Did the F-117 ever have an air to air role? Or was it always

>>34372927

The F-117 was more of proof-of-concept than an actual fighter. It lacked many essential elements necessary for a fighter jet, mainly air-to-air capability and radar warning receivers.

From what I can gather it was as maneuverable as an F-4, i.e. no slouch.

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>tfw you will never be smart enough to work at skunkworks

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Air Force so fucking incompetent, Lockheed Martin gave them the very best weapon they had, and they still managed to fuck it up.

It was little more than a technology testmule which found itself in active deployment

>>34372953
>i.e. no slouch
The f117 was so bad at flying, that it would fall out of the sky of you let off the throttle.
I seriously doubt it "handled well"

>>34372973
>Same flight path dozens of times
>bomb bay open at the same point

I think the chair force just assumed it was invincible at that point.

Did it ever carry A2A missles? At least sidewinders?

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>>34372973
airfags got a history of fucking up

can suck dick like a champ though. you don't need to fly well you can suck some mean dick, hooo weee boy.

The only thing that makes the Air Force """"good""""" is Lockheed, Boeing, and Northrop (God bless, they work their asses off). And airfags manage to fumble the ball, nonstop, consistently.

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>>34372953
Manuverability at the F-117's speeds is really not that impressive. Most of the prop planes flying out of your local municipal airport have a better turning radius than an F-4 I really wouldn't trust an F-117 to be doing loops and shit.

As for OP's question; the F-117 was pretty much always a dedicated attack aircraft. From what I've heard, the fighter designation was more of a PR move than anything else, as the highly trained pilots they needed to fly the aircraft weren't really keen on the idea of going from fighters to ground attack aircraft. I don't think it's really a demotion, but one could understand why the "high speed low drag" crowd might not want to sign up for ground pounding jobs.

In addition to this, I don't believe the F-117 was ever fitted with any kind of air-search radar or anything like that. I'm no expert when it comes to fighter aircraft electronics, but I'm pretty sure the F-117's electronic suite looked a lot more like an A-10 than an F-16. Besides, at the time it would probably defeat the purpose of all the radar-deflecting facets if you were blazing away with your own search radar. Sorta like being in a super stealthy sub and going around pinging away with active sonar on all the time.

All that being said, if you could get the radar to work, the F-117 could conceivably make a solid AAM truck, similar to the B-1R concept but relying on stealth rather than speed in this case.

>>34373007
Couldn't it pull 7Gs?

>>34373031
Only when crashing

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>>34373040

>>34373027
>Manuverability at the F-117's speeds is really not that impressive. Most of the prop planes flying out of your local municipal airport have a better turning radius than an F-4 I really wouldn't trust an F-117 to be doing loops and shit.
Go to 2:20
>https://youtu.be/8V6HQJluMyY?t=139
it was nimble

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>>34372973
The pilot looks so proud of himself.
What was his gay nickname for managing to charge face first into a surface to air phallus like the champ he is?

>>34373084
Stop it.

>>34373084
>nimble
It nimbly sat on that S-125 SAM like a good college slut.

>>34373084
High G turn at 1:40
https://youtu.be/pnt6ISOGWHQ?t=99

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>>34373092
>tfw owen wilson was only picked because he resembles that dude

>>34373096
Stop what? Showing you video of what you said it couldn't do? You stop it, comrade.

>>34373084
Try this next time
>https://youtu.be/8V6HQJluMyY?t=2m20s

Also, that's interesting. I mean, rolls aren't a huge deal, but I still wouldn't expect F-117s to be pulling maneuvers like that. It's certainly not some lumbering beast like a cargo plane, but for a subsonic jet this really isn't anything out of the ordinary.

>>34373141
Well now don't I have egg on my face. Fuck you 4chan....

>>34373130
>high G turn
>wider turn than ACX Crystal

>>34372954
im fucking plying

There was an >A/F-117 F-117N F-117B
or whatever the hell you want to call it proposal for a multi mission aircraft that could take AIM-9s.

>>34373020
The CIA was operating that when it crashed.

>>34373306
Fucking Lockheed... Try making something that can do everything and end up with something that does nothing... F-35 is fine now but I can't imagine the F-117 would have seen much action in the Gulf War if they'd tried all that bullshit.

The F-117 had air to air kills during Red Flag.

>>34373586
And Australian F-111s wasted Marine F-18s at Redflag.

Doesn't mean the F-117 is a fighter.

>>34373135
Hey he did great. That is a fantastic movie

>>34373658
>Doesn't mean the F-117 is a fighter.
are you arguing with the voices in your head again?

>>34373658
Didn't an F-111 or EF-111 get a confirmed air kill during desert storm or something?

>>34374575
>Didn't an F-111 or EF-111 get a confirmed air kill during desert storm or something?

There was one that got a maneuver kill by exploiting their pursuer's tunnel vision and letting them plow into the ground in a pursuit.

>>34372927
It was originally planned to carry 2x AIM-9s but they dropped it for whatever reason, meaning it had zero air-to-air armament throughout its life.

>>34373007
>that it would fall out of the sky of you let off the throttle.

So will plenty of other aircraft like the Mirage 2000. It's called relaxed stability and most modern aircraft have it.

F-117 was a fighter only in name. I've heard that fighter designation was chosen for it because they wanted fighter pilots to crew them, but they knew they wouldn't get in it if it were designated a bomber. That may just be a bit of lore but I know the F-117 was not capable of being used as a fighter.