Sturgeon

He did quite a bit, and it was deliberate. Making a handsome rifle was important to him. You can see this probably most clearly in the contouring of the bolt carrier and dust cover, which was unnecessary, but makes the AK look quite well sculpted. Obviously there's a lot of utilitarian decisions in that rifle as well but I don't think there's any denying the end result is iconic.

Great walkaround and talk on the YF-17:




The aerodynamics, history and politics of the project are all discussed.

It's not that crazy:
 
-YF-17 was a Northrop bird.  Ostensibly it was their entry into the LWF competition, but actually they'd been working on an F-5 replacement for years before the competition was announced.  This used YJ101 "leaky turbojet" engines.  This lost to the YF-16 for the LWF bid, but some genius had meanwhile decided that the Navy would have to buy LWFs as well, not realizing that carrier birds are much, much better off if purpose-designed.
 
-F/A-18 was the ultimate result of this foolishness.  Although the YF-16 was the better design in most respects, the YF-17 was drastically better suited to carrier operations thanks to twin engines, much wider landing gear and lower landing speeds and AOA.  However, Northrop had no experience making carrier birds, so they partnered with McDonnell Douglas, who had the entire phantom/banshee/demon/phantom II family of carrier fighters under their belt.
 
The changes from YF-17 to F/A-18 were quite major.  F/A-18 was going to be a multi-role aircraft, not just a simple day fighter.  to that end a whole mess of new avionics were added, chiefly a much bigger and better radar and also the most advanced cockpit of the time, were added to the aircraft.  Because the aircraft would be tasked as a fighter and as an attack aircraft, a lot of work went into designing cockpit instruments that could display lots of information in a smooth, efficient way.  
 
The structure was reinforced to withstand carrier operation and anti-corrosion coatings were added where needed to survive being next to the ocean all the time.  The engines were now the godly GE F404; hands down the best fighter engine until the F110.  Weight went up enormously (about 30%) and the wings were enlarged to compensate.  To try and minimize weight increase, a large percentage of composites were used to replace traditional aluminum structure.  Initially, F-15 style dogtooth leading edge vortex generators were added to the wings and horizontal stabilizers, but these were later deleted.  The gap between the LERX and the fuselage was also eliminated, except for a small slot for boundary layer air from the inlets.
 
F/A-18L:  McDonnell Douglas and Northrop agreed to share production responsibilities on the F/A-18, with some parts coming from each company.  In the meantime, however, Northrop was given full responsibility and ownership of the F/A-18L design, which would be a de-navalized F/A-18.  The advanced avionics, new engines and aerodynamic refinements would stay, but the structure would be made lighter and some of the special corrosion-resistant materials would be removed in order to save weight.  The aircraft was never built; Northrop simply dressing up the YF-17 prototypes to play the part.  Canada and a few other countries seriously flirted with the idea of buying these, but in the end all prospective buyers either bought regular F/A-18s or F-16s.
 
-F/A-18E/F:  In 1987, McDonnell Douglas submitted a series of proposals for developments of the F/A-18 under the name "Hornet 2000."  Configuration 1 was a fairly simple upgrade with uprated engines, a more powerful radar, and some updates to the avionics and cockpit.  Configuration 2 was similar, but further featured some structural improvements to the wings, and an extended fuselage spine to house extra fuel.  Configuration 3 took configuration 2 and added a larger wing and tail and even more fuel.  Configuration 4 was a new aircraft altogether; a canard-configured hornet intended to lure away members of the then-troubled Eurofighter program.
 

 
None of these proposals ever proceeded, but the spectacular failure of the USN's A-12 program did create a need for some sort of stopgap until the NATF arrived (NATF also failed).  The superhornet was thus created.  Shornet is similar to configuration 3 of the hornet 2000 proposal, but with some further elaborations.  The engines are the new F414, which is based on the F404, but incorporating changes intended for the engines of the A-12 as well as changes made by the Swedes for the gripen.  The latest version of the F414 produces over double the thrust of the YJ101; the engine that the core was originally based on.  The radar is new, additional weapon stations have been added, the LERX have been redesigned to clear up some nagging issues with the vertical stabilizer interacting with the vortices, and the inlets have been redesigned to accommodate the new engines as well as to reduce radar cross section.
 
Since the super hornet is literally the only fixed wing carrier-based aircraft to be designed since the 1970s, it's been forced to do all sorts of other things like tanking and EW.  Thus, the buddy tanking system and the EA-18 Growler.
 
In the meantime, McDonnell Douglass merged with Boeing, which is why the shornet is a Boeing bird now.

