Was the YF-23 superior to the F-22?
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 25 ก.พ. 2024
- In our previous videos, we have looked at several experimental US aircraft pushing aeronautical limits, but never saw service. The F-15 STOL MTD, the F-16XL, and the F-18 HARV to name a few. But there is one experimental aircraft that stands out above all the others for its cutting-edge design.
The Northrop YF-23 was in the competition, head-to-head with the demonstrator version of the F-22, and the Northrop/McDonnell Douglas team came up with a very impressive aircraft.
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I was a teenager during the YF-22/23 fly off and remember the news coverage showing the aircraft. The YF-22 looked like a more modern evolution of existing aircraft like the F-15, while the YF-23 truly looked futuristic to me. I was disappointed when it didn't win.
Really? I'd say they're much more similar between the two than compared to the F-15. The only three design differences an untrained eye would catch are the air intakes, the "diamond" wings, and the YF-23 having slightly sharper angles logitudinally, but I'd say the F-22 air intakes and rounded corners actually look more futuristic. Otherwise they're pretty similar to each other and either of them are very different from the F-15. If anything, the YF-23's sharper corners are more similar to the F-15. The only thing that really makes the YF-23 stand out are the diamond wings, but, to me, the F-22's wings also seem very futuristic compared to the F-15's.
I suppose if you're watching low res video, the diamond wings will stand out the most, though.
That's probably WHY it didn't win.
@@dr.victorvsNah. The YF23 is obviously very different in shape and layout to the F22. It literally looks like a sci-fi airplane.
@@Sajuuk "Nah." -is not a word, much less a sentence, but it is an indicator of how far we are ahead of the schedule shown in "Idiocracy."
@@dr.victorvs flight control surface configuration of the 23 was much more innovative
when i first saw the yf-23, i actually thought it was a 6th gen fighter that US was developing, and then i realised it was a plane of the 1990s...
6th gen won’t have pilots
When I was a kid I grew up in Palmdale, California and I was fortunate enough. To see the YF23 in flight many times
I worked on the P&W 5000 engines used in the fly-off and one aspect of the thrust vectoring that I've not seen mentioned in video's is how it facilitates Short Take Off performance which was one of the 'desired' specs. During test runs they go full AB then vector up 20 degrees then down 20 degrees with about a second each then back to level thrust. The up vector pushes the tail down before the control surfaces have achieved enough authority then the downward vector pushes the aircraft up and off the tarmac....it's now flying at a positive attitude and having more than 1:1 T/W off it goes. I've not seen a demonstration of this during airshows as it no doubt is more risky than a conventional take-off...but that ability is in there if they ever need it.
We were getting regular reports of the Fly-Off and heard that GE guys were phoning back to the plant saying they had it in the bag because they were a bit faster than us....but the AF had changed the fan requirements late and we'd run into problems making the new ones in time so were using the older design which had less performance. The AF knew that it was only a delay and took this into consideration and in reality both engines met EVERY specification and people claiming that GE's were significantly faster are stretching the definition of 'significant'. Slightly is more accurate.
Also never mentioned was why the P&W 5000 was chosen over the GE....it was because it was SO much easier to maintain as that had been high on the priority list. Conventional jet engines have so many pipes, wires and fittings that things tend to overlap and lots of things need to be removed to service just one part. That was part of our design that individual components could be replaced with minimal disturbance of others which greatly reduces the time required. The 5000 fastener count of individual part #'s is also very low which simplifies maintenance and the AF really liked this with the maintainers working on both engines universally choosing the P&W as the better engine. Hope this helps add some info.
That was very interesting, thank you.
That is very revealing as to why the Air Force chose the 22 over the 23. Obviously not the only reason but it really clarifies things considering all the opinions as to the 23 being “much faster” and capable. I really like both aircraft and I think both should have been used,22 as a fighter and 23 as a long range fighter/bomber.
That sounds like one of the things the F-15 SMTD was supposed to trial. But it had, although I think added later in the program, those huge honkin' canards to give a little bit of forward uplift. The canards were just F/A-18 tailplanes, if I remember right.
@@troyezell5841 If I remember right, both prototypes were faster in supercruise with the GE YF120 motor, perhaps because of 'variable ratio' features or whathaveyou being trialed by that engine. But as @recoilrob points out, the engines were also prototypes; the production F119-100 might have expanded since then on the initial versions' performance.
Also, both prototypes met the Air Force's requirement of "more than 1.5 Mach" without afterburner. As to which aircraft was faster at the top end, I doubt there could be much difference. Heating to the stealthy skin coatings, canopy, etc., is the rate limiting factor for the production F-22A at much above Mach 2, and those same considerations would apply just the same to a hypothetical F-23A..
