works.

PhilLin

Thanks for correction, John! My mistake, it was not shoot down but went down for some reason. I wonder how stable & manueverable a model F-117 wud handle, given the more forward CG normally used on our models?

Phil

rcmigpilot

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If memory serves me, the 117 in question made one of the cardinal mistakes of air attack by flying the same egress route more than once. Apparently they flew the same route out of the target several times. A bunch of AA was moved in and they just filled the sky with lead. No evidence the plane was actually tracked, but if you throw enough stuff in the air eventually you're going to hit something.

John Redman

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Good points on the AA deal. I would truly like to think that was not the case, but you never know. I was gone from the program at that time so I can't shed as much light on it as I would like. Getting hit by the golden BB, that was what we feared during the entire program.

Strykaas

The remains, Belgrade museum. I doubt they were able to reverse engineer the stealth techniques, but who knows what's going on in Russian labs ?

John Redman

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Strykass,

Reread post 13. As I stated there, the F-117 came to life after reading the information written by Russian Electromagnetic Physysist's back in 1965. No need for them to back engineer the bird. Plus I doubt they have the serious dollars required to accomplish the task. You might get a copy of "The Skunk Works" written by Ben Rich. Great reading and it explains it in more detail.

Doug Cronkhite

My Feedback: (34)

Anyone interested in the F-117 and its development should read the following book:

http://www.amazon.com/Skunk-Works-Pe...e=UTF8&s=books

It's really an amazing story from many aspects of how it all came together.

And as for 806, when I was an air traffic controller I did a fair amount of accident investigation with the NTSB, and though I can't say for sure without a lot more info, I have serious doubts that 806 was shot down, but more than likely had some sort of airframe failure similar to the one that crashed at an airshow in Maryland some years ago.

Strykaas

Indeed, I seem to remember stealth technology was first tackled by the Russians, but I did not know this was directky used during F117 design. Thanks for the link, think I'll buy it.

Sure it was, I saw the bullet holes in the wings. Have to find the pictures.

B58

My Feedback: (43)

If it had bullet holes in the wings, and if they were made while the plane was if flight, stealth technology probably wouldn't have helped. Someone got very lucky with their shooting. Bob

YOUGURT THE GREAT ONE

f117 shot down by a sam. yugoslavic site of scraps of stealh and other fighters http://www.aeronautics.ru/nws002/exhibit/aircraft.htm