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Robot Jet Fighter Takes First Flight

Posted by Roblimo on from the look-ma-no-hands dept.

lysdexia writes "The X-47B is a Tailless Flying Robotic Overlord, which requires neither puny human pilot nor extraneous remote control. First flight was 29 minutes, climbing to a height of 5000 ft. Next step: landing on aircraft carrier."

5 of 119 comments (clear)

  1. Not a Jet Fighter by Wyatt+Earp · · Score: 5, Informative

    Nor is it as other websites have called it, a bomber.

    X-47 is pure experimental but does have a weapons bay that could theoretically hold two 1000 pound JDAMs. Were a production plane made out of this it would be an MQ - multi-role (M) unmanned aircraft system (Q) or AQ - attack (A) unmanned aircraft system (Q).

    It doesn't carry nor is it currently designed to carry an M-61 gatling gun, which every current F designated US aircraft has, nor does it have any missile capable hard points.

    And yea, the F-117A is misdesginated too.

    1. Re:Not a Jet Fighter by TooMuchToDo · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Very true. But once the avionics and autonomous flight systems are tuned, building and flying fighter and bomber UAVs is going to be cake. Kids going through the pilot pipeline now are probably some of the last armed forces pilots who will do so.

      Now, before you huff and say, "No way will software and electronic kit replace people wholesale in military aircraft!", I'd think about it a bit. I was able to watch a UAV dock, refuel, and detach from a KC-130 tanker ~7 months ago, with no human intervention. Refueling? Check. Carrier takeoffs/landings? Almost here. You can have some pretty amazing flight characteristics when you don't have to support the human body in flight.

    2. Re:Not a Jet Fighter by Wyatt+Earp · · Score: 4, Informative

      F-4 was originally going to be four 20mm cannons, then Sparrow came along and they deleted the single internal cannon.

      Vietnam showed that Sparrow wasn't that effective at long range and Sidewinder had too limited of engagement envelope so by the F-4D in 1967 they carried an external gun pod, and the F-4E had an internal M-61 cannon in '68/69.

      The models Israel got were the F-4E which already had the cannons.

  2. Re:I for one by Doctor+Faustus · · Score: 4, Funny

    I would, if only I could find them.

  3. Re:Missiles... by lelitsch · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Physics!

    First off all, nobody is going to shoot down a UAV with an RPG, unless it is hovering at very low altitude. If you got this idea from Black Hawk down, the helicopters got shot down while they were basically hovering at roof level. A small plane going a few hundred mph is impossible to hit.

    The physics part comes in, because a small missile with lower mass, much higher thrust to weight ratio and much smaller control surfaces can pull much higher g's than anything with large wings. A F-16 can pull around 9G before things start coming off, this might be able to do 15, a light AA or SA missile can pull 20-50.

    So yeah, it might out-turn more than a manned plane, but not a missile.