nocutstoRAFNot going to quote your post Bluewings as its rather long.
Firstly going to give kudos to the French pilots who went into to Libya, they must have big brassy ones to fly into Libya on the first attack runs before SEAD/DEAD missions were carried out, but it is hardly evidence of having better than normal defence aids – just look at Israeli attack on the Syrian nuclear reactor, sure it was far from the concentration of the Syrian air defences, but they still evaded Syrian air defences and I suspect the only evidence which would convince me that there is a large difference between SPECTRA and other cutting edge defence aids is the kind I am never going to see (like technical reviews by the Indian Air force). As I said before I was willing to accept there might be a small difference, but I find your overenthusiastic description of SPECTRA and the Rafale only causes me to become more and more of a doubting Thomas as it gives the impression you are rather unbiased in your beliefs, which I sure is not your intent but I have never been good with enthusiasm.
I doubt even with my degree in chemistry, a Master’s in material’s science and 5 years research experience I would understand technical papers on the differences, for example I thought a Bragg Cell was a type of optical switching device not something to do with frequency sweeping, I would also be surprised if there were proper (i.e. peer-reviewed) papers fully describing the science as I imagine that they are both commercially sensitive and state secrets.
Surprised by the A.I. reference, presumably you talking about using a neural network to speed up identification of sources rather than say heuristic techniques?
nocutstoRAFOTOH , Typhoon ‘s main task and from the very begining was to provide air dominance , whatever people think .
Stealth and discretion were not such deciding factors , more like aerodynamics at high speed and high altitude , better than average dogfighting capabilities , raw engine power to keep the energy high , good internal fuel due to delta wings , etc … .
Not going to dispute your argument as I suspect nothing will ever persuade you, but taking your point, as the Typhoon (at least as far as the RAF were concerned, as this seems to have driven the development of the defence aids) was designed to operate in the cold war scenario of bringing down Soviet bombers while facing overwhelming numbers of fighters. So basically you looking for defence aids that can handle, identify, prioritise and jam multiple threats while being subject to EW, so I would be surprised if Praetorian DASS (the new brand name so to speak from 2012) is massively behind SPECTRA and to be honest I think that the actual situation is that Dassault and Thales are absolutely brilliant at marketing and they are broadly on par. Still the Rafale is the better looking plane.
BTW thanks to whoever corrected the meaning of ESM, looking at the Selex web-site it says “The passive Electronic Support Measures (ESM) together with the active Missile Approach Warner (MAW) work in harmony with other on-board sensing systems to give timely warning and identification of threats ” this does not sound very different to how SPECTRA is advertised offering the ability to passively fully detect threats (i.e. indentify, classify and range)
.
Links (which will all have seen but I need to include if I do not want to fall foul of the moderators): http://www.selexgalileo.com/EN/Common/files/SELEX_Galileo/Products/Praetorian.pdf
http://www.thalesgroup.com/Pages/Solution.aspx?id=3243
Now I going to ask one final dumb question before I start work (for some strange reason my boss is not keen on me surfing the net in work time): Did Dassault offer SPECTRA as part of the package for MMRCA, or was it a dumb downed version?
nocutstoRAFHi snafu352,
I was working on the general rule of thumb that US avionics tends to be slightly ahead of the European market and they usually share this technology with Israel (who obviously need to make sure their defence aids/ECM are top notch). This is of course a bias so I could be wrong but I might be hard to persuade 😉
Of course a lot depends on how good the BAE produced AN/ASQ-239 Barracuda for the F-35 will be when compared to the ESM/ECM sub-system of DASS used on RAF Typhoon’s or how good Thales SPECTRA really is.
Finally, I will admit only to being an air chair expert (i.e. mostly clueless) on this subject area, for example what is the difference between ESM (Electronic Surveillance System) and ELINT when talking about defence aids, my wikipedia level read of the subject material suggest they are both about locating, identifying, classifying, and recording radar signals?
nocutstoRAFPilot training in France is more advanced on Rafale than Typhoon pilot training for the same reasons , Rafale Pilots are also becoming “omnirole” , thanks to the aircraft .
I think that you may be over-egging the pudding just a bit here, if pilot training is more advance in France it is because your willing to pay for it, which I think you should be very proud of. The RAF had previously cancelled routine training in A2G combat for the Typhoon pilots due to budget cuts and kept a small cadre qualified. This is straight from this months AFM.
BTW can anyone point me to concrete confirmation that SPECTRA includes active cancellation technology . If there is nothing concrete then I am inclined to believe that SPECTRA is likely to be on par to DASS or any other advanced self-defence system (and personally I would expect Israeli and US systems to be slightly ahead of European systems here), and that the reason that all these self-defence systems work so well is that they have an excellent threat analysis capability combined with a high level of self-automation when it comes to self-protection jamming.
nocutstoRAFBingo…
Thanks Jonesy.
They may just be proposing it, it doesn’t mean they think they have a hope in hell of actually getting the contract.