Also also, the production F-22A is perhaps itself quite a bit quicker than it's prototype. It's publicly demonstrated 1.82 Mach, sans afterburner, and is rumored to be able to do about Mach 2. And then go to burner...this maybe isn't so far fetched. Consider that the Raptor has about as much thrust in military power as an F-15C in full afterburner, and the F-15 is not a slow aircraft. Plus the F119 motors are supposed to preserve a greater proportion of thrust at altitude from the static sea level benchmark.
@@n.w.1803You are right! I got to thinking about it and the tests I witnessed WERE with the STOL/ MTD nozzles which we built before the ATF versions.
The STOL/MTD F-15 had the canards in every picture I've ever seen of it and flew the rectangular nozzles to verify their flight characteristics then later a round vectoring nozzle. They got their money's worth out of that test program.
I have to admit that my thinking that the same performance would be achieved with the F-22's came from that earlier STOL/MTD experience and while I did have a hand in making the ATF engines and nozzles I can't say that I remember seeing one going through the same test running so that might just be an assumption and figment of old age. Could it have been 34 years ago already? Sucks getting old. :)
My understanding is that the contract mainly went to Lockheed because Northrop already had won the contract for the B2 over Lockheed and they had poured money into the project ($23 billion between 1981 and 1989, including a billion spent on redesigning the aircraft to be able to operate at low altitude), and military planners wanted to make sure they were not putting their eggs in one basket. Or at least that's the stated reason for going with what was on paper a worse aircraft - in practice I would imagine that Lockheed greasing some of the right palms helped too.
Shame though, the YF-23 is still an amazing looking aircraft - it looked futuristic in 1990 and IMO it still looks it now. Will be interesting to see if the rumors of a modernized version of the design being sold to Japan for their next generation fighter are true.
You are correct
Yea it was more about spreading the money around and keeping the corps happy over picking the best aircraft.
No that's just an excuse, and really weakest of the arguments for YF-22. There is no such thing as "all eggs in one basket" in US military planning and logistics. Factory is a factory, doesn't really matter who own it when fecals hit the fan. Famous WW2 Jeep never was Jeep's - it was designed and built by Willys, but since they didn't have the pproduction capacity for numbers needed, Jeep took over. Same will happen with ANY plant for ANY US military equipment - it will be taken over and/or plans will be given out to build another one. Now, spreading the money around - yeah, no duh, man, spot on and main reason.
It is true that in many respects YF-23 seems better than YF-22, but everyone forgets that testing of both concepts went for YEARS. And many of the YF-23's advantages may have been marginal - for example the heat dissipation. NOt saying it was a marketing only, just saying not good enough, for example. The point is that the assesment, where each plane was analyzed, compared and bottom-line'd was never declassified. So the video is a speculation at best and all we have is offcial info, which may very well be fake.
@@gmaacentralfounder The US Air Force clearly stated that the YF-23 was _significantly_ superior in stealth, range, acceleration and top speed, even when using the same engines as the YF-22 as it did in the first prototype. The only real advantage that the YF-22 had was low speed manoeuvrability due to the thrust vectoring. The Air Force themselves said they chose the inferior aircraft in most respects.
The reasons they gave were that while both aircraft exceeded their requirements , they thought the F-22 was more likely to be delivered on time, and third that Northrop were going to be heavily loaded delivering the B-2. I don't think any of those are the real reasons, so we're in agreement there.
And the differences in speed were considerable; Paul Metz has said that, while he is not allowed to give the numbers, the YF-23 was _much_ faster, not modestly faster. It could supercruise much faster than the YF-22, had better acceleration and had a much better maximum speed. The numbers are classified, those facts aren't, and those statements came from Paul Metz, one of the few people who flew both aircraft. The US Air Force themselves stated that the YF-23 had a significant advantage in stealth, particularly at longer wavelengths.
From reasonably reliable, publicly available sources my own view is that the US Air Force clearly chose the wrong aircraft.
lockheed is cia cover up company that's why they have most contracts in fascist state of america...
I really wish the YF-23 and YF-22 shared the same destiny as the F-16 and F/A-18.
Both great planes that were ultimately accepted.
There are some really badass graphics out there showing a navalized YF-23
Now that is a good take on it
@@lucasokeefe7935 too bad the navy got got bankrupt and opted for F/A-18.
i see yf-23 video i click and like immediately
Yup. And add it to my -22/-23 playlist.
@@ronjon7942 based
Wicked little machine. Like a perfected eurofighter.
The YF 23 was a damn large beast.
