X32 Boeing's Joint Strike Fighter | The X Planes Series by PilotPhotog

let's take a look at boeing's entry into the joint strike fighter competition the x-32 one of the more interesting looking x-planes the x-32 is a concept demonstrator built by boeing and given the in-house nickname monica and competed for what at the time was called the largest military contract in history the joint strike fighter or jsf the x-32 was a single-engine delta wing stealth multirole fighter that would have been produced in three variants an air force version a carrier-based naval version and a short takeoff and vertical landing or stovall version let's take a look at some specifications for the x32 length 45 feet 0.1 inches or 13.72 meters height 17 feet 3.8 inches or 5.28 meters wingspan 36 feet or 10.97 meters wing area 590 square feet or 54.8 meters squared maximum speed 1000 knots or mach 1.6 at altitude empty weight 24 030 pounds or 10 900 kilograms maximum takeoff weight 38 000 pounds or 17 200 kilograms range for the stovall version 600 nautical miles or 1 112 kilometers for the naval or cv version 750 nautical miles or 1389 kilometers for the air force version 850 nautical miles or 1574 kilometers engines one pratt whitney yf-119 pw614 afterburning turbofan producing 28 000 pounds or 120 kilonewtons thrust dry or 43 000 pounds or 190 kilonewtons with afterburner the x32 is going to be armed with either the 20 millimeter m61a2 vulcan cannon or the mauser cannon and possibly an external gun pod for certain variants additionally the design allowed for combinations of internal stores including six amram air-to-air missiles or two amram air-to-air missiles and two 2 000 pound or 900 kilogram class guided bombs for non-stealthy missions external stores could be carried up to about 15 000 pounds or 6 800 kilograms of guided weapons air-to-surface missiles and even external fuel tanks to extend range the jsf program was actually a merger of several programs including the common affordable lightweight fighter and the supersonic stovall fighter or ssf following the end of the cold war and especially after the overwhelming victory in the gulf war defense budgets were greatly reduced to pay what was then called the peace dividend as a result several major developmental projects were canceled these included the navy's advanced fighter attack the air force's multi-role fighter the navy's a-12 avenger 2 which was to be a replacement for the a6 and the naval advanced tactical fighter program which was to be a replacement of the f-14 tomcat this led to the formation of the joint advanced strike technology or jast program in 1993 by 1995 with the inclusion of stovall requirements the program was renamed joint strike fighter or jsf the goal of jsf was an ambitious one replace the harrier a10 f16 f-a-18 and f-117 with a single family of fighters to handle such an undertaking international cooperation was needed from the start the united kingdom joined as a founding member of the jsf in 1995 and became a tier 1 partner following a concept demonstration phase or cdp italy and the netherlands joined as tier 2 partners and canada denmark norway austria and turkey joined as tier 3 partners in 1997 as part of the concept development phase lockheed martin and boeing were selected as final competitors boeing's concept demonstrator was designated the x-32 while the lockheed demonstrator was designated the x-35 british aerospace and northrop grumman joined the lockheed team and the competition was on each team was to produce two flying examples one for conventional takeoff and landing with carrier capabilities and the other for stovall the boeing x32 design strategy placed great emphasis on costs as a result several compromises were made which would ultimately hinder the program the first was the wing in order to minimize production manufacturing costs and minimize differences between the different versions of the airplane a delta wing was chosen the wing would have a leading edge sweep of 55 degrees which allowed for a thicker wing that could hold more fuel while still reducing transonic aerodynamic drag however eight months into the competition the jsf payload and maneuverability requirements changed at the request of the navy and the delta wing fell short of the new requirements to accommodate these new requirements boeing engineers updated the design to include a more conventional tail which also reduced weight and improved agility however the changes were made too late to implement on the prototypes at this point it was decided that the existing wing design was enough to serve as a technology demonstrator ironically despite being designed to reduce costs the wing would actually prove a challenge to fabricate one other interesting note about the wing the naval version of the x-32 did not have folding wings however the super hornet's wings are about 44 feet or 13.6 meters extended and about 30.6 feet or 9.32 meters folded placing the x-32s 36 foot or 10.97 meters somewhere in between the two another early design decision that centered around lowering production costs