Stealth by Peter Westwick

Author:Peter Westwick [Westwick, Peter]
Language: eng
Format: epub, azw3
ISBN: 9780190677466
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Published: 2019-11-22T00:00:00+00:00

Once the planform was set, the next step was to add volume to the aircraft. The ideal shape to minimize radar cross section is an infinitely thin flat plate. A real airplane, however, needs volume: it has to carry a pilot, engines, and fuel, and this one of course would carry a radar as well. So Cashen started with a flat plate and added the volume above it; the result was a fuselage rimmed with chines, the flat, flared-out surfaces that had helped give the SR-71 its distinctive shape. In this case, though, the chines were married to a boxy-looking aircraft, so that rather than contributing to a sense of sleekness, the chines gave the plane the ungainly appearance of a butter dish. But the chines served a purpose: by putting all of the usual radar-cross-section vulnerabilities—the cockpit, engine inlet, engine exhaust—on top of the plane, above the chines, designers effectively screened them off from radars on the ground.8

figure 9.2

Side view of Tacit Blue.

Source: U.S. Air Force.

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