It's actually smaller than the Soviet Flanker series.
exactly what the US needs right now, larger fighter with much greater range
@KiingOfKombat Bigger size does not necessarily mean bigger range. The P51 was smaller than the P 38 or the P 47, but had better range
@@walterpleyer261 It's not about the range, but about the amount of missiles it can carry. Also, I have no doubt that both Su-27/35S and F-15C/EX can fly much longer than F-22
I have seen one in person (in a museum in California). It's not big, to be honest. But by far, my favorite plane.
Ironically an evolved YF-23 design is what needed now
Range, stealth, and payload is what is required out of airframe these days. It definitely has the first two. It looks like it would have been able to be designed with greater internal payload than f22.
“Ironically” the NGAD is not being based on the YF-23.
I wonder why…..
@@JohnFrumFromAmerica
Modernizing the design with today's tech would easy get the other two
@@peterwebb8732
They have strangely opted for clean sheet design which again leaves the YF-23 as wasted potential
@@verdebusterAP I don't think it's strange. The airframe design is not the biggest cost of this program. The biggest cost is likely the electronic package. Fluid dynamics software is so good these days they can design a clean sheet design in the computer and have very high confidence of it working.
in the 43 years since 1981 it hasn't made any difference which plane was better. I'm sure though Yf23 could have shot down that balloon just as well as the F-22 did. Worrying about maneuverability at low air speeds over the ability for a infrared missile to lock on seemed silly.
Best clue: the 6th Gen F-22 replacement is a hell of a lot more similar to the F-23 than the F-22. Same story on the engine chosen for each.
Mmmmhm, signed the old FDA hey?
Huh? No it didn’t bud. They went for a different design for the images currently that the public speculates lmao
@@Gyyghhhhjjjkk Well, bud, no one writing here actually knows the final form. Tail feathers, if it has them, will not include separate rudders. Thematically, it will fully embrace stealth 1st, maneuvering 2nd, like the YF-23. And the variable cycle engine will owe a great deal to the GE one they passed on.
When they picked the YF-22, I was MAD! I knew something had gone wrong!
Not judging by Northrop's performance in actually delivering an operational stealth aircraft. Might have ended up with two dozen 1 billion dollar a piece F-23s if the B-2 program was repeated.
YF-23’s top speed is still classified, and that alone says something.
Both are still classified. To put something into perspective, the Draken J35 had a top of Mach 2.3 and that was during the 50-60's. Imagine what they could do now.
Probably near to mach 3...
The YF-23 super cruise speed is classified. Neither YF demonstrator ever reached 'top speed'. The top speed of both demonstrators (22/23) is about the same because of materials, thermo limitations and fixed geometry intakes.
And the security was so tight for this other security was lacked....Look at How the China has an aircraft carrier, tanks, destroyers, and planes now.... Using basic college course, the algorithm can calculate the speed😀PS...tactic of diverting the public attentions.
@@DrsharpRothstein Excellent. I really wonder if thrust vectoring, avionics and material science of F-22 could be blended with YF23's Diamond wing shape, what might be possible... Cheers!
As they say, all aircraft have four main dimensions: length, width, height and politics. The YF-23 only got the first three right.
Facts
7:45 saweet JEEZUS what a gorgeous framing!!
I'm so glad that they didn't scrap the 2 YF-23s, because this design is where future aircraft are headed.
No, it isn't. Quite a useless production line. Hopes they get rid o' them.
@@pixelnazgul yes it is lmao all designs for the next gen are closer to the 23 than the 22 as the 22 is yes still ahead on stealth but lacking in performance frame wise.
Pretty crazy to realise that the less-capable plane from that 1990s competition is still unmatched 30-some years down the road
It was not "less capable", it was superior in different areas. Both designs were excellent, the F-22 was simply further along in development at the time of testing. It probably won on the basis of being able to launch weapons during the fight tests. Something the YF-23 demonstrators could not do.
Its not less capable, if anything the YF-22 and YF-23 were superior over in some areas over the other that it basically balances them out
The F-22 was more maneuvrable and carried a little more missiles, and the YF-23 was faster and stealthier, you cant say either is more or less capable really
The F-22 was definitely less capable, since the whole purpose of a 5th gen air superiority fighter is to never get into a dogfight in the first place. Northrop understood the true potential, just like they did with the B-2. The USAF still hadn't learned how effective stealth was, and thus both programs were degraded to better accomplish mission sets that were obsolete (F-22 dogfighting and B-2 low-level penetration). Only now with the B-21 and NGAD have they learned and optimized for low RCS missions over kinematic performance.
Not unmatched, just merely hanging on. The entire mess and the truncated program and the current state of “Who's on First? “ because O’bama and SOD Bill Gates.
