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Could Nimitz class accomodate this air group?

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westwords2020	Could Nimitz class accomodate this air group?	Lead	[-]
Posts: 287 (14-May-2008 02:00:34) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts Message Me Connection Blocking Invite Ignore User's Posts	I was wondering about air groups of different sizes again and their possible composition. I glanced through Carriers by Norman Freidman and in the data pages for carriers, the nuclear carrier Enterprise was listed as designed for 99 aircraft of all types. An airwing I have been pondering calls for: 20 F/A-18E/F 20 F-35 CV JSF 20 F/A-XX eventual F-18 Super Hornet replacement 20 XB-47 UCAS 20 multimission tiltrotor 6 E-2D 6 EA-18G 11 MH-60R/S 2 C-2A successor Total equal 125?? The tiltrotors are multipurpose and are defined by their mission kits and can be based also on destroyers/cruisers singly. The SV-22 deals with ASW/ASUW and the PV-22 deals with land attack, electronic surveillance. The KV-22 is an overhead tanker to top off tanks and refuel aircraft waiting to land on the carrier. UV-22 is utiltity transport. Equipment fit is taken from an article on tiltrotors.
emc		#1	[-]
Posts: 3750 (14-May-2008 02:57:37) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts Message Me Connection Blocking Invite Ignore User's Posts	If I'm not mistaken, currently COD aircraft (C-2's) fly to and from carriers; they are not based aboard, so your total drops to 123. With the multi-mission tilt-rotors, I'd see little need for the MH-60's. Also, I doubt if a "KV-22" tanker would be capable of fueling F-18's or F-35's, because the tilt-rotor's max speed is too low. And why is it seeing "XB-47 UCAS" do I think of a large aircraft with 6 engines?
westwords2020		#2	[-]
Posts: 288 (14-May-2008 08:36:02) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts Message Me Connection Blocking Invite Ignore User's Posts	COD aircraft are listed as being based on carriers in the figures I saw in Carriers. Perhaps future V-22 aircraft could displace Seahawks but they cannot be hangered on our current and planned ships because the helo hangars are too small. For tanking purposes you may very well be right. They cruise at only 275 knots and I was just using them as a 'overhead' (?) tanker that I never intended to accompany the strike. Sorry about the little mixup on the X-47B UCAS which is being built as a robotic tanker with surveillance and strike missions even though that is not a formal part of the demonstration of carrier compatibillity contract. Capability includes two 600 gallon bomb bay tanks, two JDAM 2000 or twelve small diameter bombs and a spherical ISR suite. Spot factor is .87 of an F-18A-D with a 44.500 lbs gross takeoff weoght. The F/A-XX is a planned replacement for Super Hornets but I kept them around for this airwing. The F/A-XX has a radius of 1000-1500nmi and would be able to accompany UCAS on long range unrefueled strikes. USN is considering a UCAV for this role but that feature is still open. I hope the final product is manned with an option for unmanned ops in very dangerous areas.
emc		#3	[-]
Posts: 3751 (14-May-2008 17:09:31) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts Message Me Connection Blocking Invite Ignore User's Posts	The COD aircraft may be based on carriers now; I'm not in the navy nor am I any longer active in the aerospace industry, so my sources may be outdated. Whether 125 (or 123 or whatever) aircraft can be accommodated depends on the aircraft size (obviously) and the number of personnel and amount of equipment and consumables needed to support them. I really don't know he proposed UCAV's support requirements, but they would probably be roughly proportional to their weight, so the UCAV's would require about 3/4 of those for the F-18. The F/A-XX's are probably greater than those of the F-18 or F-35. Based on very limited information, I would expect that the air group you're positing could not be supported for a significant period.
chart42		#4	[-]
Posts: 103 (14-May-2008 23:24:59) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts Message Me Connection Blocking Invite Ignore User's Posts	Westwords, I fear that you are once again overestimating the size of airwing that a CVN can carry. I seem to recall that you've posted this same or a very similar estimate a few times in the recent past. In the heyday of the supercarrier at the height of the cold war we carried five 10 to 12 ship squadrons of combat aircraft consisting of two 12 ship fighter squadrons of either F-4 or F-14, two 12 ship light attack squadrons of either A-7 or F/A-18 and one 10 ship squadron of A-6 medium attack aircraft totalling less than 60 combat aircraft, along with about 30 some support aircraft. You are proposing 80 combat aircraft and 45 support aircraft. If you want to know if we could carry that many, sure we could but you wouldn't be flying any missions off of it because you wouldn't have enough room on the flight deck to maneuver. To begin with I would suggest that you not propose carrying both two squadrons of superhornets AND two squadrons of their replacements, one or the other but not both. I see no problem with the two squadrons of F-35 and I'll grant that the X-47 UCAVs MAY have a smaller footprint than the aircraft that they're replacing, so I'll buy those as well. On the support side I suspect that the 20 V-22 varients are a bit much unless you are also deleting the Helo squadron (which usually only had 6 to 8 aircraft) and the COD replacement, if not then I suspect that 10 to 12 V-22s would be a more reasonable number. Also we only carried four E-2Cs and four EA-6Bs, but I dont know what the current numbers planned for the EA-18Gs but it will probably be something similar.
