Aviation Week & Space Technology
11/29/2004, page 26
David A. Fulghum
Washington
The U.S. Air Force is weighing four Skunk Works designs for an interim strike capability to augment the B-2 fleet
STRIKING CONCEPTS
Lockheed Martin designers are taking the wraps off four concepts they're offering to the U.S. Air Force to meet its requirements for an interim long-range strike platform to fit in between the B-2 and whatever will replace the 21 stealth bombers in the 2035 period.
Buried in those presentations are options--some acknowledged by the company and some not--for employing jamming devices, intelligence-gathering sensors and directed-energy weapons, say a number of military and aerospace industry officials with insight into future strike planning. Other proposals involve mounting low-observable external weapons pods and pylons, introducing morphing wing skins for carrying addition fuel, and changing aircraft skin colors for visual daytime stealth.
Air Force analysts had asked for concepts that could be fielded by 2010. Notional requirements for the interim strike capability include fielding an operational vehicle by 2015 with a range of 1,500-2,000 naut. mi. and a 5-15-ton payload. Another consideration is that "we fully expect there's going to be some pretty good energy weapons available by 2015-20," says John E. Perrigo, Lockheed Martin's senior manager for combat air systems business strategy and development.
The FB-22 is expected to offer greater range and larger payloads than the F/A-22 while maintaining its speed and improving stealth.
LOCKHEED MARTIN responded with two aircraft--C-130J and F/A-22 derivatives--that could meet the deadline and would be the least expensive of the company's offerings. However, not even notional prices were discussed. The third concept is an ICBM-derivative, missile-based concept that could evolve over time to a single-stage-to-space system with a reusable suborbital hypersonic delivery platform; it would cost more than the two derivative aircraft. However, it would be designed to place a bomb anyplace on Earth within an hour from a ship, a submarine or a land base.
Lastly and perhaps most intriguing, but also most costly, the company offered the "BMACK" common-body concept, which offers a short-takeoff-and-landing, large-payload stealth aircraft that can be configured as a bomber (B), surveillance/intelligence aircraft, special operations (M) gunship (A) or clandestine transport © or tanker (K), Perrigo says. However, he adds the cautionary note that this last concept would be tough to field by the 2015 deadline. It could require another five years based on funding and technology improvements. He says that any all-new, non-derivative design is difficult to field in fewer than 20 years and would cost more than a derivative aircraft.
Addressing the four initiatives in turn, Perrigo described the AC-130J arsenal ship as nonstealthy, subsonic and not designed to penetrate enemy air defenses. However, it would be modified internally to carry 8-12 cruise missiles for standoff attacks. The restructuring would consist of roll-on, roll-off weapon racks and a launch console. Weapons selection is expected to include the conventional air-launched cruise missile, Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff Missile and Jassm-ER and miniature air-launched decoy missiles fitted with electronic attack warheads for close-in jamming.
The FB-22 (at 120,000 lb. gross weight with fuel and bombs) would be a stealthy, supersonic fighter-bomber with enlarged wings to increase lift and carry additional fuel for extended-range missions. Lockheed Martin designers say a $8-9-billion program would produce an aircraft with the range for intertheater strike even if external weapons were added to beef up the internal weapons payload. The aircraft would be fielded with global network links that allow target-updating up to the moment a target is struck. The FB-22 would carry a number of lethal self-protection weapons--which means AIM-9X high-off-boresight infrared missiles, a helmet-mounted cuing system and AIM-120 beyond-visual-range active/passive radar missiles.
Pratt & Whitney's F119 engine could be modified for the new design with new hot-area materials and coatings, allowing it to perform at higher temperatures. The expected result is that the FB-22, a much bigger aircraft, would be able to operate at the same speeds and altitudes as the F/A-22. Pratt & Whitney officials say they are testing derivative F119 engines both for new long-range strike and long-range reconnaissance aircraft concepts.
The aircraft's combined external and internal payload is expected to exceed 15 tons. Working from the inside out: the lengthened main weapons bay also will have bulged doors to carry two 2,000-lb. GBU-31s and two AIM-120 Amraams, or six Amraams. Two side weapon bays can carry two small-diameter bombs (SBDs) or two AIM-9Xs each. Two external, 5,000-lb.-capacity, low-observable, wing weapon bays on inboard positions would each carry a GBU-31 or a GBU-37 (5,000-lb.) bomb or two GBU-38s (500-lb.) or six SDBs (250-lb.) weapons. Two low-observable pylons would be fitted to outboard wing stations so that each can carry a stealthy Jassm missile.
To curtail down, the FB-22's tail and fuselage would stay the same as the F/A-22's, but with the larger wings and an extended nose to carry a second crewman--a battle manager to run network-centric operations and control unmanned reconnaissance or combat aircraft.
While Lockheed Martin officials won't address the subject, others involved with next-generation stealth say the new Lockheed Martin/Boeing design is to be an even more elusive target than the F/A-22. Efforts will focus on reducing the infrared signature (through redistribution of heat on the skin to eliminate hot spots) and adding an active exterior skin coating that, when electrically charged, will offer shades of blues and grays to match the aircraft's high-altitude background (and thereby avoid optical detection). Similar stealth treatments are expected to show up on operational versions of the Northrop Grumman X-47 and Boeing X-45 joint unmanned combat air vehicles.
Besides extra fuel tanks in the expanded wings, Lockheed Martin researchers are suggesting a morphing wing design that would expand (to hold an extra 5,000-10,000 lbs. of fuel) when full for takeoff and then shrink to the aircraft's stealthy outline as fuel burns off. Notional company drawings show faceted, canoe-like structures on top of the wing about one-third of the way from the fuselage to the wingtip on each side.
This version of the BMACK, a versatile airframe for many missions, is refueling an F/A-22 while using an electro-optical sensor ball, located just ahead of the boom, to monitor the hookup.
The space systems would begin in 2015-18 with a common air vehicle and a small launch vehicle using a solid rocket booster. This ICBM with a conventional warhead concept would eventually give way to an air-breathing, hypersonic vehicle--a wave-rider design that could carry scores of common air vehicles with penetrator warheads or area weapons to near-space for fast delivery around the world. The near-space system would operate at "hundreds of thousands of feet, fly at Mach 7-10 and carry 16,000 lb. of payload," Perrigo says. Prime target sets would include deeply buried and heavily defended facilities. The operational concept for 2030 is to base such aircraft on airfields with conventional 16,000-ft. runways so that they can strike any target within an hour.
BMACK would come in several versions, all of them with structural and systems commonality based on a program being conducted for the special operations forces community. The subsonic, C-130-size aircraft would be stealthy for penetrating missions. Its flying wing shape would provide the lift to carry around 40 direct attack bombs, short-range missiles or other internally carried weapons, including a single Massive Ordnance Air Blast or several GBU-28 5,000-lb. penetrator bombs. It would be designed to take off and land on airstrips as small as 1,000-2,000 ft., Perrigo says.
