F-14 Tomcat

>>34702128
why was f-14 only sold to iran but not other more important allies?

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>>34702128
If Tom Clancy taught me anything it's that the F-14 is the best fighter ever made and that we shouldn't have retired them or the Phoenix missiles.

Instead of F-35s we should've developped 2 classes of carrier aircraft, a fighter-bomber, and an interceptor armed with extreme-range air-to-air missiles.

afaik it needed an extensive maintenance and had some safety problems

also all the variable swept wings died out

>>34702128
>What did the F-14 do so poorly such that she was greatly outlived by the contemporaries in her generation of fighter?

Arguably cost per flight hour. Definitely the maintenance time to flight time ratio.

Because the threat it was specifically designed for, (intercepting long range Soviet maritime strike aircraft like the Tu-22M) disappeared.Then in the late 90s the Super Hornet entered service and it became hard to justify spending such a premium to keep the F-14.

>>34702128
Stay airworthy. Decades of crashing onto the decks of aircraft carriers and exposure to salt water damaged them enough to no longer remain safe to fly at an acceptable cost.

Thats why Iran's F-14s can still fly. If they had access to spare parts, they would be in near pristine condition, given the softer runway landings and dry environment.

>>34702185
No one wanted or needed it. The F-4 was a very successful aircraft, and became a mainstay for many American allies, because it could fulfill most roles. The F-14 was its replacement, but didn't really get the same multirole capabilities until the end of its life in USN service.

>>34702196
Phoenix was good for its time, but that doesn't mean it was good. It was too large and bulky to be take out fighters that could actually maneuver evasively.

The reason we didn't is numbers. Deck space is limited, so having all your planes being able to attack when necessary will greatly increase your sortie rate when air dominance is already achieved.

I'll agree with long range air to air missiles. AIM-120D is approaching Phoenix's range in a lighter package. AIM-120 should be due for a replacement or overhaul soon anyway. I remember reading about something in early development with multiple seeker heads and fusing for both air and surface targets, but that was years ago.

>>34702249
>it became hard to justify spending such a premium to keep the F-14.

Why does the high/low arguement work for the Air Force's F-15/F-16, but it doesn't for the Navy's F-14/F-18

>>34702423
High-low only works when there is a high end threat. With the fall of the USSR, The threat of long-range maritime strike avaition regiments loaded with ASMs died. There was nothing if the type to worry about. So the Tomcat's prime advantage, the ability to go out 500nm and "shoot the archer", was rendered irrelevant.

>>34702196

we're already building the "extreme-range air-to-air missiles", see the X-51 hypersonic test vehicle. Within a decade even seahawks will be able to launch ICBMs.

It's not a cheap, short ranged bomb truck. American military dominance is such that long range carrier aircraft aren't needed to defend the ship from other aircraft. It's a plane for a role that hasn't existed since 91' as America's opponents are lucky to have any aircraft let alone combat aircraft anymore.

If you want to bring up China as a reason for needing longer legged birds, I pretty sure they're just planning on drones and cruise missiles and never letting a CVN risk a hit from anything non-ballistic.

>>34702423

Deck space.

we have acres of storage for F-15's and F-16s

jets need to do everything on a carrier these days

>>34702437

ICBM != long range AA missile.

>>34702450
>Deck space.
The F-14 took up less space than an F-4 and I suspect roughly the same as an F/A-18F.

>>34702450
>>34702453

Physical space of the jet itself isn't really that much of an issue, but the logistical footprint of operating an extra jet type is, especially if that jet is as maintenance intensive as the F-14. Consider that a current carrier air wing can potentially have all combat aircraft using the same airframe (F/A-18E, F/A-18F, and EA-18G) and so have extensive commonality in terms of parts and ground crew expertise. In the current threat environment the F-14 just doesn't bring enough extra to justify its costs.

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>tfw there's never going to be an F-14++

>>34702196
That's an F15 my man.

My friend wants to know if you have any more though

>>34702453
It's not "this plane takes up slightly more space than that air plane", it's "we can only fit so many aircraft, so to be best prepared for anything all of them should be able to do everything".

As long as your interceptor takes up any space at all, that's more than you want when it's time to go bomb shepherds. And when you have a fuckton of bombers incoming, you likewise want every inch of deck space to contain something that can fly intercept.

