A F-35 would NOT out-accelerate or out-turn a F-16 Block 50 in its designed COMBAT configuration which was 50% internal fuel and 2 X AIM-9s,it doesn’t have the thrust not the wingload nor the lift-enhencing devices called LEX.

The problem is that isn’t the configuration F-16s go into combat with though.
Try adding a few more AAMs, some EFTs, 2 JDAMs, targetting pods, etc..
The F-35 carries all that internally, and doesn’t require EFTs.

Then, trying to compare F-35 with aircrafts with external tanks attached is laughable:

The F-35 doesn’t need EFTs. The other aircraft do, aside from Flankers.

A Typhoon or Rafale routinely flies at M 1.6 and supercruises with their combat load and External tanks attached, i guess Gripen NG will do just that btw the first graph in A2A configuration give you another clue, the Mach Max with tanks is M 1.6. but it looks to me that they used datas released with 2.000 l tanks before they were cleared to M 1.6 in the case of Rafale.

These graphs. LOL. A Gripen C out draging a Rafale, ask their pilots what they think of it.

Typhoons and Rafales do not regularly fly M1.6, and they certainly don’t cruise at that speed.

NO it doesn’t, it doesn’t say it does mean this either, like the rest you are interpreting .

I’m afraid that it does mean that. You’re the one doing some wild interpreting to arrive at your conclusion.

What makes you think F/A-18 wings are DRAGGIER than that of a F-35 in supersonic?

Oh gee I dunno, maybe it’s because on of the chief critiques folks have of the Super Hornet is the wing sweep angle, which while very good for low speed performance, limits its supersonic performance compared to other aircraft.

Since we all know this then there was no point saying it in the first place.

Staments like these have little technical significance appart that guys like you keep giving falsly to them.

It’s a pretty important point. The more stuff you hang off the aircraft, the higher the RCS penalty, etc… The F-35 can fly its combat profiles on internal fuel only.

It means that it have to overcome a permanent drag penalty as well as optimisation for lower Mach and ceilings.

Can you post the stats on the F-35’s coefficient of drag for us?:rolleyes:

Radar range doesn’t do it with SPECTRA they can pick up LPI signals easly, the Ms performances are superior in every aspect,

Sources please.

with superior kinetic AIM-120 range is no greater than that of MICA.
http://forum.keypublishing.co.uk/newreply.php?do=newreply&p=1483528

In fact it is ranged between the AIM-120 C5 and C7.

UNTIL the Meteor comes into service, the latest model AIM-120s have a greater range than any other western BVR missile. The SH is carrying C7s(and soon Ds, several years before the Meteor is in service).

F/A-18 with more than 6 AAM is even less likely to compete vs a Rafale a Typhoon or a Gripen.

Just for your info, here is a M 1.6/18 (external tanks limit) configuration which proves my point if need be.

And what is the SH’s limit with 6(or more AAMS)? Is the Rafale/Typhoon/Gripen going to be travelling at that speed for all of their missile shots(all 3 would have to be in afterburner to reach those speeds, which would limit the time they could remain there.)

No he did NOT say it would do M 1.8. READ again.

This doesn’t MEAN it would do M 1.8 it means what is said:

F-35 was shown coming second last and from we’re standing it can mean not reaching M 1.8 at all rather than loosing the drag race to this Mach.

Yes it does mean it’ll do M1.8. It just means that it came in second to last in accelerating to that speed.

Which is a lot more consistent with L-M Mach Limit 1.6 which you guys keep trying to pass for KPP tesherholds, as a matter of FACT, F/A-18 DASH speed is M 1.8 and is very unlikely to be M 1.8 with the “same missile load”.

If you accept that an F-18 with draggier wings and less thrust can reach M1.8+, why is it so difficult to believe that the F-35 can match that?

This quote also casts doubts as to the real requiered specs, why mentioning “no external fuel tanks” if not making the diuference between F-35 and the rest?

The point being made is that the F-35 doesn’t need to use external tanks due to its large internal volume. In VLO mode it fights clean, which means it doesn’t have to overcome drag or the maneuver penalties of external stores, which is why it out turns/rolls combat loaded F-16/18s.

One last thing, in A2A F/A-18 is outclassed by Rafale Typhoon and Gripen.

How do you figure? The APG-79 has a longer range than any of their radars, and it carries longer ranged missiles(and more of them if need be). Once they get Meteors, then that’ll help level the playing field.

Except that the 1600 mph figure may well be a rough conversion of an unspecified Mach number, but using the sea level (and widely known) value.
Therefore, and unless proven otherwise, the 1600 mph figure means nothing. :rolleyes:

So because he may have done that, it is on us to prove that he didn’t do that? That’s a pretty weak argument. Prove that he did do that.:rolleyes:

No it is NOT.

As a matter of FACT you can find a different Mach depending on which speed value you use, since you are using non-standard speeds and do not know which value it has you’re welcome to revise your claim for M 2.42 to a lower M 2.2 Maximum.

This is the whole point, what is truely irrelevant is trying to make up a Mach value without a proper airspeed even less form a non-standard mp/h which have no equivalent in standard aviation measurements.

When pple doesn’t know what they look at they hardly can make up a result without getting it wrong. 😀

So i am asking you AGAIN how do you translate a non-standard mp/h into a Mach wihout knowing which speed you’re looking at?

The point that you seem to be unable to grasp, is that none of us care if the speed is M2.42, M2, M3, M.85. Metz never stated a Mach number.

No it won’t and that’s L-M own Maximum Mach datas not someone’s intrerpretation of resulting equivalent airspeed or quoting SECOND Last performances for requierements which weren’t its own. 😎

F-35 is optimised for transonic, not even mid-supersonic.

Did you even bother to look at that link? The guy saying that it’ll do M1.8 is from L-M.

Lockheed Martin has defended the air-to-air capabilities of the F-35 Lightning II Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) while conceding that the aircraft’s performance in combat within visual range (WVR) will only be marginally superior to that of its fourth-generation and advanced fourth-generation counterparts.
Briefing Australian journalists at Lockheed Martin’s Fort Worth facility on 2 February, Jerry Mazanowski, senior manager of air systems in the company’s strategic studies group, compared the air-to-air performance of the F-35 with that of the Eurofighter, Dassault Rafale, Saab Gripen, Boeing F/A-18 Super Hornet and Sukhoi Su-30MKI. He said that in a typical combat configuration carrying four internally stored AIM-120 Advanced Medium-Range Air-to-Air Missiles (AMRAAMs), the F-35 was marginally faster than the Su-30MKI carrying eight beyond-visual-range (BVR) missiles and no external fuel tanks; and that it was faster than the Eurofighter, Gripen C, Rafale and F/A-18 carrying four BVR and two WVR missiles and a single external fuel tank (two in the Eurofighter’s case).

On an air-to-air mission with a radius of 200 n miles, no external fuel tanks but the same missile load and a requirement to accelerate from Mach 0.8 to Mach 1.8 at 30,000 ft, the F-35 was shown coming second last. With a requirement involving the same acceleration and the aircraft tasked for a 600 n mile ‘out and back’ mission, Mazanowski said the F-35 was “nothing stellar but certainly not an underperformer in this category”.

According to Mazanowski, the JSF joint programme office required the modelling to assume an F-35 engine at the end of its life with 5 per cent fuel degradation and a 2 per cent reduction in thrust. The counterpart aircraft were given the benefit of the doubt wherever platform and systems performance were not clear – as, for example, in the assumption that all five would have active electronically scanned array radars operational within five years.

Yes, but with a disclaimer:

I think Gripen NG will become a fantastic 4.5 gen fighter, and for sure good enough for Norway in 2016; add to that the industrial offsets, and it looks like a very good deal. However I do recognize that it’s not a 5. gen a/c; so therefore my suggestion was to not just go for Gripen NG but start a collaboration with Sweden and some other countries (South Korea perhaps) to develop a multirole 5. gen fighter but with more balance between a2a and a2g than what’s the case with the F-35.

How much more balance were you thinking? The F-35 seems to have a good balance of capabilities. You have to look at systems vs. just platforms too, in an NCW environment.