so North has released flight footage of the 437 Vanguard and this aircraft is a game changer this is breaking the mold literally because this thing was designed and tested and engineered all on computers and basically did test flights on computers to find weak spots prior to it actually being produced and then released AI was used and this to me is a way that aircraft will most likely be developed moving forward I mean why not save millions of dollars potentially hundreds of millions of dollars on really extensive backend testing digitally I mean imagine if the F-35 was able to have done that I mean could have saved lots of engineering costs although the F35 has some very Advanced ways that it was created there are some that were lacking and obviously they're going to improve on that Aerospace Industries throughout the world saw that and so this is The Logical Improvement of some of the missteps that most likely happened with the F35 so this aircraft the 43 Vanguard took flight recently as the time of this video being published and most likely in my opinion it didn't do a ton of maneuvering I'm assuming a lot of this was testing different reconnaissance systems maybe some electronic warfare systems intelligence gathering systems things that needed to be tested up in the air and they had a specific test case a test mission aligned that they weren't quite able to do on computers even though they did a ton on computers prior to it being produced this test really needed to be airborne really needed to have the distance between whatever was being tested so the fact that this has been released to me is a huge step in the Aerospace industry and I'm excited moving forward just to see how this technology will advance fighter Aviation I think every fighter jet that comes out next the sixth generation Fighters they're all going to take notes and use Concepts from the 437 Vanguard and that's just huge the B21 Raider was a recent bomber that was built by Northrup and I'm assuming most likely they took a ton of notes from Lessons Learned From that thing and they applied it directly to the computer engineering that was done with the 437 Vanguard and that's just exciting but the 437 Vanguard actually is an iteration of another aircraft and we're going to talk about that one right now the model 401 Sierra project was built by scaled composits and I want you to remember that name scaled composits because it just sounds like a random run-of-the-mill design firm but it is anything but that and to me the fact that scaled composits was at the table with northrip handson literally point of the spear designing this new aircraft to me this is a very disruptive company that's able to design and build things that probably huge companies with bureaucracies just aren't able to do and this speaks to my fighter pilot heart people like John Boyd they were all about being disruptive now John Boyd was you know probably one of the biggest a-holes you've ever come across however he was a genius and he wasn't afraid to rock the boat and be disruptive when it came to the FX program which was an F-16 eventually an F-15 program so John Boyd was all about being that person in the room who wasn't afraid to say why are we doing it like this why don't we do it differently and at the time when Boyd was building the F16 he pretty much had a little more edgy a little more Rough Around the Edges mindset that scaled composits has now and the fact that scaled composits is a part of northrip it's just going to be a really cool thing to see as they build new Concepts moving forward so the 401 Sierra project the precursor to the Vanguard 437 that started in 2017 and they went from designing this aircraft to full flight testing in 24 months and that's just kind of unheard of but that's what this design firm scaled composits can do if you can't tell I'm a big fan of scaled composits I'm just a big fan of disruptive Technologies and stepping outside of the box and going to little companies who probably don't have the red tape that bigger companies have but what they were able to do with the 401 was build a medium altitude aircraft that then led to the design of the 437 now a lot of the 401 early designs did not have a pilot in the cockpit and then ultimately the 437 was expected not to have pilots in the cockpit as well but they're saying that there are going to be variants that will not have pilots in the cockpit obviously the footage that we're seeing now has a pilot in the cockpit a single place cockpit and when I look at the design of the 437 I'm looking at what looks to me to be like a very cost effective lightweight F35 I mean very coste effective and that's a big part of this whole operation is being able to do this like SpaceX does things right you don't have to overpay or overbuild you create something that is designed specifically for the the mission you need a Philip screwdriver get a Philip screwdriver you need close air support get an A10 to me that's what this program is all about it's about creating an aircraft that can fly along fifth generation Fighters fly along their wing and basically be a missile truck or a bomb truck so that goes along with the 437 design and the fact that it has some stealthy elements it's got swept wings so for me I'm thinking this thing's definitely a mock 1.2 fighter maybe a little bit faster those swept Wings to me are aren't something that you would put on a slow-flying fighter they're also claiming that I can carry around 2,000 lb so you're looking at you know maybe 2 to four amram if you want it to be a missile truck or you're looking at a 2,000lb bomb or 4 500 lb bombs so many different versatile things that you can do with this and the fact that you could most likely control this thing