>>34702128
Super Hornet is a F-14 minus swing-wing.

F-14's main problem is being xboxhueg and a pricetag to match. Same reason the SR-71 was retired.

>>34702423
Hi/Lo is why people argue for the Super Toucano.

>>34702693
imo the future of cas it's mostly drones

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>>34702249
>Because the threat it was specifically designed for, (intercepting long range Soviet maritime strike aircraft like the Tu-22M)

???

even poverty russia still has like 5? regiments of Backfires

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>>34702409
>Phoenix was good for its time, but that doesn't mean it was good. It was too large and bulky to be take out fighters that could actually maneuver evasively.

The idea of the super long range missile was just to increase standoff range. Prevent russian bombers from getting in range of the carriers.

So when you see them coming, you intercept with F14, fire a phoenix their way and hope that they'll turn back. (because if they turn back, the bombers will be out of range of the phoenix missile, but at the same time out of range of using their own ordnance against the carrier)

It's just a big stick to scare away enemies with. For most shots you take with it, you don't actually expect it to hit.

>>34702775
> furry plane art

Trump needs to ban the real sickos from serving.

>>34702775
technically this pic violates 4chan rules of no furry art especially on blue boards...

>>34702724

The threat of the Tu-22M to shipping was serious because of the sheer numbers of them they could field and how important sealifted reinforcements were to preventing Warsaw Pact from taking Western Europe. Today, the threat of Russia to NATO in Europe isn't particularly worrying, and the few Tu-22M that Russia would be able to field at any given moment are unlikely to use nuclear tipped missiles, which means that Aegis and Super Hornet CAPs are an adequate counter as long as the USN doesn't expect to approach Murmansk.

>>34702557
Did Macross ever explain why it went with "Spacy"? I'm pretty sure Robotech never covered it.

>>34702953

>Space Navy
>SPACe navY
>Spacy

>>34703000
I hope that's not true. That's incredibly lame, even for giant mecha anime.

>>34703053

Think about it nigga.

armY fights on land

navY fights on sea

spacY fights in space

>>34702128
Because the pheonix missile turned out not to be that great

>>34703064
"arm" doesn't really mean land, does it?
"nav" only became a sea thing because of the word navy in the first place.


By your logic, it should be:

Landy fights on land
Watery fights on sea
And then you get your spacy.

>>34703084

Ha ha nigga, have some fun, it's an anime, for real nigga

>>34702669
>Same reason the SR-71 was retired.
SR-71 was retired because there's something better.

>>34702423
See >>34702433 and >>34702450.

Even now, with F-22 and F-35 for the Air Force, the numbers are skewed so much that F-22 is nearly irrelevant.

>>34702453
Yes, but the F-14 doesn't do bombing as well as an F/A-18, requires more maintenance, and costs more to fly. The Navy needs more attack aircraft than interceptors right now.

>>34702693
Tucano would fill a VeryLo niche in US service, and would be more a successor to the A-10 than anything else.

>>34702705
Drones are great until you get an enemy that can do EW competently. Then again, if you have an enemy that can do EW, they can probably shoot down Warthogs or Tucanos easily.

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>>34703084

>"nav" only became a sea thing because of the word navy in the first place

>>34703091
Satellites aren't better, if they were better we'd get rid of the U2 too.

We still use the U2 because the U2 is both better than a Satellite and easier to reschedule.

The SR-71 is a much faster U2. Turns out the U2 is fast enough.

>>34703723
he meant a newer spyplane than the SR-71. There's been people that were saying that it's been replaced with a newer, super secrit one

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>>34702128

The F-14 was designed and produce in a geopolitical and military era much different than now. It was meant to protect fleets against a threat that doesn't really exist anymore.

With the improvements in aerial refueling, extra long range fighters are not needed on carriers. Legacy Hornets may have had too short a range, but Super Hornets (while not as long range as the Cat) have mitigated that somewhat.

With improvement of long range and active-radar guided missiles, you don't need the performance envelope of the F-14.

You can fit missiles that approach Phoenix-level performance on a Hornet or Super Hornet, and I imagine the F-35C will use them. too. Plus, if really necessary, Raytheon can likely make an AMRAAM variant that can reach Mach 5 and betther than 100 miles.

Along with that, the post-Cold War defense cuts brought the need for greater cost-efficiency, which is why a lot of different types were replaced by the Hornet and Super Hornet.

