Enfin un beau petit avion "normal" !
From: Jean schoefs
Subject: And just like that, a Fighter Jet is born.....
There's a New American Jet Fighter You've Probably Never Heard Of ….. America's Newest Jet Fighter Takes Flight.
Only time will tell how the Scorpion—the new warplane you'd probably never heard of before now—will fare on the open market.
The Scorpion is powered by twin Honeywell TFE731 geared turbofan engines generating 8,000 pounds of thrust. The aircraft has maximum speed of 450 knots and a range of 2,400 miles. It carries an internal payload of up to 3,000 pounds but it can also haul 6,200 pounds externally on six hardpoints.
If all goes as planned, Textron expects the Scorpion to enter production in 2015. But that's a big if.
Textron's Scorpion 'met expectations'
Will anyone want Textron's Scorpion?
The newest American jet fighter is small and lightweight. It's designed to be cheap and easy to build, repair and fly. It's optimized for low-intensity warfare. It's called the Scorpion, and you've probably never heard of it. It's equally doubtful anyone will want to buy it. America's Scorpion Jet Fighter Could Fly in Asia and Africa - Nigeria and the United Arab Emirates are interested in this lightweight combat plane
When Textron AirLand first announced the Scorpion—a lightweight surveillance and strike aircraft—last year, it raised a few eyebrows. Now the American company is talking about the first two potential customers for the diminutive jet. Namely, Nigeria and the United Arab Emirates. Neither country has bought the Scorpion … yet. But the company is pitching the aircraft as a solution for featherweight and middle-size countries looking for an advanced combat plane that doesn't break the bank.
This is especially the case for countries that need eyes in the sky—and the ability to go after insurgents.
For the most part, modern combat jets are typically multi-billion-dollar projects bristling with exotic materials, high-tech sensors, weapons and computer networks.
Most of these jet designs also treat aerial combat as requiring the best engines, most powerful radars and hardest-hitting long-range missiles. At the same time, most of these aircraft boast some degree of stealth, the operational value of which is hotly debated.
(Russian expert says fighter jets can't hide forever—but that's old news…A Russian military expert has sounded a seemingly dire warning for the United States. Dr. Igor Sutyagin claims that stealthy fighter jets and bombers can't stay hidden much longer as enemy radar technology improves. The U.S. military is betting hundreds of billions of dollars—in essence, its whole air-power investment—that detection-dodging stealth works … and will keep working for many decades to come. So if Sutyagin is absolutely right, America could be in big trouble. The roughly trillion dollars Washington has spent designing and building F-117s, B-2s, F-22s, F-35s and new Long-Range Strike Bombers since the 1970s has been a waste. And the United States is about to lose its aerial advantage. At least, that's the simplistic reading of stealth and counter-stealth in today's warplane development. And make no mistake, Sutyagin's argument is simplistic.
In truth, the Russian expert's claims aren't particularly new. And there's no reason to think that better radars are about to render radar-evading warplanes totally obsolete. Emphasis on totally.Reality is more complicated that Sutyagin's warning implies. Back-and-forth technological advancements mean that, yes, stealth is no panacea. Instead, radar-evasion is becoming just one standard feature in warplane design—albeit still a very important standard feature. Again, there's nothing particularly new about that. Stealth has never been perfect. It's not perfect today. It won't be perfect tomorrow. But it still matters..)
The downside to all this technology? It gets very expensive, and causes the programs to almost inevitably fall behind schedule. But the Scorpion is quite different, as it relies heavily on off-the-shelf commercial parts. For instance, the plane's flight control hardware relies on dual hydraulic systems based on Cessna's Citation X business jet.
"We routinely make software updates to the avionics system in days, not months," said Dale Tutt, the Scorpion's chief engineer.
The Scorpion's developers also want the final product to be cheap to build, and affordable across the aircraft's entire operational lifespan. So-called "hidden" costs are often what makes today's jet fighters such a burden on defense budgets.Take Austria, for example, where a fleet of Eurofighter Typhoons proved so expensive to procure, Vienna slashed orders from 18 to 15 jets. The fighters fly with only the most basic weapons and sensors, and have only short-range air-to-air missiles. As austerity measures bite, the jets are pulling fewer hours on air policing duties—an average of 11 hours a day in what is their sole operational role. Filling the gap are 44-year-old Saab 105 jet trainers. The Scorpion has the potential to do the job of both at a fraction of the cost.
While the Typhoon costs around $15,000 per hour it's in the air, Textron AirLand claim a figure of $3,000 per hour for the Scorpion—with a purchase price of less than $20 million per copy. A partially used, baseline-model Typhoon, as acquired by Austria? $166 million. To be sure, the Typhoon is more capable—but Austria doesn't use them to anything like their full potential. Only the richest nations can afford to.
While most fighters can carry out multiple roles, the twin-engine Scorpion is genuinely flexible—with a focus on irregular warfare, border patrol, maritime surveillance, emergency relief, counter-narcotics and air defense missions. Textron AirLand announced the maiden flight of the two-seat Scorpion in December 2013, meaning that fewer than two years passed between the initial design and its first flight.
The company continued the flight tests, pushing the performance envelope at various speeds, altitudes and climb rates, as well as putting the avionics, flight controls and landing system through their paces.
