F-16 glider

http://www.patricksaviation.com/videos/SUPERGT/3384/

For those not familiar with fighter aircraft, EPU (Electrical Power
Unit) provides hydraulic and electrical power in event of failure of
the engine. The EPU is powered by Hydrazine which decomposes into hot
gasses as it passes across a catalyst bed or engine bleed air (if
available). The hot air passes through a turbine which drive the
emergency hydraulic pump and generator through a gear box.

At 20:00 17 January 2009, wrote:
http://www.patricksaviation.com/videos/SUPERGT/3384/

For those not familiar with fighter aircraft, EPU (Electrical Power
Unit) provides hydraulic and electrical power in event of failure of
the engine. The EPU is powered by Hydrazine which decomposes into hot
gasses as it passes across a catalyst bed or engine bleed air (if
available). The hot air passes through a turbine which drive the
emergency hydraulic pump and generator through a gear box.



My buddy at work who is a Portuguese air force officer, also called Mario,
and I discuss glide characteristics and other aviation stuff. We have to
because we are both 'flying desks' at the moment. At least I get to fly
my Std Cirrus at weekends.

Apparently the glide ratio of an F-16 with the engine out is 1:1 so the
pilot's rate of breathing in the video clip is impressively calm!

When I had winglets fitted to the Std Cirrus last year we came to the
conclusion that winglets probably wouldn't make the slightest bit of
difference on the F-16.

He is looking forward to some flights in the club's Grob 103 Twin Acro II
when the weather improves.

Gavin
Std Cirrus, CNN now G-SCNN, #173
LSV Viersen, Keiheuvel, Belgium

On Jan 18, 5:45*am, Gavin Short wrote:
At 20:00 17 January 2009, wrote:



Apparently the glide ratio of an F-16 with the engine out is 1:1 so the
pilot's rate of breathing in the video clip is impressively calm!


Well, it's a little better than that. When practicing SFOs (simulated
flame out) approaches, the rule of thumb (and this is from memory so
any F-16 drivers out there please jump in!) was 250 knots clean and
6:1 to the field; i.e. you needed 1000' for every nautical mile from
your intended touchdown point. Tried it several times in F-16
simulators at Luke AFB and it worked fine (lots of fun, too -
sometimes the hardest part was getting it stopped!). So the L/D is at
least 6:1, probably as high as 10:1 clean at L/D max speed.

OTOH, the F-4E flight manual (that I just happen to have handy) is
very explicit on what to do with both engines out:

"If neither engine can be started - EJECT"

Kirk
66

On Sun, 18 Jan 2009 07:07:17 -0800, kirk.stant wrote:

Well, it's a little better than that. When practicing SFOs (simulated
flame out) approaches, the rule of thumb (and this is from memory so any
F-16 drivers out there please jump in!) was 250 knots clean and 6:1 to
the field; i.e. you needed 1000' for every nautical mile from your
intended touchdown point.

I noticed that the film showed the airspeed pretty much nailed at 220 kts
until he started to flare. Couldn't get anything from the altimeter
display - hard to read off low-rez viseo!

I thought the glide ratio had to be better than 1:1 because even the
Shuttle manages 3:1 and an F-16 looks as it it should do rather better
than that.


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martin@ | Martin Gregorie
gregorie. | Essex, UK
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