Barack Hussein Obama, cutting the defense budget to the bone. The military was reduced to scavenging parts from other plane for repair and maintenance…among a litany of boondoggles.
Trump turned the sorry state of affairs and conditions facing the military, and the Pentagon brass and paper pusher repaid President Trump by betraying him. Conducting secret commissions with the Chinese Military and Xi Jing Ping…they’ll disobey and give them head’s up on any military commands by President Trump. Treacherous rats nest.
Unmatched? What has the F 22 done to prove that position? Thirty years on yet still the best? Time moves on and makes everything old.
If you haven't I would encourage you to watch the documentary about the YF23 and its test footage, It seriously blew my mind when I saw the fly by wire systems detecting small bumps in the runway and moving the flight control surfaces accordingly, truly impressive for its time!
That was considered a bug in the FBW system. The control laws were rewritten to stop that when full weight was detected on the landing gear.
Oh yes apologies, I should have mentioned that but I still think even though it was a bug the fact that it could still detect the bumps really says a lot about the technology and its capabilities within the YF23 and I appreciate that you mentioned that :)
Yeah go watch videos of the YF-16 taxing around. It does the same thing.
Jack Northrup was always ahead of the curve. YB-49 for example. That creative genius tended to work against him. Until years later the consensus of the experts was that Northrup was right.
Please respect Mr. NorthrOp by spelling his name correctly.
One of the only two protypes of the YF-23 is available for public viewing at the Western Museum of Flight in Torrance, CA. Well worth it.
For those on the other side of the country the other prototype is on display at the USAF Museum at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base.
Yf23 looks like its closer to what the Air Force is looking for in the NGAD interms of airframe. Of course the main technology breakthrough of NGAD will be the electronics.
Exactly Which is why I think that the YF-23 is the superior Airframe.
The common thing that pilots said that caught them by surprise about going against the F-22 in Training was not its
maneuverability but its speed. IF the YF-23 was faster and had a stealthier design, its without a doubt better.
Also maneuverability doesnt matter much as dog fighting is for the most part dead.
@@looseygoosey1349 yf23 could be a better airframe for today's needs but f22 could have fit the original requirements better. Both are probably the best fighters ever developed even up to this point.
@@looseygoosey1349 The limitation on sustained speed is the canopy, the sensors, and the RAM coating primarily, and the airframe to some extent, and nothing about the YF-23 would have been able to be better in those aspects than the YF-22/F-22, so it is a distinction without a difference. Dogfighting is not dead, when a stealth plane goes up against another stealth plane their detection and engagement range is greatly reduced, and with closing speeds being what they are, unless they fire and immediately turn away to defeat inbound missiles they are basically at the merge as soon as they get lock on to launch their own missiles. The only reason kinematic performance is less valued in a dog fight is due to the development of high off boresight short range missiles that do not require the launching aircraft to point its nose at the target in order to engage it. But short range fights will most definitely still occur.
@JohnFrumFromAmerica
The YF-23 fit the ATF requirements far better than YF-22. The original requirements were to penetrate Soviet air defenses from unexpected direction get behind the Soviet front line and destroy Soviet AWACS and fighter formations as they were forming before they could get the the front line. Everything about the YF-23 design beets the F-22 in those regards.
the yf23 was undoubtedly a stunning looking aircraft
The early 90s anime Macross Plus was clearly inspired by the YF-22/23 competition, with one of its planes being clearly based on the YF-23. Everyone should watch Macross Plus.
The yf21 i remember that
GREAT video!! About twenty years ago I had a conversation with one of the engineers who worked on the YF-23. He told me that the YF-23 beat the YF-22 by ten decibels at the radar range. (No, he did not tell me what angles nor what radar frequencies.) If my math is correct, this would imply a reduction in detection range of about 44 percent.
It was said below... the YF-22 would have been a better dogfighter. If you're looking for an air dominance fighter, it needs to be able do get into, and dominate, the dogfight. The YF-23 was more stealthy and probably overall faster. Personally, I think BOTH should have been produced. The F-22 would have filled exactly the role it did. A production F-23 would have been a fantastic escort for the B-2 and later B-21 as the F-23 would have been stealthy enough to not give away the presence of a stealth bomber. That's a role and capability that the F-22 probably can't do. Given that some possible designs of the NGAD look like they're derived from the YF-23... this may be what they're going to use the NGAD for.
The F-22 is more agile, and the YF-23 was more stealthy. The F-22 was chosen to hedge bets, in case it needed to dogfight. But really, by the time of this competition, dogfighting didn't happen anymore. Everything was BVR. The F-22 is an excellent plane, and is still unmatched. But, the YF-23 would have been able to be in service longer, due to better stealth characteristics, and would have been just as deadly as the F-22 in real world scenarios.
