AKarhu

To be precise, it used the aft fuselage of Finnish F-18C, HN-413, that survived mid-air collision, and the forward fuselage of Canadian CF-18B, the background of which I don't know. So, it was a combination of B model and C model to make up a D model. The resulting "Frankenhornet" HN-468 was destroyed when its stabilator servo supposedly malfunctioned during an attempted recovery from a tailslide that was a part of the post-modification test flights. Reportedly, the servo malfunction at a critical moment was pure coincidence, and had nothing to do with the modification. Hornet's fuselage is made of two major sections, which split the airplane right where the vortex splitters are located over the aft part of the LEX. Actually, these little fins are only attached from their forward end, to the front part of the fuselage... there are a couple of 'stories' about why it is so. :)

My info puts it the other way around: European countries (Finland at least and I think remembering Switzerland as well though I'd need to confirm that one) operating F/A-18 discovered some accelerated fatigue damage in mid-life structural inspections, in comparison to the expected. The analysis put the cause on shortened average flight time spent in transiting flight, as opposite to maneuvering flight, as the ACM practice areas etc. tended to be almost right next to the AFBs. I would not count out an option that the g-limit function is block standard, but the SOPs regarding the use of paddle switch for overriding is more allowing in that mentioned land-based service.

Nah, that could source down to anything. :) There are large amounts of myths surrounding the Hornet that have come up from attempts to "explain" stuff, such as it not being counted in Mach 2 class, or its lower g loading, etc. I am not sure how Swiss Hornets were reinforced, or if they were at all, what I do know of the structure of the Hornet is that the fatigue life of the central barrel structure (the part of the fuselage the wings attach to) is apparently way more critical than the absolute loading of the wing fold hinge in what comes to its service life.

Do Swiss Hornets have fixed (non-folding) wings? Edit: quick Google search brings up pics of them with wings folded, so I guess that was quickly answered! :)

Also recall that any aircraft which is dragging some stores is limited in g capability. Hornet is pretty smart in this respect for an airplane of its age, having dynamically calculated g limit. 9 g airplanes are very seldom that in combat loadout. Of course, same applies to 7.5 g limit of the Hornet.

The one behind the link is actually a different case, which resulted in loss of another aircraft after pilot ejected. About the case you're after...I'm not sure if one can call it lucky to hit another airplane mid-air, but other than that, that was as lucky escape as they come. Another airplane turned towards the other, but lost the sight of it. He then rolled inverted, in an idea to pull under the other airplane he didn't see, IIRC. The vertical stabilizer of the airplane pulling into an inverted dive hit the canopy of the upright airplane. Both airplanes remained flyable and repairable, and pilots uninjured. It won't come any closer than that.

BUNO 165407. Of course, the simulation may not necessarily be entirely representative of an individual aircraft, I wonder if it simply has to do with photographic material of the cockpit used.

Jesus this thread! :D It is fairly basic flying, except maybe for that the Hornet is flown on the approach at somewhat unconventionally high lift coefficient (=slow), and thereby being alpha sensitive. There are no mechanical do-this solutions, but one needs to fly the dynamics: the bracket responds best and almost immediately to the throttle, whereas to move the velocity vector positively, a combination of throttle and stick movement is the best. If one pulls the stick alone, the bracket lags behind, indicating increasing alpha, prompting one to add power.

Swiss and Finnish AF actually benefit from the wing fold, as both employ underground aircraft facilities, originally dimensioned, I'd guess, for Mirage III (Switzerland) or MiG-21/Draken (Finland). The wing fold mechanism itself is quite an elaborate part of the wing structure, not sure how simple it would be to strengthen the wing in overall even if it was disabled. Anyways, I don't think the wing fold feature itself is really related at all to the tip launcher capability.

You mean the HDG and CRS switches? They need to be held.

And of course, while I don't think it has anything to do with the wingtip AMRAAMs, having the wing fold mechanism inoperable doesn't really speak much at all about the structure of the wing. Anyways, at least the wing fold handle is in place in Spanish Hornets - or has been - by quickly searching up some photos.

Correct. Eight under the wings and two on conformal stations or whatever the armpits are called. :D Can't recall. It depends on the flight profile, but in pure A-A role I'd use 6x AIM-120 on the inner pylons and armpits, 2x AIM-9M/-9X on the tips and a centerline tank, with outer pylons removed. If you loiter a lot, I'd guess the two-tank config could indeed be reasonable, but the weight/drag penalty offsets some of the added fuel. I am under impression that the config of three external tanks makes little sense for any reasonable combat flight profile. I'd figure completely removing the outer pylons, and carrying a single centerline tank can give almost similar combat endurance to having the twin LAU-127s under the outer pylons and two external tanks under the inner ones. Again, it certainly depends.

