From contract start in January to initial operational capability with two squadrons in 2009, development of the EA-18G electronic-attack (EA) variant of the Super Hornet is on an aggressive schedule. The US Navy is anxious to replace its Northrop GrummanEA-6B Prowlers, and the EA-18G's commonality with the two-seat F/A-18F is key to meeting the deadline.
"The F/A-18F platform is well known, and the G is very common with the F," says Bob Feldman,EA-18G programme manager. "The only difference is mission equipment. Even the structural modifications are common." To make room for antenna wiring on the G, for example, a tunnel was added under the centre fuel tank. This is now common to the F, he says, as is a structure to mount antennas on the G.
"The F and the G are truly common aircraft that will come off a common line," says Feldman. In fact, two F/A-18Fs will be taken off the line and modified into EA-18G test aircraft, the first entering lay-up in May next year and flying as a G in August 2006. Operational evaluation will begin two years later. Ninety of the planned 550 US Navy Super Hornets will beEA-18Gs.
Six months into the $979 million system development and demonstration programme, Boeing says it is under cost, under weight and ahead of schedule. Weight is 100kg (220lb) under budget and the G is meeting all of its key performance parameters, says Feldman. Empty weight is 815kg higher than the F and, while maximum take-off weight is unchanged, carrier landing gross weight is increased by 1,360kg by the need to bring back jamming pods, as well as unexpended weapons.
Equipped with a repackaged version of the Prowler's latest Increased Capability (ICAP) III selective-reactive jamming system, the EA-18G initially will have a similar capability to the EA-6B. "We are on a fast track: the navy said give us EA-6B capability in an EA-18," says Feldman. "Everything the EA-6 can carry, the EA-18 can carry; and for every loadout configuration on the EA-6, the G can also carry two [anti-radiation AGM-88] HARMs and two [air-to-air AIM-120] AMRAAMs."
Northrop Grumman is developing the EA subsystem, comprising the ALQ-218(V)2 ICAP III sensor; the electronic attack unit, or EA "mission computer"; USQ-113 communications countermeasures system; and up to five ALQ-99 jamming pods, taken from the EA-6B. Mounted in the nose, with antennas in wingtip pods, the repackaged (V)2 suite has a digital measurement receiver "with a big increase in sensitivity, to pick threats out", says Feldman.
After extensive simulator evaluations using Prowler crews, "the navy has declared the two-man EA-18G is able to do the mission of the four-crew EA-6B", says Feldman. "The ECMO [electronic countermeasures officer] in the rear seat has left and right hand controllers and the pilot now participates in EA mission execution. We have half a pilot and one-and-a-half ECMOs in the EA-18G versus one pilot and three ECMOs in the EA-6B."
GRAHAM WARWICK / WASHINGTON DC
Source: Flight International
