What mods, would be needed to make the Scooter a fighter? A radar? If so what would be suitable? Armament...Sparrow & Sidewinder or other?
How about making the Fighter Scooter supersonic, an afterburning Avon, reskinned rudder, different intakes for instance.
This idea stemmed from a 'make do and mend' situation the Fuerza Aérea Argentina found themselves in during the Falklands war.
So any comments, suggestions, mild insults, gasps of incredulity, brickbats, whatever they are will be gratefully considered
Ken
Going on the assumption that the basic airframe and wings/tail are retained, there are a few things you could do to improve performance without starting the design from scratch.
- Raise the cockpit and fair into an enlarged avionics deck to fit a larger radar in the nose.
- add F-16-ish radar
- add IRST ball
- General aerodynamic clean-up of new cockpit/avionics deck: Drag reduction, fair in new radar, fair in CFTs, apply area ruling to new configuration, etc.
- Minor structural strengthening: re-skin control surfaces, strengthen brakes and landing gear, strengthen controls and control surface mounts, etc.
- Wire wings to carry 4 x AIM-9s and 4 x AIM-120s plus CL tank
- switch to afterburning F404 or even an F414.
You'd probably end up with a slightly higher speed (just under transonic, I dare say) ability to target and shoot BVR, reasonable legs (from the F404) and remain a good dogfighter with ability to maintain very high energy levels during all flight regimes. (with the F404 it would be near 1:1 thrust ratio at combat weight and greater than 1:1 with the F414).
So, if it could see you far enough away, it could probably kill you with the AIM-120s, closer, a good chance with the AIM-9s and in very close would probably be a good match for many Gen 3-4 fighters with the excess energy capability.
However, it would be vulnerable in that area between the AIM-120 and AIM-9 ranges as it's speed would give the enemy the advantage to engage or not.
In 2nd tier air forces, though, I bet it would be a handful against other similarly aged aircraft and a fair number of newer ones.
Paul