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> They are a well-known nemesis of military planes, that fly faster and don't have redundancy to survive a hit. Wait, military aircraft have LESS redundancy to

> They are a well-known nemesis of military planes, that fly faster and don't have redundancy to survive a hit. Wait, military aircraft have LESS redundancy to survive "hits" than civil?

mynegation 1y ago
Civil aircraft usually have at least two engines and military - usually one.
- lazide 1y ago
  Haha, no. Most military aircraft have multiple engines.
  - topkai22 1y ago
    That might be technically true, but the F35 and F16 are both single engine aircraft and IIRC constitute the bulk of at least the US air force’s combat aircraft.
    - lazide 1y ago
      B2, F117, B52, P9, F22, F14, F18, C130, C17, C5, CH47, AH-64, SR71, U2, A10, and on and on just to give some recent examples. There are a few single engine aircraft roles (including the F104), but they are not and have never been the bulk of active serving aircraft. It isn’t just ‘technically’ true.
      - mango7283 1y ago
        Be that as it may, the workhorse combat aircraft of most NATO air forces and the USAF itself is the F-16, a single-engine fighter, and its nominal replacement, the F-35 is also single engine. You can try to make your point by comparing those vs the numbers of F-15s, F/A-18s, F-Fs, Rafales, Eurofighters and so on in service vs the F-16 and F-35, but bringing C130s and C17s into it is irrelevant, those are not "combat aircraft". edit: ah but they are "military aircraft", sure. fine.
        lazide 1y ago
        I think you mean ‘fighter jet’ which is a small set of ‘combat aircraft’ which is further a small set of ‘military aircraft’. And not all fighter jets are single engine. For example, the F22, F18, etc.
wkat4242 1y ago
Um yeah that's really surprising considering military planes are designed for situations where there are being shot at.
- B1FF_PSUVM 1y ago
  I'd guess they mostly try to "move fast and don't get broken" ...
- MindSpunk 1y ago
  They're designed around not getting hit at all, rather than being able to take hits. Stealth, stand-off weapons, sensor fusion and information displays all so the plane never gets put in a position to be hit. That's not to say they don't defend in depth, one reason twin engine fighters are desired is because of engine redundancy after all, but a more "armored" plain is a slower, bulkier, easier to detect and easier to hit target. And you'll still likely get taken down in one hit. And there's still not a lot you can do if your engine swallows a bird or two, especially if you only have one. The military also has the expectation that not everyone is going to come home, unlike a civilian airliner where the safety margins are much wider.
marcosdumay 1y ago
AFAIK (what is not much on the military side), fighters are all optimized for performance, and not resilience. And fighters that work on improving the crew options focus on survivability instead of resilience because it tends to weight less. As a result, resilience isn't great. Bombers and logistic planes have redundancy.
- lazide 1y ago
  F22. F14. F18.
  - usefulcat 1y ago
    I heard that the Navy (historically, at least--don't know about today) placed a greater value than the Air Force on engine redundancy. Hence why we have both the twin engine F-18 (Navy) and the single engine F-16 (Air Force), even though functionally there's a lot of overlap between the two.
    - lazide 1y ago
      Sure, but then you also have the F22, F117, B2, A10, SR71, U2, and a bunch more I can’t think of right now. Some helicopters have a single engine. Most have 2. They are still unreliable death machines, and arguably 2 engines makes the problem a bit worse (more moving parts). They are (sometimes) more tolerant of a single engine out, of course. But transmissions are often the weak spot with helicopters. Single vs Dual has many factors, not just reliability. A single engine failure on a SR71 (if I remember correctly) resulted in a airframe loss and ejection at relatively low speeds, and one at full speed would likely result in a complete crew loss on top of it - and it has dual engines. Think catastrophic near instant destruction. Sometimes you just need more power than a single engine (with current tech) can provide in the space you have available, for instance. Sometimes, like an A10, you really do want something that can take a massive beating and keep going. A B52 can lose 2 engines with no issues, and theoretically up to 4 and still be controllable (depending on the distribution of the lost engines). But that isn’t because it needs reliability, but because it’s got 8 engines because it was designed to carry a metric shit ton of explosives, and it only had 60’s era tech jet engines. Modern jets usually use 2 (much more powerful) engines for similar or even larger payloads.
potato3732842 1y ago
>Wait, military aircraft have LESS redundancy to survive "hits" than civil? How many single engine civilian jets are there?
- lazide 1y ago
  If we’re talking General Aviation, lot more than single engined military planes that is for sure!
- inferiorhuman 1y ago
  Plenty. They're far simpler to fly than multi-engine planes, but they don't have the redundancy or power needed for e.g. airliner purposes. For example FedEx operates a fleet of over 200 single engine turboprops (Cessna 208). Pilatus built about 2,000 PC-12s in the 35 years since it was introduced.
hollerith 1y ago
The small ones have less, yes. In compensation, they have ejection seats.

