SH being a naval plane is underpowered. And when you take such a plane to fly in the thin air of Leh high altitude airstrip that would have been the nail in coffin. I would expect SH to be one of the below-par.

The EPE engines are yet to be developed and would create a time-lag. So it does not fall in line with “everything ready to ship, so no delay” capability that SH keeps tom-toming about.

Being a naval plane it might explain the dirt and dust issue, if true.

I think its a tossup between the MiG and the SH. I give the edge to the US plane.

Re the ongoing MMRCA, here are some press reports all attributed to Boeing that I picked up on other sites.

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Boeing-leased U.S. Navy F/A-18F set a new Super Hornet speed record in Bangalore Monday, during the opening day of flight evaluations in India’s highly coveted 126 aircraft Medium Multi-Role Combat Aircraft (MMRCA) competition.
The Super Hornet, flown by Boeing F/A-18 pilot Mike “Sting” Wallace and Weapons Systems Officer U.S. Navy Lt. Cmdr. Michael “Spock” Chenoweth of VFA 122, hit a speed of 1.84 Mach, shattering the previous record of 1.76 Mach.
“Up in the control tower, they were looking (at the radar screens) in disbelief as it was happening,” said Bret Marks, the F/A-18 program manager for India. “We were confident that when we got here we’d impress the Indian Air Force with the capabilities of the Super Hornet and setting a new speed record with the first flight set the stage.”
Boeing Tech Fellow, Mike Heller, who persuaded the team it was possible, said India provided a rare chance to do a speed run.
“The engines perform best in the coldest air,” said Heller. “And the air is coldest at 50,000 feet nearest the equator.”
Besides Boeing, the other contenders are Lockheed Martin (F-16), EADS (Eurofighter), Saab (Gripen), Dassault (Rafale) and Mikoyan (MIG-35).
Boeing will wrap up its India based phase of the flight trials on August 28 after flying in hot desert conditions in Jaisalmer and the cold high altitude environment of the Himalayas.
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The F/A-18 Super Hornet continued its impressive Indian flight trials with another noteworthy performance, this time over the desert sands of Rajasthan.
On Wednesday, the Super Hornet impressed the Indian Air Force with the extreme accuracy of a medium altitude bomb drop near its Jaisalmer air base.
“The highest of the four drops was performed from a 13,000 foot level release with an unguided warhead with no inertial guidance system. The inert Mk-83 landed within 15 yards of the intended target, demonstrating the accuracy of the Super Hornet’s auto-release weapons systems,” said Boeing pilot, Elliott “Hemo” Clemence, who had an Indian evaluation pilot watching from his cockpit’s back seat.
Live weapons testing, another crucial element in the rigorous Indian fighter competition won’t come until the third and final evaluation phase in the U.S. in February.
The Indian evaluation team also studied the Super Hornet’s ability to withstand the desert base’s 100F (38C) degree daytime temperatures. One F/A-18F jet was set out to bake in the blazing noon sun so that a record could be taken of the cockpit temperature as a gauge to pilot comfort and avionics cooling in the searing desert conditions.
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The proposed GE F414 EPE (Enhanced Performance Engine) for India offers a 20 per cent increase in thrust and a 1 per cent reduction in fuel burn. The F414 is itself in the 22,000 lb thrust class, 170 lb/second airflow. Engine change is done in under 30 minutes, interchangeable left and right engine installation. No need for a functional check flight after engine change. No throttle restrictions while in operation (I have personally witnessed this … its amazing … you can pretty much do what you want with the throttle … slam it to burner and take it back as much as you want … nothing happens).

I wonder how much faster the F-18SH will go with F414 EPEs installed.. that’s an additional 8.8K lbs thrust to play with?

APA is well known for their criticism of F35, however their analysis and forecast are reliable, and I don’t see why the claim that’s made upon such firm rationale could be laughed at?

Or experience truly matters most?

I don’t give APA much credibility. Their analyses tned to be driven by their biases and vested interests. They have zero access to official data on either the F-35 or F-22 and rely on whatever speculative reports exist in the public domain but don’t hesitate to make sweeping and authoritative conclusions based on such.

I wonder if it can target airraft and what kind of effect it might have? Another possibility is as an ASAT system seeing as there’s less of earth’s athmosphere for the beam to contend with. I hope they get the funding they need.

Its evident that the main wheel retracts into the air intake almost vertically and only a small amount fits past (into) the wing root…

As for the weapons bay under the wing, the small fairing is the only “logical” choice, though it “looks” only large enough for one AAM.
As you can clearly see that the fairing, there is not actual join with the wing.
So it must open somehow….

My guess is the small fairing is jettisoned exposing a single missile.

Sure, but if you throw it at Rafales from BVR distances it hardly scores a kill. 😉

Neither of us know what happened. But the article quite clearly claimed, that the Raptor never had to switch on their radars which implicates two things. The French were not using jammers. And thus the Raptor was not using AMRAAMs. Add those two up and ask yourself: how did they score kills then in BVR combat as the article claims? I’d be curios to read your thoughts about that.

Presumably the Raptor’s ALR-94 was able to passively detect and track and range the Rafale with enough accuracy to launch an AMRAAM close enough to the Rafale’s projected location at w/c time the missiles onboard radar would go live and achieve the kill.

Another possibility I’ve come across is the Raptor was actually using his radar’s LPI mode but SPECTRA was unable to detect it. If this report on the F-22 vs. Rafale exeercises emanated from a French pilot, not being able to detect the LPI emissions could lead them to conclude that the US fighter did not use its radar when in fact it did.

Maybe more info will emerge in the coming days.

Funny how governments like to play with people’s money. The Rafale fared worst in the evaluations, it is still substantially more expensive than its rivals even after the price reduction so by politician’s logic it deserves to win. Who are we to question the award if it pushes through? The Brazilian taxpayers obviously don’t seem to mind. :diablo: