MildaveAmerican fans would be very happy on hearing this…..this is not going to be uneventful… people have not learnt their lesson with American consultancy from the past.
It’s not really like they have a real choice…
MildaveAn exageration that makes one of the salient points of the article, because the crux of that article is to show that with the Rafale, the “IAF bought the bread now instead of the cake tomorrow”.
Well fortunately the IAF realized that without bred today, you’ll never live to see the cake tomorrow…
Anyway don’t be surprised by someone who think that badly managed, under developed and over priced is a advantage nowadays !
MildaveHi folks, just getting back from a two weeks vacation in the Caribbean ! Had a good time. Hope everyone is doing well.
Back to business then…
But we have seen Rafale and Mirage 2000 working together, and Rafale and SEM. Tornado/Typhoon mixed pairs worked well, and were equal to more than the sum of their parts. As Typhoon gains more weapons capabilities, such co-operation will become less necessary.
Rafale/Mirage 2000, Rafale/Mirage F1CR, Rafale/SEM worked quite well in pairs in Libya as well. Air Fan special issue n 400 March 2012 has a very interesting article on that.
That a airforce uses every available aircraft in every available configuration during a 7 month 24h a day engagement is only natural and necessary.
As such there is nothing wrong for Typhoon to be paired with other aircraft’s type.
However given that the AtG capability on Typhoon came a bit late after most deliberate targets had been taken care off (specially anti air) it’s harder to evaluate the real capability of the plane in AtG and in a high intensity scenario (since by the time they arrived it was no longer high…).
As it is, as of now, Typhoon has a better LDP than Rafale (and more experience of using LDPs), a helmet (you keep failing to address this major lack in Rafale), a cheap PWII LGB capability, and a cheap dual mode weapon IN SERVICE right now, with PWIV round the corner.
Typhoon’s LDP isn’t better than Rafale’s Damocles. It’s a “cheap” pod whose only advantage over Damocles right now is the TV channel which is only relevant in urban and counter insurgency operations. Damocles XF is around the corner and will negate that advantage in due time. It would be better to compare Damocles and Sniper which are in the same class.
And BTW SA seems to like Damocles quite a lot…
No, it wasn’t. Dual mode was more appropriate. It’s not just about weather, it’s about target obscuration through dust, smoke and debris – important if you’re hitting multiple DMPIs relatively close together. The RAF had the choice of using pure LGBs and dual mode, and chose to use dual mode more of the time, and moreover when it did use dual mode, tended to use GAINS.
At this point and unless you can provide a clear source, opinions can be multiple.
Maybe Typhoon’s LDP laser designator wasn’t powerful enough to provide accurate targeting in clear sky condition ? Maybe having to remove a fuel tank wasn’t the right thing to do given Typhoon’s range. Maybe… Maybe.
AASM does the job, but at massive cost.
AASM is an high intensity operation weapon. Not a low to medium weapon. Predator can do the job as well and at a lesser cost, does that mean that EFT is irrelevant ?
True. But not necessarily more useful, nor more effective.
Lol you’ll have to explain that one to me for I’m afraid to be to dull to understand.
The too big bombs thing is an irrelevance. Where they needed less Net Explosive Effect they just used part-filled or inert warheads.
No it’s not. Many nations are looking at Brimstone after the Libyan operation because it’s relevant.
That’s your opinion. The wider choice of impact angles and attack directions is, however, more than a marginal difference. And Typhoon also offers a better LDP and a helmet. If dropping cheap PGMs is the task at hand, Typhoon offers advantages over Rafale. That doesn’t make it a better air-to-ground platform overall, nor a more flexible one, but it is an advantage in this one narrow area.
Without self propulsion that “wider choice of impact angles” look to me more like marketing than anything. If they mean that due to guidance improvement they are able to guess a little better the exact point the bomb will impact, well I’m sure the bystander civilians will appreciate !
Typhoon doesn’t offer a better LDP, it’s the other way round (except for the TV channel for now). Typhoon do offer an helmet which wasn’t used during Libya and whose utility is yet to be demonstrated. Obviously that argument as done the Typhoon little good in most international tender, so maybe you shouldn’t get that excited about it. Air Fan magazine also report that Belgian pilot on F-16s preferred to use Sniper pod directly on their LCD rather than use their helmets (just another opinion around)…
MildaveDSA Malaysia 2012: Safran’s Malaysian expansion strengthens Rafale’s MRCA bid
Turbomeca and Snecma – subsidiaries of French group Safran – have expanded their presence in the Malaysian aerospace and defence market through investment and industrial collaboration deals with local firm Global Turbine Asia (GTA), it emerged at the Defence Services Asia (DSA) exhibition in Kuala Lumpur.
