Are you really that shortsighted? Do you really believe that radar detection is contingent upon only one part of a body? Is it possible that depending on certain factors of a body, such as shape and materical, specular reflections, aka direct reflections, can have the same signal strength as diffracted signal? Yes it is possible...The F-22 is sparing on RAM and most absorbers are on leading edges. That mean if taken as a standalone object, the specular reflection off the leading edge, as affected by absorber, will have the same or very similar signal strength as the diffracted field from the wing's trailing edge. If the entire wing's surface is coated with absorbers, then of course the diffracted field strength will be less than specular signal strength due to wave's energy loss as it traverse the wing.
That said...On a complex body, like an aircraft, all scattering points are
CONTRIBUTORY elements towards the final total RCS, and we are not talking about just the geometric cross section, which is the surface area that is facing the transmitting radar. A scattering point could be from direct reflection
OR from a diffraction field. If we confine the discussion to a geometric RCS, then one scattering point that exist in one aspect angle may not exist in another aspect angle. But no matter what, the signal magnitude of a diffraction field is still a
CONTRIBUTOR to the body's total RCS. Not only that...On the same complex body, a diffraction signal could create a direct reflection signal. How? When the canard is in front of the wing, the canard's trailing edge create a diffraction field, which then impact the wing's leading edge. Is the wing on a different horizontal plane than the canard? Most likely. That mean part of the diffraction signal and the radar's signal may merge. Part of the diffraction signal may impact an area of the wing, leading edge or elsewhere, that is not impacted by the radar's transmission at all. So what we have here is a good possibility that the canard actually
ASSISTED the seeking radar in revealing target information.
So for you to demand that we focus only the signal strength differences between direct reflection and diffraction field is utterly absurd in your feeble attempt to salvage a failed argument that the JXX's canards cannot be a negative in RCS reduction.
No...It is
YOU who are wrong. As a surface wave travel, any disruption
IS an abrupt medium change and will create a diffraction field. The term 'knife edge diffraction' is appropriate and is well used to describe such an abrupt medium change. Yours is typical of someone who has no relevant experience in the subject under discussion and is willing to impose his own flawed understandings of terminologies related to the subject. In radar detection, a 'scattering point' is a general descriptor for any disturbances in a radar signal's path, be it in open air or when there is a traveling surface wave. A flat plate directly facing the transmitter is a scattering point. A diffraction field
IS a scattering point. A diffraction field
CREATE a scattering point. On a wing, there are two edge diffraction fields: leading and trailing. So for a wing, we have direct reflections from the top and bottom surfaces combined with the two diffraction fields to make the wing one large scattering point.
In the case of a wing, the diffraction field strength is affected by the angle of approach of the incident wave. If the incident wave is perpendicular to the surface, meaning directly facing it, then the diffraction field strength is statistically insignificant. But your argument, sections of which I grouped together for clarity, missed two points: that there are two surfaces that an incident wave can traverse, and that an airfoil is not a sphere where a creeping wave can exist. An airfoil is conducive to surface traveling waves, which do not lose energy as it traverse the wing's surface. A surface traveling wave is continuously supported, or kept alive, by the transmission power itself. So for an airfoil, if the incident wave has a low grazing angle, we will have two surface traveling waves and when they meet at the airfoil's trailing edge, they will merge and the diffraction field created will have some backscatter. In the case of an aircraft, a highly complex body, creeping waves can be statistically insignificant, on the other hand, if we take a look at the F-15 from its frontal profile, the cylindrical nose section can create creeping waves if the aircraft is being scanned from the side. Looks like I know what a 'creeping wave' is better than you do...
If there is a god of radar physics, he must be laughing his guts out when he read the nonsense about bi-static radar operation from you. Anyway...What the hell does this...'
inhomogeity of the medium'...mean? The 'medium' here is air, or rather relatively 'empty space'. A bi-static configuration exploits the greater forward scatter signals. So by your argument here...
the inhomogeity of the medium...whatever the hell that mean...make a bi-static configuration inefficient, then that would make the mono-static configuration completely worthless. And yet mono-static radars are prevalent. As I have pointed out before and will repeat, in theory, a bi-static configuration is low observable aircrafts' best detector precisely because of those forward scatter signals. So in trying to prove me wrong about canards, you just ended up calling bi-static radars worthless against 'stealth'. Am beginning to suspect that these are not your words but someone else's that you are trying to pass off as your own. There seems to be no technical consistency.
That is why bi-static radars are no panacea to 'stealth' despite what some chinese fanboys would like believe whenever they tried to downplay the F-22. This is not because bi-static sensor systems, like the Kolchuga or Silent Sentry, do not work but because a bi-static configuration is inherently structurally intensive, requiring physically distinct transmitter and receiver stations.
Meaningless drivel. The point I am making is that diffraction energy in a contributor to a body's total RCS. So far you have yet to show the readers a source that says otherwise.
Sandwich?
When a fighter launches a semi-active radar guided missile, we have an airborne bi-static configuration.
The parent aircraft illuminated the target, the missile is the receiver and its position is an offset from the parent's position, thereby creating a 'bi-static triangle'...
Bistatic radar noncooperative illumination synchronization techniques
When we have data link capability, the transmitter aircraft is one leg of that triangle, the target is another leg, and the receiver aircraft is the final leg. It does not matter if there is one or ten receiver aircrafts, for each receiver there is only one bi-static triangle. That mean we can have ten bi-static triangles from one transmitter. The receivers do not have to be directly opposite of the transmitter. Forward scatter does not mean literally straight forward but can be angular as the signal is deflected off the target. If anything, the ideal bi-static position is when the transmitter-target-receiver triangle is like below...
...But since airborne targets are in motion we know this is not possible. A bi-static configuration can exploit diffraction or deflection or both. So once again your ignorance and pretense is exposed.
More like made up 'facts' and 'truths'. But hey...Since when is a communist an honest person?
The JXX is supposedly equipped with canards. Naturally the question would be if canards are detrimental to its RCS reduction. I presented arguments and sources that say leading and trailing edges produces diffraction fields that are detrimental to RCS reduction.
RCS Pylons | Antenna Measurement Solutions
The product guide state...
Nowhere have I asserted with absolute certainty that canards are detrimental to RCS reduction, only that conventional technical wisdom from decades of laboratory and field experience showed that edge diffraction fields are detrimental to RCS reduction if the aircraft design does not take them into consideration. There is no shortage of those literature...
Marietta Scientific, Inc. - RCS Reduction Short Course
Got that? There are different types of traveling waves and that a leading edge does produce a diffraction field.
But here you are trying in vain to dismiss decades worth of technical experience and literature in trying to support the JXX. You are a fanboy of lies and deceit.