there are only three things official (with press relese) I saw about typhoon vs other aircrafts. But I may have missed other articles…

-The typhoon managed to kill two F15 in a very short time in WVR.

-The Typhoon has been shot down by a gripen in BVR during last red flag.

-The typhoon has been shot down by a tornado F3 (BVR) during a british exercise.

then I have no doubts that the typhoon has an impressive kill ratio against teen fighters. Remember that the mirage 2000-5 managed a 40 to 1 kill ratio in its first international exercise against F16 mlu and other types with amramms, so the typhoon should be even better.

I can conclude that the typhoon is certainly a great air to air performer but doesn’t enjoy unfair advantages like the F22 has in that role against other 4th generation fighters like the gripen, the rafale, the su-30mki, the SH block 2Su 35…

I believe that tactics, pilot experience, ROE, luck (it helps!!):D , support of AWACS or not and ability to withstand high G forces, EW… will account for more of 80% if not 90%:D of the outcome of an air to air combat… The remaining 20% depending of aircraft performances.

Indeed a perfect symetrical engagement with aircrafts in the same sitauations, same ROE, same pilot experiences, same loadout configuration… is just wishful thinking and exist only on forums…

EW could change the outcome of AtA engagement, but since they are never used during peace time we will never know….

Only the F22 can escape from that rule, and that why I think Typhoon advantage in AtoA is marginal vs other 4th generations aircrafts which also all have sensor fusions-god eye view of the combat situation. (But there is a significant gap with 3rd generation)

it is true both in BVR and WVR (the percentage could change a little bit, but it is just aimed to make my point).

unfortunately no!

I think that with this deployement we should see many other pictures and videos in the coming weeks.

nice!

7’30 and 7’40 is crazy with the F1!

I think I read in A&c that the AASM should be used in spring in Astan and not deployed imediately at the beginning of the deployement.

There are many ways to achieve some kind of LO other than RAM, painting and shape.

-tactics ( flying very low makee you harder to detect )
-use of passive sensors rather than radar
-pencil beam jamming or tracking
-Active cancelation??

about Active cancelation we had an interesting discussion on the rafale news thread:

sweetman’s article sum up very well these different things for the rafale, but it is also valuable for some other aircrafts I think.

Teeth of the Wind
The Rafale EW suite, known as Spectra, is one of the most powerful systems installed on a fighter aircraft and is intimately associated with the unique approach to stealth and survivability designed into the Rafale. Dassault executives describe the Rafale as discreet rather than being stealthy in the sense of a F-22. To avoid detection, it combines avionics, tactics, and reduced radar reflectivity with some techniques that have not been directly revealed and are apparently unique.

The first element of discretion is that Spectra’s receiver system and the FSO help detect and track targets without using radar. Spectra incorporates a radio-frequency (RF) detection system, a missile-approach warning sensor, and a laser-warning system and provides full 360-degrees coverage. The RF detection subsystem uses prominent square-section antennas, mounted on the lower corners of the engine inlets and in the rear of the fin-top pod, covering 120 degrees each. The receiver antennas use interferometric techniques to measure a signal’s angle of arrival within less than 1 degree and are designed so that they do not have a large radar-cross-section (RCS) contribution.

The Rafale is also designed to use terrain masking, particularly at night or in bad, weather when visually cued short-range surface-to-air weapons are less effective. With its maneuverability and a high degree of cockpit automation, the fighter is designed to fly a terrain-avoidance/threat- avoidance profile at 5.5 g and 100 feet in altitude. The RBE2 and a terrain-referenced navigation system, using stored terrain data, are used to provide redundant flight guidance.

Rafale makes extensive use of radar-absorbent material (RAM) in the form of paints and other materials, Dassault engineers have said. RAM forms a saw-toothed pattern on the wing and canard trailing edges, for instance. The aircraft is designed to so that its untreated radar signature is concentrated in a few strong “spikes,” which are then suppressed by the selective use of RAM.

Spectra’s active jamming subsystem uses phased-array antennas located at the roots of the canards. Dassault has stated that the EW transmit antennas can produce a pencil beam compatible with the accuracy of the receiver system, concentrating power on the threat while minimizing the chances of detection.

But there is more to Spectra than conventional jamming. Pierre-Yves Chaltiel, a Thales engineer on the Spectra program, remarked in a 1997 interview that Spectra uses “stealthy jamming modes that not only have a saturating effect, but make the aircraft invisible… There are some very specific techniques to obtain the signature of a real LO [low-observable] aircraft.” When asked if he was talking about active cancellation, Chaltiel declined to answer.

Earlier this year, Thales and European missile-builder MBDA disclosed that they were working on active-cancellation technology for cruise missiles and had already tested it on a small unmanned aerial vehicle, using a combination of active and passive techniques to manage radar signature. This revelation makes it considerably more likely that active cancellation is already being developed for Rafale.

Active cancellation is a LO technique in which the aircraft, when painted by a radar, transmits a signal which mimics the echo that the radar will receive – but one half-wavelength out of phase, so that the radar sees no return at all. The advantage of this technique is that it uses very low power, compared with conventional EW, and provides no clues to the aircraft’s presence; the challenge is that it requires very fast processing and that poorly executed active cancellation could make the target more rather than less visible.

The complexity of active cancellation could account for Spectra’s high price tag, estimated in 1997 as “several billion francs” (equivalent to the high hundreds of millions of US dollars) for research and development. One of four Rafale prototypes was dedicated to Spectra tests, along with a Falcon 20 flying testbed. Four new large anechoic chambers were built to support the Spectra project, including one which is large and well equipped enough to operate the complete system in a fully detailed electromagnetic environment.

about AC from Mercurius post :
http://forum.keypublishing.co.uk/showthread.php?t=72432&page=18

Active cancellation is an established technique used for example in noise-reducing headphones, and I think it is also used to quieten the passenger cabin of at least one small airliner.

The same technique is equally applicable at radar frequencies, but making an effective system probably depends being able to accurately predict your own RCS as seen by a threat radar, and being able to create steerable narrow beams of RF energy to create the required RF response.

To spoof a radar, the trick is to emit a signal that the identical to the reflection created by your own aircraft, but 180 degrees out of phase (anti-phase) with this reflected energy. The two signals effectively cancel each other out. Since the cancellation is done using the basic principles of physics, it should work with any type of enemy radar, irrespective of how clever that letter’s processing capabilities might be.

Generating a suitable cancellation signal requires an ability to accurately reproduce a anti-phase replica of the radar energy being reflected from your aircraft. Some differences between the two will be inevitable, so the cancellation will not be total. Some useful energy will still be receivable by the targeted radar. Like other stealth techniques, active cancellation reduces your radar cross section. It cannot eliminate all radar returns.

One problem with active cancellation is that it only works for the radar being spoofed. The radar returns ‘seen’ by other enemy radars that may be illuminating you will be unaffected. Another problem is that for all but the radar being spoofed, the activation of an active cancellation results in your aircraft emitting an RF signal.

The WW2 German maxim “Alles funkwerker ist landestverat” (all radio traffic is treason) comes to mind here. To avoid betraying your aircraft by this radiation, you’d need to confine the signal to a narrow beam directed towards the radar being spoofed. If this can be done, similar spoofing could in theory also be applied simultaneously to several other threat radars.

and also from mercurius:
http://forum.keypublishing.co.uk/showthread.php?t=72432&page=17

I can confirm Bill Sweetman’s statement that France has developed active stealth technologies for missile applications. This work was well under way in the late 1990s.

Around that time I too found myself at the receiving end of French hints that Spectra incorporates unspecified special capabilities, and observed how my mentioning active stealth caused the briefer to become extremely laconic.

So it is probable that active canceletion may exist on a fighter jet. Though nothing is sure, this rumor has some strong fundations I think.

To explain how AC might work from my understanding on a fighter jet I can quote another poster which explains it better than me:

The fact you must be able to compute your own signature is something that make me think that active cancellation is not the wonder, all around stealth technique some people would like to see but a bit more limited in its scope.
I long ago hypothesised that active cancellation would be used to eliminate radar returns from a few hot spots on the airframe, not to cvancel the whole aircraft signature. Aiframe shaping would not need to be as radical as on F117, F22 or F35 if you could concentrate the radar return on a few hot spots and reduce these returns with an active cancellation technique. The air intakes spring immediately to mind since S shaped intakes would not totally eliminate radar returns from the fan blades but reduce it, and could be designed to concentrate the signal in a specific direction. It would also be easy to dispose antenna in the air intake to monitor this return and measure its parameters (frequency, pulse shape, phase, repetition, intensity …). Active cancellation could then be used to eliminate this return using combination of DRFM and beam forming AESA antenna. One can note that Rafale has S shaped intakes and Spectra has 2 AESA ECM antenna just upfront of the air intakes.

I think that this subject is fascinating because of the rumor stuff around it. What makes it even more exiting is that there are clues that it is already implemented.

Their will be no production gap. This issue has already been taken into account : the 8 rafales from the F3 standart which were canceled to fund the post F3 standart have been re-ordered to avoid any production gap.

The next order for 60 airframes is schedulded for late 2008 or the beginning of 2009. Note that the new devices like the AESA radar, OSF-IT new missile warning reciever are funded for this batch.

hopefully there is no controversy in france about this aircraft, in fact it is one of the very few big programmes which hasn’t known any big price inflation. Only a 4% increase.

The main hurdles are behind now. The AdA is very satisfied and need this aircraft to phase out older models so it has no other choice.

the rafale is available, almost fully developped to fulfil any kind of missions, and is not overpriced according to the senate military programme review (50M to 55M euros depending of the version).

the first F3 and F3 retrofit will arrive this summer. Many upgrades are under consideration like rockets, new bombs, EW pods or are currently under integration like the scarabé datalink.

