S14/ AS-24 Hammerhead
Name/Type: S14 Hammerhead Air Superiority/Attack Fighter (AS-24 Designation for Stellar Enterprises service)
Designer/Manufacturer: Stellar Enterprises/ Stellar Enterprises and Contegorian Confederation
Combat Role: Air Superiority, Secondary Role: Fast Attack
Crew: 1
Length: 16.5 Meters
Speed: 140 MGLT, 185 MGLT Under Boost, 2550 Kph
Acceleration: 24 MGLT/s, 29 Under Boost
Maneuverability: 138 DPF
Hyperdrive: x1
Shield Rating: 105 SBD
Hull Rating: 35 RU
Weapons: 2 Atg-130 TurChar Heavy Laser Cannons, 1 ChinMount dual mode Laser Cannon, 4 small internal weapons bays (2 Torps or 2 missiles each), 1 heavy weapons bay
Extras: Thrust Booster, Cognative Interphase, 360 Sensor Suite, LAM-2 Protector, EV-101 Ejection System, Link-22 LDL, J-14 Jammer, MicroThruster Banks, Layered Armor
Description: The Hammerhead fighter is Stellar Enterprises first attempt at creating an all around Air Superiority fighter, that is manned. It was on the drawing board at the Centrala Design Labratory just prior to the Kashan request for a fighter of its type. For this reason, Stellar Enterprises took the lead in the Hammerhead's development and set out to produce a fighter that address both the needs of Stellar Enterprises and the Contegorian Confederation.
Stellar Enterprises needed a fighter that could be mass produced and sold on the open market, while at the same time being one of the best fighters around in the galaxy. The Confederation needed almost the same, but also required their fighter to have some stealth aspects as well as a high survivability rate.
Many new technologies were integrated into this design concept, but some proven technologies were used as well. These technologies were all brought together and linked up to a sophisticated high speed data processing unit. This unit provided the pilot with quick access to all systems and with speedy feedback. The downside to all these systems, however, was the added weight to the fighter's frame and also the amount of room they needed.
For the issue of room, the fighter's design was lengthened and widened, but this still didn't solve the weight problem. To address that issue it was decided to lightly armor the spacecraft, but give it sophisticated shields for survival reasons. The large 16.5 meter long frame gave the fighter more than enough room for all these systems.
The shield system and engines were both taken from the proven AB-10 Hornet droid bomber that had been developed by Stellar Enterprises. Both systems needed only minor tweaks for operations on the Hammerhead. This gave the new fighter reliable parts as well as lessened the cost since those systems wouldn't need development. Internal weapons bays were also adapted from the Hornet bomber and utilized on the Hammerhead to give it a decreased sensor return signature and provide more stealth for the large fighter.
A stealthy design was also achieved by using curvatures and sharp angles as much as possible to redirect senor waves. These techniques in no way made the fighter as stealthy as other Confederation fighters, but it did decrease the detection of these fighters at longer ranges. At closer distances, the fighters could still be easily detected, howeve, this is where the other systems came in and inceased the craft's survivability.
Microthrusters located on the wings and nose of the large fighter increased the maneaverability of the fighter greatly. Quickly reversable thrust engines also added to this fighter's maneavering ability. The manvuevering was increased so much in fact that fighter pilots would have been highly stressed or even killed during combat if not for the heavy internal compansators. These units were derived from those used on A-wing fighters, but improved to be even more effective.
The boost capable engines installed on the Hammerhead offered it a way to exit the battlefield quickly or make fast attack runs against fighter groups or larger ships. These boosters also allowed the fighter to accelerate or turn faster during maneuvers, but for these purposes they would have to be used for slit seconds or risk killing the pilot. In order to decrease the engines heat signatures, the whole compartment was exposed to the temperatures of space through vents located at the top rear of the fighter. As the fighter flew through space, the cold would move into the engine compartment and over the hot internals, cooling them down instantly. To prevent engine failure all engines were upgraded with newer and stronger materials that could withstand such conditions.
