Forum: General F-35 Forum

Though I do wonder if a ramp would have improved the CVs of WWII. Would the old radial engine tail draggers have been able to use them safely?

F-16.net Sponsor

Last edited by spazsinbad on Sep 04, 2012 - 10:16 AM; edited 1 time in total

The Coming of the AMERICA Class Warship to the USN-USMC Blue-Green Team By Robbin Laird September 2012

http://www.sldinfo.com/the-coming-of-th ... dium=email

"When Ed Timperlake and I were commenting on the CNO’s recent piece in the USN Institute Proceedings on platforms and payloads, we underscored how some of the new assets fit into the CNO’s approach.

The CNO’s approach is reinforced by the kinds of platforms starting to come on line or in the pipeline. The FORD Class carriers are designed for upgradeability in terms of power, communications and eventual form, fit and function of weapons systems, some only found today in labs and test ranges. The AMERICA Class LHAs are designed to carry a new generation of aircraft, which are inherently upgradeable. The AMERICA Class warships are virtually the same size as France’s CHARLES DE GAULLE Class carriers.

And we also underscored that you do not build a new strategy for the century based on where you have been, but where you are going...

....Question: And the LHAs after 6 and 7 will have a well deck?

Col Weisz: Yes, but it is not planned to be the same size of the well deck that was built into the WASP Class amphibious assault ships [LHDs 1-8]. The WASP Class warships can embark three LCACs (Landing Craft Air Cushion Vehicle) or two LCUs (Landing Craft Utility) in their well deck. LHA 8 is currently being designed to be able to embark two LCACs or one LCU; again, due to a smaller well deck than that of the WASP Class LHDs. A blue-green study was conducted by OPNAV-HQMC and validated that the smaller well deck of LHA 8 could still easily support the rapid build-up of landing forces ashore.

Question: With the launching of a more aviation capable ship and by putting on the MV-22 Osprey and the F-35B, you have the potential to shape some innovative CONOPS for distributed operations of the sort we talked about during Exercise BOLD ALLIGATOR 2012?

Col Weisz: Absolutely. The AMERICA Class ship, enabled with the F-35B JSF and MV-22B Osprey, significantly increases your ability to conduct over-the-horizon (OTH) ship-to-objective maneuver operations. With the ability to project Marine Air-Ground Task Forces (MAGTFs) directly to critical operational objectives located deep inland while simultaneously dislocating our adversaries both in space and in time, the AMERICA Class ship is an immediate game changer. Amphibious forces will now be able to project power more swiftly than ever before, they will be able to not only “kick down the door” that the enemy’s defense’s present, they will also be able to “get a foot in the door”, and preclude him from effectively integrating his anti-access/area-denial (A2/AD) defenses into the scenario.

Question: One of the dynamics of change going forward with this ship and its interaction with the F-35B is re-shaping C5ISR and understanding that this is an open ended process of innovation. The C5ISR suite on the initial ship will certainly be modified over time as folks begin to understand how it could lead operations and as they begin to focus on the C5ISR capabilities of an F-35B aboard the ship. This sets up a dynamic situation of synergy to forge new capabilities and new developments over time.

Col Weisz: That is a great way of looking at the situation. The F-35 Bravo will bring significant capability in the C5ISR arena. We are only beginning to realize the extent of its great enabling capabilities."

Long article - only beginning / ending here. Best read at the JUMP! AND a PPT here:

http://www.slideshare.net/robbinlaird/l ... s/download Graphic/PPT

Don't get me wrong. I agree with this direction; but if I took a drink for every time Weisz uses dumb buzz-words like "game-changer" or "synergy" here, I'd be in the hospital. Razz

You'd be SHIP 'shaped' by the 'shaping'. Very Happy

I visited the USS Alabama over the weekend. I have a lot of respect for anyone that could endure living on any ship for a week let alone for the whole cruise. I cannot imagine that they improve the hangar arrangements on the LHD without reducing creature comforts in some way.

count_to_10 wrote:

You keep repeating that, but you aren't demonstrating any understanding why it should be so. If you tilt the rotor backward, you are only slowing the craft down without improving lift. It simply isn't going to work the same way for a rotor craft as it does for a fixed wing aircraft.

For a tandem rotor or coaxial rotor, it may be a different story -- in those cases, a forward velocity can be used to generate more lift on the forward moving blades of both rotors. But you still have to deal with the problem that the ramp would be tilting the rotors backward, causing their thrust to slow the craft down.

You keep saying tilt the rotor back. (Actually you seemed to imply a fixed rotor earlier, so at least that is progress.) There is more range of motion to the rotor than simply forward or back. And you're forgetting the whole idea of pitch and to what it relates in aerodynamics. The pitch of the blades are not the only thing to concern about. I'm not going into all the details of helicopter collective lift for your special needs case. I suspect you haven't looked at all and keep arguing from your perched position of superiority.

I will give you some clue. A lifting rotor acts as a large span wing. The danger of using a ramp is that you can stall your rotor if you don't have some forward propulsion to overcome drag, so it would be ridiculous to suggest tilting the rotor back for any reason whatsoever.

madrat wrote:

I visited the USS Alabama over the weekend. I have a lot of respect for anyone that could endure living on any ship for a week let alone for the whole cruise. I cannot imagine that they improve the hangar arrangements on the LHD without reducing creature comforts in some way.

count_to_10 wrote:

You keep repeating that, but you aren't demonstrating any understanding why it should be so. If you tilt the rotor backward, you are only slowing the craft down without improving lift. It simply isn't going to work the same way for a rotor craft as it does for a fixed wing aircraft.

For a tandem rotor or coaxial rotor, it may be a different story -- in those cases, a forward velocity can be used to generate more lift on the forward moving blades of both rotors. But you still have to deal with the problem that the ramp would be tilting the rotors backward, causing their thrust to slow the craft down.