Not sure there is that big of an issue with weight particularly (the wing kind of supports itself - and more!), but there easily could be some with twisting moments a heavier & longer missile would do on the tip. The wing of the Hornet is notoriously non-rigid in twist. I understand it actually shows aileron reversal behavior at some speed range, that the FCS scheduling accounts for. Anyways, as mentioned many times by now, the launcher is for AIM-9 series only. The maximum load of AIM-120s is ten, as shown in the couple of pics posted: four in two double LAU-127s under each wing, for total of eight, and two under the armpits.

For graphs accuracy, that would be AoK, for what I know off. :) But I recall the -402 engine was mentioned in Matt's video. I'm sure the few remaining points of importance are noted.

In what comes to performance data, the Avialogs document is the only one shareable for the C-model I quickly figure. But it refers into a -400-engine instead of -402. For ballpark figures certainly fine, but I'm not sure of the actual difference that would make into specific graphs.

Pretty nice. If one wants to dig a little more into specifics without going into reference books, radartutorial.eu is rather fine little site as well.

BTW, has there been any statements on how much of the datalinked real-time target information will be in the sim? Lots of missions can be flown with on-board active sensors off for emission control with appropriate ground or airborne support. Anyways, having some specific interest in sensors and comms, I'm already excited about this A/G radar simulation. :)

From the other side of the pond, actually, Finland.

Yep, gotcha. Just didn't have the name for run screens. Around here, they weren't always used (and I think were prohibited during icing conditions), I'd guess it was trusted that people and stuff were off the danger area.

Great discussion so far, thanks guys! :) I might specify a little what I'm looking for. I am familiar with aviation in cold weather per se. Cold itself is not really a big problem for most airplanes - and certainly not for Hornets (I think I've handled them down to some -25 °C but many here on the forum have certainly been below that). With civil aircraft, the issues are mainly those of doors and toilet systems, which may get stuck or blocked due to ice. Landing gears may or may not develop various seal issues. When we get into more...adventurous conditions, with freezing temperatures but mostly open sea not covered by ice, one issue is sea spray blown by the wind, which freezes over the surfaces it hits. LINK While certainly not an issue to the vessel of that size itself, it doesn't have to be that extreme to render the aircraft parked on the deck unflyable before some de-icing takes place. I don't know if there are any means and/or procedures for such encounters, or if the deck is in practice above most of spray. In combinations with land areas in particular, one can also have rather intense snow storms over an open water, but I suspect one doesn't run into those so often when a good distance away from the land, where carriers mainly operate, I think. Aircraft Carrier Sails Through Winter Wonderland ZEEOH6; Thanks for sharing your experiences, great read! I guess I've been luckier than you in what comes to warm hangar - "warm" at least in comparison to the outside, not necessarily in cozy terms. mvsgas; Yeah, those intake grilles may cause some headache. For similar reasons, the removable intake protector webs (what are they called?) that are normally used during engine tests runs were not used in conditions where they might collect some ice.

That's a part of the point of the original question. Such airfields certainly do have some winter maintenance and warm hangar space. I understand that on the carrier, a portion of the air wing spends its time on the deck instead of under it. What comes to the deck itself, I doubt it would be heated. For simply being a maintenance nightmare that way.

Thank you for your responses so far! :) Indeed, most military airplanes lack structural ice protection, albeit in most other fast airplanes, such as jet airliners, only minimal amount of surfaces are ice protected as well (in airliners we speak of engine inlet rings and a couple of most critical slat panels for example). Hornet only has heating on its probes and engine inlet guide vanes. There is an inlet ice detector in the LH engine intake duct, which is the only ice detector on the airplane. Windscreen is protected by blowing some bleed air over it if necessary. When having to penetrate icing conditions, fighters rely on high airspeed mostly. Hornets do relatively well with cold, perhaps in part because they don't rely on battery for starting (APU is kicked on by hydraulic accumulator). But it appears so far, that the aircraft carrier as an "airfield" is not that winterized but is primarily intended for relatively mild conditions.

Cheers guys, I know something about Hornet but very little about carrier operations. Therefore I'd like to throw a question to you guys who know more about this business! Simply put, what kind of means of combating more 'arctic' conditions these vessels equip? Do they have any on-deck de-icing capability, and are there any serious means to keep the deck free of snow and ice? Or, are the carriers necessarily kept out of the harsh stuff in what comes to the winter weather? I've been wondering about this since Jane's sim, as it was localized into an area where winter conditions do prevail for a good part of a year, but never really found out anything on the question.

I've given all you need.

Have you gone inside the actual airplane? I've got my own opinion where they are silly or not (they do both). Unless they schedule the trim motor by flight conditions (which would make technically a very silly option, knowing the system), there are no other mechanical means to alter the stick force per displacement. Of course, if you can point that they use the trim motor to schedule the control feedback, then I'm interested. So far, this is all I got to say, simple as that.