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>>34703723

I wouldn't say the U-2 is "better," but it does fill in some niche roles that a satellite can't.

Like you said:
>easier to reschedule

That allows it to get recon photography when the satellite is on the other side of the globe. An aircraft has greater flexibility than a satellite, but it also costs more to operate and puts a pilot at risk.

I won't argue that a good recon aircraft isn't necessary, because it really is. But I don't think one is better than the other, but rather it's two systems that complement each other to fill one complete role.

>>34702953
Engrish

>>34702128
Operating costs.

>>34704146
>That allows it to get recon photography when the satellite is on the other side of the globe

The orbital period of a spy satellite is on the order of 84-127 minutes. Do you think that a U2 will be able to fuel up, taxi, take off, and reach the area to take photos under 84 minutes?

>>34704498
not to mention that there are tons of spy sattelites to begin with

>>34704498

And there are 4 KH11 satellites...

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>>34702128
It was too expensive, it had nothing to do with performance because it was arguably one of the best performing airframes the navy has ever used

Did I banned?

>>34702128
It was a MASSIVE hangar queen due to the fact that it had so many parts. It did well when it was out, but once it was back there were a lot of parts to deal with.

>>34704960
You can check just by going to 4chan.org/banned

>>34702128
It's fighter that required a 2-man crew.

But mainly it was just old and the cost of maintenance was getting too high. Also, Grumman didn't have enough lobbyists to keep it going for another 10 years.

>>34702128
Did the issues with it turning into a frisbee when it lost an engine contribute to it's demise or is that a myth?

>>34702409
All we really know about Iran's F-14s is that they can in fact still fly. We don't know anything about their actual reliability or what upgrades (if any) they've undergone. I'm not sure saying carrier aircraft are just inherently better in terms of durability when used on land is accurate, considering how beat to shit Canada's Hornets are. In fact i'm pretty sure when F-16s and F-18s sold at roughly the same time were compared (Canada vs Belgium for instance) the aircraft losses over time to crashes weren't significantly different.

it wasn't a jack of all trades. Specialized aircraft tend to be a waste.

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>>34710681

>>34702841
>>34702865
same fagging,

how sad.

>>34710701
Cargo planes can be specialized

Fighters cannot if they want to be successful

>>34702128
The Cold War ended and the diminishing of its main mission and the maintenance-heavy swing wings (among other things) meant it wasn't well-suited to withstand the peace dividends. Cheney deciding he didn't care much for Grumman was the nail in the coffin.

>>34702128
Because carrier crew get tired of F-14 jocks playing Danger Zone or spouting one-liners.

>>34702128
because it was expensive that's all

>>34702423
Because airbases are a shitload bigger than aircraft carriers. On an airbase, you can stash spare parts and even spare airframes for two, three, even ten different types of aircraft, and if you ever find out you need something else, you can have a huge fucking strategic airlifter show up from halfway around the world the very next day with everything you need.

On a carrier, you have severely limited space all around - limited deck space, limited hangar space, limited spare parts, etc. and delivering cargo onboard is considerably more challenging, so commonality becomes a key part of maintaining aircraft in a high state of readiness.

>>34702128
>What did the F-14 do so poorly such that she was greatly outlived by the contemporaries in her generation of fighter?

We can star with Tomcat being naval fighter, that reduces life of aircraft by two ways. First is corrosion due to sea water and salt. Second limited maintenance facilities in carrier. Then we can get to swing wing, that is mechanical clusterfuck that increases maintenance requirement a lot, that is also expensive. Third thing is not having Rumsfeld on as major recipient of donations for elections and shieet.

>>34710701

A large strategic air-lifter can carry nearly anything rather than just a few specific types of cargo, and cargo aircraft have been used heavily both to support US small wars and in peace time. If the C-5 could only carry helicopters, you would have a point.

>>34702724
Obsolete aircraft with obsolete weapons that can't be operated safely today aren't exactly the threat that the Tu-22 was in 1986

>>34705678
On a carrier this is doubly a problem. A completely full nimitz can carry ~120 planes. If only 40 of them are available at any time, your airwing is now the same as an airwing of a kuznetsov carrier with planes that are 66% available. This is a problem.