You keep saying tilt the rotor back. (Actually you seemed to imply a fixed rotor earlier, so at least that is progress.) There is more range of motion to the rotor than simply forward or back. And you're forgetting the whole idea of pitch and to what it relates in aerodynamics. The pitch of the blades are not the only thing to concern about. I'm not going into all the details of helicopter collective lift for your special needs case. I suspect you haven't looked at all and keep arguing from your perched position of superiority.

I will give you some clue. A lifting rotor acts as a large span wing. The danger of using a ramp is that you can stall your rotor if you don't have some forward propulsion to overcome drag, so it would be ridiculous to suggest tilting the rotor back for any reason whatsoever.

You seem rather confused. I did mention tilt-rotors (like the V-22) because they potentially could benefit from a ramp. A helicopter, on the other hand, will find it's rotor tilted backward as it goes off the ramp because the helicopter itself is pitching upward. When the rotor is tilted back by the slope of the ramp, that rotor will direct some of it's thrust forward instead of backward -- which has the result of slowing the helicopter down as it is trying to gain speed.
Fixed wing aircraft can benefit from a ramp because pitching upward helps them get into the air. Pitching up is counter productive for a helicopter.

You're helicopter in this situation would need wheels. Not a lot of them fit this criteria, the ones that do use fully articulated rotors. You're never in danger of the blades striking the ramp. There is this nice thing called coning that is an advantage of these rotors. The real danger of using a ramp with a helicopter is attacking the ramp too slow and suddenly losing too much forward air speed which decreases translational lift. At enough speed the loss of translational lift is overcome by the increase in vertical velocity imparted by the ramp, which is a net positive result. The transmission integrity and stalling the blades are much more of a danger than the amount of pitch of these ramps. These ramps do not have a steep enough incline to overtake the collective pitch. That is where this conversation with you has a disconnect.

We were only talking about the helicopters that a) had full landing gear and b) typically used a rolling start for takeoff, and asking if the ski-jump ramp on the ship would be of any use to them.

Moving Target. check.

I think Freedberg needs to differentiate between "dead end" and "useful, but only two this specialized needed." It's not as if there are several of the things already under construction that will eventually need extensive modification... *cough* LCS *cough*

Quote:

Navy's Newest, LHA-6, A Dead End For Amphibious Ships?

The Navy will christen its newest amphibious warfare ship in Pascagoula, Miss. on Oct. 20th. The boldly-named, $3 billion America is a major departure from past designs -- and, quietly, the Navy has decided not to build many more like it in the future...

...aircraft have become ever more important to Marine Corps operations. Older ships were designed to carry conventional helicopters like the CH-46 and the Marine Corps's Harrier "jump jet," but their successors -- the V-22 Osprey tilt-rotor and the F-35B version of the Joint Strike Fighter -- are much larger machines that take up much more space. So when the Navy looked at replacing its aging LHA-1 Tarawa class ships, it decided to sacrifice the well deck to better accommodate aircraft.

The result is what any other navy would simply call an aircraft carrier. At 844 feet long and 45,000 tons displacement, LHA-6 America is only slightly smaller than the Russian-made Varyag now in Chinese service and significantly larger than the French carrier Charles de Gaulle (neither of which has a well deck, either). Only the US Navy, with its 1,000-foot-long, 100,000-ton Nimitz class, would consider the America a small carrier...

But landing craft are still essential, less for the first wave ashore than to sustain the operation with bulk supplies and heavy equipment -- trucks, artillery, tanks -- that aircraft can carry only in small amounts or not at all. And if landing craft are essential, then so is the well deck...

http://defense.aol.com/2012/10/03/navys ... ous-ships/

You could build a dedicated carrier much smaller and it would be more efficient use of resources. 20K tons would be enough for the task. It's a good size for a carrier to use in the WoT. Removing the well deck on an LHA makes it not an LHA and I wish they would change the designation to reflect the reality.

madrat wrote:

You could build a dedicated carrier much smaller and it would be more efficient use of resources. 20K tons would be enough for the task. It's a good size for a carrier to use in the WoT. Removing the well deck on an LHA makes it not an LHA and I wish they would change the designation to reflect the reality.

Well, despite what Freedberg says, this ship's primary mission is to move Marines from sea to land, and it is equipped as such. You'll almost never see it with more than 6 or so jets onboard. Of course, that doesn't mean the USN won't experiment with it. I'm willing to give it a few years to see how it works out.

'madrat' says: "You could build a dedicated carrier much smaller and it would be more efficient use of resources. 20K tons would be enough for the task. It's a good size for a carrier to use in the WoT...."

Firstly I thought the 'WoT' was over by next year or so. Who knows wot next. AND I flew from a sub 20K carrier. What kind of aircraft will fly from yourn version?

The only reasons I can see this size carrier are both as a stepping stone and as a forward stage to camp some F-35B until the calvary arrive. If you want to perform humanitarian aid on the edge of hostilities it's a good excuse to stage the ship in the area. It relieves the need for the full blown CVN, but offers capacity to sustain a heavy sortie rate for one or two hundred sorties in a pinch. UCAVs are great for a potshot, but you need bigger tin for serious work.

The relative small size is because you don't need to tote around an MEU or a full squadron. All operations would be STOVL, therefore you don't need catapults and angled decks. Too bad they cannot cat launch F-35B, but the size is big enough to support STO operations.

I've been told that small carriers are not as cost effective as large carriers, though I would add that it is harder to take out multiple small carriers with, say, guided ballistic missiles, than it is to take out one large carrier.

Forum: General F-35 Forum

Possibility small STOVL carrier USN/USMC