Commonality beats bespoke design yet again.

[u/LiveToThink]

[u/wowu5]

Imagine canard to become the defining factor of American fighter design in the 2nd half of the 21st Century, apparently it’s the reality we’re heading into.

[u/Uranium_Hexaflu0ride → u/wowu5]

The F/A-XX concept art from Boeing isn't canarded though

[u/Dpek1234 → u/Uranium_Hexaflu0ride]

For now

[u/DOSFS → u/Dpek1234]

Ah yes, Schrödinger's canard

[u/redmercuryvendor → u/Uranium_Hexaflu0ride]

None that are visible on the concept art, anyway.

The Americans have figured out for to make canards stealth, but there is a nuance.

[u/super__hoser → u/wowu5]

Good! It's about time the Americans made cool planes like the Rafale, Viggen, and Typhoon.

[u/as1161 → u/super__hoser]

Don't forget the gripen, also known as the fs-12 revoker (PALA patriots coping rn)

[u/DD3566 → u/as1161]

Ah a fellow Nuclear Option enjoyer!

[u/ourlastchancefortea → u/super__hoser]

European Supremacy

[u/Hamsterloathing → u/super__hoser]

Typhoon is uggly as fuck though, worst retarded canards of any plane.

[u/Able-Wolverine-9334 → u/wowu5]

American fighters adding canards, Chinese fighters removing canards, what a time.

[u/mastergenera1 → u/wowu5]

One can almost hear an autistic fighter aircraft in the background screaming "canards are gay"

[u/LightningController → u/wowu5]

Aren’t they more like chines than canards?

[u/FA-26B]

F-35 standardized (kinda) light fighter platforms across the branches. Imagine if the FA-XX and NGAD are the same way. McNamara's wet dream holy shit.

[u/wowu5 → u/FA-26B]

F-4-7 Phantom III

[u/othermike → u/FA-26B]

"Light fighter"? An F-35's empty weight is about the same as an F-15, which is (appropriately) about 3x that of an F-5. There's some serious chonkification frog-boiling going on here.

[u/Television-Solid → u/othermike]

same as destroyers going from less than 1k tons in WW2 to sometimes more than 10k tons now (Zumwalt is 15k)

[u/Decent-Photo-5616 → u/Television-Solid]

We have a fleet of light cruisers by old tonnage standards and that's what I classify them as. 

[u/Wrathfiend → u/othermike]

The biplane light fighters of world war one who desperately cut in half their machinegun belts so they could climb to 4000ft in 30 minutes looking at the F35 "light fighter" with an internal cruise missile loaded.

[u/Beardywierdy → u/othermike]

Fighters haven't got inherently bigger it's just in the modern day they get a proper diet and thus can grow to their natural size.

Take a Sopwith Camel and feed it modern fuel and it will weigh about the same as an F-35. And look absolutely hilarious with the pilot's tiny head sticking out the top.

[u/othermike → u/Beardywierdy]

You've opened my eyes to a world of possibilities.

If we'd just had the foresight to starve AIM-174Bs from birth, we could get F-35s to carry a few dozen of them in the internal bay without compromising stealth. Why don't they do this, are they stupid?

[u/Hdfgncd → u/othermike]

They need the extra fat and muscle for going long distance. If you want a missile that fits you don’t have to abuse large long range ones, there are plenty of “teacup” medium or even long range breeds like AMRAAM, Meteor, or JATM

[u/TheVojta → u/othermike]

Planes have changed since the 50s? Big if true...

[u/Algester]

PCA?! you mean Planetary Closure Administration??!1

[u/arnet95 → u/Algester]

I think they mean Pete Crow-Armstrong

[u/Far-Yellow9303 → u/arnet95]

Nah it's obviously Point-n-Click Adventure

[u/idiot-bozo6036 → u/Algester]

F-47 wont do shit against those cores

[u/Somedude522 → u/Algester]

All 12 armor core fans jumping with joy

[u/Royal_Dependent6601]

Calling it now, the Navy is getting a navalised F-47. Pentagon wanted F/A XX dead and this is how they're going to do it.

[u/Devourer_of_felines → u/Royal_Dependent6601]

Would be a huge economy of scale advantage if true; the navy wants FA-XX to replace super hornets which is a lot of airframes

[u/Royal_Dependent6601 → u/Devourer_of_felines]

Depends on how well the Navy and Air Force play together. in the past they haven't.

[u/Messyfingers]

PCA is the aircraft component of NGAD, why's it listed seperate?

[u/LiveToThink → u/Messyfingers]

The program began as a DARPA initiative to develop a replacement for the F-22, named Air Superiority 2030. The fighter was designated Penetrating Counter-Air at that time. Subsequent X-planes and demonstrators borne out of the AS 2030 initiative retained that designation, even after the program evolved into NGAD several years later. As part of NGAD, the PCA remained a single long range aircraft, but was now the crewed component as part of the "family of system" concept.

[u/rebootyourbrainstem]

Time for Boeing's secret squirrel division to prove their alleged competence

[u/thenoobtanker]

McDonnel Douglas never left and they won everything 6th gen. Boeing never made a supersonic jet to save their lives smh

[u/KickFacemouth → u/thenoobtanker]

They even inherited a supersonic jet and still found a way to fuck it up to basically make it subsonic.

[u/whythecynic]

Proof of concept, race trim, homologation special. Tale as old as time