PAF is happy with the avioncs ,weapons, dog fighting ability/angle of attack due to lerx in prototype04
I've read that generally wing loading higher/lower matters for specialized ground/air attack fighters ---- in a multirole fighter,wing loading has to be carefully selected based on the role employed by the consumer/designer i.e paf
PAF has not officially disclosed the wing loading but did disclose the landing and take off distances in dubai airshow, this might help the experts to reach conclusions on wing loading
@
gambit
I am no expert
regarding delta fighters like m2k I've read that they have higher drag so need a more powerful engine
Look at the carrier launches. You have a combination of engine thrust and external assist in the form of the catapult. Also look at jet/rocket assisted take-off for prop jobbers like the C-130. For catapult and rocket assisted launches, the takeoff distances dramatically decreases with the increase in combined thrust. The point here is that if you have powerful enough of engine(s), you can make a brick wall fly face on at Mach. But since propulsion is limited, we have to contend with matters such as wing loading
IN RELATIONS TO THRUST and how to combine thrust with wing area and with leading edge extensions to give us lift with smaller wing area to make it easier to attain Mach.
When we are talking about a design intended for unpredictable rapid attitude changes, aka maneuvers, called a 'fighter', then these combinations are even more critical if we are to meet customer demands. Wing area is relatively minor in acceleration, so we have something like the F-104 with its tubular fuselage and barely enough wing area for takeoffs and landings. If the customer demands maneuverability, then wing area in relations to weight, aka 'wing loading', becomes more relevant, so we must have a larger wing area. But then if the customer want Mach and as high as possible, then we have to look at alternate
LOCATIONS on the design where we exploit for lift so we can minimize the increase in wing area.
Loaded weight divided by wing area equals the 'wing loading' figure.
For the example above, if wing loading is calculated differently
FOR THE SAME DESIGN, we will have a misleading figure.
Between two aircrafts, the one with the higher figure is good for speed but not so good for maneuverability. Conversely, the one with the lower figure is good for maneuverability but not so good for speed. But this assume that we confine lift, or rather the source of our lift, comes solely from the wing. Blended body-wing design is an additional source of lift. That is 'additional', not in lieu of. The leading edge root extension and canard are additional sources. Today, the blended body-wing design with leading edge root extension is pretty much a necessity, F-15 and F-16 for examples, as the highly tubular and high wing loading F-104 design is discarded.
What this mean is that for the small 'fighter' class, we can no longer look at wing area and opine that A is more maneuverable than B. If A and B are of the modern blended body-wing design, comparison gets muddled because of the fuselages' contributorship to lift.
TO/L distances can hint but as the extreme catapult and rocket assisted examples showed, propulsion can blur the revised opinion that took into account the blended body-wing design. Actually, landing distance is the better hint because landing distance is directly affected by approach speed, which is usually just the minimum to maintain airborne condition. If both are of blended body-wing designs but one have a higher approach speed than the other, we can reasonably assume that one blended body-wing design have a higher overall loading than the other. But this should not be construed as the one with the higher overall loading is inferior in maneuverability because landing speed is at minimum throttle. In full flight and in BFM, if the design with the higher overall loading have the superior engine, it will have equal or even superior maneuvering capability as its competitor because the full capability of the engine(s) will be used.
Confused yet...??? Now take into account thrust vectoring where attitude changes can be done with no or minimal aerodynamic exploitation.