wabpilot		#5	[-]
Posts: 2047 (15-May-2008 00:54:56) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts Message Me Connection Blocking Invite Ignore User's Posts	Define the threat. Define the mission. Define the air wing. You have it all backwards, you are designing the air wing without regard to the threat and the mission. Sometime in the future, we may see a convoy mission facing a large maritime attack threat that your notional air wing might be reasonable to try and counter, but then you would be hauling around a lot of extraneous tiltrotors. At some point in the future, we might be facing a threat that requires lots of offensive firepower where your notional air wing with six VFAs might make some sense. Although, the USAF and the USN currently see the proper mix at about four VFAs and one medium attack squadron. (The USAF has heavy bomber squadrons that they like to mix in with their air wings at times. The USN hands that mission to the TLAMs.)
westwords2020		#6	[-]
Posts: 289 (15-May-2008 03:45:29) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts Message Me Connection Blocking Invite Ignore User's Posts	Points taken. The V-22 as a support aircraft or even CSA type was in several articles and if carried, your helos might drop to just six for plane guard and closein ASW defense. The SV-22 fulfills the role of the retired SA-3B Viking. The ability to mix and match allows a limited AEW capability or a ELINT/SIGLINT capability. An AV-22 belongs on the LHD/LHA(R) properly. The Super Hornet by this time in the 2020s may be the block III variant with extended range and performance, if it is still around. F/A-XX is a mystery aircraft that I can find little about except it is intended to replace the Superbugs. I guess the Superbugs get deleted but JSF might be retained. UCAS has the long range surveillance role built into the demonstrator along with ISR gear to be carried in the two weapons bays or the fuel tanks for automated aeriel refuelling, two 2000lb guided bombs or twelve Small Diameter Bombs Increment II for hitting moving targets. I guess my info was out of date but I was speculating on the maximum sized airwing and failed to define the threat. However, I believe you will all agree that a manned strike fighter with the same long combat radius of 1500nmi and advanced stealth in the F/A-XX would be desirable. T he X-47B is only 38.2 feet long and no more than 29 feet wide/24 feet? wide and has a spot factor of .87 of the F-18 A-D Hornets. Two lines of this a/c would occupy around 76 feet in length and 24-29 feet folded span wide so that a high number of UCAS could be crammed in plus ideas to have these a/c vertically 'stacked' in the hangar bay. I guess the threat would come from the continuing buildup/modernization by China or another near term competitor such as the Russian gov't aims to increase the size and capability of it's armed forces. A third competitor might be India which is pushing the limits enough to make Australia somewhat concerned. In any case, a manned a/c with the raduis of the unmanned UCAS is needed since machines cannot do it all well. A long range strike fighte could excercise close control over the UCAS. The Growler cannot obtain the new range stats here so it might be replaced by an electronic attack F/A-XX and EW packages in the UCAS payload bays and in the F/A-XX. Cerebus is a podded AEW X-band radar that could fit several types of aircraft so surface combatant AEW and supplemental AEW for CVBG enters the picture. E-2D Hawkeye number was chosen to maximize the aircraft on 24/7 station to guide SM-2/SM-6 over the horizon against low altitude cruise missiles and aircraaft at distances far greater than the horizon limited SAM warships, thus exploiting their full range capability. UAV could lesson the burden here but the ideal solution would be a manned airship with an endurance of 30 days at a time to combat low altitude, fast and stealthy targets. Well, that's my two cents. I''m begining to feel overwhelmed by my mistakes and would like to correct them. Thankyou for responses.
seasick		#7	[-]
Posts: 4658 (15-May-2008 04:19:48) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts Message Me Connection Blocking Invite Ignore User's Posts	E-2D Hawkeye number was chosen to maximize the aircraft on 24/7 station to guide SM-2/SM-6 over the horizon against low altitude cruise missiles and aircraft at distances far greater than the horizon limited SAM warships, thus exploiting their full range capability. That's a neat trick. I'd rather send out bugs with AIM-120D. UAV could lesson the burden here but the ideal solution would be a manned airship with an endurance of 30 days at a time to combat low altitude, fast and stealthy targets. I considered that as part of my SSDL story line. A rigid blimp with a lightweight version of an AN/SPS-40 mounted on the underside. It would be required to hold station in the upper stratosphere above the jet stream and below the burning up meteors in the mesosphere above. The problem is power. Up that high air is too thin, even hydrogen requires a large balloon. There really isn't a good way to power the radar.
westwords2020		#8	[-]
Posts: 290 (15-May-2008 13:05:23) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts Message Me Connection Blocking Invite Ignore User's Posts	USN plans over the horizon applications with the forthcoming SM-6 ERAM that has a 200 nmi range. Airships would carry very large UHF radars in their gas bags and operate lower than the stratosphere, much lower and would carry a crew with 30 days fuel and supplies but lighter than air aircraft are not doing that well with USN. Now aerostats for the same job seem to have interest but they are tethered and require a support ship. Numbers of Hawkeye, six that is, were assumed necessary to have one a/c in the air at all times and the nose was fitted with a tracking/illumination radar to allow regular SM-2s to be used in over the horizon engagements just as they would allow OTH with ERAM which employs the AIM-120 seeker in active mode or alternately in semiactive mode. CEC is to tie it all together in any case allowing everyone's netted sensors to create a shared fire control quality air defense picture.

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