Japan Brings Back To Life Modernized YF-23

the history of the yf-23 fighter aircraft perhaps the most revolutionary in the history of aviation is like a solid bestseller there's a tough confrontation with a rival a dramatic defeat and going into the shadows for several decades in order to suddenly rise from the dead seemingly forgotten forever rejected by u.s military officials in 1990 yf-23 like the phoenix bird is now trying to revive of course not in the same exact form and not in their homeland but in well let's not get ahead of ourselves in 1991 the u.s air force formulated requirements for a new fifth generation jet fighter the advanced frontline fighter atf to replace the f-15 eagle it was proposed to put all the latest breakthroughs in the new fighter including advanced avionics new digitally controlled engines and it was also supposed to be stealthy for radars and multifunctional radar stealth is the main thing that should distinguish the fifth generation from the fourth the pentagon considered that it would be much wiser not to get involved in a dogfight as the pilots call a close-range battle but to sneak up on the enemy and hit it with a missile without even entering the radius of destruction of enemy weapons in july 1986 the beginning of the competition for the design of the fifth generation fighter was announced in october of the same year two teams were selected lockheed boeing general dynamics and northrop mcdonald douglas which within 50 months were to create prototypes of the new fighter which were designated yf-22 for lockheed and yf-23 for northrop by 1986 each team had rolled out two prototype aircraft to the airfield northrop offered the following prototypes the dark grey pav-1 spider which featured a black widow spider on the fuselage the prototype took off in june 1990. the second prototype of the pav 2 grey ghost was light gray which took off in october of the same year the pav-1 spider used the same pratt and whitney f-119 turbofan engine found in the yf-23 and which later will be installed on the f-22 raptor the pav 2 grey ghost was equipped with a general electric yf-120 engine which could switch between turbojet and turbofan modes to improve fuel consumption characteristics at low and high speeds respectively the winner of this competition has long been known this is the yf-22 later reborn in the f-22 raptor the first serial fifth generation fighter before analyzing why this happened we'll describe the little-known but no less outstanding offspring of northrop the yf-23 aircraft its appearance is mesmerizing even now although our eyes have long been accustomed to the futuristic images of fifth generation fighters the aesthetics of the machine are mesmerizing the yf-23 unofficially called the black widow had an integrated aerodynamic design that is the lift was provided not only by the wings but by the fuselage itself a diamond-shaped mid-wing with cut-off tips and a v-shaped tail the body of the aircraft turned out to be more elongated compared to the yf-22 but noticeably thinner in this it resembles the sr-71 a strategic supersonic reconnaissance aircraft the fastest mass-produced aircraft in the world thanks to the elongation of the fuselage the developers were able to push the two engines of the black widow deeper so that their nozzles did not protrude beyond the general contour of the aircraft and this is a huge plus in terms of infrared visibility but at the same time the nozzles were not rotatable that is the aircraft did not have a variable thrust vector but the black widow had a noticeably high cruising speed mach 1.8 and this is without the use of an afterburner then as the yf-22 showed only mach 1.58 and only on afterburner also in the flight test report of these two prototypes it said that the yf-22 had less radar signature so why did the us military prefer the yf-22 over the yf-23 of course we can only speculate first lack of controllable thrust vector this means that the yf-22 was a more maneuverable aircraft plus the elongated fuselage of the black widow also does not look like an advantage in this sense in comparison with the sturdy yf-22 even at a quick glance at the latter he looks like a born air fighter who's perfect for close air combat but there was a concept that a fifth generation fighter would not engage in close combat obviously the air fleet generals at the time had not yet been able to completely reorganize to a new concept and in their heads maneuverability seemed to be the most important factor in air battles of the 21st century in addition the yf-22 looked significantly more conservative in comparison with the truly revolutionary black widow u.s military is not characterized by british conservatism as well as the desire to save money on military development however no one likes extra risk either especially when there's a much simpler and more understandable option the factor of the developer's company also played a role perhaps it was this factor that was the stone that tipped the scales in favor of the yf-22 and put an end to the black widow on the one hand northrop had by that time vast experience in creating stealth aircraft after all it was created by the famous flying wing the strategic bomber b2 but their competitors lockheed by the time the yf-22 was built had already created stuff they were the creator of the f-117 nighthawk but in our opinion something else turned out to be more important here by the time the competition was summed up many northrop specialists were completely absorbed in issues related to the b-2 the most complex combat aircraft of its time and also the most expensive in the world the military reasoned sensibly that if these specialists also take on the development of the yf-23 fighter they will simply be overburdened and in the end neither the b-2 will be brought to its full perfection and the development of the yf-23 will fail and this is already undermining the country's defense capability as a result in 1990 the choice was made in favor of the yf-22 at the same time eyes were closed to the fact that the yf-23 provided a long flight at supersonic speed without using the afterburner mode while the yf-22 did not but this requirement