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Artwork / Re: Models Needed
« on: May 04, 2008, 01:09:17 am »
I'm sure they dream of constantly getting offered completed and textured models they don't need.

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i dont think you will ever get rid of human pilots.That's actually the direct result of Burnside's Zeroth Law of Space Combat.
look at star wars Grin
How many pilots have to get killed before one gets an opportunity to exploit?I could say: "How many millions of dollars worth of aircraft do we have to lose in engagements a human could have taken advantage of?"
Sorry, but this is no useful information. Every divebomber can outdive a Zero.The pilot didn't survive by diving away, but by turning into each Zero as it made a run on him. I don't remember the exact reason he couldn't simply dive away, but I suspect that if he did, at least one of the Zeros could shoot him down before he would have been out of range.
And nearly every allied fighter/fighter-bomber can outdive a Zero. The Zero is an extremely light and agile construction without plating. In contrast to that, all allied aircrafts where pretty heavy and with stronger structure.
In fact, my information about g-forces in regard of the Phoenix and the F4 are from a little video clip, commented by an 'expert'. The F4 was a UAV (you know these orange-red colour), a target for a Phoenix. And thereby this expert explained, that the F4 turns with 6g, but the Phoenix hit it with a 16g turn.I'm sure I've read many times that dogfighting missiles, like the Sidewinder, have to pull 40 to 50 g in order to hit a maneuvering target. And I did just read that the F-16 was the first US fighter to be designed to withstand 9g.
Furthermore, a couple of texts talk about that issue. They point out, that the F-16 was the first plane which can stand 9g and all others can stand maximal 6g or 7g.
The range of the Global Hawk is TWICE the range of an U2!I think that has a lot to do with its increased wing aspect ratio, a more efficient engine, and the ability to fly at a leisurely pace.
I assume, you need perhaps 3 cubic meters for a human pilot in the best place of the plane (in the front, central).You're right that there'd be nothing additional to install for an AI pilot. I think 3 cubic metres is a bit much, though.
As all modern fighters use fly-by-wire and autopilots, there's nearly no additional tech to install for an AI pilot.
My you please quote the text, as I cannot find that. It seems to me, the only arguments for the Stiletto are - it is cheap and 'available'.From here: http://ufoai.ninex.info/wiki/index.php/Aircraft/Stiletto-class_Interceptor. The first brief is dated 2026, and later Navarre mentions in the Addendum that "It's hard to believe we built these little things in 2026." Navarre confirms its agility: "What we have here is probably the most manoeuvrable aircraft ever built..." We also know only PHALANX designed and built it, because the report is an internal report, plus Navarre wonders why no one ever knew what kind of gold they were sitting on.
That's exactly the point. Standard fighter tactics from nowadays are almost useless against UFOs - as no long-range missiles work...My point is that the very first interceptor designed to go up against the known capabilities of UFOs is the Dragon, followed by the Stingray, which incorporate alien technologies. The Saracen was designed to go up against Terran fighters, and the Stiletto was designed to be the best it could be against anything.
Imho is your tactic with an foreward human 'UAV observer' not better, than the use of complete AI pilots.I don't quite get what you're saying here, but I do think a forward UAV operator probably is the best compromise between the two worlds.
Yes, the UFOs behave in the atmosphere in dimensions of human technology. There's no information about g-compensation for UFOs - but it's certain, that they use some kind of gravity technology. This technology could lead to g-compensation which would the UFOs allow much more maneuvers (plus: aliens could stand more g-forces than humans).I'm not so certain they have g-dampeners, at least not ones powerful enough to provide a force of more than two to three g. Such technology is also very applicable in creating a linear accelerator that can propel nonmagnetic uncharged objects, yet both the missile launcher and particle beams use electromagnetic acceleration. The only gravity technology that I know of that the aliens use are jump drives and sensors.
Well, there's a little bug in UFO:AI. Your base radar works 100% correct. The UFO is despite all ECM exactly on the position where we expect it thanks to our radar.The scale of the geoscape easily allows 'exactly where we expect it to be' to encompass an area measuring at least tens of km on a side, possibly up to hundreds of km. Its location is probably a best guess by the radar operators, despite the fuzzy returns and ECM.
The result is, we're back to the 70s - a time in which the interceptors had to be guided by the base to their targets.
Well, this system was installed in the B1A. They removed it by the upgrade to B1B - as this system is heavy and not so reliable compared to ejection seats. The F-111 still has such a system, but I don't know any modern aircraft with these systems.The B-1B has a slower top speed and different mission profile, too, making it less vital for an ejection pod. Few modern aircraft travel past mach 2, and so likely do not need the ejection seat. I expect in the future it would become more reliable and attractive for hypersonic craft.
Of course - and as state-of-the-art interceptors reach 9g, no missile can hurt them - as they reach 16 just at ignition... Roll EyesI did point out that in the final stage of a missile's flight, it will probably pull over 50g to try to hit its target. (I'm not so sure about the Phoenix - it's a big, heavy, missile designed to hit cruise missiles and bombers. Smaller missiles like the Sidewinder definitely pull more G's.)
Of course, the Phoenix can turn around at 16g.
