It’s widely believed that the extent of stealth with the F-35 is much smaller than the one on the F-22 but the RCS of the F-35 won’t be that much worse than the one of the series T-50, I think.

You’ve got that bassackwards. The F-22’s RCS is< than F-35 which is < T-50.

It’s possible to lowered RCS by an order of magnitude. A MiG-21 technology demonstrator had its RCS lowered to 0.25 m^2 by a Russian research institute some years back.

I’m not saying that it’s not possible that some measures have been taken, but I haven’t read anything about the Mig-29K receiving that sort of treatment. Even at .25m^2, it’d still be worse than a SH, Typhoon, or Rafale.

Regarding the Norwegian Air force, please leave politics on the sideline, as it has nothing to do with the F-35 as a platform. As for the P-47, 109 and Spitfire, they are all withdrawn from service 🙂

My comments on the F-35,as a fighter are still unrefuted.

What’s the endurance of any of the F-35’s competitors?
What’s the likelihood of any threat nation that has PAK FAs, to enjoy a numerical superiority?
What’s the endurance of the PAK FA that’s flying an offensive mission(that’s already flown several hundred kilometers) vs. a scrambled fighter(or freshly tanked one)?

Old Willy was right about that one. The P-47 was a brick, and like any brick, it had momentum on its side. So you can say that it was good in a dive (and maybe a zoom climb) But that was all she had.

Now on to the comparizon between the F-35 and say the Rafale. The Rafale can loose bulk and weight by dropping external tanks. The F-35 can only loose weight. However, if the F-35 drops fuel, it will still have to use the AB more than the Rafale, to counteract the bulk. This means that the F-35 will run out of fuel quickly. So it is more like the Mig-21 in this respect, actually.
The Mig was only good when the can was lit, and it ran dry in a snap.

So you allready know the taktics to use against it. Use agressors to run it dry, make it ditch, bomb the airfield. Or simply go bomb something else.

So in my opinion, the F-35 is a bomber, it will do a good job if it has the luxury of doing it in a straight line. Compromises were made to get the aircraft down in price. Sadly they are connected to the agility of the platform as a fighter.

This may be ok for you if you are American, and have the F-22 to fly top cower. I am Norwegian however, and the prospect of having the F-35 performing national defence against the Pak-Fa, is less than glorious.

Do you consider an aircraft that is more agile than an F-16/F-18, to be a straight line only kind of plane?

In recent RSK MiG press release concerning MiG-29K introduction into IN service, it was stated that MiG-29Ks radar signature had been “substantially reduced”.

How much is substantial though? That’s a very nebulous term.

If you know the range to the target you probably also know the velocity of the target, why then do you need to use the radar to get the info you already know?

How does your system guareentee that random background noise is not incorrectly identified as the returning signal? That’s either a major risk or a massive amount of processing power.

The comment about the radar knowing when a pulse should be back requires some explanation. How can it do this?

The radar is used to determine range and velocity to provide a tracking solution on the target, thus until the radar is used it doesn’t know where the target is so cannot predict when a pulse will be returned.
If you are refering to the radar being cued by another system that might work, however that is in all probablity dependent on the target emitting.

Which then brings us full circle, so again, why are you using the radar if you already have the info you need?

You’d use the radar along with your ESM systems to get the most accurate picture of what’s going on around you. They work in concert with one another, along with offboard sensors.

But can it be fired exclusively on information from the RWR….?

That is what I mean by “cue”.

If the enemy is emitting.

To date, there is absolutely nothing that would support the notion it could be fired using ONLY the ALR-94.

I’d hesitate to say that a single F-22 could do that, without any offboard assistance, but multiple F-22s would be able to. I highly doubt you’ll see any open source links that would verify a single F-22 being able to accomplish that though.

Who said it was? I was talking about IR AAMs.

My point was that unless the target survived the AIM-120, it wouldn’t matter whose short range missile had the longer range(and unless all of the -120s had been fired, they’d be useful all the way to the -9X’s range).

It’s a nice sunny morning here in the UK, and I’ve just padded off down the corridor to consult my nearest friendly electro-optical ‘wizard’.

He has no figures for the angular coverage of the ATFLIR pod, but has confirmed that it was designed for use against ground targets – there is no known air-to-air capability. I suppose that it could be re-roled by a change in software, but not wanting to outstay my welcome I didn’t ask.

In casual searches about the ATFLIR, there are numerous references to A2A modes as well as A2G.