Aircraft Systems

Tactical Manned Aircraft Systems

Boeing Microlattice: Lightest Metal Structure Ever Made to Revolutionize Future Aircraft Construction?

By David Crane david (at) defensereview (dot) com Image(s) Credit(s): Boeing and HRL Laboratories May 17, 2022 Speaking of Boeing products, and Boeing aircraft, specifically, Boeing’s designed the “lightest material ever made” for aircraft called the Microlattice, and it’s pretty cool. Boeing has this to say about it: At 99.99 percent air, it’s light enough to balance on top of …

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Boeing T-7A Red Hawk Advanced Pilot Training System/Jet Trainer Aircraft Pays Tribute to Tuskegee Airmen ‘Red Tails’ of WWII!

By David Crane david (at) defensereview (dot) com May 4, 2022 Image(s) Credit(s): Boeing This one’s pretty cool. Boeing recently introduced their T-7A Red Hawk advanced pilot training system for US Air Force fighter and bomber pilots, and it looks pretty good, at least in the videos DefenseReview’s (DR) watched of it. The “Red Hawk” element of the name and …

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Aevex Aerospace Phoenix Ghost: ‘Secretive Suicide/Kamikaze Drone’ Aircraft being Shipped to Ukraine to Help Fight the Russians

By David Crane david (at) defensereview (dot) com April 30, 2022 Image(s) Credit(s): AeroVironment (AV) An interesting company called Aevex Aerospace out of Solana Beach, California is making a very interesting “secretive suicide/kamikaze drone” aircraft, or armed/weaponized UAS/UAV called the “Phoenix Ghost“, and they’ve reportedly started shipping them to Ukraine to help battle the Russians. Specifically, they’re sending 121 Phoenix …

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Russian Sukhoi Su-75 Checkmate Single-Engine 5th-Gen Light Tactical Fighter Aircraft/Russian Medium Fighter: Will it Beat the F-35 Lightning II?

By David Crane david (at) defensereview (dot) com Photo(s) Credit(s): The Russians, Rostec, Sergei-Karpukhin/TASS and Eurasian Times November 23, 2021 DefenseReview (DR) has been publishing information on the Russian Sukhoi Su-57 Felon “Raptorsky” 5th-Gen stealth fighter jet aircraft for quite awhile. Well, the Russkies have developed a smaller, lighter-weight single-engine 5th-gen stealth fighter called the Su-75 Checkmate (the Russians DO …

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Chinese Military Mounting ‘Laser Guns’ to Hypersonic Vehicles (Aircraft and Missiles) to Increase Speed and Range

By David Crane Image Credit: The U.S. Sun July 27, 2021 Well, this isn’t good. Apparently, they’ve been busy little beavers over there at Beijing’s Space Engineering University, developing a “powerful laser gun” mounted onto hypersonic missles and aircraft to increase speed (and obviously range) by cutting air resistance by 70 percent (70%) or more. According to the Chinese laser …

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Sukhoi Su-57 Felon ‘Raptorsky’ 5th-Gen Low-Observable/Stealth Air-Superiority/Multi-Role Fighter Jet Aircraft Goes Live: Is it Really a Raptor Killer?

By David Crane david (at) defensereview (dot) com Photo(s) Credit: The Russians, and The Aviationist December 31, 2020 Last updated on 1/01/21. Six days ago, RT posted an interesting video (see first/top embedded video below) on the Sukhoi Su-57 Felon “Raptorsky” 5th-generation low-observable/stealth air-superiority/multi-role fighter jet aircraft going into serial production, so DefenseReview (DR) thought it would be nice to …

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Future Long Range Assault Aircraft (FLRAA): Will it be a Compound Helicopter, or a Tiltrotor Aircraft…and What’s Taking So LONG?

By David Crane david (at) defensereview (dot) com December 27, 2020 Back in 2011 and 2013, DefenseReview (DR) published pieces on the Sikorsky X2 coaxial/dual-rotor compound helicopter technology demonstrator and Sikorsky S-97 Raider dual rotor/coaxial compound helicopter concept, here and here. Well, all these years later, it’s being reported that “the Army is taking its final steps before starting a …

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Attack of the Drones: Artifically Intelligent ‘Robotic Wingmen’ UCAV’s and UAS/UAV ‘Drone Swarms’ are on the Way: Will They Actually Work?

By David Crane david (at) defensereview (dot) com September 27, 2020 Last updated on 9/28/20. DefenseReview’s (DR) been following drone aircraft/UAV/UAS technology for, well, forever. The unmanned aerial/aircraft systems technology sphere is indeed a fascinating one, and one that forces one to think about the future of military combat aviation as a whole, and what it’s likely to look like …

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Chinese Xian H-20 Long-Range, Low-Observable/Stealth Bomber Aircraft: How Big a Threat is it Really?

by David Crane david (at) defensereview (dot) com Image(s) Credit: Weibo and South China Morning Post (SCMP) July 21, 2020 As if hitting us with Coronovirus COVID-19 weren’t enough, China’s reportedly got a new long-rang, low-observable/stealth bomber in late-stage development called the Xian H-20, which also coincidentally sounds like a Chinese virus. So, it looks like China’s becoming one hell …

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Did Soleimani get JAGM’ed? A Little Follow-Up on the Joint-Air-To-Ground Missile, Precision-Guided Goodness

By David Crane defrev (at) gmail (dot) com Photo Credit: Title Image: Lockheed Martin via Defense News January 6, 2020 Last updated on 1/09/20. Well, this year (2020) certainly started off with a very big bang (or several bangs, perhaps), when a US General Atomics MQ-9 Reaper/Predator B weaponized drone/UAS (Unmanned Aerial System) sent what may have been multiple Lockheed …

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