Do you really believe that?I'm fairly certain I remember watching a Dogfights! episode about a Divebomber in the Pacific facing up to a few Japanese Zeros, and surviving because he repeatedly pulled high G turns in order to meet each one head-on. You're right it might not have been 9 g, but I'm very sure it was 6g or more, and his rear gunner kept passing out from the turns.
G-suits are no modern invention - even the pilots of the F100 Super Sabre had them - 1954 (in contrast to the MIG-pilots). Also the F4 Phantom hat G-Suits, but the plane could only stand 6g.
No plane of WW2 could stand 9g.
The Global Hawk is an aircraft for long-term surveillance - and not designed for high velocities. And for this mission, this shape and dimensions of the wings are optimal.Yes, the shape is that of a high-altitude glider (very long, thin wings), and isn't all that much smaller than another high-altitude, long range reconnaissance aircraft, the U-2. Its wingspan is actually longer than the U-2.
Further: The size has no meaning and AI pilots save a lot of stuff inside the aircraft (pressurized cabin, live support system).Actually, that's just about all you'll save by removing the pilot. You still need the engines, control surfaces, landing gear, internal gun magazine, hydraulics, computers, radar, fuel tanks, backup generator, and probably more. If you want the airplane to carry missiles, it needs a powerful enough engine in order to actually carry the weight. If you want to download live TV feed from the sensors, you need an antenna of a certain size and power. The longer you want to be able to fly it, the more fuel you need.
Absurd. You cannot 'wish' the stiletto to be the super-interceptor. It is the oldest interceptor from human's arsenal - and no use against bigger and faster UFOs. There's no way to upgrade the stiletto to the level of the Dragon interceptor - which will replace it.Where did this come from? I never said anything about the Stiletto being a superior design. My point was that the Saracen is a human design for human needs - so it is not a throw-away fighter by any means. The Stiletto is designed in the 2020's as a very maneuverable fighter to combat a completely unknown alien force. Neither were expected to have a mission life of 5 missions. Personally, if I were looking at lifetimes like that, I'd just use SAM batteries.
Today, at a speed of mach 2 you cannot simply alter your course - as even slight turns cause high g-forces. The production of g-forces is always the result of speed and turnaround. And at mach 4, it is much worse. There's nearly no chance to avoid missiles.Yes, at higher speeds you get more acceleration at lower degrees-per-second turns. This is one reason turns at high speeds are wider and take longer to complete. However, you also get a lot more drag at high speed. That's another reason turning at high speed is tricky - if you turn too hard, you'd point the other way very quickly, but now you're travelling very slowly.
And BTW: If you need a computer for combat - an AI pilot - why use a human pilot at all?I'd use the computer for the things it's best at - calculating bomb release times, computing gun sight vectors, and missile hit probabilities. It's not so good for luring opponents into traps, reacting to unusual situations, and making tactical decisions.
The alien materials are not that advanced in UFO:AI. The Gallileo probe entered the atmosphere at an altitude where the atmosphere is much less dense than on earth (at an altitude of 10-20 km). Further: The probe was made to 2/3 of heat shield and one millimeter away from its course and the probe gets destroyed.The Galileo probe entered the atmosphere at interplanetary speed - 47.4km/s. On Earth, the speed of sound at sea level is 0.34029 km/s, so that makes the probe travelling around Mach 140. The Jovian atmosphere is mostly hydrogen, though, so it'd be travelling at a lower Mach number than that. The fastest atmospheric speed alien materials can expect are reentry speeds - about 7.7km/s if entering from LEO, or about 11km/s if entering directly from Lunar orbit. That's Mach 23 and Mach 32, respectively. Well, actually the alien's engines let them slow down more before entering the atmosphere, so their limit could very well be lower than that.
Pure speculation. There's nearly no use for your flexibility. It's simply that way: 'Go to these coordinates and intercept the enemy'.What if the enemy isn't exactly where those coordinates say it is? How does it determine which of the radar contacts it has actually is the enemy? Which strategy does it use to engage the enemy? What if the enemy behaves differently from what the AI and its programmers expected? There's a lot more to fighter combat than simply trucking missiles out to a point and launching them at any radar contact that comes near.
Any kinetic impact would comletely detroy any human aircraft. Plus, the rest of the antimatter will react with normal material and detonate - with several kilotonnes TNT. This additional effekt of the alien antimatter rocket-launcher is described in the UFO-wiki.The missile simply does not contain enough antimatter to make that large an explosion. The wiki says nothing about that - the closest it gets to is saying "even a proximity detonation of the antimatter fuel is enough to take out a fighter jet," which leaves wide interpretations on how close this proximity detonation is. What's likely is that most of the fuel has been expended by the time the missile reaches its target, leaving just enough to turn the casing into hot shrapnel.
Furthermore - no human will survive a dropout at mach 4 at an altitude of 10,000 meters. Even today no one survies a dropout at mach 2.Then jettison the entire cockpit. The B-1, a supersonic bomber, already does that.
1. The missile AIM-54 Phoenix (for the F14 Tomcat) got in service in 1974. This missile can fly 16 g at a top speed of more than 4,800 kph. G-forces are no problems for AI aircrafts.