Yeah put that on a shirt and send it to that man and all the people who made that aircraft.

not really something to brag about, lol.

@@sankubanku1633 I think it is. He has fantastic stories and experiences. He did want he wanted to do in life and is proud of it. He went to work in weapons development. The end goal is just that.

@@RedShirt230 I agree he seems like a great guy and a good Management Engineer, and I was fascinated with his whole methodology when it came to the selection program. I just dont think the field that he is involved in (War/military) is something that brings about a positive influence on the world.

These planes don't launch creme puffs. They break things and kill people. Welcome to the real world.

Absolutely , i'm here to get the WHOLE story

You can see the amount of respect Mover gives him too; and also had a good rapport with him too. The result is this insane interview that’s such a great tidbit into aviation history. Love it.

I also love that he gives his guests the space and time to actually think and talk. He doesn't feel the need to interject every few minutes or whenever there's a pause with random questions and thoughts. In other words, ego = well grounded.

@@hammernnails7314 how do you know that mate? any proof or somethin might be a lil helpful

congrats sukhoi made your dream reality and improved what the 23 lacked 3d vectoring

​@@ywe3but it has a terrible rcs so its still not good lol

@terraoftime they sacrificed stealth for maneuverability...it's a valid trade off as the maintenance shouldn't be as high as a result...but we shall see the felon also seems to be more versatile than its American counterparts so it can be upgraded with new equipment much easier which makes sense as the design is 20 years more modern

@@ywe3 The Felon is Raptor meat

Looks mean nothing

More plz

You should see the F35 guest badges we give now really slick

@@toddie4usa1 Yeah.. friend of mine is testing the F-35C with VX-9, and he gave me a couple of swag items.. pretty slick stuff!

@@dougcronkhite2113 Too bad the F35 program itself is a complete and utter failure and has produced a subpar airplane. If only they had told the Marines to fuck off and build their own STOVL aircraft, and then kept the F35 program to an AF variant and a Navy variant we would have gotten a far superior airplane. The tech is cool and once the loyal wingman program catches up the F35 will make a pretty good C&C platform, but that's all because of the avionics and data sharing features and not so much because of the aircraft itself. They could've spent the trillions they did on the F35 program on a Raptor fleet and updated the avionics over time in Blocks like the F-16 and the Superhornet.

@@jaxastro3072 Except it isn't. It's actually (except the B model) a VERY capable airplane

@@dougcronkhite2113 Capable, sure. Is it the aircraft we should've gotten for the development costs? No. Ask any of the people who fly them and they'll say the same. Thing is capable and the computer systems are top notch, however it is not a trillion dollar fighter by any means. You could take the avionics and data sharing systems, put em on an F15 and you'd have just as capable of an airplane. Instead the DoD and the Airforce decide to waste trillions on a plane almost none of the original supporting countries are going to buy. Canada is waiting for a Sixth gen fighter, Britain only bought them because it is the only current aircraft capable of landing on their carriers. Australia is going with more Superhornets. There are so many issues with the F35 that cannot be fixed via software. It didn't get the nickname Fat Amy for nothing. Also when it comes to fuel and ordinance storage the F35 is severely lacking, and using exterior tanks or hardpoints defeats the purpose of the aircraft. So as a carrier-borne fighter its combat range compared to 4.5 gen fighters is going to be pitiful without mid air refueling, which in wartime is not always possible. The US built an Aircraft that they thought the world would buy, they tried making the aircraft into 3 separate planes (which has never worked before) and built it to fight a "near peer adversary". However in any serious war with an equal the F35 would struggle without its fleet of drones. It is a huge waste of money and they should've just went right to the F15EX program instead of wasting trillions on a subpar aircraft. They make excuses about its shortcomings saying that its range can be made up for by air to air refueling, its internal storage being supplemented by hardpoints and its stealth making up for its low thrust to weight ratio and poor performance. However in a fight against China A2A Refueling would be impossible inside a combat zone, hardpoints would eliminate stealth making the plane a sitting duck and stealth is not as effective as people are led to believe. The B2 has to fly very specific flight paths to keep the aircraft at the optimal position to deflect enemy radar, in a BVR fight that is not always possible, you give one wrong angle and you light up like a Christmas tree on enemy radar. Plus the better IRST gets the less effective stealth gets, and if it gets to a point where it full counters stealth the US will be left with an aircraft that cannot outperform, outshoot or outmaneuver enemy fighters, nor will it have any advantage in a BVR fight essentially making the F35 a shitty F16 that cost the taxpayer like 50+ times as much. Literally the only thing the F35 leads in is avionics, which could just be put into a different aircraft. Until the F35 can become a command and control platform for the loyal wingman program it will be a subpar aircraft that we didn't need

