Talk:LTV A-7 Corsair II/Archive 2

Archive 1

Archive 2

Pivoting Wings

Did this aircraft have pivoting wings that rose for takeoff and landing? 12.74.74.83 21:03, 26 March 2006 (UTC)

No, you are thinking of its predecessor, the F-8 Crusader. - Emt147 ^Burninate! 21:20, 26 March 2006 (UTC)

The F-8 Crusader was not the direct precursor of the A-7, at least not in the normal way. The F-8 series was designed from the outset as a fighter/interceptor, while the A-7 series aircraft was designed with only one function in mind: ground attack. Therefore, a completely new airframe and mission were required. Jak474 (talk) 18:20, 17 May 2017 (UTC)

Unreasonable citation demands

The two citation needed entries in "Design and development" refer to points of common knowledge.

- subsonic flight, given the technology of the time and unless the aircraft was to have been specialized beyond the point of utility as a ground attack aircraft, is more efficient than supersonic flight.

- a turbofan engine is more efficient than a turbojet. 50.53.72.138 (talk) 14:38, 24 August 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for pointing this out- indeed, it would seem these may be difficult to find citations for. If I’m reading your comment correctly, the two statements you are referring to are:

“However, the Navy felt that a subsonic design could carry the most payload the farthest distance, due to the lower fuel burn rate from avoiding supersonic flight”, and

“Turbofans achieve greater efficiency by moving a larger mass of air at a lower velocity”.

For the first one, I’ll agree with the CN tag- there’s a lot of info in that statement (more than just the technical aspect- it also discusses the Navy’s motivations), all of which should probably come from a verifiable source.

For the second one, it probably wouldn’t be too hard to find an aeronautics textbook or webpage to verify this statement. I’m trying to figure out through if this statement could be re-written to connect it with the rest of the paragraph (while still being verifiable)- right now, it just kinda seems like it was put on as an afterthought.

Skyraider1 (talk) 15:27, 26 August 2012 (UTC)

"Based on" F-8 Crusader

From what I've heard and from looking over drawings of the basic airframe and dimensions, the A-7 was only "based on" the F-8 the way that a Super Hornet is "based on" the original Hornet...which is to say, they have a similar overall appearance, structure, and aerodynamics, but there are few if any parts that are actually shared between the two aircraft. I know it's a matter of opinion, but I always felt "based on" should only be used for designs that actually share common components, and for something like this "derived from" is more accurate. Whatever the wording, it would be nice to see some mention of this in the article, if it is in fact true.

I also have to wonder whether the detail about the crewmen from the A-6 that was shot down is really relevant to this article. So an A-7 was shot down. And an A-6. Do we need to know about the crewmen of the A-6 and what their names were and the degree of their injury as well? That seems like it belongs on the article on the A-6, if it belongs anywhere..45Colt 12:14, 10 April 2014 (UTC)

Quote 'Whatever the wording, it would be nice to see some mention of this in the article, if it is in fact true'. I'm just reading Bill Gunston's "Attack aircraft of the West" where he says on p235"..hardly a split-pin common to the two designs, and even the superficial similarity tends to vanish under detailed scrutiny..". He also says "Vought had studied the possibility of turning the F-8 into a subsonic attack aircraft" so I guess it was derived from the F-8. I think "derived from" and "based on" by themselves are too woolly to read too much into their meaning.Pieter1963 (talk) 01:18, 15 May 2014 (UTC)

Split Aircraft on Display Section

I concur that the list should be split onto another page (usually when it reaches 100 examples). I am still adding examples and this will just make the page even larger.Redjacket3827 (talk) 20:18, 15 July 2015 (UTC)

Splitting just seems like a good idea for this. It does not have to be done today, but should be done before long. -Fnlayson (talk) 20:22, 15 July 2015 (UTC)

No, it wasn't - HUD, etc

"It was one of the first combat aircraft to feature a head-up display"

The EE Lightning had a true HUD in 1959. It was called AIRPASS. Maury Markowitz (talk) 00:35, 1 September 2015 (UTC)

It says "one of the first", not "the first" - I don't see the problem here. - BilCat (talk) 00:50, 1 September 2015 (UTC)

I don't think it was either. The UK had working HUDs with radar cue, range, horizon line and altitude combined into the gyro gunsight in 1942. These were in production in the AI.17 and AI.18 of the early 1950s. Similar systems were in use on US planes at the same time, notably the MG-10 used in the F-102 among others, which allowed you to fire off the optical or radar screens (but unlike the UK examples, were not combined). AIRPASS of 1959 was far more advanced, including all the features you would see in something in the F-16 (perhaps not AoA, I don't know) including a clever display that indicated the direction for the aircraft to fly to bring it into weapons firing parameters as rapidly as possible. I don't think the A-7 was even remotely close to first, and including the language "one of the first" is simply and completely misleading. Maury Markowitz (talk) 19:20, 1 September 2015 (UTC)

Actually all you need is on the Wiki's own article on the HUD. The Buccaneer pre-dates the AIRPASS, which is interesting because it used a derivative of the AIRPASS radar. So that means there were at least two aircraft in service with HUDs of an advanced design at least seven years before the A-7 even flew. Further, this article's body does not actually claim it was one of the first, but specifically the first US aircraft. That's a very different statement. And only a few characters later, we see that it was built by Elliott, and was thus a version of the AIRPASS. I am adjusting the lede accordingly. Maury Markowitz (talk) 19:36, 1 September 2015 (UTC)

• The Lead text actually lists 3 things in the relevant sentence, not just the HUD part. -Fnlayson (talk) 19:39, 1 September 2015 (UTC)

