A F-14 & F-111 engine question.

[KJakker 875]

I was wondering if anyone might know the answer to a couple of question that occurred to me.

 

Both the F-14 and the F-111 started life with the same Pratt & Whitney TF30 engines but to improve performance the F-14 was reequipped with the General Electric F110.

 

Could the F-111 have physically carried/mounted the F110 engines?

 

If so, was the F-111 ever considered for the same upgrade that the F-14 received?

[MAKO69 186]

I don't think so. The F-14 a fleet interceptor/defender was designed to be able to dog fight. The TF 30's didn't like being throttled about, which is needed in ACM. F-111 would have taken off flown to its destination drop its stuff then fly back, hopefully with no enemy aircraft meeting them on the way there or back.

[Caesar 305]

The F-111's TF-30's were updated several times, to include increased thrust (the P-9 was one initial improvement and P-100 was another from later).  The thing is, the F-111 didn't need an engine like the F-14 did - different jets in different roles.  The F-111 was a Strike platform, the Tomcat was a Maritime Air Superiority Fighter and had to be able to jump into the dogfighting arena and turn and burn with enemy fighters.  The TF-30 did not help them.  Stable enough at full afterburner or full military power, trying to change throttle settings at high alpha and slow speed, where a dogfight can easily end up, didn't always turn out too well (one Tomcat driver explained "you could move the jet, or the throttles, just not both at the same time.")  The F110, apart from adding a good amount of thrust, more importantly added great reliability.  The F-111 didn't have those requirements.

[thodouras95 25]

I don't think it was ever considered for the F-111 since IIRC, that engine was intended for the F-111 since day 1.It was an engine exactly for that type of plane, so I take it an upgrade wasn't necessary.

[KJakker 875]

Thanks for the info everyone.

[turkeydriver 4]

Yes the TF-30 in the F-111 in its final form produced more thrust than in the F-14 did it not? The TF-30 makes more thrust at mach.9 at sea level(at least in the F-14) than the F-110. As the F-111 was a low level TFR strike platform, this engine was well suited to the role. In thinking of the F-14 as a high speed, long range, high altitude, bomber interceptor-the TF-30 actually makes more thrust at high speed 9 above mach 1.7? IIRC, and high altitudes, than the F-110. So if the 1960s and 70s mindset of aerial warfare actually happened (nuclear bombers and mach2 interceptors), the TF-30 would have been adequate. Vietnam showed that visual range aerial combat was more of a rule than the exception though, so the F-14 needed the F-110. The F-110 may have been able to get better speed at high altitude if the intake ramps on the F-14 were scheduled for Mach2+ flight in the F-14B/D. AFAIK, there wasn't a lot of time spent, if any testing F110 motored tomcats above Mach 2.

Edited January 6, 2014 by turkeydriver

[Derk 265]

Hm, I DID see a fighter like demo by an F-111E (but only once) and it was flown with a lot of AB which- reading the comments- probably wouldn't have been a problem . Impressive flying just the same and at relatively low weight a surprising agility..... 

Edited January 4, 2014 by Derk

[cheapshot 0]

Both the US and Aussie Air Forces considered upgrading the F-111 to use the GE F110 engine.  For the US it was a no brainer option, but the big budget axe that came after the wall fell ensured that no F-111 got the time of day for just about any upgrade, since they were planned to be phased out by the technologically superior, but far inferior airframe of the F-15E anyways.  

 

http://www.secretprojects.co.uk/forum/index.php?topic=803.0

 

The Australians also considered some vast improvements to the 'Vark fleet as they also knew the F-111 airframe was far superior to any other new build "long range" strike platforms, but would have required such massive structural overhauls to the airframe to lengthen their service life, that they might as well have been rebuilds.  A real shame, since new builds would have solved that issue, but the production tooling was loooong gone by then.

 

http://www.ausairpower.net/TE-F-111-Upgrades-1998.html

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