The F-14 had nice capabilities on paper but in reality it was something different.

Its glove vanes were little short of useless, so that it was concluded that it was better to weld them retracted.

Its leding edge slats were of little use because it was restricted to 5 g maneuvers with them extended. Also the AIM-9 firing was forbiden with extended slats !!!

Its max allowed loading was 6.5 G. Too low compared to Mig-21 bis or MiG-23 ML (8.5G).

Its specific excess power was patheticaly low.

In fact it was a Phoenix missile carrier. Not more.

Whats the point here ?? The raptor doesnt even have a workable routine yet and performs a different setup everytime because Dozer is on record of saying that he doesnt expect them to have a routine up and ready by mid to end 2007 What you are seeing at oshkosh is just the TIP OF THE ICEBERG according to the pilot as the full capability will be shown next year.

It is true. That is my point also. Its FCS is only recently being refined enough for that maneuver. It the other words, it is new in that business.
We shall see what other maneuvers it can do next year, with fully refined FCS.

I dont know what you said back in the day but many detractors said that due to its stealthy design the raptor cannot do a cobra !!

I said it was very difficult for it to do it because of many aerodynamic compromises which should have been made regarding its stealth requirements.
That is a fact.

So you dont want to believe the Raptor pilot who knows 100 time more about his jet then you when he says that nothing was done to the aircraft and it was as it was as a PRODUCTION REPRESENTATIVE example taken from squadron service and without any changes whatsoever .

We can not believe everything we hear.
I have a video documentary called Eagle Country,from late 80-s, in which McDonnell test pilot says that the F-15E has FBW controls. That proved to be a hoax, because much later was revealled that it has electro-hydraulic FCS, like F-15C.

I wont say complex but different , raptor’s nozzles need to adhere to strict IR and RF signature setting and the aircraft offers all aspect stealth something the MKI does not !!

Of course. That is the point. Because of stealth requirement, its nozzle inherently must have constraints compared to the nozzle of SU-30MKI.
You can not have everything.

The same applies to its aerodynamics also.

Ahhh what ?? Missed the X-31 performance at Paris ?? What about the F-16 cobra ?? The F-18 HARV videos by NASA and pilot testimonials ??

Yes,I know that, but note that these are all experimental aircraft programs.

Please explain how a OshKosh , NJ and others dont have the same security requirments when it comes to airshows ?? Have you ever been to osh kosh and seen international participation ??

Of course that it is an International airshow, but you have to admit that it is not in the same class as Farnborough or Le Bourget airshows where Sukhois and Migs regularly perform theirs extreme maneuverabilities.

Mind providing a video ( unless it is the OVT in which case i have seen it) !! And the raptor does so with 8 missiles ( 6+2) so whats the point ??

You could compare Raptors Cobra maneuver with performance of MiG-29 OVT in Farnborough this year.
Both of these have TVC controls, and you can see what Mig can do with it.

The difference is noticeable, you must admit.

As for Raptors missiles, it can do basic Cobra only with internally mounted stores in which case they do not degrade lateral-directional stability.
That is much easier to do than with external stores.

Just like it was almost certainly incapable of doing a cobra a year or two ago!! Do we have to go back and read some of the posts on the raptor’s manuverability in the mig-31 and other threads !!

My statements were true, because its flight control system has not been refined yet, at that time.
The Lockheed engineers have achieved to fine tune its FCS, recently, in that measure to enable it to do it. We shall see how efficiently in the Paris airshow next year.

How many Su-37’s are in operation ??

Note that SU-30MKI has been in service since 2004, and it has 3D TVC, like SU-37.

That is much more complex design than 2D TVC of F-22, which enable it to do unbelievable maneuvers, completelly devoid of any flight restrictions.

It is the first in jet fighters world. Before that, only light aerobatic planes were devoid of any restrictions.
From aerodynamic point of view, that is incredible achievement.

And do you not beleive the F-22 pilots , F-16MATV pilots , F-15ACTIVE pilots and F-18 HARV pilots when they claim that their aircraft have no AOA limitation ??

We can not believe them on words, because we have a bad expirience with pilot reports of F-14, F-18, etc, where we were systematically convinced, for years, that these fighters also have had no limitations regarding AoA.

We have to believe only to what we see.
The Raptor has matured recently to be able to do a Cobra, but it is only a basic maneuver.
See what the Russians do now.

The radome is going to be radar-transparent, sure, to allow radar emissions to return to the array. The fun part is that the array itself is angled and not completely vertical. That means your radar beam that gets through the radome isn’t going to be reflected back to you anyway, so you’re still at a loss.

SOC, it does not work that way.
The stealth design is much more complex than that.
In order to be stealth, the radar array must have very smooth surface. The angle only is not enough.
As you know every radar array has very rough serface, so some angle from vertical means nothing in this case.

Firebar, there are pictures from this airshow showing that it is a production aircraft. The only planes flying in the airshows around the US are production aircraft as the prototypes are still at Nellis and Edwards.

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All right. I can agree with that, but are you sure that the pilot who has done Cobra in F-22 is not best of the best in USAF service.
We can not be sure yet that the F-22 is safe enough for regular average service pilots to perform Cobra.

On the other hand, note that the Cobra maneuver is so safe to perform in MiG-29 and SU-27 that the Russians organize Cobra maneuvers for civilian tourists !!!

You still have not proved why the Raptor isn’t as aeroynamically efficient as the Flanker or Fulcrum. Vortex has already explained why the Raptor’s airframe takes the performance of today’s fighter to another level.

Again, the Raptor has a carefree envelope. It will not depart from flight in almost any condition as explained by Kilcoo. You are not voicing an opinion. You are saying that the inability of the Raptor to have a high-AoA envelope is fact.

The F-22 is not aerodynamicaly efficient at all, compared to modern fighters. It simply has a bad aerodynamics which is a consequence of compromise which had to be made in order to get a more stealthy design.

Remember that in aircraft design you can not have everything. To be more stealthy design, the F-22 have got some desigh features which are good for stealth but not so good for controllability at high AoA.

Design requirements for Stealth and for a good Lateral-Directional stability at high AoA are not the same.

It has less than optimum wing aspect ratio, its fuselage volume is too high, it has no LERX, etc, etc. All that, on the other hand, is required for stealth characteristics.

Thats because you saw just that one video , there are about 3-5 little clips of the osh performance and in some of them you can see the tail codes clearly , try looking for them . Plus arent Pilot’s own testimonials not enough??

I agree with that.
My point is that in MiG-29, the pilots of other nations also do these maneuvers. That is a proof that it can do it safely at any time.
The Cobra and Tail slide maneuvers are even demonstrated by MiG-29 in Farnborough with 6 underwing miissiles. A truly marvelous.

So whats the AOA limit of a su-30MKI , F-16MATV or a Mig-35 ?? at what AOA do they become Uncontrolable ??

The max for SU-27 is 120 degrees, for MiG-29 it is about 100 degrees.

Again do the russian aircraft hold cobras in a sustained manner ?? Are you sugesting that the Super flanker can sustain 120+ degree AOA ??

Of course not. These are transient maneuvers.

The pilot demonstrating these manuevrs and who also happens to be the most experienced in service raptor pilot says that he can perform everyone of those manuevers and with time he will do so leading up to the big airshow demos more likely in 2008 – however do except some more snippets at Langley this year . Now we can either believe you or believe the man who flies this jet on a daily basis and is asking every entusiast to just hold a while .

I believe him. No doubt.
But the whole point is that it has to be performed by other pilots, not only the best available.
Remember that Luftwaffe and Czech pilots also performed these maneuvers in airshows.