you are aware that in deployment F-22 was a disaster right? And then there was F-35...

@@BigSmartArmed The deployment of the F-22 was a disaster 1. because the cold war ended 2. congress got involved and slashed numbers causing the price per plane to rise. Simple economics, he just stacked up the airplanes on an engineering basis he did not say how many should be built or manage IOC.

Absolutely

Now I can't be sure, but I'd betcha a hundred bucks had they picked the YF-23, Lockheed woulda been sayin the same thing.

@@BagelSammich they'd be filing lawsuit after lawsuit, because they'd be grumpy that their lobby machine millions hadn't bought the correct people.

@@BagelSammich They may have, but the actual performance numbers that you can look up for yourself has the 23 nudging out the 22 in just about every way.

Everyone who worked with Northrop is going to say that. They were competitors. I'm sure anyone from Lockheed would say the exact same thing.

@@rustusandroid The F22 ended up surpassing those numbers in the end once it was produced. So who knows which plane would've ended up being better IRL. They both had difference strengths and weaknesses. Saying the yf 23 performed better in just about every way is also false. It had it's own problems just like the F22. Anyone acting like it is a simple choice, or that the yf-23 was objectively better is just blowing smoke up their own butt.

I literally shake my head every time I hear stories about the widow vs the raptor. Just the whole 🤦‍♂️ of course it came down to effing back room politics.

@@adarkwind4712 what doesn't come down to money and back room politics in the US government...

@@goawaybaizuo the interests and lives of the common people obviously! Wow I meant that as a joke and it still hurt to actually think about that.

@@adarkwind4712 Yea the whole thing was a shitshow. YF22 was picked because it would be better in a dog fight...F22 has never been in a dog fight. YF23 was a lot faster, had a lot more range, and was quite a bit stealthier.

Contrary to what the man said, there was more than one Chief Engineer on the 23. My father, Larry Nanney, was CE for McDonnell on the project. So I’m obviously prejudiced, but I’ve read everything I can find and it seems very clear that the 23 was more advanced. Some say the Gen 6 fighter Northrop is helping Japan build is essentially the 23. I dunno. But my dad was the avionics lead for MAC, and I believe that the overall avionics package was probably the most advanced ever built.

It's ugly as sin and it's performance was terrible it couldn't launch a missile from its weapon bay (the yf-22 could) and if it exceeded on speed of Mach 1.6 it's cockpit would start cracking

@@spartanx9293 You sir, are a Lockheed plant. Go to sleep.

I agree that the 23 is a beautiful design. However, beautiful doesn't usually translate to good. There are exceptions: P-51 and F-16...

@@st3wi3D a Lockheed plant how so just because I insulted an aircraft I believe looks ugly

I totally agree!

A lot of people would be saying that about the F-22 if the YF-23 won. 🤷🏻‍♂️

@@EstorilEm no

@@AS-zc8mr Whelp, some would as it’s human nature. I promise you if they had actually seen the cost differences, risk factor, maintenance costs, and maneuverability factors between the two, they’d appreciate the Raptor more.

@@EstorilEm No, I agree with RS here. The yf-23 represents a more unique concept in my eye than the yf-22 did. It's the shape and difference to past technology that makes it more intriguing than the yf-22. The yf-22 can seem like a reskinned f15. Now I know that isn't fair to the depth of technological advancement behind it from the 1970's eagle to the 1990's Raptor design. But, what else does the yf-23 look like? Thats why it's still my favourite.

