F-40 Phoenix

The AMIndustries F-40 "Phoenix" is a mid-sized supersonic multirole aircraft in service with the Asgarnian Air Force. The F-40 replaced the F-19 Turmoil fighter in mid 2007 after major design flaws were noticed within the F-19 fleet.

The aircraft is made by AMIndustries Aerospace (AMInAe) and the design is licensed to the Asgarnian Air Force only.

Design and Development

The Phoenix is designed for performance, flexibility, effectiveness and survivability in air combat.

Flying properties and performance are optimised for fighter missions with high demands on speed, acceleration and turning performance. The combination of delta wing and canards gives the Phoenix good take-off and landing performance and flying characteristics. The totally integrated avionics make it a "programmable" aircraft. The Phoenix also has a built in electronic warfare unit making it possible to load more ordnance onto the aircraft without losing self defence capabilities.

The Phoenix affords far more flexibility than earlier generations of combat aircraft, and its operating costs are about two thirds of those for F-19 Turmoil.

The specifications for the Phoenix required the ability to operate from 800 m runways. Early on in the programme, all flights from AMInAe's facility in Balkan City were flown from within a 10 m × 800 m outline painted on the runway. Stopping distance was reduced by extending the relatively large air brakes; using the control surfaces to push the aircraft down enabling the wheel brakes to apply more force and tilting the canards forwards, making them into large air brakes and further pushing the aircraft down.

One interesting feature is the Phoenix's ability to land on public highways. Once on the ground, it can be refuelled and re-armed in ten minutes by a five man mobile ground crew operating out of a truck, then take off again and resume flying sorties. This gives its users a remarkable level of flexibility in deployment and resupply.

In designing the aircraft, several layouts were studied. AMInAe ultimately selected an unstable canard design to give the greatest benefits to performance. The canard configuration gives a high onset of pitch rate and low drag enabling the aircraft to be faster, have longer range and carry a larger payload.

Variants

FX-40

Experimental version used as a testbed for further variants.

F-40A

Attack-specialized variant with more external hardpoints to increase payload

F-40B

Bombing-specialized variant with more tri-mount external hardpoints to carry more than 12 500-pound bombs.

F-40C

Two-seat training variant with no armament or hardpoints.

F-40D

Standard service variant optimized for all roles, including ECM.

Users

Asgarnieu

Asgarnian Air Force: 7,500 F-40's in service.

Specifications

• Crew: 1-2
• Length: 14.1 meters (46' 3")
• Wingspan: 8.4 meters (27' 7")
• Height: 4.5 meters (14' 9")
• Wing area: 25.54 meters (274.9')
• Empty weight: 6,620 kilograms (14,600 lbs)
• Loaded weight: 8,720 kilograms (19,200 lbs)
• Max takeoff weight: 14,000 kilograms (30,000 lbs)
• Powerplant: 1 David & David AFTF-1-DD afterburning turbofan, 54 kN dry (12,000 lbf), 80 kN afterburner (18,100 lbf)

• Maximum speed: Mach 2
• Range: Combat radius 800 kilometers (500 mi, 430 nm)
• Service ceiling: 15,000 meters (50,000 ft)
• Rate of climb: Classified
• Wing loading: 341 kg/m² (703 lb/ft²)
• Thrust/weight: 0.94

• Armament:
  • 1 AMInAe 27mm cannon
  • 6 AAM-37
  • 4 BVRAAM
  • Various bombs, rockets, precision guided munitions
  • 4 Sitka AShM