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Replicating Harrier GR5/AV8B records - 3000m, 6000m, 12000m


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Posted (edited)

I'm trying to replicate the some of Harrier record breaking flights. The book describes GR5 which is our AV-8B with Pegasus 11-61 engine but diff avionics and weapons. Usefully, their plane was also instrumented, not F-15 Streak Eagle-like with most things stripped to reduce weight. They did take the pylons off (500kg?) though, I could only somewhat compensate by reducing the fuel load.

https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=gZCeDgAAQBAJ&lpg=PA80&ots=k7t_D8Tp9j&dq=harrier "time to climb"&pg=PA80#v=onepage&q&f=false

aharr.jpg

 

 image.jpg

 

I'm using the below flight profile and aiming for their benchmark times:

harr.jpg

My current best attempt to 6000m is about 75 seconds; 9000m - about 106 seconds. I've set air temp at 26C (as per text - high 20s), flying from Kutaisi so about sea level start, 600lbs of fuel (not 1200 from the book so as to compensate for the pylons weight).

Could I do much better?

Edited by Katmandu
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Posted (edited)
On 1/23/2023 at 10:46 PM, Katmandu said:

My current best attempt to 6000m is about 75 seconds; 9000m - about 106 seconds.

I made a mistake in converting meters to feet and took 6000m =~ 18 000ft, but it's nearer to 20 000ft. My current attempt to 6000m/19700ft - even with with 0lb infinite fuel (to compensate for the pylons - as discussed above) - is about 80seconds. 55 seconds seems impossible...

 

Edited by Katmandu
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Posted (edited)

Been busy with life, sorry for the late reply 🙂

The profile is as stated in the book section above: acceleration to 450kts, then 45deg angle climb. The drag from pylons - yes, but could it account for 100-55/80*100=32% discrepancy in performance? For comparison, DCS F-16C without pylons flies to 6000m in 47sec, with pylons in 49sec - a 4% difference.

Edited by Katmandu
Posted

Yeah, I know the pylons can't account for all of it.  

The profile question is because the excerpt you gave said 450kt>45deg>17,000ft>vertical>record but "the profile didn't feel right... changed the profile... beat the records" so it was never "hold 45deg to altitude"

Posted (edited)

Try dumping the water before you start and also turn on combat thrust.

EDIT: Reread it and it says he was using the manual engine control. As far as I can tell this isn't implemented correctly which could be why the numbers are off

Edited by lukeXIII
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