Pictures Of Mystery Plane Over Wichita

a reply to: SirDrinksalot

If your gearing up for war, tankers loitering around on the border of a country would sort of give it away. During desert storm they flew tankers on the border for a few day before it but Sadam probably knew it was inevitable that they'd strike soon whereas if you wanted to have a complete suprise a stealth tanker would be what you need.

A stealth tanker for a new stealth bomber like LRS-B its a good idea. May be the bomber is the Texas sighting, and the refueler the Kansas sighting who know .... in theory its not the same plane

originally posted by: boomer135
You can't combine the air radar and ground radar on the same airframe. Something to do with radar but I read that somewhere.

No, but hear out my mad ramblings. How about you could use a completely passive hemispherical surveillance system to monitor the skies around you for say 100 miles whilst sat using a VLPI targeting system to find / designate for the bad boys.

Supersonic would not be a good regime for such an airframe (Lockheed Martin have done a very comprehensive speed / survivability versus signature control study for penetrating airframes - If you take a VVLO sub sonic system, you find it is very survivable at extreme heights. You need extreme broad band signature management and hefty threat awareness systems though once into that regime, but with todays tech, that's very doable indeed.

I'd say some thing like EODAS would be a wild ride if the sensors were larger and the computing power a little more space and a little more juice. Add VLPI X band AESA to hunt the ground targets and a sub system for sending comprehensive GPS co-ordinates via laser satellite uplink... I'd think you'd have a hefty system for making life hell from up high unseen.

Just saying.

a reply to: SirDrinksalot

A stealth refueler makes sense to me. Like Boomer mentioned "follow the fuel" if an adversary can track the un-stealthy tankers (in contested airspace or not) they will know that almost every airborne asset must eventually link up with them. Kill the tankers and ground the Air Force.
A stealthy tanker can be used for other missions than just refueling every day sorties in a mass deployment theater of operation.
I think someone in the Air Force once said they wanted an all stealth fleet eventually too, can't remember where I heard that though.

a reply to: Sammamishman

Thats kinda what I was thinking. The weakness of a stealth fleet is when it has to refuel midair with something that is not stealthy. The enemy can hang around tankers if they can get close enough and knock down the stealth craft meeting up with it. Easier in the short term then actually trying to counter the stealth technology with some super plane or missile or radar.

I still don't think the craft in those pictures is a stealth tanker. I think its probably something way cooler.

a reply to: boomer135

HM...

TR-3A?

I thought all those TR designations were bunk (such as the TR-3B and whatnot)?

originally posted by: BASSPLYR
a reply to: Sammamishman

I still don't think the craft in those pictures is a stealth tanker. I think its probably something way cooler.

Agreed.

Could this be Boeing's new F/A-XX?

I mean, from underneath and at a high altitude one might confuse THIS for the "mystery" craft.

a reply to: MystikMushroom

I don't think thats what it is. And, from what I've personally seen, that f/a -xx looks soooo last year.

Maybe they are planning on building something like the f/a - xx but they have some things way beyond anything in that plane.

a reply to: Sammamishman

Oh SO much cooler. But i thought you guys would appreciate the tanker.

a reply to: Astr0

Now THAT is an interesting idea. Hopefully they do eventually do something like that and don't screw it up.

I hope more cooler than a tanker

a reply to: darksidius

Oh it's not a tanker. This was just good timing for a little leak.

originally posted by: darksidius
I hope more cooler than a tanker

If its the proposed KQ-47C tanker, I'd frankly # a little golden egg of happiness. So would you.

Think a 'super sized' X-47B, unmanned, internal fuel load, and a shrouded boom (faceted a la F-117 RCS Pylon) for those times when an F-22 wants to drop right out of hostile skies for some gas not 100 miles from the fight.

Some where there was once a picture online of it. As it is, they proposed the bulk standard X-47B to have a drogue system for refuelling manned assets.

a reply to: Astr0

From everything I've been told there were RCS issues with the boom. Everything else worked, but the boom was harder to hide than they thought.

I don't know where you get your info Zaph, but damn. Very few people even knew about the existance of a stealth tanker being tested. And it was roughly 10-12 years ago. The problem was trying to hide the booms RCS from radar. Yes they experiemented with RAM and a faceted ruddervator system. They got the RCS down pretty low but not low enough to make it worth while for a strike package to go undetected. For example flying a package of F-22's and a tanker into a heavily defended area would just give up the fighters too easy. So as far as I know it never went past RCS testing inflight.

But Air Force generals have wanted some sort of stealthy tanker for a while now, and it was rumored for a long time that after the KC-Y competiting, the KC-Z would focuse on stealth technology. Were not going to be bombing Iraq and Afghanistan anymore. We will be out in the pacific ocean focusing on mainland China and the likes, a place where a stealthy tanker would work. Just how far do you think an F-22 or F-35 can fly into mainland china in its current state of fuel load?

If we had a tanker that could fly with fighters undetected it would be a game changer for sure. March 2003 was the first time a tanker officially was "in country" during a war. We went from air refueling tracks in Saudi to mirror tracks in Iraq. We went from combat support flights to combat flights. But that was after the initial strike packages took out what was left of iraq's SAM's and possible air force. In a battle with China, they have weapons that could reach out into the ocean hundreds if not thousands of miles and hit tankers, AWACS, JSTARS, etc.

I agree that the need for a stealth tanker is there, but i doubt that its gone anywhere in the last ten years, and if it has i don't know about it. As for the F-117 companion, its still operational as of Janurary of this year . But i could see these new triangles as being a replacement for them, although they themselves are not triangles.

a reply to: boomer135

I channel.

It's good to have friends.

Is it a stealthy transport/cargo plane perhaps?





Northrop’s Stealthy Cargo Plane

a reply to: boomer135

It's too bad people keep getting the designation wrong with the F-117's companion, so close yet so far away lol

Some more enhancements from reddit:



I think this is the shape of the aircraft:



reddit