Bushmaster ACR that was moded to take 9x39 and AS mags

you could host a midnight drive in movie with all that projection

This. This right here is an absolute choice bit of consequential apologism. It doesn't occur to you at all that Panther might have been a dysfunctional product of a dysfunctional system. If it does occur to you, your brain runs interference and blocks you from allowing yourself to even imagine such a thing could be true. Hitler has cucked your brain. Your raising his little aryan kiddies in your head! Only question is: why?

depends on the specific gun, but typically you have a normal rifle fire control group in the rear which the trigger is connected to by a long (and frequently unfortunately flexible) rod.

some bullpups are different, however, like the RDB, which has the fire control group close to the trigger, and actually telescopes the entire hammer around the bolt group.

Oh god they're still trying to do this retarded thing?

Leopard 1 retrofitted with a 105 mm Cockerill turret :
 

 

If you haven't read colli's post, do so. He's entirely correct.

So, it's worth pointing out for this generation that the above situation is why Jeff Cooper is important. I've said a lot about what a weirdo Jeff is, and how stupid his scout rifle idea is (OK, realtalk: Just because an idea has an internally consistent train of logic does not make it a good idea), but he was one of the first to concern himself with the idea of the fighting civilian. The scout rifle is like the FBI crouch: It's not really a great idea, in retrospect, but the scout rifle has its origins as far back as 1966 - so even then Cooper was thinking about the problem of, basically "what happens if there's something like Ruby Ridge?" almost thirty years before that actually happened. And yes, the Bren Ten handgun is goofy and stupid, but it was an answer to a question that was brand new at the time.

For people interested in tanks, you can draw parallels between this situation and that which resulted in the American tank destroyer doctrine. I was walking through the Barksdale Air Power Museum about a week ago with my father, and we were talking about Butterfieldian historiography and the Apollo program, and as an example he brought up the American tank destroyers. "I was reading an article," he said "about the tank destroyers, and what they were trying to do. Nobody had stopped the Blitzkrieg at that point, but they knew they needed to. I tell you what, they didn't end up using them quite that way, but somebody was really thinking when they came up with that idea."

Indeed. Here's to you, Jeff Cooper. For thinking where few else did.

Hello all.
 
New here. I found this forum by reading through a lovely debate on suspension systems and a certain user's tromping; I thought I would stop on through and drop information occasionally as I find it, if anybody finds this stuff interesting. 
 
P.S. unfortunately the original link no longer exists (?) but it still has a presence on the Way Back Machine, which as far as I can tell, is still navigable for the most part. Its a pity its not working in its entirety like when I found it, though given the site is Belarusian, I can put two and two together on why its acting up. Enjoy?
 
https://web.archive.org/web/20220214180137/https://letopis.belta.by/

Thanks to this Secret Projects thread, we have some images of the transitional forms of the Northrop fighter lineage which help connect the T-38/F-5/etc to the Cobra/Hornet. As is fairly well known, the this transition begins with the Northrop P-300, which is still firmly grounded in the Freedom Fighter. This is an important member of the family, which I left out of my original posts:





This is a configurable study model of the late version (A43) of the P-300 (seemingly evidenced by the very difficult to read nameplate). Clearly visible is its resemblance to a high-wing F-5, but you can also see in the belly shot a very clear view of the flared out body-intake configuration that would follow the design all the way through the P-530 and YF-17, which was much more subdued in the F-18:



 
In fact, the early P-530 looks much more like the P-300A43 than it does the later P530s:






 
Note that by May '67 they haven't even ditched the single tail yet (that wouldn't happen until the summer of 1968)!

By the end of the P-530 the aircraft gets looking very much like a proto-Cobra:



You can see that in this very "Starfightery" series of designs, one of the big distinguishing features visually is caused by the location of the gun. Not in front of the pilot like in the Cobra and Hornet, but below the pilot:
 



Speaking of guns, evidently the armament of two M39s in lieu of an M61 was being considered as late as 1973/4:




The photos in that SP thread really clearly illustrate the evolution from the F-5 to the Hornet very well, and there's even a handy visual outline:



But what's this? It mentions a single-engined P-610? Indeed:




 

Not sure if it was stated here already, but C. G. Haenel's lawsuit was dismissed, thus the planned purchase of the HK416A8 as part of German Army's G36 replacement program can move forward.

Just for the record we do already have an A-10 thread: 
 
 

Oh no, you did offend us. See, here we don't get offended by nazi memes or unpopular political opinions, we get offended by retard non-contributors coming in here swinging their dicks around and acting like their opinions are all that needs to be said.
Referte aut morimini, bitch. Opinions don't trade. Ya ken?

Tiger turned out to be a failure , and an obsolete design the day it rolled of the production line. scrap it make something new or get a licence for Apache and make EuroApache if we must.

