Super ace Chuck Yeager, the first pilot to break the sound barrier, once said that “of all the airplanes in the world that I’ve flown, the F-5 is the most fun to fly.”
The Northrop F-20 Tigershark, originally designated the F-5G, was a lightweight fighter developed and manufactured by Northrop. Work on the aircraft began in 1975 as an advanced version of the F-5E Tiger II, incorporating a new engine that significantly boosted performance along with an updated avionics package centered around a powerful, versatile radar. In comparison with the F-5E, the F-20 was considerably faster, offered beyond-visual-range air-to-air capability, and featured a comprehensive range of air-to-ground modes able to employ most U.S. weapons. Thanks to these enhancements, the F-20 could rival contemporary fighters like the General Dynamics F-16 Fighting Falcon while remaining far cheaper to buy and operate.
Chuck Yeager, the legendary pilot who first broke the sound barrier, once remarked that “of all the airplanes in the world that I’ve flown, the F-5 is the most fun to fly.”
As author Ehud Yonay notes in the sidebar of his article ‘Top Guns’ from the May 1983 issue of California magazine—which later inspired the well-known Paramount film ‘Top Gun’ and can be read at www.topgunbio.com—“The F-5 is actually a family of planes, starting with the F-5A back in 1964 and culminating last year with the F-5G Tigershark (now called F-20). All are elegant, zippy beauties with body lines so trim they look like canoes with wings. The only fighter plane made in California, the F-5 is an anomaly in the high-budget defense business. It is not only small, effective, and easy to repair, but it is also very cheap. The F-5E Tiger IIs used by Top Gun instructors to simulate Russian MiGs cost around $5 million each, and even the top-of-the-line Tigershark lists at only $9 million — one quarter the price of a single F-14 Tomcat. The Navy could court-martial anyone it caught showing off the classified cockpit of the F-14, but here’s how to make a hop in an F-20.”
1. The stick. Imagine you’re heading into bogey territory. To see what lies ahead, press the air-to-air weapon select button with your right thumb. (This functions essentially as an “on” switch—your head-up display and digital display indicators will now be active.)
2. The throttle. Using your left index finger, choose “range while search.” A display showing the relevant range, similar to a radarscope, will then appear on the digital display indicator on your right.
3. The right-hand digital display indicator. If a bogey is present, it will show up on the screen as a small black square. To lock your radar onto it from behind, press the throttle’s acquisition button until the acquisition symbol on the screen—two vertical parallel lines—frames the target. Once the lock is achieved, the acquisition symbol vanishes, and a numbered aiming circle appears around the black square, instantly showing you the bogey’s speed, altitude, and direction.
4. The head-up display. At this stage, you can look directly through the head-up display and see both the actual target and the head-up steering circle, which resembles a bull’s-eye, at the same time.
5. The left-hand digital display indicator. This screen shows your available missiles and gun ammunition. After selecting your weapon, maneuver the aircraft until the steering circle in the head-up display is positioned directly over the target. Once you are within the correct range, the word SHOOT will flash on the head-up display. Then press the stick’s missile release or gun trigger with your right index finger. Bingo.
A large portion of the F-20’s development took place under a U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) program known as “FX.” The goal of FX was to create fighters that could match the latest Soviet aircraft in combat while leaving out the sensitive front-line technologies used in U.S. Air Force (USAF) planes. The program stemmed from the Carter administration’s military export policy, which was intended to supply allied nations with high-quality equipment without risking the transfer of frontline U.S. technology to Soviet hands. Northrop expected the F-20 to perform well on the international market, but policy shifts after Ronald Reagan’s election forced it to compete against the newest F-16 variants rather than the downgraded F-16/79.
The F-20 Tigershark program was canceled in 1986 after three prototypes had been built—two of which were lost in crashes caused by their pilots blacking out under excessive g-forces—while a fourth remained only partially completed.
Photo by Tom Kasser, published in California magazine, May 1983 and U.S. Air Force
