Discussion: F-14, F-15 Hybrid Idea

[MAD]

Actually, all Vigilantes have folding vertical tail tips, it's needed for hanger deck clearance. 

The twin tails are as much to take advantage of air flow as to prevent the blanking that a single vertical would encounter; granted, two widely spaced verticals have less chance of either encountering such flow, but it also greatly reduces the chances of both encountering it at the same time.  Bsides, I seem to remember a USAF/USN/NAS extensive wind tunnel study in the late 1960s on fighter afterbody design that found that twin tails, properly done, had a touch less drag, too.  The study did appear to have valid results in that the original aft end design for the F-111 appears to have had 'bout every feature known to increase aftbody drag and they did have to do a fair bit of redeisgn there to deal with ijust that problem.  If you look at pictures of the final single-tail F-14 mockup in the old Salamander large-size book, you'll see that it has folding vetral fins, folding outboard from under each engine nacelle, much like the MiG-23/23 family; going to twin verticals allow smaller fixed ventral fins.  Mind you, I've got one of the old and inaccurate Mongram/Mattel 1/72 F-14A kits that's based on that mockup and I'm sorely tempted to rework it back to single-tail configuration and I might utilize the ventral fins from a couple MiG-23s as starting points for those ventrals.

Isn't it some what ironic!
The original North American Aviation design of the A-5 Vigilante – the NAGPAW was one of the first modern jet designs that incorporated a twin tail fin arrangement, specifically for the purpose of stability and carrier hanger clearance.
And yet being seen by the navy as to advanced of an idea, the U.S Navy was to specify, that this arrangement be replaced by a single and extremely tall tail fin.

Oh and as per the single fin and large folding ventral fins arrangement on the original Grumman F-14 Tomcat mock-up –take a look at the arrangement that Vought used in their V- 507 'VFX' design submission!

M.A.D

[KJ_Lesnick]

Considering that my ideas have evolved so much from the original concepts that I have decided to create a new thread.  As a result, I am shutting down this thread.

KJ Lesnick

[Jeffry Fontaine]

Since Kendra opted to lock this topic.  I am elated and will be glad to see this disappear into the backwaters of the forum but until then it will hide here in the staff forum.