I've seen the YF-23 up close, and took many pics of her. She is a beautiful plane, and more so in person (I'm probably using terms that are not popular these days like referring to a plane as "She" but I'm old school that way).
I got to touch it, walk beneath the fuselage, took many pics of it when it was temporarily parked behind a local Torrance (Ca) business at the outer edge of Zamperini Field, in Torrance, Ca.
The version was the gray version, and of course all the Tech was removed ahead of time, (No engines, and canopy was blacked out)as to not be compromised in a public area where she ultimately was put.
I pass by her everyday to and from work, and now she's a part of the Western Museum of Flight, Torrance, California where she is proudly displayed. She still looks beautiful, and awe inspiring.
I've been there a couple of years ago. She's beautiful. I was a little disappointed that she was just parked outside the museum - to me that plane should be indoors. I'm not sure if that's the case now.
@vinylexplorer9817 I agree with you on that. I recently just commented on another video about the flight museum in Dayton, Ohio, where the other YF23 is kept immaculate and indoors.
I think that the Museum in Torrance, in keeping this beautiful plane outdoors, exposed to the elements, is disrespectful to this beautiful plane. And it's a shame they can't or won't find a better place to showcase her.
YF-23 was a beauty
I have seen both the YF23 and YF23 prototypes at the US Airforce Museum, both are spectacular. I was surprised you can get so close to them. My read is Lockheed had at the time a much better track record of delivering working aircraft within expected budgets and this was the deciding factor. The USAF did not trust Northrop to deliver the F23 without significant delays and cost overruns.
And that's exactly what they got from Lockheed after choosing them. Just sayin
That is a true statement also McDonnell Douglas just had the totally disastrous A-12 project for the Navy.
What 'is' over looked is that Northrop was overcoming the problems on the manufacturing of the B-2. The same management that ended up producing the B-21 ahead of schedule. (Going from memory on that)
Excellent stuff bro
In a parellel universe, people are watching this same video and having the same arguements about "what if," just in reverse :-)
yh but the yf23 looks so much better, all universe' agree on that
I first saw the YF-23 as a child in a video game I was playing and it quickly became my favourite aircraft in the game. Already having a love for aircraft. When I found out that it actually existed in real life I was so excited I kept bothering my grandfather (who shared my interest in aircraft) with questions and information about the plane for weeks.
What a shame, wish it would have turned out like the F16 - F18 drama story, would have been kool to have the F23 in the toolbox as well.
f22 was a peace time fighter, now they wind has changed and we need an evolved yf23
Ok. I played a very small part of YF-22. But, the point is, I was there. Watching the flight test programs super closely. After all, my job literally depended on it.
Point 1:
YF-22 was one of the most ambitious and successful flight test programs ever. We did a lot more than we had to. It demonstrated reduced risk for the AF and the taxpayer. You can also see the risk point play out in the AF selecting the P&W engines vs the GE. The Pratt was an evolutionary engine while the GE was revolutionary.
Point 2:
The YF-22 was a fighter plane that was very stealthy while the 23 was a stealth plane with fighter capability. The 22 aligned better with the lessons learned from Gulf War 1.
All that said, I feel that the 23 is one of the most beautiful fighter aircraft ever and I wish it had been produced for a different customer or role. Just to see them flying. Just gorgeous.
Awesome video!
Two different airplanes built to requirements that evolved during the competition, but LM was more agile in responding. The YF-23 was a beautiful airplane for what the requirements, but thrust vectoring alone would not solve the high AOA configuration performance in that regime with the tech at the time. The single weapons bay was also a problem in the event they had a hung load. I would have loved to see this navalized in a way different than the NATF configuration proposed. It could have been a formidable replacement for the F-14.
IIRC, one of the determining factors given for selecting the YF-22 was the belief by NAVAIR that the F-22 would be more feasible to adapt a version for carrier use than the YF-23, and there was a thought that (like the F-4 Phantom before it), having the Navy and Air Force use variants of the same basic airframe as the baseline for their primary fighters would be advantageous.
Note, theis would have been in addition to the JSF (the program that selexted the F-35). The JSF was going to replace F-16s in the Air Force and F-18s in the Navy, and the ATF/NATF program were going to replace the F-15 and F-14, respectively - this would maintain the planned High/Low mix that had been working so well for both services so far, with a highly capable "top" fighter backed up by a slightly less capable but far more affordable (and, important to the Navy trying to fit the max airframe on a carrier, *smaller* fighter) they could buy and field in larger numbers
"potential purchasers may not be technically astute": you're officially my new diplomatic guru :D
Excellent video.