>naval and aircraft lasers threaten to reduce the viability of missiles
>can't press buttan to explode enemy aircraft anymore, have to fly right up to them and fill them with holes
>need to have two things to do the above: big engines to fly fast, and wings that are good for both flying fast and turning hard at low speed (nudgenudge)
The Tomcat will rise again! You just wait and see!

>>34702693
>Hi/Lo is why people argue for the Super Toucano.

Nope. Cheap COIN aircraft is why people argue for that, you don't need advanced multi-role fighter to bomb illiterate goat fuckers with no anti-aircraft weaponry half way around the world, if you have access to local airstrips light aircraft like Tucano or OV-10 does everything fighter does at fraction of the costs and lot smaller logistical footprint. Smaller logistical footprint also applies when light fixed wing attack aircraft is compared to attack helicopters, those have twice the engines, some extra gearboxes and three times maintenance crew involved.

Something mundane like few boxes of MREs, some tents, some camping beds or some aviation fuel might be irrelevant costs while operating from base in home, but quite a lot more expensive if it all has to be airlifted to some shithole populated by people that molest dancing boys. Repeatedly, week after week for decade or so.

>>34711686

Your rebuttal would make sense if the F-14 could only destroy helicopters

>>34712624

Except it literally was specialised as an interceptor that launched long range missiles against strategic bombers. It was pressed into other roles (especially in Iranian service) but without its niche, it was like using a C-5 Galaxy to deliver post.

>>34710701
How the fuck general purpose cargo aircraft is specialized? Especially with fighter with extremely limited multi-role capabilities, at least most of its existence.

>>34712624
Nope. Tomcat was purpose built interceptor that only later on got limited multi-role capability, even then it couldn't use lighter unguided bombs due to aerodynamics. Just as fighter it's main armament, the phoenix, had only limited usefulness against fighters.

>>34702128

It was expensive and it broke a lot.

>>34702198
>Safety problems.
>Killed Goose.

Yep.

>>34713997
>Based on engine faults that really happened

>>34702128
Maintenance.

>>34714189
>Goose died from hitting the cockpit glass, something that could never feasibly happen

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>>34713997
F-14 killed first carrier qualified female aviator. Compressor stall at very slow speed and altitude on approach to carrier, an engine characteristic that had been known from the first day Tomcat entered service.

>>34714219
>Woman dies from being too slow and cautious

Color me surprised

>>34714219
She killed herself. She Failed flight school several times. The Navy and Air Force were in a race to have the first pilot without a penis.

>>34714219
Thank McNamarra's F-111 related autism for that.

>>34714217
The flame-out to flat spins did happen. And it is actually feasibly possible if the flat spin results in no forward momentum, and the canopy isn't yanked away clear from the plane by wind resistance.

>>34714296
>he angrily posted while closing the cockpit of his F-35

>>34714298
If McNamara, USAF and USN had common sense when F-111 was designed, it would have been designated B-72. Turning a medium bomber in every sense into a fighter-interceptor is taking multi-role to special level of stupidity. Simply too different roles to be combined to same aircraft. While some people at Navy opposed it from the start, lot of people in charge of Navy and almost everyone in USAF pushed for it. USAF back in 50's and 60's was ran by strategic bomber guys, as side note this the reason why USAF did quite badly in air combat in Vietnam War, all training was ran by bomber guys with bomber focus: safety, safety and mission completion. They basically skipped lot actual combat training. Navy did better than USAF with gunless Phantoms. When it comes to F-14 staying with same engine as F-111. USN had sunk lot of money into that engine. F-14's wider spaced engines made the compressor stall far more dangerous than it was with F-111 as it caused far worse thrust asymmetry.

Compressor stall was fucked up and hard to recover from in higher altitudes in situations like dog fight training, but on approaches to carrier it was pretty fucking deadly, with extremely limited to punch out of the plane.

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>>34714296
>The Navy and Air Force were in a race to have the first pilot without a penis.
they could cut the penis of an actual pilot...

also tfw russia had female fighter pilots since 40ss and had them in 90ss too, and usa claim to be more women empowering feminist friendly when they barely got one shitty fem pilot in the mid 90ss

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>>34714219

I laugh everytime

>>34702200
Panavia Tornado is still in use lad.

>>34716261
on its deathbed
so? f-14 is still in use too, in iran :^)

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The world changed.

>>34702224
This. Even in the best of times, the Tomcat was a hangar queen.