There is no practical use for supercruise in combat. Supercruise is affected by aerodynamics and thrust to weight ratio, with the emphasis on the former.
Lol,supercruise has no practical use?Now u have shown ur true mettle as a noob.
''Supersonic cruise or supercruise is a term which refers to the ability of a combat aircraft to sustain supersonic flight without using afterburning thrust.
Combat aircraft have had supersonic capability since the 1950s, exploiting afterburners to effectively multiply available thrust and thus overcome the drag rise characteristic of transonic and supersonic flight, as well as improving climb, turn and acceleration performance. The additional thrust advantage of the afterburner comes at a prohibitive price - fuel burn is multiplied severalfold as fuel is injected into the tailpipe and combusted. A byproduct of afterburner use is a dramatic increase in the aircraft's heat signature, the engine plumes becoming effectively an infrared beacon which can be detected and tracked from dozens of miles away.
In practical terms conventional gas turbine engines afford only a transient supersonic capability, one which must be used very carefully as it can expend thousands of pounds of fuel in minutes, and advertise the fighter's presence and energy state from tactically very useful distances.
Having the ability to sustain supersonic speeds without these drawbacks affords numerous advantages in combat. The first of these is that entering an engagement the supersonic fighter has a reserve of kinetic energy which a subsonic opponent does not have. As a result the supersonic fighter can often dictate the terms of the engagement.
More importantly, sustained supersonic speed presents genuine problems in engagement kinematics for an opposing conventional fighter. Even in Beyond Visual Range (BVR) combat, air to air missiles have kinematic limitations. To effect a kill a fighter must position itself so the target falls into a 'no escape zone' for the missile type being used. Unless this precondition is met, the missile will likely run out of energy and be unable to engage the target.
In classical intercept geometries, fighters are typically vectored into a head to head closing geometry upon which the player with the earliest firing opportunity, whether afforded by longer radar/missile range, or supporting networking capability, has the advantage. Where both fighters have matched conventional kinematic capabilities, the game well and truly revolves around incremental advantages in missile capability, or situational awareness, provided by onboard or offboard sensors.
This delicate balance, and the advantages yielded by incremental imbalances in missile and sensor technology, will collapse once one of the fighters has the capacity to sustain supersonic speeds. As a result, even modest heading changes by the supersonic fighter, when positioning for the engagement, will force the conventional fighter to go into afterburner early, and typically will create enough separation to ruin the conventional fighter's missile shot geometry. In effect, conventional fighters flying against fighters with sustained supersonic capability usually do not get good opportunities for BVR missile shots. Only a very significant advantage in the kinematic performance of the missiles carried by conventional fighters can offset the advantages held by the player with sustained supersonic capability.
The reality is that the situational awareness advantages afforded by modern ISR and networking capabilities only work where the fighters using them have kinematic parity with their opponents. Once the opposing fighter has a significant kinematic advantage, the tables may well be turned. Given that most modern fighter fleet operators have AEW&C capabilities, or are acquiring AEW&C capabilities, the line of argument which presents AEW&C and networking as an air combat panacea is little more than nonsense. driving the capability contest yet again into other areas - and supersonic cruise will be the next arena in the global competition for air superiority.
Achieving genuine supersonic cruise capability hinges on two technological prerequisites. The first is having a powerplant which develops enough dry thrust at altitude to offset supersonic airframe drag. The second is having an airframe design built for low supersonic drag. Unless both conditions are met, supersonic cruise capability is not achievable.
The airframe issues dictate a wing design typically with 45 degrees or more of leading edge sweep, and suitable fuselage area ruling. Moreover, weapons must be carried internally or in a semi-conformal or conformal arrangment, to avoid a supersonic drag penalty. Pylon mounted missiles are not the preferred strategy. To date, airframe aerodynamics have not been the obstacle in the supercruise game. Engine capabilities have remained the principal obstacle.
A turbofan engine designed for supersonic cruise will be characterised by a much higher turbine inlet temperature than contemporary 'conventional' fighter engines. It is this operating cycle which permits the engine to sustain higher dry thrust ratings at high altitudes. This has also proven to be the primary obstacle to date in building supercruise engines, as it requires advanced materials and advanced turbine cooling techniques.
The first service to recognise the importance of supercruise was the US Air Force, which incorporated supercruise into the early requirements definition of the Advanced Tactical Fighter (ATF) program, which eventually coalesced into today's F/A-22A Raptor. An extensive and expensive engine technology research and development effort led to the design of the Pratt and Whitney F119-PW-100 engine which powers the F-22A. Delivering around 35,000 lbf of afterburning thrust, the F119-PW-100 is the most powerful fighter engine manufactured in the Western world. The simplest qualitative measure of the F119-PW-100's performance is that this engine has a dry thrust performance envelope matching the afterburning thrust envelope of the F100-PW-100 series engines fitted to the F-15C/E and many F-16 variants.
As a result the F-22A is the only production fighter in existence with a genuine supersonic cruise capability and the enormous kinematic advantages this affords in combat. This analyst had the opportunity to discuss the practical aspects of supercruise capability with one of the F-22A test pilots some years ago. Not only were chase fighters unable to keep up, but in mock intercepts flown by F-16Cs and F-15Cs against development F-22A airframes, even modest 20 degree heading changes caused the teen series fighters to abort their intercepts, having burned their fuel down to bingo levels.''
Supercruise is great advantage for stealth aircraft as it preserves its stealth signature longer without having to switch on afterburner.