Thanks to this Secret Projects thread, we have some images of the transitional forms of the Northrop fighter lineage which help connect the T-38/F-5/etc to the Cobra/Hornet. As is fairly well known, the this transition begins with the Northrop P-300, which is still firmly grounded in the Freedom Fighter. This is an important member of the family, which I left out of my original posts:





This is a configurable study model of the late version (A43) of the P-300 (seemingly evidenced by the very difficult to read nameplate). Clearly visible is its resemblance to a high-wing F-5, but you can also see in the belly shot a very clear view of the flared out body-intake configuration that would follow the design all the way through the P-530 and YF-17, which was much more subdued in the F-18:



 
In fact, the early P-530 looks much more like the P-300A43 than it does the later P530s:






 
Note that by May '67 they haven't even ditched the single tail yet (that wouldn't happen until the summer of 1968)!

By the end of the P-530 the aircraft gets looking very much like a proto-Cobra:



You can see that in this very "Starfightery" series of designs, one of the big distinguishing features visually is caused by the location of the gun. Not in front of the pilot like in the Cobra and Hornet, but below the pilot:
 



Speaking of guns, evidently the armament of two M39s in lieu of an M61 was being considered as late as 1973/4:




The photos in that SP thread really clearly illustrate the evolution from the F-5 to the Hornet very well, and there's even a handy visual outline:



But what's this? It mentions a single-engined P-610? Indeed:




 

Thanks to this Secret Projects thread, we have some images of the transitional forms of the Northrop fighter lineage which help connect the T-38/F-5/etc to the Cobra/Hornet. As is fairly well known, the this transition begins with the Northrop P-300, which is still firmly grounded in the Freedom Fighter. This is an important member of the family, which I left out of my original posts:





This is a configurable study model of the late version (A43) of the P-300 (seemingly evidenced by the very difficult to read nameplate). Clearly visible is its resemblance to a high-wing F-5, but you can also see in the belly shot a very clear view of the flared out body-intake configuration that would follow the design all the way through the P-530 and YF-17, which was much more subdued in the F-18:



 
In fact, the early P-530 looks much more like the P-300A43 than it does the later P530s:






 
Note that by May '67 they haven't even ditched the single tail yet (that wouldn't happen until the summer of 1968)!

By the end of the P-530 the aircraft gets looking very much like a proto-Cobra:



You can see that in this very "Starfightery" series of designs, one of the big distinguishing features visually is caused by the location of the gun. Not in front of the pilot like in the Cobra and Hornet, but below the pilot:
 



Speaking of guns, evidently the armament of two M39s in lieu of an M61 was being considered as late as 1973/4:




The photos in that SP thread really clearly illustrate the evolution from the F-5 to the Hornet very well, and there's even a handy visual outline:



But what's this? It mentions a single-engined P-610? Indeed:




 

You missed the "family" part, didn't you?

I am definitely talking about the Growler. The Prowler is not a Northrop bird, nor is it related to the Fang.

Thanks to this Secret Projects thread, we have some images of the transitional forms of the Northrop fighter lineage which help connect the T-38/F-5/etc to the Cobra/Hornet. As is fairly well known, the this transition begins with the Northrop P-300, which is still firmly grounded in the Freedom Fighter. This is an important member of the family, which I left out of my original posts:





This is a configurable study model of the late version (A43) of the P-300 (seemingly evidenced by the very difficult to read nameplate). Clearly visible is its resemblance to a high-wing F-5, but you can also see in the belly shot a very clear view of the flared out body-intake configuration that would follow the design all the way through the P-530 and YF-17, which was much more subdued in the F-18:



 
In fact, the early P-530 looks much more like the P-300A43 than it does the later P530s:






 
Note that by May '67 they haven't even ditched the single tail yet (that wouldn't happen until the summer of 1968)!

By the end of the P-530 the aircraft gets looking very much like a proto-Cobra:



You can see that in this very "Starfightery" series of designs, one of the big distinguishing features visually is caused by the location of the gun. Not in front of the pilot like in the Cobra and Hornet, but below the pilot:
 



Speaking of guns, evidently the armament of two M39s in lieu of an M61 was being considered as late as 1973/4:




The photos in that SP thread really clearly illustrate the evolution from the F-5 to the Hornet very well, and there's even a handy visual outline:



But what's this? It mentions a single-engined P-610? Indeed:




 

https://www.gao.gov/docket/b-420766.1
LoneStar has filed a protest against the Army, almost certainly about the NGSW.

As they continue to fall apart, yes:

Well the A-10 costs about 50% more to fly than the F-16 so...