You’re going off of its unique looks, but it’s the performance and capability that matters in the end, which is why the Raptor was picked. No matter how you skin it, they picked the airplane that would do the job they wanted best and that’s what we got

If they redesign the weapons bay, they might, too will have to redesign the plane.

It is ugly as sin

And the best choice in all reality void of politics.

@@natural-born_pilot you are aware it showed worse performance than the yf-22 correct in order to get it to work you would have to rework significant parts of its airframe which is expensive

@@spartanx9293 There are numerous factors, here. Performance is somewhat relative to the specific area of the flight envelope and the YF-23 was superior at the higher energy end of the envelope with lower overall drag and greater preservation of energy during ACM. Critically, it also had a lower overall RCS and IR signature. While you are correct in that the F-23 proper that was proposed was significantly different from the prototype - Northrop had zilch going on for fighter work and had its full attention on the program. The production model included elongated fuselage with a longer munitions bay as well as intake-mounted bays specifically for the AIM-9. The intake, proper, had a DSI installed as well. While hindsight is 20/20, nearly everything that could go wrong with the ATF role as conceived did. For starters - the role itself crumbled with the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact. The ATF was supposed to be the primary counter to an air offensive and ensure air superiority. That threat disappeared as did an obvious need for the aircraft and its role. The F-23 and its deeper munitions bay is critical, here. The F-22's shallow bay simply could not perform a strike mission. As it was the chosen airframe - the intervening years between the selection and beginning production was spent trying to justify purchase of the aircraft with development of weapons pylons and all manner of other contrivances that more or less tried to turn it into an F-15E. Which is easier... Turning the F-22 into an F-15E - or an F-23 into an FB-111/Tornado? Lockheed spent more than 10 years making revisions to the airframe and additions to the avionics suite to try and solve an identity crisis. When no one was buying the "invisible" F-15E - they started packing it with ELINT and AWCS suites to try and argue it could be a wing lead for normal F-15Es. Somehow, they thought magnesium access panels on carbon based composite airframe was a good idea, too. I get a good chuckle out of the whole fleet being grounded over that fuckup. In hindsight - a more comprehensive look at the state of Northrop's manufacturing allowed them ample opportunity to work on and resolve issues with the design and begin production nearly immediately upon selection - which they fully intended to do. The deeper munitions bay which so concerned a few of the evaluators was precisely what Lockheed spent a decade trying to bolt onto their airplane, and none of the additional cost or time of airframe revisions was relevant within the greater environment. Even by the time of the flyoff, it was painfully obvious that the primary mission of the aircraft was a hard sell. Even removing our advantage of hindsight - the decision to select the F-22 was either stubbornly focused on a limited set of criteria or mostly concerned with politics.

Sounds like your very familiar with the F-35 program lol, I wish a guy like Rick was around then but one man can only do so much.

@@jericho1-4 unfortunately, I have zero knowledge of the F35 program. It just sounds so very similar to programs that I do know about.

@@jericho1-4 I know nothing of the F35 program but am very familiar with how the DoD system gets gamed by contractors, congress, and service brass with pet rocks when there are not resolute and dedicated professionals like Rick.

@@baghdaddymike6669Then this will make you smile, as you probably know The DOD has been trying to faze the M-4/M-16 for some time now during my deployments from I'll say 05 to late 2010 as an 0321 w/FORECON I watched all the SOG/SOF/SF teams get handed one new useless platform after another. The DMR's were all very good and a weapon you could trust, The main battle rifles and some MG's not so much. Take the SCAR for example they tossed those to Delta and Seal's to put through it's paces in combat within a week they had told everyone from Rangers to Raiders not to use it as it had some serious kinks that could get you FUBAR. This was when they were first developing the newer version based off a 90' prototype and it has come quite a ways I hear but it's like any platform or weaps sys once they guys in the field give it a no go it's earned a rep as a dead stick and it usually stays that way for everyone in the service who ever used it, or would have been issued it.

I was on the YF 23 program the entire time to fly off and like you still scratching my head wondering why.