Conclusion: the programme is now on the track and the only issues could come from a political decision “Deus ex machina”.

For the moment it seems to be a healthy programme in respect of all the initiatives and devlelopments schedulded. I hope it will continue like this!

Spectra features AESA right now? My impression was it uses PESA. Is there any source for this?

I also read that spectra is using AESA, I can’t remember where unfortunately, perhaps another french poster (Tmor?) have it?

Torpedo: I believe your view is a sensible one about active cancelation. It doesn’t give you an all around stealth but can reduce dramatically the global radar signature.

Rafale makes extensive use of radar-absorbent material (RAM) in the form of paints and other materials, Dassault engineers have said. RAM forms a saw-toothed pattern on the wing and canard trailing edges, for instance. The aircraft is designed to so that its untreated radar signature is concentrated in a few strong “spikes,” which are then suppressed by the selective use of RAM.

a speculation: maybe another part of the treatment is active cancelation? If they are able to know where are the spikes it means that they have measured it (in anechoic chambers for instance). It goes in your direction.

Active cancellation is an established technique used for example in noise-reducing headphones, and I think it is also used to quieten the passenger cabin of at least one small airliner.

The same technique is equally applicable at radar frequencies, but making an effective system probably depends being able to accurately predict your own RCS as seen by a threat radar, and being able to create steerable narrow beams of RF energy to create the required RF response.

To spoof a radar, the trick is to emit a signal that the identical to the reflection created by your own aircraft, but 180 degrees out of phase (anti-phase) with this reflected energy. The two signals effectively cancel each other out. Since the cancellation is done using the basic principles of physics, it should work with any type of enemy radar, irrespective of how clever that letter’s processing capabilities might be.

Generating a suitable cancellation signal requires an ability to accurately reproduce a anti-phase replica of the radar energy being reflected from your aircraft. Some differences between the two will be inevitable, so the cancellation will not be total. Some useful energy will still be receivable by the targeted radar. Like other stealth techniques, active cancellation reduces your radar cross section. It cannot eliminate all radar returns.

One problem with active cancellation is that it only works for the radar being spoofed. The radar returns ‘seen’ by other enemy radars that may be illuminating you will be unaffected. Another problem is that for all but the radar being spoofed, the activation of an active cancellation results in your aircraft emitting an RF signal.

The WW2 German maxim “Alles funkwerker ist landestverat” (all radio traffic is treason) comes to mind here. To avoid betraying your aircraft by this radiation, you’d need to confine the signal to a narrow beam directed towards the radar being spoofed. If this can be done, similar spoofing could in theory also be applied simultaneously to several other threat radars.

Exellent! You seem to be very well documented on this subject. It makes even more probable that spectra can have this kind of technology.

I am speculating here, but perhaps the construction of the four anechoic chambers (including the huge one) are made to precisely mesure the RCS of the rafale in order to use AC in an effective way.

when you reread sweetman’s article and your post it seems that there is a logic:

Spectra’s active jamming subsystem uses phased-array antennas located at the roots of the canards. Dassault has stated that the EW transmit antennas can produce a pencil beam compatible with the accuracy of the receiver system, concentrating power on the threat while minimizing the chances of detection.

and

But there is more to Spectra than conventional jamming. Pierre-Yves Chaltiel, a Thales engineer on the Spectra program, remarked in a 1997 interview that Spectra uses “stealthy jamming modes that not only have a saturating effect, but make the aircraft invisible… There are some very specific techniques to obtain the signature of a real LO [low-observable] aircraft.” When asked if he was talking about active cancellation, Chaltiel declined to answer.

Earlier this year, Thales and European missile-builder MBDA disclosed that they were working on active-cancellation technology for cruise missiles and had already tested it on a small unmanned aerial vehicle, using a combination of active and passive techniques to manage radar signature. This revelation makes it considerably more likely that active cancellation is already being developed for Rafale.

and

The complexity of active cancellation could account for Spectra’s high price tag, estimated in 1997 as “several billion francs” (equivalent to the high hundreds of millions of US dollars) for research and development. One of four Rafale prototypes was dedicated to Spectra tests, along with a Falcon 20 flying testbed. Four new large anechoic chambers were built to support the Spectra project, including one which is large and well equipped enough to operate the complete system in a fully detailed electromagnetic environment.

I recently read in A&C that EADS will perhaps use an active systems to diminish the vibrations of the four huge turboprop in the cabine of the A400M. It looks like it follows the same logic.

If AC is already available in some applications, I would be surprised that the military would not be intested to see some applications for their armed forces.

knowing the amount of money spent on spectra, and with the mystere 20 article in A&C, this rumor has some strong fundations I think.

This “rumor” stuff makes this subject fascinating.

But impossible to bring a definitive answer…