An extra strong "bathtub" was constructed around the pilot to increase his or her survivability. The tub was made from a layered process would used a ceramic outside that could stop even heavy laser blasts, to a certain extent, and a backing of durasteel plate. This plate was attached to the ceramic with a polymer glue that held the two together and prevented the ceramic from chipping off upon a hit. These two layers gave protection from both projectile weapons as well as lasers, allowing pilots to survive glancing hits. Upon heavy damage, the whole cockpit is made to eject from the fighter and provides the pilot with a self contained escape pod.
The advanced sensor systems integrated into the fighter's large nose section are capable of scanning in a multitude of modes and work with the other sensors placed around the fighter's frame. This systems is capable of tracking over a hundred different targets as well as projectile weapons launched at it. It is able to quickly trace back trajectories of incoming fire and accurately predict from where the shots came within seconds.
Most internal systems were designed with backups so that destruction of one did not mean a fatal blow to the fighter. It is much cheaper to fix a fighter than build a completely new one. There is even an autostablize feature included in the fighter's software and is able to balance out a fighter in the event of an uncontroled spin. The software pretty much takes over the whole fighter and uses the microthrusters in very precise bursts to level out the whole craft.
Jammers and anti missile defense systems are used to add to the survivability of the fighter and increase it its role as a space superiority fighter. To fill a small role as a fast attack fighter, the frame contains a large internal bay that could be loaded with a space bomb or disintegration warhead, or any other large weapon system. This use, however, unbalances the fighter and causes maneuvering ability to suffer as well as acceleration.
This fighter is a proud achievment by Stellar Enterprises and is hoped to launch the company into the large market for fighter craft. Export variants are expected to sell in large numbers.
Advanced Technologies:
Fighter Cognative Interphase: The system allows the pilot to mentally control the fighter. Unlike the other helmet system, however, this one actually projects everything the fighter sees inside the pilots mind. By using holocams situated around the Hammerhead's exterior, a computer system onboard transfers these images into brainwaves and feeds them into the pilot's head. It causes what appears to be dreams, but ones that happen while the pilot is awake. Every action the pilot does in these "dreams" is interprated and sent via secure laser comm to the fighter as direct commands.
Unlike actually flying, the pilot can get a 360 degree view of the surrounding area and conduct manveures by just thinking about them. The system is, however, also known to cause great mental strain on the part of the pilot after prolonged use requiring frequent vacations and downtime. It also causes the pilots brain to work harder and use up a lot more glucose than usual for this activity. For this reason, each pilot is issued glucose tablets that provide him/her with the needed glucose for proper brain activity.
360 Sensor Suite: This newly developed sensor system has been installed on the Hammerhead fighter. This system concisted of numberous sensors and receptors spread around the fighter's airframe, such as the wings and rear. These would scan 360 degrees around the craft and report any detected signitures or even comm traffic. These 360 Sensor Suit worked together with an array of small holocams to provide the pilot with as much information as possible when physically piloting the craft as well as piloting it through the cognative interphase system.
LAM-2 Protector: The Laser Anti-Missile Protector system is a newly designed systems brought to life by Stellar Enterprises with the help of newly acquired Atgar SpaceDefense. This system is situated at the rear of the fighter on a reather small rounded turret and it capable of disabling torpedo and missile sensor heads so that the whole projector will no long be able to track the fighter or any other. How this is done is with the use a low powered laser beam with the sophisticated 360 Sensor Suite.
When the Sensor Suite detects an incoming missile, prodictive software inside track the course of the missile and transfer that data to the LAM-2 in real time. This allows the turret to track the missile as well and fire off the laser beam at the missiles sensor head. This is a continuous low power beam that simply destroys the delicate sensor equipment inside. It does not have the power to destory the missile as a whole or damage anything such as shields or actually hull plating.
EV-101 Ejection System: The EV-101 is a full enclosed ejection system. It allows the pilot to punch out of his/her stricken fighter in something other than an ev suit. It gives the pilot an escape pod of their own that could sustain them for upto three days or upto 2 weeks if they land on a planet. The EV-101 is equipt with small thrusters on its underside to jettison it away from the Hammerhead and allows it to also be directed towards friendly ships. Of course its course would be slow and in battle the EV-101 turns into a sitting duck. A small shield system, supplied from a battery pack, is installed within the EV-101, but is only capable of stopping one or two laser blasts as the most.