@@natural-born_pilotWe heard that Northrop was in hot water for the B2 program over-runs plus the YF-23 incorporated some new materials and construction methods that were at that time unproven...and the Air Force is more comfortable with improvements over innovations. The YF-22 was basically conventional with new stealth features and they were assured that it could be built without creating a fiasco of cost over-runs...which pretty much became the truth. If the program had been left to complete all initial order aircraft the cost per would have been well under $100 million but since they killed it too soon the massive development costs amortized over so few aircraft drove the individual price up badly. Also the line was just getting all the bugs worked out and processes working properly when they killed the program for mostly political reasons. Must be terrible having to work with Congress and all the leeches demanding money for their reelections all the time. Oh...on the engines, the P&W engine was outperformed by the GE in several areas...not badly but the GE guys were feeling confident that they were going to win, but they didn't because our engine had been designed with service in mind. (I worked on the program at P&W) When the service personnel were asked which engine they preferred they all chose the 5000 Pratt because we sweated a LOT of details that showed when every nut and bolt was touched....can you reach this? Can you remove this or that without taking anything else off? Stuff like that makes working on things a lot easier...and modern jets are difficult enough to keep in the air without over-complicating things due to poor engineering. The very best engineers were at P&W (personal opinion) and it showed. :)

@@recoilrob324 thanks for your response informative and interesting. You brought up a few things I wasn’t knowledgeable of since being retired for the past 100 yrs. You were spot on with your explanation and question about political destruction of high tech innovation with unreasonable financial budget priorities. After my USAF retirement went to work for McDonnell Douglas Tech Inc primarily working in LO’s and was in charge of security for the huge and important contract we had with Northrop on the B2. During my time their I was security program manager on several other new and mind blowing concepts. Like most of the employees there I became very much involved and took the mission very seriously. While there I experienced a few changes in presidency’s. When the change involved POTUS with budget interests set miles above technology in national security and subsequently watched in horror some of the greatest, eye popping and proven technology programs disappear. Programs were cut and the badly needed ‘holy s__t’ high tech items shelved never to be seen again. For me it was like loosing a best friend and I will never understand the purpose behind such an atrocity. I was deeply involved in our YF program as with everyone else. We had such a great aircraft and felt it had a big edge on our competitor. There wasn’t a person in the business, outside of MDTI, we came in contact with that felt the same. I’ll never forget that time sitting on the first third of my chair waiting the count down for the winner of the fly off especially the way the YF-23 out performed the 22. When we heard the final choice you could of heard the dust landing on solid objects. The place went into confusion and morning, hard to describe. Latter when many surrounding facts came out supporting the big picture on the government’s choice it left that bewilderment with the governments way of thinking which did not back ‘the best tool for the job’ theory. I think you know what I mean. I enjoyed the work but it came with its frustrations.

