F 16 Test Beds Term paper
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F-16
FIGHTING FALCON
A FLYING TEST BED FOR AERODYNAMIC AND AVIONICS TESTING FOR MORE THAN
27 YEARS
In the early 1970 s, the Air Force was in need of an inexpensive fighter aircraft to supplement its new and expensive air superiority fighter, the F-15 Eagle. Two aircraft were created for this mission. The YF-16 Falcon came from General Dynamics, and the YF-17 Cobra from Northrop. The YF-16 rolled out of its Fort Worth hanger on December 13, 1973 and was put on a C-5 to be transported to Edwards AFB, California for testing. The first flight happened on January 21, 1974 by accident. Test pilot Phil Oestricher was attempting the first high-speed taxi when the nose started to lift off of the runway. The YF-16, which was the first aircraft to use a fixed stick because of its fly-by-wire flight controls, started to veer off to the left. Instead of plowing into the desert, he decided to take off, he flew the pattern for six minutes and landed uneventfully. It didn t take the program long to come up to speed, soon the YF-16 reached speeds over Mach 2.0 and pulling aver 9G s. Part of the reason this aircraft could pull so many G s was because of the seat; it was inclined 30 degrees to reduce the effects of G-force upon pilots. An interesting fact is that the YF-16 and YF-17 never faced each other, but flew against MIG-17s and MIG-21s that the USAF had acquired . The YF-16 won the competition, and what is probably the most versatile aircraft in the world was born. As a side note, the YF-17 program was later targeted towards the Navy and became the F/A-18 Hornet .
One of the first experiments with the F-16 was the Control Configuration Vehicle (CCV). The aircraft used for this program was the first YF-16 (72-1567); it was rebuilt in December 1975. This aircraft has independent of uncoupled flight control surfaces, which make it possible to move in one plane without moving in another-such as turning without having to bank. The last flight of the YF-16/CCV was on June 31, 1977; it had flown 87 sorties for 125 hours.
The experience gained in the YF-16/CCV program was later utilized in the F-16/AFTI program. The F-16/AFTI (Advanced Fighter Technology Integration) program was awarded to General Dynamics on December 26, 1978, and an F-16A (75-0750) was modified for this purpose. The F-16/AFTI program is a joint NASA/USAF effort to evaluate advanced digital flight controls, automated maneuvering, voice-activated controls, sensors, and close-air support attack systems. Most of the program focused on avionics, but it has provided a lot of information in aerodynamics, flight controls, and aircraft structures. A couple of the most noticeable features of the F-16/AFTI is its canards mounted just below the engine inlet, and the Forward Looking Infrared (FLIR) mounted near the wing roots and in front of the canopy. The canards allow for selective fuselage pointing to quickly acquire and target an opponent. The FLIR pods were used to study the aerodynamic and operational effects versus the traditional mounting of FLIR pods on the intake. Part of the structure testing involved the use of strain-gage instruments mounted on the interior of flight control surfaces. The latest use for the F-16/AFTI that I could find is its use in the development of the Joint Strike Fighter (JSF). The Lockheed Martin JSF team replaced the traditional hydraulically controlled flight control actuators with power-on-demand electric actuators, combined with a new 270-volt switched reluctance power system on the F-16/AFTI. This system saves both weight and cost compared to the heavy and labor intensive hydraulic system. This system increases an aircrafts survivability with the use of redundant wiring, and with the JSF being a single engine aircraft, there is always power for flight control surfaces in the event of an engine failure.
One of the more interesting F-16 test programs in my mind is the F-16XL. It was originally designed to explore wing platform and camber shapes to provide efficient supersonic cruise while providing fighter-like agility. The cranked-arrow design of the F-16XL...
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