And all three are wrong. The HUD came from the Lightning which used it almost a decade earlier, the INS was first used circa 1961 on the F-104 (and others on other airframes through that period), and the engine flew three years earlier on the F-111. Maury Markowitz (talk) 19:44, 1 September 2015 (UTC)

• OK, but the text said it was among the first aircraft to feature all three together. Looks like you are dissecting the parts and/or over analyzing this. Whatever... -Fnlayson (talk) 19:49, 1 September 2015 (UTC)

I'm not sure replacing unsourced claims with other unsourced claims is the way to go. Toss the whole thing out, and find something reliably sourced before readding. - BilCat (talk)

I'm happy with that. Done. Maury Markowitz (talk) 20:00, 1 September 2015 (UTC)

I was sure you would be. :) Btw, I see nothing in the Lightning article about it being the first aircraft with a HUD, but the claim probably depends on how one defines HUD. - BilCat (talk) 20:07, 1 September 2015 (UTC)

Museums?

Where can I find an A-7 in a museum? I live in the US South and visit military museums fairly often, but have never seen an A-7 in one. Since I conducted an airstrike with one (my first one), I have a soft spot for one and would like to see one again. CsikosLo (talk) 13:58, 19 July 2017 (UTC)

Smaller?

This article makes the following curiously worded claim: "Its airframe design is somewhat a smaller version of the supersonic Vought F-8 Crusader." - watching to much Star Wars the writer has been perhaps. As the A-7 has a greater wingspan and is taller (according to wiki information), one presumably can't make the claim it is a smaller version of the F-8 based only on its shorter overall length (which could just be because it is using a shorter, non-a/b turbofan vs. an a/b turbojet engine, plus being designed for subsonic flight it didn't require the higher fineness ratio of the F-8). Also, the A-7 was heavier and carried a much greater payload, so can't be claimed to be smaller in that regard either. The two aircraft look a little similar, but to say that one is a scaled down version of the other is silly. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 192.158.48.162 (talk) 14:12, 18 October 2018 (UTC)

It is not a "fighter".

How can the A-7 "have the lowest loss rate of any fighter" when it's not a fighter? Fighters are F series. This is an A-7, Attack. It's a single seat bomber and ground attack aircraft, not designed for air combat, like the A-1, A-3, A-4, A-6. Just because it looks "fightery" like an F-8 doesn't make it a fighter (technically an F-105 isn't much of a fighter either, but I won't argue with their designation, even though not many people still pretend the F-117 is a fighter). Also could use more data on ord loadings. Saying "it can carry 20,000lbs, but only with greatly reduced internal fuel" is true but not very helpful. According to the book I have here, it can carry 20,000lbs theoretical (which I think means "can carry 20,000lbs, but only if you only put a tiny bit of fuel in the tanks), 15,000lbs practically with a reduced but technically useful internal fuel load, and the typical combat load is 6,000lbs with full fuel. - 64.223.106.35 (talk) 08:10, 27 January 2021 (UTC)

The designation is one thing; what the USAF calls it is another. Fighter jocks want nothing to do with "attack aircraft", so the USAF calls them all fighters (and nowadays doesn't touch the A- designation with a ten-foot pole. A strong case can be made that the F-35A is the A-7 replacement). - The Bushranger _{One ping only} 08:22, 27 January 2021 (UTC)

Just because the USAF calls it a "fighter" for political reasons (but for some reason still classifies it as an A series jet) doesn't mean that it IS a fighter. Do you have any sources showing that it was official USAF policy to refer to all single-seat jets as "fighters" in spite of what they are officially designated? And this doesn't apply to the Navy, only USAF pilots are sensitive enough to need the ego boost of being able to call their jet a "fighter", while Navy pilots are satisfied either way? And because the Navy stuck an "A" before the name, the USAF was stuck with the A designation, but always wrote "fighter" when talking about so as not to offend their pilots? It just doesn't make any sense. The F-105 can be called a fighter because it does Mach 2+ and can carry air-to-air missiles. It has and afterburner. An A-7 is a strictly subsonic, non-afterburning high-efficiency turbofan engine, ground-avoidance radar without any air combat capability that I've ever seen mentioned. It is able to carry Sidewinders, that's the only possible claim towards calling it a "fighter", but so can the AH-64 Apache, for the same purpose: self defense. Just being a single seat jst doesn't make it a fighter, even if the US likes to call it that. Which I haven't seen any proof for. 64.223.106.35 (talk) 04:11, 28 January 2021 (UTC)

Please remember that talk pages are not forums for discussing the subject itself, but for making changes or improvements to the article. But yes, the USAF does have a long history of calling anything with 1 or 2 seats a "fighter": Even in 1947/48, at its inception, the Air Force dumped the "A" designation long used by the USAAC/USAAF, and redesignated the A-24 Banshee as the "F-24"! The USAF Fighter designation has included day fighters, night fighters, fighter-bombers, strike fighters, interceptors, and even (temporarily) a couple of missiles! Wikipedia reports what is found in reliable published sources. So if a source compares the A-7's losses to fighters during the Vietnam War (assuming that wording is in the source), it's not our job to parse the text to the inth degree. That said, we can probably state "fighter-type aircraft" and not be stretching the source too much. BilCat (talk) 04:31, 28 January 2021 (UTC)

The A-7 was a capable fighter aircraft; were slowly passed to the Air National Guard where they were seen as capable and dependable fighters; used the A-7’s capabilities to define mission success through the air-defense role. Tinker Air Force Base official history page. - The Bushranger _{One ping only} 04:35, 28 January 2021 (UTC)