The NEW Super F-22 Replacement is Coming

It was 2005, and the world would meet its most powerful fighter, the F-22 Raptor. It was an invention so far ahead of its time that it had to be put in a generation of its own, the world's first fifth-generation fighter. For almost two decades, the F-22 Raptor has remained the ultimate air superiority fighter, with a long line of advancements too advanced for even newer fighter A fighter so precious that a federal law was passed 24 years ago to prevent it from being sold to any other nation on the planet, not even to allies of the United States, even though they did line up to buy. This is the story of the F-22 Raptor, the superfighter that changed the world, and whose sheer existence was history in the making. The mid-80s was a time of intense power tussle between the US and the Soviet Union, and the Soviet Union was in the lead. Their Su-27 Flanker was no doubt the most powerful by far, with exceptional agility, powerful engines, and a big load of weaponry that could win any dogfight that ensued. To end this seemingly Soviet dominance, the US decided to develop an air superiority fighter of their own that could take on and take down any other fighter already in existence at the time, or coming in the following years. To achieve this, the US had to pit Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman, two of its largest aerospace companies, against each other, although there were proposals from other big names such as Boeing and General Dynamics. The winner of the Advanced Tactical Fighter program would get to be the pioneer of American aviation for decades to come, and could rightly add, developer of the world's first fifth generation fighter to their website. And so on receiving the requirements for the program, the companies set out to design and develop a prototype fighter that was better than anything they'd ever done before, which they did, the most relevant of which were the YF-22 from Lockheed, and YF-23 from Northrop, both lethal as the Air Force would like. But still, the YF-22 managed to stand out to become the winner of the program. Its unrivaled super-maneuverability would come in handy in dogfights, while its balanced combination of capabilities that saw almost no trade-offs would come in handy in virtually everything else. By the time the jet would be officially introduced into service in 2005 as the Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptor, those capabilities that earned it the crown had evolved even further. Since its introduction, the F-22 Raptor has remained the core of the air superiority of the U.S. Air Force. This is thanks to, of course, a long line of capabilities, but four in particular have stood out. Stealth The F-22 Raptor was built from the ground up to be stealthy or invisible to radar. The Raptor achieves this with attention to the It's also coated with radar-absorbent material, although significantly less reliant on this coating than, say, the B-2 Spirit, which is a good thing because while the maintenance-intensive B-2 Spirit requires fancy climate-controlled hangars, the F-22 can undergo repairs in a normal hangar. The aircraft actively cools its leading edges and features flat thrust-vectoring nozzles to reduce infrared emissions and ultimately mitigate the threat of heat-seeking missiles. And to maintain these stealth capabilities, the Raptor is fitted with a signature assessment system that delivers warnings when the radar signature is degraded and repair is necessary. All these combine to ensure the Raptor has a radar cross-section of the same as that of a steel marble, which is incredible, to say the least. Engine The F-22 Raptor is a twin-engine fighter with two Pratt & Whitney F119PW-100 augmented turbofan engines. These engines are closely spaced and incorporate pitch-access thrust-vectoring nozzles for athletic-level agility. Each engine has a maximum thrust of 35,000 lbf. Combining to thrust the fighter to a peak altitude of 50,000 feet and a top speed of Mach 1.8 dry or over Mach 2 with afterburners. These engines also give the Raptor a maximum operating range of 2,000 miles, more than half the radius of the Earth. This high cruise speed and operating altitude combo increase the aircraft's against ground defenses and also come into play during dogfights, particularly the supercruise ability that allows the fighter to intercept targets that couldn't sustain supersonic flight without ephemeral afterburners. Then there are the thrust-vectoring capabilities that allow for a dominating 60-degree angle of attack. Not to talk of how well they make for a good airshow, performing maneuvers like the Herbst Maneuver and the Pukachev's Cobra. Avionics A fighter's avionics determine how intelligent and aware the fighter is, and it's not unfair to say the Raptor was designed to be the most aware of all thanks to its key mission