Having higher mass flow through the core doesn’t make it magically produce more thrust with afterburner… it just means that it will have higher output in mil thrust w/out burner. Additionally, the turbine inlet temperature limit still exists… having higher flow doesn’t offset the fact that they will run into the hard temperature limit sooner due to the increased pressure ratio… whereas the GE-402 will be able to handle the higher flow at higher speeds without as much concern for the temp limit… since it won’t reach it until later than the RM12.
On the other hand, we know that the F404-GE-402 document states explicitly that the only place the RM12 fan would improve upon the GE-402 model is in the upper left hand of the envelope. I’m sure since they took the effort to say this it would imply that it indeed doesn’t benefit them in the rest of the envelope.
If you’re not familiar with journal articles, I’m sure it might seem that way. As someone who regularly reviews scientific papers I can tell you it is not the case.
Going back to the “industry standard” issue… they clearly discuss more than just the static thrust increase for the -402, and likely aren’t generalizing here either. I think it is quite obvious that the -402 would have improved thrust over the RM12. If you think otherwise, you are clearly not reading the available materials… Probably deducing your opinion from the position that you won’t believe it until the numbers are publicly available directly from a primary source to prove it… in spite of the fact that sufficient evidence exists to already show this.
We can all agree we have different thresholds which we deem sufficient evidence.
Quite the contrary. I was unaware of the increased bypass ratio of the 402, so if anything you’ve only unearthed more evidence to convince me the RM12 is the superior engine. Thankfully, for once me and the devs are in agreement here.
Why would you go through the effort of building a brand new engine with the stated goal of faster time to altitude and intercept, with the stated goal of more provided power, to then make the engine worse than the previous model? That doesn’t even make sense.
He’ll point out the constraint of having to use the lower flow fan to be fit in the F/A-18 without modifications to the airframe. The issue with this response is that the document clearly states the RM12 only provides additional performance in a specific area of the flight envelope.
The RM-12 should be superior to the GE 402 in several very important ways. Someone correct me if I’m wrong, but the first and very important thing is that the RM-12 engine needs to be more reliable and safer because the Gripen has one engine - so the engine design is more geared in that direction.
The second important thing is more bird strike resistance.
More engine thrust in a certain area of the flight envelope, directly adapted to the intended use of the Gripen.
The RM 12 is not inferior to the GE 402, it is different and has its own advantages. Naturally the GE 402 has its advantages too.
The -402 received the reliability enhancements and mechanical backup should the FADEC system fail. Aside from the bird strike issue, it has all of the same improvements but without the higher flow fan, as well as the improved core and a couple of other minor enhancements. The core has less friction and flows air better than the RM12’s -400 core w/ material modifications that enabled it to manage higher turbine inlet temps.
Of course the Gripen will have higher thrust than the -402’s in certain specific conditions… but those are likely limited to very slow airspeeds especially when combined with higher altitudes. This is what is stated and what I have covered in the discussion already to this point.
AFAIK they bring no benefit over their equivalent single seat equivalents outside of aesthetics. Perhaps as event vehicles as they like to intro 2-Seater variants for events.
Yeah, that’s what I was thinking honestly. An F/A-18B or D as an event vehicle, with a load of adversary/tiger meet schemes would go hard. It’d be useless, but again, something a bit refreshing
I personally just want the Hornet B/D for customs to zoom about in (tbf, that’s what I want a majority of vehicles for lol), and a lot of the time unique skins end up adding to the experience (for me at least).
I mean, imagine either spawning into a match (Air RB/Sim) or landing at an airfield (custom battles) only to be greeted with like 10 Hornets, all wearing these different camouflages/liveries…
I don’t know, I don’t have more information about the RD-12 or the GE 402. The Gripen vs Hornet C comparison to me lacks an important indication of installed thrust, so I really don’t know. This is more of an academic debate than a practical one. I’ll take some graphs of the Hornet later and post them here.
F-18C/D Lot 14 Block 36 and more had GE-402 engines. It is possible that the table shows these engines, I am not that familiar with the Hornet
From the last table you will certainly find a lot of interesting facts.
The F-14A is interesting, why did Northrop humiliate the Tomcat A like that? To make the F-14D look better for the US Congress?
There were concerns about the missile packing capability of the F/A-18. However after using AMRAAM few times on dev server, I don’t think it’s going to be a serious problem.
While the missile itself is epic and lot better than AIM-7M, we still need enough speed and energy to use it well. And Hornet requires combination of SUU-63 pylon + LAU-115 launcher + two LAU-127 launcher 10-AMRAAM loadout. These stuffs are quite heavy and creates very high drag, makes maximum speed and acceleration even worse.
The Hornet would be very powerful within AMRAAM’s NEZ, but its slow speed would limit its ability to extend missile range. So in a BVR engagement it would be at great risk of being preempted. A further disadvantage is that a large number of missiles will adversely affect its weight and drag, making evasive maneuvers against 40-50g missiles more difficult.
Gaijin doesn’t model massive reduction in performance from pylon drag. The Gripen is a great example, as it should go maximum mach 1.4 with air to air missiles loadout and can do nearly mach 2 anyway in-game.
If so, I shall leave out the part about pylon drag. Then I wonder if I need to revise my opinion that 10 AMRAAM would not make the Hornet a ultimate game breaker.
It could change in the future but as of right now it wouldn’t be the case in-game. Missiles and pylons have very little additional drag currently. They primarily affect mass and center of gravity iirc so it will hurt dogfight performance and energy retention primarily due to additional weight but not drag.
Given that the speed of the launch aircraft and the effective range of the missile are roughly proportional, it would be safe to say that the F-15 and F-16 are overall better AMRAAM platforms than the F/A-18, despite of less missile capacity.
For this reason, I don’t think 10x AMRAAM loadout would be a major balance issue―it’s more of a minimal measure to compensate for the Hornet’s inherent weaknesses in the Fox 3 meta.
