Such as going off on a tangent on topics. Remember when you claimed that the F-15SA deal was cancelled and a new one was being negotiated (without any evidence to back it up) and a few weeks later the first tranche of aircraft was delivered to the Saudi Air Force (btw the third batch is in transit having landed in the UK a couple of days ago)?

Or how about claiming that the AH-64E deal between Boeing and India was also dead and that a new attack helicopter tender would soon be out? Claiming that there will be range and loiter time across the board in the context of the LRS-B? as if long range was not a factor in the design of current crop of long range strike assets? (Jeez where did you get that from? Perhaps the first two letters in the acronym?LRS-B)? So don’t be surprised if there are skeptics out there when it comes to what you comment or write about US hardware.

Several posters here have taken an increasingly trollish turn of late.

The US’s next strategic bomber will be planned with strategic range/endurance. Shocking discovery.

The US’s next heavy-weight fighter will similarly be planned with a relatively long range/endurance/payload relative to the aircraft that is replacing the US’s shorter ranged Harriers, F-18s, and F-16s.

It is just one revelation after another around here today.

Yeah for sure, but still, it makes no sense to buy F-16 when the F-35 will be available at not much more. If you want something really cheap for air policing, they can go with a T-X derivative with a small AESA. An F404 is well enough to push the plane at mach 1.5 with 4 missiles. If that’s the goal.

A T-X derivative is possibly an option, but that would require money and time to develop. Whether it makes sense depends how many planes they think they need, how long they have until the F-15s run out of lifespan, and exactly what capabilities they need.

It makes sense to take a look at their options.

Yeah it could have been an april’s fool joke.

Those F-15s will have to hold long enough to be replaced by F-35s or something of new generation. Even if they put flight restrictions on them on speed and Gs for the last years…

They are talking about for air policing.

While the USAF is saying news of the F-15’s demise has been greatly exaggerated, the service’s head of Air Combat Command also outlined the increasing costs to keep the Eagle flying. The F-15 would require a series of service life extension programmes including a center fuselage overhaul estimated at $40 million per unit, Gen Mike Holmes told reporters during a 29 March event in Washington.

“I’m probably not going to do that,” he says. “So the question is, what year does that happen at the rate we’re flying them and then there’s an end out there and somewhere in the late 20s that you either have to put $30 million or $40 million an airplane into them or stop flying them.”

If the USAF retires the F-15, then the service could use block 52 F-16s with a modernized AESA radar to fulfill the Eagle’s domestic air defense role, Holmes says.

Basically they are comparing the cost of an extensive life extension/modernization program for an old F-15, against some new build F-16s, in the domestic air defense role.

They aren’t talking about replacing all F-15s with F-16s, if that were the case they would cancel the 6th generation/PCA effort.

I don’t see the point in comparing Block 50 with F-35. If anything it should be block 60.
Or perhaps F-2?

Yeah, lets focus on country specific sub variants that make up less than 200 of the total >4,000 F-16s produced, and that aren’t slated to be replaced by F-35s.

By all means, show us the data on the F-2 and F-16 Block 60.

Why would I need to bookmark it? 590 or 620, it doesn’t change squat.. The original quote that the F-16 has longer combat radius than the F-35 is valid.. There is absolutely nothing to argue about..

Except, no, it doesn’t. Other than that though you are right on target.

Sooo.. Unspecified high would most likely mean at optimum cruise altitude. For the sake of figures advs if nothing else.

And i take it also there is no combat(no AB duration or maneuvering) range, but just maximum cruise range, or?

A “combat radius” without any combat would be pretty useless I think, don’t you?

I suspect the combat time is minimal however… if you read the Janes article I quoted it allowed for 1-min of combat time at maximum radius.

And in which altitude flight profile is this done?

Unspecified “high,” as would be expected for an air to air mission. (and why the range is longer than the strike profile tracked in the SAR that bring_it_on provided)

Well hint : type NATO MACE Xii and Rafale about S300. About RBE2, it evolves constantly. Yes when it was inducted they decided to stay on same modes as the PESA. Do you really think it is a static config? NEw modes are arriving next year. Anw, we should have a fair comparison here.

Which new modes specifically? Even if the radar gets a software patch it is still early 90s tech with a new antenna. You could do worse, but you could certainly do better.

We will see. EPAF was nice. Training in France also. Where will pilot train? .

Who cares if training is in France? Do you really think a country is going to pick a plane based on where the training is? There is going to be F-35 training happening all over Europe.

Remember “5th Gen” is a LM gimmick about F-22 (and it is true in US context, it is THEIR 5th Gen). (And btw, F-35 do not comply with LM’s own definition of 5th Gen). Citing data fusion and data links as revolutions is maybe true in US context. It is not worldwide. Oh i forgot! µIt US so it is uber alles.

I remember when all the fanboys used to claim that 5th generation was a marketing ploy. Of course now we have the F-35, F-22, PAK FA, J-20, J-31, and several emerging programs in Korea, Japan, Turkey, India. It is getting harder and harder to pretend the evolution of fighter aircraft stopped when the Rafale flew isn’t it?

The fundamental truth is that the Rafale is an excellent 4th generation fighter, but that it has its roots in the early 1980s. Conceptually it was advanced in the late 1990s, but time doesn’t stand still. You can’t honestly expect it to stay competitive with jets decades newer with more advanced technology and more advanced operational concepts.

Btw hopsalot, AdA was very happy with the change from US modules to European ones. Much more regularperformances among modules.

Even if I believed you, and I don’t, the deficiency was almost certainly with the French engineers who had never built a fighter AESA before. The US had no difficulty with hits own AESAs, of multiple different designs from multiple venders. Shoot, the USA had more fighters with AESAs flying when France first trialed an AESA antenna on the RBE2 than France has flying today.

You are also seeking to compare the modules the US was willing to export in the early 2000s with what Europe is producing a decade+ later.

Physical division of the antenna is coming (MELBAA programfunded in (2014) that will allow simultaneous allowment of diferent parts of the antenna to different tasks. (nad not switching very rapidly like APG81) for ex. I let you guess what will be the next step when will be demonstrated the capability to phusically separate several antennas of a sinle radar…

I am not sure that will offer much real utility, especially given the small antenna in the Rafale.