So then you will concede that the Super hornet is worse than the F-35? Because where does the hornet like to fight at? Is the Hornet a F-16?

Listen, the Hornet is **** at EM, comparing F-35 to the Hornet and praising its performance is like awarding the a fat kid a medal for beating another kid with a broken leg in the sprint at sports day.

F-35 is a bit worse in kinematics but traded off by much superior VLO, SA characteristics, which are more important

Why is the SA of an F-35 “much superior” (if indeed, better at all) than the Rafale/Typhoon/Gripen NG.

I accept it will be better than an F-16C Blk 50 or a F-15C, but compared to aircraft that have actually received (and are/will receive) updated avionics/software…

[and I don’t want a whole load of bloody acronyms thrown around with the equivalent of “just cos”. Justify how and why the systems are better.]

A few thoughts.

– Was Paul Metz talking about YF-22 or F-22? Big differences.

– Interesting that the PAK-FA does appear airframe (not drag) limited, I wonder how they are going to enforce this in flight controls and I wonder what kind of excess power does this give the aircraft?

– For a number of reasons, I had believed the PAK-FA will be a supercruiser at least approximately equal to the F-22 (I suppose, this is predicated on the engines being up to snuff). Although I am developing doubts as to whether the intake has variability or not.

Pitch and yaw reponse-JPO and one of the test pilots had already alluded to any over dampened FCS had left some agility on the table because of transonic roll off, buffeting and wind drop encountered during testing ( especially on the “c”).

The test just shows that they “must do better” rather than “it’ll do”. The press release is a load of fuzz (as usual).

If they wanted to tune the FCS, they’d use canned evaluation procedures. If you cannot quantify it, then the test is no use. Now they are going to have to go back and revisit the software laws to see what extra they can find without bringing on problems. There may be some easy pickings in initial responsiveness, but its doubtful there is *much* more (not saying there isn’t some more) when the aircraft is already at aggressive AoA/yaw.

This was a qualitative comparison vs. the F-16, in which it didn’t fare well. But, then, the F-35 is not supposed to be an F-16, its more like a F-111 lite.

H-6K has more range than Tu-22M already. China is probably looking for something in the B-1B class.

Yes, but it goes around 1/2 the speed.

A group of Mach 1.6 Tu-22m vs. a USN carrier defended by Mach 1.uhm3 ish Subpar Hornets and Mach 1.6 ish F-35s? Could get very ugly very quickly.

The fact that the UK has paid for many of the upgrades demonstrates the problem with such programmes. Perhaps next time round things will be easier.

Yes, maybe a workable system would allow the developer (in this case the UK) to charge the other nations part-developmental cost as and when they decide to install the upgrades too.

Also interesting that pilots rate improvement in systems over CFTs and TVC because the aircraft is already fuel efficient and agile.

It is interesting. It would seem to indicate the “fusion” in the Eurofighter is definitely lacking vis-a-vis the competition (F-22/F-35/Rafale… maybe Gripen too). I suppose you’d expect the pilots have shaped those opinions by seeing what the others can do.

In general, it also shows the Rafale’s greatest strength, no design/development by (international) committee. The AdlA says “we need this” (in dodgy french accent) and Dassault says “ok, let us make it so” (in dodgy picard accent).

Rather than getting politicians from several countries involved.

Before this discussion goes further, I need to reinforce 1 point:

LPI radar is not magic. It won’t always work against modern digital RWR.

http://www.artechhouse.co.uk/International/books.aspx?iid=978-1-59693-234-0

http://www.ijetae.com/files/Volume2Issue9/IJETAE_0912_76.pdf

http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/login.jsp?tp=&arnumber=5307178&url=http%3A%2F%2Fieeexplore.ieee.org%2Fxpls%2Fabs_all.jsp%3Farnumber%3D5307178

http://www.researchgate.net/publication/228605786_Intercept_receiver_signal_processing_techniques_to_detect_low_probability_of_intercept_radar_signals

These are all public domain. BAe, Thales etc are all 5-10 years ahead of this. i.e.

https://www.rusi.org/downloads/assets/WHR_1-15_Maximising_European_Combat_Air_Power.pdf

This enables the recognition and tracking of hostile threat signals (including those from ‘low probability of intercept’ AESA radars), as well as various other classified functions.