The latest version of the Boeing F-15 Eagle, the F-15EX Eagle II, can reach speeds of almost Mach 2.5 – and you can see its maiden voyage here.
Each of its two GE F110-GE 229 engines are capable out a 29,500-pound output of thrust.
That was originally thought to help it to soar at Mach 2.9 (3,581 km/h/2,225 mph at sea level) at full throttle.
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“Yeah, it’s fast,” Boeing’s Rob Novotny, a former U.S. Air Force F-15 test pilot and Boeing’s F-15 business development director told Aviation Week & Space Technology at the Singapore Airshow last month.
That’s only 129 km/h (80 mph) short of Mach 3, commonly referred to as ‘dash speed’ – however see below that this claim was later amended on LinkedIn.
‘Dash speed’ is the maximum speed an airplane can fly to get to or away from something.
It’s actually rumored that America might possess an even fastest ever jet that’s capable of hypersonic speeds at Mach 5+.
Admittedly this has nothing on this unedited, raw footage of a spacecraft ripping through the atmosphere at Mach 25 – but it’s fast for a plane.
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Dash speed hinges on the configuration of a jet.
Mach 2.9 was achieved for the Boeing F-15EX Eagle II in a “clean” configuration.
Translation: it wasn’t carryingexternal fuel tanks or weapons.
In fact, it didn’t even have stores pylons on its wings.
This would reducing aerodynamic drag significantly, boosting speed in the process.
“In that airshow configuration, with the two big GE F110-GE 229 engines, it’s putting out 29,500 pounds of thrust per side,” Novotny said.
However, he neglected to mention how much fuel it was carrying at the time.
While that might not seem significant to the uninitiated, the Boeing F-15EX Eagle II can carry a reported 13,550 pounds of internal fuel.
Reducing that by a fraction can make a substantial difference in the thrust-to-weight ratio.
What’s more, weapons carried can also limit speed.
For example, the Raytheon AGM-88 High-speed Anti-Radiation Missile (HARM) is not certified for speeds above Mach 1.2.
At these breakneck speed, the two GE engines are likely reaching their thermal limits.
Exceeding that would mean refurbishment immediately or shortly after landing.
It outflew the renowned Soviet MiG-25 Foxbat.
However no confirmed military aircraft has come close to the Mach 3.2 top speed of the combat-configured Lockheed SR-71, which was sadly retired from the Air Force in 1998.
As well as speed, the range of the Boeing F-15EX Eagle II is also unrivalled.
With all this in mind, the US Air Force is preparing it for certification with the new Hypersonic Attack Cruise Missile (HACM) – making it the first USAF jet to carry and deploy them.
Boeing’s F-15EX chief pilot, Matthew Giese, spoke to Popular Mechanics.
While he never went faster than Mach 2 while flying the F-22 Raptor in the Air Force, he acheived that on Boeing F-15EX Eagle II’s first-ever flight in 2021.
And you can see it happen in the video above.
“It was a clean airplane right off the production line in green primer [paint]. I did a maximum-afterburner takeoff, pointing the jet straight up and wound up at 40,000 feet going Mach 2.5 (1650 mph),” he said.
“That’s a hell of a first flight.”
He testified to the acceleration the new F-15 Eagle can generate, explaining that it can out-climb and win a drag-race against other American fighter aircraft
“Where the EX differentiates itself is the acceleration and power of the GE-129s,” he said.
“An informal drag race of an EX vs. an [F-15] E model at Eglin resulted in an easy win for the EX.
“When it comes to climb/turn performance, the powerful GE-129s again out-perform legacy engines.”
Single-engine fighters (like the F-16 and F-35) do no better in Giese’s opinion.
The US Air Force plans to buy 104 of them.
And, with the future firmly in mind, the fighter aircraft is built on a digital thread.
This will allowing USAF to add future upgrade and tech capabilities to the already magnificent machine.
However, Boeing’s F-15 business development director amended his claim about the F-15EX’ top speed late last month.
“Mach 2.497 is what we can get out of the Eagle jet,” Novotny said on Linkedin.
“And that’s close to [Mach] 2.5, but it’s not close to Mach 3… “That said, I stand by my quote of ‘yeah, it’s fast.”