Both deals have strengthened Dassault’s hand in bidding for the Royal Malaysian Air Force (RMAF) Multi Role Combat Aircraft (MRCA) requirement.
Under the terms of the collaboration agreement, GTA will service the Snecma M88 turbojet engine that powers the Dassault Rafale if the French fighter wins the USD1.5 billion MRCA contract, which is also being contested by Russia’s Sukhoi Su-30MKM, the Eurofighter Typhoon, the Boeing F/A-18E/F Super Hornet and Saab’s Gripen NG.
GTA confirmed to IHS Jane’s on 17 April that Turbomeca has recently completed the acquisition of a 30 per cent stake in the Malaysian company. Meanwhile, Snecma signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with GTA that is intended to provide maintenance, repair and overhaul (MRO) services to Snecma engines in service in civil and military sectors in Malaysia.
MildaveCould help the Rafale’s cause.
Global Turbine Asia Looks At Building Engines For Jet Fighters
MildaveIt should be in the next few days/weeks, or it could be around 2015 when a proper assessment of F-35 can be done, as well as progress on the EMAL.
MildaveThey asked for TOT to maintain the plane on their own and second, to upgrade it on their own without having to run to France everytime. TOT does not mean they are going to easily used for the Tejas etc. Hardly. By the time India absorbs the Rafale TOT, the Tejas systems would be in their next variant of development with a MK3 variant to beef up numbers, thats typically how the IAF does things.
Right surely why the actual Kaveri engine program is been terminated in favor of the K10 which will use the M-88 core…
Almost every other projects are either Israeli-Indian JV, Indo-Russian JV, Indo-US etc. India need to absorb all these tech right now in order to be one day independent. But that day isn’t here yet. The Su-30 didn’t allow India to build Pak-Fa on its own.
The Saudis have already politically backed up Pakistan on Kashmir politics – and you never know how things can fly from there. There may not be even a 1 percent chance of war, but the IAF would be cautious if they consider an adversary with a fleet of Typhoons.
This is geostrategic nonsense. SA is “officially” backing the Palestinian cause and almost every other Arab causes unless they’re from Iran.
IAF will take into account China and Pakistan’s jets first, and will bother considering EFT at the bottom of their list. Whether SA is getting a bomb is not going to be linked with protests (that would only prevent NATO from interfering), but with countering Iran if they do get the bomb. Then because SA are buying so much US and European tech, the US will like in Egypt be happy to provide them with courteous “advises” on how to limit bad press should any revolution start (which is unlikely since the repression is done using western technologies btw).
Anyway do you really think SA will interfere with a country that is nuclear armed, just to help their Pakistani brothers ? Don’t be naive.
There was also a hell of a lot of reliable sources reporting the Typhoon was technically leading the race and a handful of others stating it was favoured by many in India, however, costs weren’t mentioned during these times which are the deciding, somewhat ‘sole’, factor in the competition.
Yeah if reliable means EFT PR effort. No official sources provided a shred of legitimacy to such claims. The IAF is silent to this day.
MIG-35 failed range requirements? and claiming Eurofighter used helicopter for AESA. (helicopter is the least powerfull source for AESA radar range).
Rafale radar doent have growth it will have the same small nose and underpowered engines. it is unbelievble that new RD-33MK engines will be poor performance.
These aren’t claims, but facts. And apparently IAF doesn’t think Rafale is underpowered or with a limited radar since they put it ahead of 5 other jets…
half runaway is BS unless you know the loads, internal fuel capacity and the power of electronics.
The power of electronics ? Unless you’re refering to FBW, I hope you realise how dull that sound right ?!
Aviation Space and week have picked up on the delay in the MMRCA deal… mind you the main bottle neck for final deliveries will be the readiness of HAL to produce the aircraft
Right now these are only speculations. People are turning quiet into delay…
It’s been quiet, but I doubt nothing is happening.
MildaveGood news.
But I wonder how useful this will be for the UK if we decide to go down the F-35C route?