> They are a well-known nemesis of military planes, that fly faster and don't have redundancy to survive a hit. Wait, military aircraft have LESS redundancy to survive "hits" than civil?

mynegation 1y ago

Civil aircraft usually have at least two engines and military - usually one.

lazide 1y ago
Haha, no. Most military aircraft have multiple engines.
- topkai22 1y ago
  That might be technically true, but the F35 and F16 are both single engine aircraft and IIRC constitute the bulk of at least the US air force’s combat aircraft.
  - lazide 1y ago
    B2, F117, B52, P9, F22, F14, F18, C130, C17, C5, CH47, AH-64, SR71, U2, A10, and on and on just to give some recent examples. There are a few single engine aircraft roles (including the F104), but they are not and have never been the bulk of active serving aircraft. It isn’t just ‘technically’ true.
    - mango7283 1y ago
      Be that as it may, the workhorse combat aircraft of most NATO air forces and the USAF itself is the F-16, a single-engine fighter, and its nominal replacement, the F-35 is also single engine. You can try to make your point by comparing those vs the numbers of F-15s, F/A-18s, F-Fs, Rafales, Eurofighters and so on in service vs the F-16 and F-35, but bringing C130s and C17s into it is irrelevant, those are not "combat aircraft". edit: ah but they are "military aircraft", sure. fine.
      - lazide 1y ago
        I think you mean ‘fighter jet’ which is a small set of ‘combat aircraft’ which is further a small set of ‘military aircraft’. And not all fighter jets are single engine. For example, the F22, F18, etc.

wkat4242 1y ago

Um yeah that's really surprising considering military planes are designed for situations where there are being shot at.

B1FF_PSUVM 1y ago
I'd guess they mostly try to "move fast and don't get broken" ...
MindSpunk 1y ago
They're designed around not getting hit at all, rather than being able to take hits. Stealth, stand-off weapons, sensor fusion and information displays all so the plane never gets put in a position to be hit. That's not to say they don't defend in depth, one reason twin engine fighters are desired is because of engine redundancy after all, but a more "armored" plain is a slower, bulkier, easier to detect and easier to hit target. And you'll still likely get taken down in one hit. And there's still not a lot you can do if your engine swallows a bird or two, especially if you only have one. The military also has the expectation that not everyone is going to come home, unlike a civilian airliner where the safety margins are much wider.

marcosdumay 1y ago

AFAIK (what is not much on the military side), fighters are all optimized for performance, and not resilience. And fighters that work on improving the crew options focus on survivability instead of resilience because it tends to weight less. As a result, resilience isn't great. Bombers and logistic planes have redundancy.

lazide 1y ago
F22. F14. F18.
- usefulcat 1y ago
  I heard that the Navy (historically, at least--don't know about today) placed a greater value than the Air Force on engine redundancy. Hence why we have both the twin engine F-18 (Navy) and the single engine F-16 (Air Force), even though functionally there's a lot of overlap between the two.
  - lazide 1y ago
    Sure, but then you also have the F22, F117, B2, A10, SR71, U2, and a bunch more I can’t think of right now. Some helicopters have a single engine. Most have 2. They are still unreliable death machines, and arguably 2 engines makes the problem a bit worse (more moving parts). They are (sometimes) more tolerant of a single engine out, of course. But transmissions are often the weak spot with helicopters. Single vs Dual has many factors, not just reliability. A single engine failure on a SR71 (if I remember correctly) resulted in a airframe loss and ejection at relatively low speeds, and one at full speed would likely result in a complete crew loss on top of it - and it has dual engines. Think catastrophic near instant destruction. Sometimes you just need more power than a single engine (with current tech) can provide in the space you have available, for instance. Sometimes, like an A10, you really do want something that can take a massive beating and keep going. A B52 can lose 2 engines with no issues, and theoretically up to 4 and still be controllable (depending on the distribution of the lost engines). But that isn’t because it needs reliability, but because it’s got 8 engines because it was designed to carry a metric shit ton of explosives, and it only had 60’s era tech jet engines. Modern jets usually use 2 (much more powerful) engines for similar or even larger payloads.

potato3732842 1y ago

>Wait, military aircraft have LESS redundancy to survive "hits" than civil? How many single engine civilian jets are there?

lazide 1y ago
If we’re talking General Aviation, lot more than single engined military planes that is for sure!
inferiorhuman 1y ago
Plenty. They're far simpler to fly than multi-engine planes, but they don't have the redundancy or power needed for e.g. airliner purposes. For example FedEx operates a fleet of over 200 single engine turboprops (Cessna 208). Pilatus built about 2,000 PC-12s in the 35 years since it was introduced.

hollerith 1y ago

The small ones have less, yes. In compensation, they have ejection seats.