from an F35 cockpit an F22 cockpit potentially a weapon systems operator in the back of an F-15 ex just kind of flying this thing as their pilots flying them I mean there's so much potential for this to really be a force multiplier I mean think about putting 20 of these things out front of an F-15 ex formation and then fifth generation mixed into that F15 ex formation I mean it's just exciting if you can't tell like the fact that the versatility that will come from this is really going to create a lot of unique Mission sets that can be completed and scaled composits to me they just seem like a cool company because they named those early prototype 401 son of Aries so they really like giving the nod to Greek gods which I think is just kind of cool and speaking of kind of cool one of the things that has been noted on the 401 and potentially on the Vanguard 437 as well is the fact that the belly has placements for what looks to be potential directed energy weapons so laser weapons or maybe even like sophisticated threat detection systems sophisticated photo technology there's lots of new technology that's being put on this thing that I don't think has ever been put on a fighter before and since this thing is brand new think about it there's going to be adapted technology from the F22 from the F35 all the lessons learned all the data collected all that put into this computer system and then researched developed designed built quickly with people that are thinking light on their feet to really create something that's Mission capable so this thing is really to me going to have so much of a focus on Innovative weaponry and speaking of innovative Weaponry you know think about things like the Star Wars program which were basically lasers that were meant to shoot down intercontinental ballistic missiles that was decades ago but think about a defensive energy weapon so instead of just thinking offensively about directed energy why wouldn't this thing have the ability to potentially shoot down objects with lasers I mean think if you've got you know 100 drones coming out of Iran and you're trying to shoot those down why not have sophisticated laser weapons that can just burn holes through you know 100 of these at a time I mean there's so much potential for this to really be a game changer so it's all about rapid design prototyping and testing and that's something that you know government organizations typically don't do very well so the fact that scaled composits is in this mix now the little Nimble light on their feet design firm that is crushing it with designs like this you know you might look at this 437 Vanguard and not be very impressed okay fine but the fact that it was designed prototyped and built so fast with the latest technology and you know they can just spin these out you know test pretty much everything on a backend system that is costing so much less to the taxpayer like to me it's just exciting and I think it can basically reduce bloat in government programs when you bring in these super Savvy design firms who have the engineering prowess to actually create something that's effective but back to the Vanguard 437 it's powered by a pratton Whitney 535 single jet engine it's got an intake above the cockpit so another Innovative design that most likely increases efficiency and then again back to the max speed I don't know for sure it's just a guess there is a chance that it's a slower flying jet and it's just super efficient but with the swept Wing configuration man I got to think this thing is at least going Mach One maybe a little bit faster I mean you don't really need to go extremely fast if you're just a missile truck who's stealth you just got to make sure that you have that stealth technology if you're not going extremely fast which it looks like this thing has definitely some elements of that stealth it's got a wingspan of 41 ft and a takeoff weight of 10,000 lb so again composite material for this to have a takeoff weight of 10,000 lb that's what I can find on the internet as far as what's being published that is super light so again efficiency is going to be through the roof most likely a loiter time in this I would assume like 6 to 8 hours something like super impressive the composite material is going to give it the ability to pull g-forces as well to be nimble have the ability to turn on a dime depending on what altitude it's at but to me this thing is really built for efficiency and now the fact that you have a pilot you can put up in the cockpit there's potential variants of these that will just be able to turn and burn and dog fight extremely fast and then variants that will be the missile trucks for the fifth generation ERS I mean there's just so many options when it comes to this thing it's it's pretty cool so as far as a lowcost multi- mission platform this is exciting this is super cool I hope big companies take notes from northrip and they bring in these super Nimble light on their feet fast thinking Savvy little businesses that are just trying to make a name for themselves but they're really good at what they do I mean these this is how companies like SpaceX started in my opinion is being Scrappy making it happen being you know that Hustler out there on the court who's just you know not afraid to just run from one into the other as fast as they can to make things happen that's what I see skilled composits as being and it's just super excited to watch so thanks for watching the video guys if you enjoyed it please check out another video that would mean a lot to me I've also got a podcast coming up you can go ahead and subscribe to that podcast and episodes will be posted here in the next couple months thanks so much for watching we'll see you on the next video