The F-23 never found a place in the sky but it will always find a place in our hearts.
I really hope they start up yf23, it has such an innovative design
MAN if only, LOVETHISPLANE, also check out Macross Plus is kinda the story, but one plane being the SU 47 Berkut the other YF 23
This is by far my new favorite TH-cam channel
I think the real reason why the Northrop YF-23 didn't win the competition was because at that time Northrop had the B-2 contract. As well as huge cost overruns.
Along with XF 32/XF 35. This competition that i was followed. Both of my favorite were lost to the competition 😊
X-32 was butt ugly though.
you like that ugly whale plane?
The McDD design that didn't get down-selected was cool though. Kind of a single engined cross between YF-23 and F-35.
I've always said the F-23 should have been the F-14 replacement. It's long range would have been perfect for the Navy. Much better option than the short leg Hornet.
Unfortunately, the F-23 would have been too long to fit between the head of the catapult track & the jet blast deflectors on American carriers. Simply wouldn’t fit.
As things turned out, there never was a navalized version of the shorter F-22 either.
@@johnrusac6894 very interesting. Thanks
The YF-22 would have been a better fit for the Navy. The YF-23 was not really suited for carrier operations.
One of the YF-23's can ce viewed at the Western Museum of Flight in Torrance, CA USA.
Thanks for A Great Video! New Sub Here
can anybody tell me if Japan started producing the YF-23?
Crazy tech for 1990
It all comes down to which aircraft did certain people invest in. Like applying for a job, going through the whole process, and the position is already given to someone.
same here, i was in high school reading about f22 and f23 in "Aviation"
Would love to see a video about the X-32
This competition was originally for 600+ aircraft. In hindsight, since less than 200 F-22s were ever produced due to budget cuts, they should have gotten both platforms albeit in reduced numbers.
THE MOST RADICAL FIGHTER TO EVER BE PRODUCED IN AVIATION HISTORY! THis thing to this day looks like it stepped out of a a sci fi novel from the year 2080! And I feel the NAVY should have took this design for itself..SHAME! what a beauty! This and the XB-70 Valkyrie are my alltime favorites!
Yes.
Though it likely would've been somewhat more expensive.
Not that it matters much when congress "pulls a B-2" and guts procurement sending the per-unit price into the stratosphere anyway.
I wished there were international partners that were interested in the YF-23 so that it could have been like like something similar to why the F-5 was designed - designed for afforable export sales to quickly equipped friendly air forces and naval aviation forces. That way both F-22s and F-23s could have both been in production and in hindsight, it would mean that even with the F-22 production lines canceled and dismantled, the F-23 production facilities setup for export sales would have been still around that the US could have start ordering more F-23s to make up for the less than a hundred F-22s still available now that we're back in the era of great powers competition and Cold War 2.0 with China. It would have been a more viable and tenable option instead of relying on the F-35s to do everything including making up the slack for the lack of F-22s to cement air superiority, which a multirole fighter like the F-35 would never do as well as the F-22 or F-23.
With the much longer range and reduced radar and IR signatures, the YF-23 could've been developed into an amazing interdictor/strike aircraft.
Which is better? It is according to the requirements! The YF-23 was more stealthy, the YF-22 was more maneuverable.
What a beautiful aircraft. It really is a shame that both could not be produced. Northrop had the stealthier design. Time has proven them wise. The NGAD will probably have a similar type of high stealth design with less emphasis on dogfighting. If you have BVR engagement it pretty much comes down to absolute stealth. With the modern engines and electronics of the F-35 it would be a truly formidable aircraft.
So the states have retired one stealth design, rejected at least 4 more that made it to prototype stage and now has 2 in service?
Your numbers are wrong. F-117s are still flying, B-2s, F-22s, F-35s are all in service, not to mention lots of unmanned systems and several more that the public doesn't know about.
I agreed. The computer system was not advance enough to run it effectively until now.
Not quite the same as an existing type modified for experimental purposes. This was a completely new design competing for a USAF production order. Count me among those who thought it would win.
Such a beautiful plane
How crazy is it that the US was working on such an advanced technology in the 1980's and the rest of the world is still trying to get to that level
anyone else notice how the ai plane from stealth looks like lockheeds 2 possible designs for ngad?
If we had chosen the YF-23, Wed still be making them. They may have 95% the air dominance of the f-22, their applications beyond air dominance would have justified continued production. I am sure they would have outlived the f-23 as well.