The EV-101 also contains an advanced prediction system. With its link into all the fighters systems, the computer within the EV-101 always monitors the danger to the fighter and pilot. If, perhaps, the system registers shield failure and hull impacts from enemy attacks or anything really, and does not detect any action from the pilot, the system will automatically trigger the ejection system. In simulated tests the system was shown to be over 70% effective at saving the life of a pilot after a critical hit. It was determined that under stress of combat, pilots don't always have time to activate the system by themselves.
Link-22 LDL: Link-22 is a new continuous laser data link system. This system is not effect by any sort of jamming and allows pilots to quickly communicate with each other even under the heaviest of jamming conditions. Link-22 is a new generation of laser data links that is capable of sending massive amounts of data through laser light. This system sends and updates information continuously from all friendly ships equipt with a Link-22. This data becomes quickly updated within the fighter's systems. It allows the fighter to gather data from all over the battlefield through the use of other fighters and ships.
The problem with this system is that it requires line of sight to work. Anything solid that get into the fighter's path will prevent the information from being sent. Computers, however, could reroute the data through other sources around the battle like other ships or fighters in order to deliver it to proper place. The laser beam is also very hard to intercept and contains heavy encryption to prevent most from breaking it.
J-14 Jammer: The J-14 Jammer is primarily based on older jammer designs that are widely availible. This jamming system allows the fighter to throw off targeting systems based both on capital ships as well as fighters and missiles. Besides this function the J-14 is also built to intercept and analyze sensor transmitions thrown at it. Once analyze the system sends back data on the same channels that could throw off sensor readings under heavy scanning, but could also transmit data back that tells the senor system that nothing is out in the area. Of course this system is not completely foolproof and most sophicticated sensors could get some readings. For this reason the jammers are mostly used at close ranges and the fighter's slight sleath is utilized at the longer ranges.
MicroThruster Banks: To aid in the fighter's air superiority role, a multitude of microthruster banks had been incorporated into the airframe. These banks concisted of three micro thrusters each and provided the craft with ultrafast reaction times. These are located around the fighter, but mostly on the wings and nose. The banks were linked to a control system that seemlessly integrated them into the Hammerhead's thrust vector exhaust nozzels. With these systems working together, the fighter could outturn and outfly even the most advanced fighters around.
Layered Armor: To keep the weight of the fighter down, but still provide some protection to the pilot and systems inside, a new armor type was developed and employed in the fighter's design. This armor consists of two durasteal layers held together with a honeycomb type framework that provides lightweight strength to the whole durasteel armor. This honeycomb provides strength against projectile explosions as well as heat disipation against laser weaponary. It also helps to provide structural integrity even if sections of the fighter become damaged.
This Honeycomb middle layer is filled with a specialized gel, the same gel used in the Carbon Matrix Armor developed by Stellar Enterprises. The gel, once exposed to space after damaging hit, instantly foams up and fills in this hole to prevent more damage to the Hammerhead and exposure to space.
Atg-130 TurChar Heavy Laser Cannons: These laser cannons were developed to use turbochanging technology to increase the power and range of the laser cannons. With this system the weapons are defaulted to regular Heavy Laser cannons while at times these weapons could be turbocharged for the increase in power and then brought back to regular levels. Using Turbochanged mode has the drawback of straining the power systems and also the laser barrel. If used too much the weapon could over heat or the power generators could overload and destroy the whole fighter. For this reason safeties are put into place so that only two shots could be fired from the turbocharged mode. For best use, the turbocharged blasts are used to quickly take down enemy shields and then use heavy laser mode to take out the fighter.
One fourth of these fighters were recieve a new miniturized version of the Spectrographic sensor array. This will give each squadron flight a lead fighter that would be able to detect stealthy fighters at short to medium ranges.