Douglas F6D Missileer
The Douglas F6D Missileer was a scheduled carrier-based interceptor. This never -built aircraft was designed on the basis of a tender of the United States Navy in 1959.
Description
The F6D should not be optimized with two turbofan jet engines without afterburners type Pratt & Whitney TF30 -P -2 on speed but on low fuel consumption and hence can stay up to 6 hours on standby in the air in the subsonic flight. The F6D had a very conservative design with straight wings, the radar should be a Westinghouse AN/APQ-81 Doppler radar to be with a range of about 220 km. With it should be up to six objectives simultaneously and with Bendix AAM - N-10 Eagle, an air - to-air missile for long distances, can be attacked. The missiles with a range of approximately 185 km should be equipped with conventional or nuclear warheads.
The project was terminated in December 1960 because in the U.S. Navy very soon arose concerns because a so -designed " missile carriers" after a successful rocket launch due to lack of speed, maneuverability and armament would not be able to defend themselves. Also by the Douglas Aircraft Company was in trouble and merged in 1967 with McDonnell to McDonnell Douglas.
The Eagle missile was never built, but the development flowed into the AIM -54 Phoenix missile from Hughes Aircraft, radar technology in the Grumman F-14 Tomcat.