Not a chance. The GWOT was spending trillions and there wasn't a near peer in sight, as the Soviet Union had collapsed, Russia couldn't afford to maintain it's existing military much less field advanced new capabilities, and China was still largely rural fishing villages and relied on Russian export hardware for its own military forces. So, no, the US military had other priorities than obtaining 12x overmatch capabilities in air to air when they already had a 6x overmatch.
Woulda loved to see the 23* with thrust vectoring
That would need a total redesign of the aircraft, particularly the aft fuselage with a good several feet of 'trough' beneath and behind the nozzles. Which they designed on purpose to help shield the IR signature from beneath it. Unless you'd want the nozzles to only vector the exhaust 'up'..
I think they should revisit this aircraft today, base the new fxx on the yf23 and just keep upgrading the f22 in its own path to remain dominant
Imagine what classified fighter jet we have now if we had this in the 90s
I would expect that the F-22 ended up with some tech and features from the YF-23 integrated into it. I mean it would make sense, take the best of both and merge em.
Also maybe they have some Black Widows stowed and ready but ultra secret, aided by the idea that since the F-22 won and is the one in use the F-23 was completely canned and none are flying. If I was in the business of having secret aircraft, that is one way I would operate.
Cool plane!.✈️
I was in high school during the ATF program. My biological father worked on the YF-23 program.
1:17. Check out that guy's stealth watch! The progenitor of the iWatch?
if it's so stealth then how is he visible? checkmate, this is why the a4 is beteter. B)
Superior in stealth (aka better at BVR) but in agility (aka WVR), that goes to the F-22, now need the best of both, maybe NGAD except 3D thrust vectoring instead of F22 2D?
The thrust vectoring is done by the missiles nowadays. With high off boresight missiles the plane no longer needs to be able to point its nose at the target. So NGAD will likely be focused on range, top speed, sensor and EW capability, and payload capacity. It should be basically a large, heavy, strike fighter/medium bomber in design, just packing a boat load of air to air missiles instead of only bombs.
The YF23 was what the F35 is now. Back then, BVR was just not yet as hot of a topic as it is now
YF 23 is one of the greatest aircraft never put into production!
I still find it funny that old military brass still cling to their belief that modern jets need the capability to dogfight. This isn’t the mishap of the Vietnam era F-4’s. This is the modern battlefield where air superiority fighters are meant to be nothing more than $100m+ missile trucks with cutting edge stealth technology. A lot of the concepts I’ve been hearing about the NGAD prove this point; the brass realize now that losing one of these aircraft in a dogfight is off the table as the limited production would prove far too costly to replace the jet. Not to mention the basic cancelation of the F-22 goes to show that, while it won the competition, it wound up being nothing more than a stop-gap while better AI technology was developed. With AI/drone wingmen being used starting with the F-35 and will no doubt be far more advanced for the NGAD, the idea of having a jet that still sticks to old dogfighting doctrine is laughable. Future air dominance fighters will be almost akin to flying command ships controlling their AI wingman, having drones pack the firepower needed to protect the “mothership” as it were, and soaking missiles and thwarting attack attempts while keeping the main aircraft housing the pilot safe.
Also the Japanese have revived the YF23 so to speak so maybe we will have true production level competition between these 2 aircraft afterall.
They were also worried the YF23 would cost too much, which with hindsight of the numerous costly set backs of the F22 is ironic made worse by the fact the YF23 had a parts that were already in service, the landing gear was from the F18 and modified, the nose and cockpit from the F15. I heard another reason but I don't know how true it is, they picked Lockheed and Boeing was because they wanted companies other than Grumman to work on stealth aircraft, which doesn't really make sense since Lockheed made the F117, maybe it meant newer stealth but idk.
The "off the shelf" parts were only for the technology demonstrator. New landing gear would be required because the heavier aircraft needed more powerful breaks than those supplied by the F-18 main landing gear.
The cockpit displays for a production F-23 would be a all new glass display to handle the increased information load of a modern fighter.
well out of the 22 or 23 what do nearly everyone else's 6th gen fighter programs look like more?
I think if we knew what we know now, it was a slightly better platform. The reduced agility wouldn't seem to matter with modern missile tech, and how stealth fighters operate.
Detect them early, fire missile, defend. These planes should never encounter another plane.
I can make an excellent argument that the YF-23 is more maneuverable in the usefull areas of flight for fighting over the YF-22.
I have read that thrust vectoring is not that useful in air combat as it bleeds off air speed and as fighter pilots say: "speed is life". As a lay person, I still think the YF23 was an opportunity missed by the US Air Force.
It is my understanding that the Japanese, looking at building an indigenous stealth fighter, have been in negotiations with Northrop to use the YF-23 as the starting point.