"In these early flights, we have evaluated the aircraft performance and tested a wide range of mechanical and electronic systems," said Dan Hinson, Scorpion chief test pilot and a veteran U.S. Navy aviator and combat veteran. "The Scorpion is a very agile platform," he added. Back when the aircraft first broke cover, the big question was whether anyone would actually buy the distinctly unglamorous Scorpion. Now, two nations might. And the manufacturer confirms that others are taking a close look at the subsonic attacker.The two nations now linked with the Scorpion are the United Arab Emirates and Nigeria. Both are already in the process of beefing up their airborne surveillance and counter-insurgency forces to combat asymmetric threats—and both have a track record of procuring similar aircraft.
The Scorpion would be a logical addition to a fast-growing UAE close air support and special missions fleet that includes prop-driven Air Tractor AT-802Us—an armed, upgraded crop duster.
However, a U.S. official quoted by Defense News reckons the UAE is interested in Scorpions for training purposes and for the military's aerobatics team. Here, they could substitute for pricier Alenia Aermacchi M-346 jet trainers. The UAE has selected these trainers, but has not yet ordered them. So it's not too late.
Textron AirLand is meanwhile working on a dedicated trainer version of the Scorpion that would better suit these roles. But UAE officials are hesitant to sign up right away for the Scorpion, preferring to wait until another country buys it first. That county could be Nigeria. Here there's a requirement for a bigger counter-insurgent fleet—currently based around a variety of aging fixed-wing types all suffering from low availability, as well as ubiquitous Mi-35 helicopter gunships.
Speaking at the IQPC Fighter Conference in London, a Nigerian air force officer confirmed that the Scorpion was on the radar, as the military seeks more effective ways to defeat Boko Haram militants.In contrast to Nigeria's current fleet of fixed-wing jets—sourced from a variety of European manufacturers—the Scorpion would boast a precision weapons capability, modern surveillance sensors and superior agility, all in the same package.
In August, the Scorpion took part in 'Vigilant Guard 2014', a large-scale, multi-state disaster response exercise conducted in Kansas by U.S. Northern Command and the National Guard. During the maneuvers, the Scorpion provided high-definition, multi-spectral aerial reconnaissance—and shared full-motion color video and communications with other aircraft and ground stations.
The pilot wore a helmet-mounted cueing system, of the type familiar to high-performance jet fighter pilots. When a trainer version of the Scorpion comes on line, Textron AirLand can then take a tilt at the U.S. Air Force's T-X trainer replacement competition. That could yield orders for anything from 350 aircraft to more than 1,000.
That is, if anyone's really interested in buying.
The Scorpion in search of a customer
Textron AirLand Scorpion Caught Flying the Mach Loop During It's Visit to the UK
Meant to be cheap and flexible, the Scorpion has a reconfigurable internal payload bay that should be able to carry a variety of weapons and sensors or fuel. The aircraft will not have any dedicated built-in combat avionics such as radar or recon cameras.
Total capacity of the bay is 3,000 pounds. The aircraft also carries 6,000 pounds of internal fuel. Scorpion has six external hard-points that could probably carry a combined 6,200 pounds of weapons and fuel tanks. At max gross take-off weight, the new fighter weighs just 11 tons and will have ferry range of 2,400 miles. The demonstrator aircraft is powered by two Honeywell TFE731 geared turbofans, which provide a total of around 8,000 pounds of thrust. The engines give the Scorpion a maximum speed of 450 knots. A production version of the jet could be equipped with different, more powerful motors.
Donnelly said in September that if a customer can be found, the Scorpion could enter production in 2015. The new plane is tailored for training, irregular warfare, border patrol, maritime surveillance, emergency relief and counter-narcotic patrols.
"The target market that we have was kind of this hybrid of both ISR [intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance] and light attack," Donnelly said. "This aircraft was designed because we saw a very very large gap between very high performance aircraft and single-engine turboprops." The company's position is that buying the Scorpion would cost less than upgrading existing aircraft like the A-10 or F-16. Additionally, Textron AirLand expects that the sustainment costs for the new machine will be much lower.
When Textron AirLand first introduced the Scorpion at the Air Force Association conference in Washington, D.C. in September, analysts were baffled as to what markets Textron AirLand was hoping to target. Though the company had stated that it was aiming at the U.S. Air Force—particularly its Air National Guard component—most observers doubted the Air Force had any interest.
Indeed, the flying branch is almost certainly planning to divest itself of the much more sophisticated and capable A-10, which has never been popular with the brass. Why would the Air Force turn around and buy a new plane to replace the A-10 when it doesn't want anything in that category? A more pressing question is the USAF's ability to even pay for a new plane, given shrinking budgets. "Beyond the issue of being able to afford another new program, many of the missions suggested for such an aircraft might be better performed by RPAs [remotely piloted aircraft], possibly at less cost than a manned platform if you factor in the need to maintain pilot currency," said Mark Gunzinger, an analyst at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments in Washington, D.C.
While it is highly doubtful that the Scorpion will find favor in the halls of the Pentagon, there could be buyers overseas. Analyst Richard Aboulafia of the Virginia-based Teal Group had suggested earlier that Textron AirLand would only launch a venture of this scale if it already had a potential customer in mind. Traditionally, the only major buyer for an aircraft of this class has been the United Arab Emirates.