was also one of the keys in the atf program as you know in 2005 the f-22 entered service it soon became clear that the f-22 raptor was not exactly what america needed at the moment yes the plane turned out to be excellent very low radar signature the ability to hit air and ground targets being unnoticed and without entering the range of enemy weapons but all this had to pay a high price in the truest sense of the word the raptor alone cost a whopping 379.5 million dollars including the development costs plus the huge cost of an hour of operation over 58 000 just by not flying for an hour on this airplane you could save enough for the coolest tesla model 3. in addition at supersonic speed without afterburner the f-22 raptor can fly for only 6 minutes or 180 kilometers in the first years of this century america was the only country that could afford to design and create a fifth generation fighter but the world is changing rapidly other countries are already on their heels russia su-57 china j-20 and another one j-31 is on the way and it suddenly brought to life the seemingly long buried yf-23 project if something is done really well it won't be forgotten but the yf-23 will be revived in japan this country seeing that its sworn friends russia and china had such a formidable weapon wanted to have it as well so in the land of the rising sun there was an ambitious program to create its own stealth fighter f3 mitsubishi heavy industries has been appointed the lead developer of course japan as one of the strategic military allies of the united states outside of nato has us f-35s but the japanese military obviously know about the shortcomings problems with stealth coding insufficient thrust to weight ratio lack of supersonic speed without afterburner as well as us officials at the pentagon after all the same russian su-57s thanks to their new engines which produced 38 tons of thrust combined can safely fly in supersonic mode without afterburner at the same time their maximum speed is 2 800 kilometers an hour while the f-35 has only 1930 kilometers per hour the japanese after spending several years developed a domestic technology demonstrator called atdx from 2016 to 2018 they conducted a series of test flights then they clearly assessed their capabilities and realized that if they developed a fifth generation fighter on their own they would have to sell one of their islands for example hokkaido and the development time will rush into the distant future therefore it was decided to turn to american companies but to whom such aircraft can only be made by lockheed and northrop japan turned to both lockheed martin the developer of the f-22 raptor and f-35 fighter was the first to respond with the hybrid of the two then northrop gunman took up the challenge it looks like we will again see an exciting fight between two pros in stealth technology there's no doubt that northrop will offer a revised yf-23 concept and this time the company's chances of success are much higher first even in the prototype the yf-23 showed a speed of mach 1.8 without afterburner and this is 2160 kilometers an hour of course this is not the 2800 kilometers an hour the su-57 can achieve but we repeat this is a prototype not a final aircraft during development this figure can be increased secondly the yf-23 aerodynamic integrated circuit offers many advantages over the traditional circuit the frontal resistance decreases and it becomes possible to significantly increase the internal volume for stealth aircraft the latter is very important after all they cannot have missiles on external suspensions since then radar visibility increases sharply plus with such an aerodynamic configuration it's possible to control the aircraft in supercritical angles of attack up to 60 degrees in general the aircraft is very maneuverable for example the russian mig-29 and su-27 were designed specifically as integral ones and it was on the su-27 that the famous hookah chef cobra was performed when the plane in fact flies with its engines forward and only starting with the su-35 and further on the su-57 the traditional aerodynamic design was used again but on the other hand they have an engine with controlled thrust vectors this means the future japanese f3 can take the middle between the poorly maneuverable not very high speed but with excellent radar invisibility of the f-35 and the super maneuverable high speed but with the worst indicators of radar invisibility of the su-57 and maybe this middle will turn out to be golden meaning the most optimal but will the japanese be able to create such an aircraft together with u.s company northrop we're sure that they can northrop has expertise building outstanding stealth aircraft such as the famous b2 as well as integrated scheme aircraft such as the northrop hl10 and the scheme of a flying wing as on the b2 is somewhat similar to an integrated scheme and the japanese will add their electronics and possibly an engine to the project indeed one of the positive results of the atd x program has been japan's progress in the field of highly efficient jet engines second question will japanese stealth fighters be in demand in the us hard to say us has the f-22 and f-35 would they buy something similar to them and even more technically advanced it's unlikely that the pentagon the senate and the white house will agree with this and then buying means admitting a mistake when choosing between the yf-22 and yf-23 back in 1990. what do you think about this what is the prospect of the f3 project tell us your opinion in the comments

Channel: Military News

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Keywords: yf-22, yf-23, f-22 raptor, yf-23 declassified, jet fighter, 6th generation jet fighter, first 6th generation jet fighter, daily aviation, secret jet fighter, new jet fighter, stealth, jet, airplane, fighter jet, air force, yf23, black widow, stealth fighter, technology, future, military technology, aviation history, history channel, aircraft, stealth aircraft, us air force, jets, northrop grumman, secret technology, airplanes, military news, us military news

Id: tNaXnLh5O1Q

Length: 13min 6sec (786 seconds)

Published: Fri Sep 03 2021