SIAI Marchetti SF-260

The SF-260 is an Italian aircraft used by numerous countries as a military trainer, tactical support combat aircraft, or in civilian roles. Twenty-seven airforces fly some 1,000 aircraft; less than 100 have been imported into the U.S., mostly for use by aerial acrobatic teams.

Countries which operate the SF-260 include Belgium, Brunei, Burundi, Chad, Ethiopia, Haiti, Ireland, Italy, Libya, the Philippines, Singapore, Tunisia, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates, Uruguay, Venezuela, Zambia, and Zimbabwe.

The cockpit can accommodate 2 or 3 seats. In a military role, underwing hardpoints can mount two or four 7.62mm machine guns (Aircraft LMGs), 661 lbs. of bombs, one or two photo-reconnaissance pods, or auxiliary drop tanks.

The SF-260 burns 9.7 gallons of aviation fuel per hour at routine usage. A full load of fuel costs $12.40 (or $369 in 2006 dollars).

SIAI Marchetti SF-260 (TL7)

Subassemblies: Light Fighter chassis +3; Light Fighter wings with High Agility option +1; 3 retractable wheels +0.

Powertrain: 194-kW aerial Supercharged HP gasoline engine with 194-kW prop and 62-gallon standard fuel tank [Wings].

Occ.: 2 CS Body.

Cargo: 0

Armor F RL B T U

All: 2/4 2/4 2/4 2/4 2/4

Equipment:

Body: Backup driver option, medium radio transmitter and receiver, navigation instruments.

Statistics:

Size: 27' 4"x23' 4"x7' 11" Payload: 0.40 tons Lwt.: 1.42 tons

Volume: 144 Maint.: 174 hours Cost: $3,040

HT: 8. HPs: 50 Body, 45 each Wing, 5 each Wheel.

aSpeed: 190 aAccel: 4 aDecel: 13 aMR: 3.5 aSR: 1

Stall Speed: 67 mph.

gSpeed: 324 gAccel: 16 gDecel: 10 gMR: 1 gSR: 3

Ground Pressure: Low. 1/3 Off-Road Speed.

Design Notes:

Although the SF-260 is a TL7 plane (first produced in 1966), the above craft was designed at TL6.

The SF-260 has a very small wing area compared to many of the options presented in the MVDS. To model this, a pair of High-Agility Light Fighter wings was chosen, and then the SF halved (along with weight, cost and HPs). This presented a number of problems with space requirements for fuel and overall VSPs (as the chassis is actually too small for the design). The wingtip tanks could have been modeled as pods, but this would have increased design weight as well, which was already high. In the end, performance calculations (usual actual wing area) for the aircraft reflected real-world values quite well (aSpeed was exact; actual Stall Speed is 62), so the slight excesses were hand-waved as negligible.

Variants:

The SF-250 was the prototype for the SF-260. It featured a vertical windshield bow and a 250-hp engine.

The SF-260A through D are civilian models. The -A is the fastest of the models.

The SF-260M (1970) is the military trainer version. It is Identical to the -C.

The SF-260W Warrior (1972) is the armed version of the -M, having two to four underwing hardpoints.

The SF-260SW Sea Warrior is nearly identical to the -W

The SF-260TP (1980) is a slightly modified version for an Allison engine.

From the Aerodrome for GURPS