Last time i´ve checked there´s this thing called “Crowsnest” and i can vividly remember a Video in wich an operator from a certain Asac 7 system describing (from somewhere in South England, maybe yeovilton, but this one i´m not sure) the air space over … Paris.

Quite frankly they would have had the flexibility to operate Rafale, Super Hornets, Sea Typhoon (if developed), Sea Gripen (also if developed), or F-35 in either naval flavor. Plus any other legacy aircraft including E-2 Hawkeyes. The project lead allowed shenanigans to prevent catapults ever being added knowing full well his decisions had consequences. These are not dumb and naive engineers.

PoW and QE II will never be as capable as its French sister ship no matter how one tries to spin the realities.

The boot is arguably on the other foot. QEII will be capable of taking at least a 50% bigger aviation wing, roughly twice the aviation fuel and an identical amount of amunitions. The British ships can deliver more sorties for much longer. On severall importante metrics they are more capable ships.

Lockheed Martin has the F35A, F35B and F35C.

Why has the F35B been the preferred choice for the UK Aircraft Carriers and not the F35C – Carrier Variant?

A) Bloody expensive to re-equip QEII and POW with Cats
B) Severall more years to IOC
C) QEII transformed into an almost useless “Helicopter only” gigantic barge till… (almost certainly) forever.
D) (Totaly unofficial, and entirely my opinion) Not a chance in hell that the RAF would have a great big chunk of its pilots tied in deck training

From the horses mouth:

By February 2012, the estimated cost of converting the aircraft carrier for the carrier variant of the JSF, requiring the ship to be fitted with catapults and arrestor gear (‘cats and traps’), had increased by 150 per cent: from £800 million to about £2 billion. As a result, the Department estimated that, over the next ten years, the STOVL option would be £1.2 billion cheaper than the carrier variant. This difference halves to £600 million over 30 years.

Another key factor was that the carrier variant option of the JSF could also not be delivered until 2023, three years later than the planned date of 2020.

The entire report here:
http://www.nao.org.uk/report/carrier-strike-the-2012-reversion-decision/

Cheers

Wasn’t the Enhanced Tactical Fighter the Strike Eagle? Good thing this Blitzfighter got dropped then. 😀 It seems the reformers were totally off base about the F-15.

Yep, and the ideia of going into battle in a subsonic, sensorless, gun only, no pgm’s, missiles, whatever, against the first and second Warpac echelons in germany by the eighties makes the charge of the light brigade look like a very nice plan.

They could buy Russian… :dev2:

Yep, they dont have the money to fly a 5 ton aircraft, so they would buy an 11 ton aircraft with almost four times the thrust… Not going to happen unless some seismic change in the FAA budget.

Textron AirLand Scorpion makes debut in the UK:

This new US aircraft actually made it to the UK. :applause:

😀

@ Multirole:

In the times the Mig-21 and Mig-23 have gone against the F-15 they have come out on the short end of the stick. This would be USAF F-15s in the Gulf wars against the Iraqi air force and Israeli F-15s against Syrian Migs in the lop sided Bekka Valley air-to-air fight in 1989. In most of these cases the victories were scored in BVR combat.

During Cope India however the F-15s engaged Indian MiG-21s, Bisons, flown by surprisingly competent IAF pilots. using innovative tactics that surprised and impressed USAF pilots. And during the Red flag exercises it was noted as I mentioned earlier that the Su-30MKI was spotted earlier in the merge leading to WVR tussling which gave the USAF pilots tactical advantage.

Considering that the J-20 is at least as large an aircraft as the Su-30MKI and lacks the TVC of the visually smaller ATD-X it can be surmised that the J-20 may very well enter a WVR dogfight with a disadvantage against its more agile opponent.

And when one takes into account the experience and training of JASDF aircrew it can be argued that the PLAAF may be placed at even greater disadvantage.

The ATD-X is a technological demonstrator, and if anything comes out of it, according to official press releases by the Japanese MOD, it will be a great big aircraft (the “F3”), powered by two “15 Tons” engines, that means something the size of a Raptor/T50.

http://aviationweek.com/awin/japan-aims-launch-f-3-development-2016-17

NEZ is a volume of space which can be approximated by a sphere originating on the nose of the launching jet.

If an AIM-120C5 had a range of 65km (the diameter of the sphere), three times that NEZ volume would result in Meteor range of 95km.

“Having flight-tested various intercept profiles, MBDA defined the changes required in the next batch of missiles–the preproduction standard. The first of these guided firings (GFs) was from a Gripen in mid-2009 in a snap-down, tail-chase engagement. That tested the seeker against background clutter. Then came five ejector-launched GFs over the Hebrides range in northern Scotland from UK Royal Air Force Tornado F.3 interceptors operated by QinetiQ.

GF2 was a tough test of the missile’s ability to snap-up through thick air in a tail chase. GF3 then tested high-altitude performance, GF4 was a longer snap-down tail chase against background clutter and GF5 was a high-speed head-on engagement at “well in excess of 100 kilometers,” said Bradford. The Meteor’s actual maximum range is classified.“

http://www.ainonline.com/aviation-news/farnborough-air-show/2012-07-08/theres-no-escaping-mbdas-meteor-missile