Scorpion Attack Aircraft from Textron:
The plane that caught World War II Development Timeframe
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The Scorpion Attack Aircraft might be a very good versatile aircraft or it may not...
However I am not to discuss the aircraft specifics, rather the time it took the develop the plane. Two and a half years ago Scorpion was just a concept on a PowerPoint slide . But in July this year, it flew from Kansas to Hampshire in UK for the Farnborough Airshow.
It is quite impressive given the time it takes to develop modern aircraft these days...
Look at F35: Development Contract signed Nov. 1996, System Development & Demonstration on 2001. First Flight 2006. It's already 2014 and the plane still not fully in service.
F15 Eagle: First Flight in 1972, entered service 1976.
Fast Rewind >> 1930s. Lockheed awarded contract for P38 June 1937. First Flight January 1939. Total time from Contract to First Flight 18 Months!
The tools and technology that helps engineers advances vastly. In 1930s there wasnt even a calculator, only drawing boards and slide rulers. Now we have Computer Aided Design tools, Product Lifecycle Management Tools, Computer Aided Analysis Tools, FEA, Computational Fluid Dynamics, even software that analyzes ans simulates Radar Cross-sections. Computational capabilities are multiplying
Yet the development durations are increasing dramatically in spite of all the tools and computational capabilities...