After it entered the service, F-22 needed many improvements to make it reliable. With so much serious work invested in it, with so much capacity for further development, it is absurd that F-23 was not utilized in some form.
I've never heard or read anything about the YF-23 being able to do mach 2.6. Officially the to speed is mach 1.8 BUT anybody should see the F-15 has a total 50 000 lbs thrust and can do mach 2.5 clean. The YF-23 would have had 70 000 lbs thrust and far better aerodynamics. Mach 2.6 might actually be conservative I think mach 2.8 might have been possible. A production version was projected to have even better aero due to smaller engine nacelles.
Most fighters (and especially the F-15 and F-22) are engine overpowered so that they have acceleration and energy to sustain repeated agile movements for WVR BFM maneuvering and to kinematically defeat missile threats, so top speed is not limited by engine thrust, it's limited by heating of the canopy, sensors, on board munitions (for those that aren't exclusively internal carriage), RAM coating for stealth platforms, and the airframe to some extent. So in real world use the F-22 and the F-23 would have seen similar top speeds due to the above mentioned factors/technology being the same between them. Only with ceramic RAM coatings and advancements in engine design/intake design will NGAD be able to fly at higher top speeds. As is best known the F-15C was Mach 2.5-2.6 capable, the F-15EX is Mach 2.8-2.9, the F-22 is Mach 2.7-2.8, and the YF-23 was likely the same Mach 2.7-2.8 (while the YF-22 at the time was slower, but the F-22 has improved upon the YF-22's performance and become it's equal at this point).
Grey ghost and Spider!? I read the codename of PAV 2 was Black widow!
The YF-23 was, in my opinion, a better overall aircraft than the YF-22. I think politics played a huge role considering the B2 was also from Northrup and the cost overrun caused considerable political backlash. There was also the fact that the YF-22 looked like a fighter, while the YF-23 was strange and unfamiliar. I personally always loved the look of the YF-23 more, because I think that form follows function, not convention.
The F-22 is an incredible aircraft but man, the YF-23 is an absolute beauty. Pity they didn't go for both...
They should have done a dog fight between the F22 and YF 23 and required other test like how good the accuracy of missiles targeting and test how good the stealth is by competing with other jet fighters
The YF-22 was evolutionary and the YF-23 revolutionary. The YF-23 was otherworldly looking.
Jesus, unveiling of both in 1990. This goes to [prove] that the US has been working on 6th gen for at least 15 years…do we now think 7th gen is on the drawing board?
the yf23 stealth is so good everybody thinks the military didn't adopt it.
The YF-23 looks futuristic
Many of us thought it was. It's lines and looks were dictated by stealth needs making it look different. That counted against it.
Does anyone know why they didn't smooth out the top of the aircraft? It looks like they could have made more internal volume with no impact on drag?
one possible reason is in the planning stage to account for limited time and material
thes argument was formed in a spur of time
The YF-23's shape is dictated by area ruling optimized for about Mach 1.5 cruise. So "filling in" the rear of the aircraft would result a large rise in supersonic wave drag. It is said the YF-23 is the best area ruled aircraft ever to fly.
@@DrsharpRothstein nice one :)
YF23 was a better platform. Maneuverability is nice but stealth and speed are more important for gaining first kill opportunity. We see those priorities in the NGAD program.
I just like the fact that this video wasn't made to just bash on the F-22 as an inferior machine fueled by corruption while the YF-23 was god's gift to mankind
wow now i know why many people said SU57 is look like YF23 more than F22 what a Beautiful Machine i wish i had a chance to watch them all at some air show but maybe it will never happen 😢
lol the SU-57 is not like the YF-23. It wishes it was.
@@looseygoosey1349 i see many people said in many SU57 Vids that SU57 got so many thing adap from YF23 and when i got to see this video and they were right im not looking for debate or anything just want to said this i really like all of this Aircraft Design because i will never got a chance to see this irl because i live in Thailand and the only plane we have is F5 F16 and Griphen E i really jealous USA that have F15 F18 and F22 and Russia have many cool looking like SU35 and SU57
@@PalyGround10you have better planes than Russia as they work as advertised. :)
These plane made me want to join the air force but with my terrible vision I wouldn’t be able to fly the FA22
In an article in AWST magazine, a comment was made about the F-22 had much better slow speed handling. More or less inferring that if ever caught in a slow speed combat engagement, the F-22 had much better slow speed maneuvering. Knowing how the two fighters would be employed, to me this did not make a big bit of difference. These two fighters would fly in combat areas at high speeds. Lockheed appeared that it had more confidence in their design than did Northrop.