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From: maniac%garnet.Berkeley.EDU@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU (George W. Herbert)
Newsgroups: sci.military
Subject: Re: B1A vs. B1B
Summary: Enough 'Subsonic' allready!
Message-ID: <6459@cbnews.ATT.COM>
Date: 11 May 89 01:25:33 GMT
Sender: military@cbnews.ATT.COM
Organization: University of California, Berkeley
Lines: 19
Approved: military@att.att.com



From: maniac%garnet.Berkeley.EDU@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU (George W. Herbert)

In article <6256@cbnews.ATT.COM> fiddler@Sun.COM (Steve Hix) writes:
>The B-1A had supersonic dash ability, but it couldn't do it for
>very long because of high fuel consumption.  The gains bought by
>supersonic dash weren't very great, and the B-1B didn't try for
>it.

Having seen this mistake float around for ~ 20 articles, it's time to put
it to rest.
	THE B-1B IS SUPERSONIC.  The B-1A was designed to do mach 2 plus at
mis level, costing all sorts of design penalties.  The B-1B was derated to
about mach 1.2 max (but still Very supersonic) primarily for radar sig. 
reasons: the intakes were made more stealthy, and the supersonic effeciency
fell through the floor...
	They don't very often, but that's primarily for range considerations,
not airframe.