Will we be able to swap this B with a C for the USN?
LM claims all versions behave the same once in the air so… I guess we’ll see.
MildaveMildaveU.S. Air Force Finds Stealthy Way to Restart Alternate Engine Program
There’s an old saying about Washington that no political issue there is ever fully resolved. You may think it’s done, but then it resurfaces in a new form and the fight goes on. So it appears to be with the alternate engine, the extra propulsion system for U.S. fighter jets that teammates General Electric and Rolls Royce finally seemed to give up on last year after being rebuffed by Congress and two different presidential administrations. The basic problem with the alternate engine was that nobody could prove it would offer any cost or performance advantage over the fighter engine the Pentagon was already buying, so it looked like a giveaway to a couple of well-connected military contractors. Once the Tea Party arrived, it was curtains for the alternate engine.
Or at least, so it seemed[…]
MildavePentagon Updates F-35 Cost Estimates, Schedule
The report lists the cost as nearly $48 billion for the airframe in 2012 dollars, compared with the $32.5 billion estimated when system design and development began in October 2001. The cost of engine development has increased from $6.5 billion to $11.7 billion, again in constant 2012 dollars. The system design and development phase (which the report labels RDT&E) is apparently not now due to end until 2019, with the completion of initial test and operation in February of that year. The Block 3F software that is required for meaningful combat capability is now predicted to be available in August 2017.
The three U.S. services have again delayed the initial operating capability dates of their respective F-35s, and revised dates won’t be set until next year. They were previously December this year for the U.S. Marine Corps F-35B and April 2016 for the U.S. Air Force and U.S. Navy. Full-rate production, meaning an annual rate of 60 F-35As for the U.S. Air Force and 50 F-35B/Cs for the Marine Corps and Navy, is now due to begin in 2018.
The average unit recurring flyaway cost (URFC) is given as $78.7 million for the F-35A, $106.5 million for the F-35B, and $87 million for the F-35C, in 2012 dollars. But this assumes an unchanged ultimate U.S. Air Force procurement of 1,763 F-35As and 680 F-35B/Cs, plus an international partner buy of 697 aircraft plus 19 for Israel. The URFC does not include the cost of initial training, spares and support. However, AIN believes that it is a more useful measure than the average procurement unit cost (APUC), which is also quoted in the report, since this amortizes development and a number of other costs. Also, the average URFC figures mask the substantially higher URFCs of the low-rate initial production (LRIP) aircraft. For example, the LRIP F-35As are costing between $100 and $125 million, and the 19 for Israel are quoted at $144.7 million in this report.
There has been much discussion of the grand total of $1.5 trillion the report gives for development, acquisition and operation of the F-35. This estimate is predicated on a support structure that is not yet defined, plus fuel costs and inflation over 55 years. Lockheed Martin commented that such an exercise had never previously been attempted, and that “a number of variables are subject to considerable fluctuation…making the estimate inherently imprecise.” The company expressed continued confidence that F-35 operations and support costs will be comparable or lower than those of the seven aircraft types it replaces.
MildaveWell to be fair they would not be so insistent on ToT if they had already got everything they needed wouldn’t they ?! (And Tejas wouldn’t be such a mess…:o)
Mildave:confused:
Anyway even if SPECTRA does do ELINT (which Thales seems to think so) we’ll never know for sure since these things tend to be classified anyway…
MildaveI wonder if even Airbus had a direct competitor in cargo capacity terms to the C-27J if it wouldn’t lose anyway to LM in Australia because of politic reasons.
I think the most important question is which country among the airbus consortium would buy a sized down A-400M version ? A military product not been bought by the countries that produce it don’t sell to well usually.
The important thing is that C-27J and C-295 both have a domestic market to rely on.
Now as it happens, mos new airlifters tend to be medium to large sized, the C-130J come in a stretched version, the A400M replaces the C-160 and older version C-130, Brazil is developing the KC-390, Japan the Kawasaki C-2, China the Shaanxi Y-9 and Russia the An-70 which are all in the A400M class.
Now maybe a modernized C-160 would do the trick (I’m quite sad to see the type going away) since it would be in the right spot to compete with the C-27J at a lower cost than developing a all new airframe. The question is which European country would support such a program ?
MildaveIt’s a wake up call if the Indians want to consider taking on the Royal Saudi Air Force.
Why on earth would the IAF consider taking on RSAF ?
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