Testing and Proving the GBU-24 Laser-Guided Bomb from the U.S. Navy's F- 14 Aircraft

摘要

When the U.S. Navy identified the requirement to carry and employ the Texas Instruments-Raytheon GBU-24 Laser Guided Bomb (LGB) hard target penetrator from the F-14 aircraft, its weapons compatibility/certification engineers had to modify the weapons flight test process which had been in use for determination of aircraft and air-to-ground (A/G) weapons compatibility. That process consisted of beginning test at low Mach/Airspeed in straight and level flight, and continuing tests, at incrementally greater speeds, through the highest Mach/ airspeed and steepest flight path angles, with the acceptability of the weapon separation trajectory evaluated through film from aircraft-mounted cameras. The GBU-24, because of its large size and large deploying wing, had to be evaluated through an integrated test and evaluation process consisting of Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) analyses, wind tunnel testing, ground testing, flight testing and photogrammetric analyses, used interdependently, to determine the extent of aircraft/weapon compatibility. The test process ultimately led to the authorization for all F-14 variants to carry and employ two GBU-24's on fuselage carriage stations. In addition, the testing led to authorization for launching of an AIM-7 air-to-air missile from a fuselage carriage station which was behind the LGB A/G weapons.