was to implement a direct lift thrust vectoring system similar to the one used in the harrier the advantage of direct lift is that minimal additional hardware is required in order to implement however a disadvantage is that the engine has to be placed in the center of the aircraft or directly behind the pilot which results in a forward center of gravity this was necessary to allow the x-32 to perform a neutral attitude hover in comparison the x-35 made use of a system that connected a drive shaft to the turbine which turned a lift fan that essentially operated like a helicopter's main rotor the x-35s approach was seen as an evolution of previous examples with dedicated engines to provide vertical lift such as found in aircraft like the convair model 200 and the yakovlev yak-141 the dedicated engines basically became dead weight in level flight and by instead using a lift fan weight was reduced and less maintenance was required while more complicated than a direct lift system the x35 lift fan allowed the engine's placement to remain aft similar to most conventional fighters the decision to go with a direct lift system also produce what some feel is the most identifiable feature of the x32 the large air intake under the nose while other fighters such as the a7 and f8 made use of a similar intake setup the x32s appear to be oversized the location and size of the air intake was required in order to drive sufficient air into the engine during hover as ram air pressure could not be used aside from the appearance another detrimental side effect was the possibility of making the compressor blades directly visible to radar some strategies to deal with this were proposed including variable baffles that could block radar signals while not negatively impacting airflow and finally the location and size of the intake would cause hot air from the exhaust to circulate back into the engine when near the ground causing reduced thrust output and potentially overheating the engine despite these challenges the x32 is soon ready for the competition with the x35 in september of 2000 the x-32a made its first flight which was planned to last about 40 minutes but was cut short due to a minor hydraulic leak which was discovered shortly after takeoff despite this setback about 80 percent of the plant objectives were achieved and included flight to 10 000 feet or 3000 meters and attaining a speed of 200 knots or 370 kilometers per hour originally scheduled for the third quarter of 2000 the x-32b stovall made its first flight in march of 2001. using a modified pratt whitney f-119 engine known as the f-119 pw614s the x-32b transitioned from conventional flight to stovall mode by making use of a butterfly valve which diverted the exhaust gases to thrust vectoring nozzles and while this provided the x-32b with stovall capabilities the x-35 solution using a lift fan would allow for a greater payload this along with the fact that the x-32b demonstrator had to have parts removed to enable supersonic flight due to its heavy delta wing was not helpful to the x32's chances in the competition and although as mentioned before a conventional tail would have solved some of these problems the fact that the x-35b demonstrator could transition to supersonic flight as is and was actually built out of the x-35a prototype was another blow to the x-32's chances flight tests for both the x32 and x35 continued until july of 2001. in october of 2001 the winner of the jsf contract was announced it was the x-35 which would go on to become the f-35 lightning ii the loss of the contract was a major blow to boeing as some estimates had the contracts calling for as many as 5 000 fighters to be produced although the x-32 was never produced it was not a total waste boeing viewed the project as a strategic investment and did apply some of its findings to both the f-18 super hornet and the mq-25 stingray and as to where the two x-32 prototypes are today the x-32a is currently located in the national museum of the united states air force in dayton ohio while the x-32b is at the patuxent river national air museum in maryland what do you think would the x-32 have been successful if it had implemented its conventional tale let me know in the comments below thanks for watching if you enjoyed this video go ahead and subscribe and click the bell for notifications if you'd like to support this channel consider patreon or some of the merchandise below stay safe and see you next time

Channel: PilotPhotog

Views: 149,404

Keywords: A6, Boeing, F14, F18, F22, Intruder, JSF, Joint Strike Fighter, Monica, STOVL, Tomcat, USAF, USMC, USN, VTOL, aircraft maintenance, airplane, avgeek, aviation, aviation compilation, aviation memes, aviation news, aviator, bae systems, budget, contract, delta wing, dryden, edwards afb, edwards air force base, fighter, fly, flying, jets, meme, northrop grumman, photography, pilot, pilotphotog, plane, planes, procurement, super hornet, testbed, thrust vectoring, weekly dose of aviation, x-32, x32, x35

Id: zWXTGAVWKsY

Length: 12min 3sec (723 seconds)

Published: Mon Sep 21 2020