UFAF-F-40 "Thunderbird": [Very Expensive] This is a jet aircraft, powered by two of Forenia's first functional turbojet engines. It is a relatively small fighter, the pilot sits in a round glass cockpit with two AS-AC18 cannons and a Sorraia in the nose. The wings are as narrow as possible, low-mounted and swept back, and have small wing fences to prevent sweep-related instability. The tail is relatively high-mounted to put it outside the jet wash from the wings. It also features air brakes. The Thunderbird's aT-J03 engines are relatively small, axial-flow turbojets, and they are somewhat 1crude in nature. The 2interior of the turbojet becomes extremely hot, necessitating high-temperature alloys, and they burn lean using excess air for cooling. The two engines 3burn kerosene, and lots of it, and they sit in nacelles under the wings- each generates almost as much power as a Haast engine. Overall the aircraft has a speed a significantly faster than the Stinger (though much less than what these new turbojets are theorized to be capable of), and its jet engines have a higher altitude ceiling. The air brakes are a good choice, because the 4jet engines must maintain a lot of thrust at their minimum speed to avoid a flame out, so landings and slower combat engagements benefit from them. Requires a long runway for takeoff. Right now, the engines are [Complex] and require frequent maintenance. [4 Ore (1 Ti), 4 Oil]
Looking at the problems...
1: complex, it should not take much to fix this, I would expect that merely asuccessful revision would be enough.
2: Overheating and thus running below optimal performance. Annular doesn't seem like it would help much with the primary problem. Spreading the heat out would be nice, but it is still getting too hot in there. Increasing the heat tolerance would be good, but I still feel that it needs a redesign to reduce the heat buildup as much of the current problem is that it is expending air on cooling that it could be using on thrust, and if there is insufficient cooling then it will just keep heating until something gives.
3: Fuel hog. Annular would probably help here, and we could look into other fuels. Probably a refinement of the combustion spaces/mixture and turbine efficiency would be the best way to fix it. Although if we can fix the cooling system it may get a lot more power with very little extra fuel consuption as running lean is likely inefficient.
4: No slow. Not much can be done here. We could probably brute-force some sort of perpetual flame, but that sounds messy...
Sorry, I didn't mean to offend.
That is a massive relief to hear, and thankyou very much for the advice. I fear I shan't be taking it, I am ridiculously stubborn about such things, but I accept my ideas being passed as a due price.Other people can reinterpret* my ideas* too, even with different names, even with different names and identical content. Annoying, yes, but I'll endure!
Oh, and apologies for being aggressive. When I see an argument my first impulse is to jump on it and start biting. It is sort of a bad habit I know, but, argh, when you see a little speculation snuffling about with its conclusions and you think maybe it might be about to get one its assumptions caught in a paradox, you just can't help but to absent-mindedly lean forwards and start wiggling your hind-quarters in preparation...
*within the context of submissions to this forum game...
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Topic: Intercontinental Arms Race: Finale (Read 603515 times)