@@natural-born_pilot When we at Pratt where shown pics of the competing airframes I can't recall a single person who didn't think the 23 looked the business! Like an attractive but plain girl standing next to a super model....I'm sure she's a wonderful woman and all of that...but when presented with someone truly knock-out beautiful it does something irrational to you...or me. Looks aside we were being fed little bits and pieces during the fly-off and IIRC the 22 was able to fire missiles while I don't think the 23 was that far along and the AF really liked that and it took a LOT of pressure off being that modern airframes can really act weirdly when dropping ordnance or launching missiles. Being involved with security I'm sure you all took things as seriously as we did at P&W and only recently have I felt OK about talking about things that happened back then trying to be careful about what is said to be sure that it's in the public domain already and not letting any 'cats out of the bag' so to speak. But I can now say that I was shaken one Monday morning going to work during that same ATF competition time frame that there had been an 'Open House' for relatives and workers and there...right out in the open in the main hallway was something that we'd been working on for quite a while back in the 'Black Rooms' (that didn't exist..you know what I mean) for all to see and even take photos of!??!! I couldn't believe it.....48 hrs earlier even mentioning the existence of this 'thing' would have gotten you at least a visit by Security personnel and possibly FBI and here it was out in plain sight. It took a while but I finally came to the conclusion that for us 'Security' was mostly to prevent our competition...GE and Rolls-Royce from stealing our tech and this 'thing' likely lost funding so it became an attractive trinket for display. While thinking about it...there have been many 'leaks' of our technology to foreign adversary's that happened when we had gotten the upper hand on them...as with the F-22, it was cancelled supposedly because there was no 'need' for it and nobody had anything that could approach its' capabilities so we don't need so many of them. I think the reality was more akin to when a project is in development there is a very loose 'fund' from which campaign contributions can easily be siphoned but when in serial production every penny is accounted for...so once the F-22 was being produced they needed another 'NEW BETTER' project to push and fund so they (politicians) could get their campaign contributions. Very dirty business and 'National Security' only matters when something 'secret' can be sold by THEM to the highest bidder to level the playing field which then spurs more funding for us to get ahead again. It's only when someone out of the Official Channel sells secrets to the 'enemy' (Walkers come to mind) that they really get angry because THEY could have sold that same tech and made the money...how DARE some little person horn in on their game? Think about it: if we developed a technology that was so advanced that China/Russia et al would have no chance of competing with...would our aircraft factories just be shut down? Heck no! The secrets would leak or be stolen or be sold and they'd catch up...much as they are right at the moment so hey....we need a NEW aircraft to stay ahead! I wouldn't be upset if they just said 'our aircraft are the best and we want to make them better'...but there's no money in that for they that control the funding, so they fund it and siphon off money under the table. It's a dirty business just like elections aren't 'fair' but sold to the highest bidder. Perhaps I'm getting cranky in my old age, but I do think this is the way the system actually works and the sooner everyone realizes it ...the better. Good talking with you! Rob

@@recoilrob324 for what I read, the 23 was about to perform live missle fire, however the team didn't demonstrate it while the 22 team went out of their way to do it. With that said, say the 23 is plain is weird, after all the 22 is more conventional looking

Go Tech Center!

Marty, thanks for your service to our great country! Salure!

I was also working for Northrop at the time - NCAD/NCAL programmer that wrote the IGES translator for the ATF project (and later used by the B-2 project among others). I too believe the YF-23 was the best plane here. Was fortunate to see PAV-2 two days before they took it apart and put it on the rail cars and shipped it to Palmdale for flight test. I remember turning that last corner and seeing it for the first time - I seriously didn't know that a human jaw could open that far :-) And oh yeah, Tech Center, Max Factor, Pico (unclassified trailer only - was going out there 2 times a week for a few months to help with the backlog of NCAL bugs)

@@GF-sy1iv Dude remember the 2nd floor Tech Center? There was a guy who was going blind and wore orange glasses, and my teammates made the NCAD Manual w/“hamburger” screen caps...

Pico Mod Bldg. We worked together

The F-111 was heavy which wouldn't have been a tragedy except that it took P&W a LOOOOONG time to deliver an adequate engine. The F-14A got stuck with the early TF30 as well.

@@toomanyuserids Well, the f14 was designed for the f100 from the f15. The navy said "use the tf30 for the test planes, and we'll use the f100 for the production versions." Cost cutting gives a hint of how that story ended up. People seriously freaked out over the expense of the f14 and f15 back then, even though they were SO much cheaper than things like the f22/f35 today...

Because as we all know the best plane is the plane that has a cockpit that breaks after exceeding a speed of Mach 1.6 can't fire missiles from its weapons Bay. And all in all showed worst practical performance in comparison to the other offering

@@spartanx9293 p.p.s. I have read extensively about the 23 and have heard nothing about faulty canopies.

@@thefrustratedtheologian6238 actually the yf-22 tested tested an aim120 amraam from its weapons Bay so you just straight up lied

@@thefrustratedtheologian6238 then evidently you haven't read much about it

@@thefrustratedtheologian6238 again that issue has been long since fixed it's a lot more complicated to completely redesign a cockpit and weapons Bay which evidently Northrop agreed with as the yf-23 cockpit is a modified f-15 cockpit

It does at that.

The raw interview is available on the channel.