systems. They include the AN-ALR-94 Electronic Warfare System with more than 30 antennas for passive detection and all-round radar warning receiver coverage, the AN-AAR-56 Infrared and Ultraviolet Missile Launch Detector for full spherical infrared coverage, the AN-APG-77 Active Electronically Scanned Array Radar with low-observable, active-aperture electronically scanned antenna for track-while-scan capabilities in all weather conditions. To lower interception probability, this radar changes frequencies more than 1,000 times per second. This high frequency enables it to double as an electronic warfare system by overloading enemy sensors. All of this radar information, as well as communication, navigation, and identification information, is processed into a combined tactical picture to enhance pilot situational awareness by two Hughes Common Integrated Processors, each capable of processing up to 10.5 billion instructions per second. The F-22 can operate shockingly close to the battlefield, allowing for threat detection, threat identification, intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance tasks. To keep all of its systems running, the Raptor's software has an encyclopedia-long 1.7 million lines of code. Armament To maintain its stealth profile, the F-22, by default, has its weapons stored internally, shared across one main bay and two side bays. In the main bay is a combination of up to six 65-mile-range Mach 4 Flying AIM-120C Advanced Medium-Range Air-to-Air Missiles and 1,000-pound-class GPS-guided Joint Direct Attack Munitions. In the side bays are two AIM-9 Sidewinders with Mach 2.5 top speed and a 22-mile range. An M61A2 Vulcan 20mm Rotary Cannon with 480 rounds is also embedded in the airplane's right-wing route. And for when stealth isn't a priority, the Raptor is free to carry extra ammo externally, up to 5,000 pounds on each of its four underwing hardpoints. This suite of armament, avionics, engines, stealth, and many other little factors is what it took to produce the most expensive fighter in history, as the Raptor boasts a budget-exceeding unit cost of $350 million. And with so much spent on the fighter, the U.S. military understandably tried to milk it for all its worth by proposing many variants of the fighter in what we like to call an F-22 mania. First, the Naval F-22 variant was a planned carrier-borner variant of the Raptor with variable sweep wings to be developed under the Navy's Advanced Tactical Fighter to replace their F-14 Tomcat. It was cancelled in 1991. Then there was the planned two-seat variant of the Raptor designed to save development costs of the original F-22. This program too was cancelled in 1996, and its orders were converted to orders for the original F-22 it sought to replace. And lastly, there was the FB-22, a bomber variant with revised fuselage and delta wings three times the size of the wings of the original F-22. The bomber would have been able to carry significantly more fuel and ammunition, except that the concept was cancelled in 2006. Apparently, the best version of the F-22 Raptor was the original F-22 Raptor, and so focus was shifted on continuously upgrading that instead. To maintain its reputation as the fighter to beat, the F-22 is welcoming 14 upgrades. And while even the less major of these upgrades are rather interesting, there are three main highlights. 3. Stealthy Reflective Coatings Three times the F-22 has been spotted with exotic metal-like coatings. These coatings were carefully applied to not interfere with the jet's many key access points and critical systems, and they're expected to do one or both of two things. To reduce the aircraft's radar signature, or as a tool used in testing Advanced Infrared Search and Track Systems, IRSTs. 2. IRST In a post by the head of the US Air Force's Air Combat Command, General Mark Kelly, the Raptor is fitted with a faceted pons that in many ways prove to contain IRST sensors. IRST sensors provide the capability to passively detect and track both stealthy and non-stealthy aircraft from miles away while being completely immune to electronic warfare. 1. Low Drag Tank and Pylon – LDTP In the same post by General Mark Kelly, the Raptor is fitted with a stealthier, more aerodynamic Low Drag Tank and Pylon, or LDTP, which comes with reduced drag, increased range, better-sustained supersonic flight. Simply put, an LDTP is overall more efficient than the Raptor's original 600-gallon fuel tanks. Now a fighter in its latter years of operation, the F-22 Raptor has seen more glory years than most, and is preparing to pass the baton of air superiority to the sixth-generation NGAD fighter it's being used to develop. Until then, the F-22 remains the greatest fighter in history, one that wants you to subscribe to this channel and give this video a like, so kindly do so now. That would be all for this video, thanks for watching!