Not that I am disagreeing with you but I am not sure we are talking about the same thing here. I am wondering why SAAB needed to talk to the MoD about a project aimed at Brazil (and while they say India I think they missed their window there). There are only a two reasons I can see for needing to talk to the MoD. The first is that they need some sort of licence to set up a defence company in the UK and they have just got it, the second is that SAAB need access to IP owned by the MoD and just got an agreement to do so. I am not trying to suggest that the talked to the MoD as the MoD are interested in this project (and if MoD are interested, surely it was low blow to announce this story while Obama was visiting)
As I said before I cannot see the point of this design exercise – to back this point up further I think it should be pointed out that the UK is not going to operate three different types of fast jet, that even if it did it cannot afford to maintain reasonable sized fleets of each type, so even if the Sea Gripen met all the KPI of the JSA I cannot ever see the MoD having the cash to operate a mix of Typhoons, F-35C (as Tornado replacement) and Sea Gripen.
Plus I cannot see them getting enough sales of the Sea Gripen to justify the development costs – no expert but I be surprised if this project made sense on anything less than 150 Sea Gripen sold, and there is at best a market for what – 60 world wide, possibly more if the F-35B is cancelled?
nocutstoRAF….but it also makes the ships, to get into that market in the first place, a good deal more expensive and inaccessible than ever before. Unless you believe that Sea Gripen will be able to STOBAR hop from a short deck carrier with any more than the ability to carry a matchbox the length of a football pitch!
Just trying to understand your point here Jonesy, are you saying that going for a small CATOBAR carrier would be too expensive and a STOBAR version of the Sea Gripen too limited?
Also I have a question which is open to everyone. Is it normal for defence companies to talk to the MoD before starting a new project not aimed at the UK defence market?
To quote the article:
The Swedish company announced its plan following a 24 May meeting with Ministry of Defence officials in London, where it is also to open a new headquarters to accommodate the project team.
Does this mean that SAAB needed the MoD’s permission, or that the project will involve IPR owned by the MoD?
Personally I am struggling to see how SAAB will get this to work unless they want to demonstrate the ability to build a carrier based aircraft in order to get consultancy work in future Indian aircraft programmes.
nocutstoRAFI was surprised to read this week-end (in Sukhoi Su-25 Frogfoot: Close Air Support Aircraft by Gordon Yefrim and Alan Dawes) that the Russian’s were applying “radio” absorbent coatings (as it was designed to reduce RCS against ground radars I assume it was some sort of RAM coating) to the fuselage, absorbent films to the canopy and modifying the intakes and engine to reduce the IR signature of the Su-25 during its development in the 80’s, with various modifications added incrementally from around 81 – 90. According to the book a more stealthy Su-25 was exhibited in an air show in Paris in 92 without the new engines, but with all the other modifications visible.
Therefore it would seem that current generation of stealth modifications are simply a reflection that previous efforts to reduce RCS and IR signature are simply not good enough any more.
nocutstoRAFI agree with you RN Phantom, but only if they then actually buy an off-the shelf product to fill the scout and utility roles, otherwise we are back to square one with old kit needing replacement while the MoD tries to come up with something that’s “perfect” rather than good enough, all the time not entirely being sure what their definition of perfect is.
nocutstoRAFHow many Jaguars are there in storage ?
Sorry Super Nimrod I was being a tad flippant (though I think the Jaguar is an excellent aircraft and I would dearly love to see new build Jaguar using Honeywell engines, blending the carrier capable design that the French looked at back in the day, with the more agile FBW demonstrator, with wing-tip pylons for ASRAAM. I rather see us build 60 new Jaguar’s than bring the Harrier back). My point was that we might as well wish for the Jaguar to come back as the Harrier, as it is as likely.
However from what I can tell back in 2007 Everett Aero had a good number of Jaguar’s for sell, but beyond persistent rumours of Jaguars being in storage I cannot find any evidence that there are any that could be brought back into service, and Everett only has one serviceable Jaguar for sale now.
Sources:
http://www.everettaero.com/
http://www.airsceneuk.org.uk/hangar/2007/435jags/jags.htm
nocutstoRAFIf we are going to spend loads of money bring an aircraft into service under UOR to take account of the pressure on the Tornado and Typhoon squadrons, would it not be better to take our Jaguar’s out of storage, give them a full service, and get them back in service? They had a good upgrade before they retired, and they are perfect for the role in Libya, zooming around in the sand with a couple of Paveway’s, and as an added bonus for the RAF, they do not need to put them on a carrier, and they could likely reassemble the pilots to fly them from the old hands flying their way to retirement, and use them as a cadre to re-train some of their Harrier pilots who would otherwise be on the scrapheap, while leaving the FAA in the cold :diablo:
nocutstoRAFHi Pongoglo
Try this link:
http://www.baesystems.com/BAEProd/groups/public/documents/bae_publication/bae_pdf_qec_datasheet.pdf
It open’s fine for me.
nocutstoRAFI’m curious as to which Scavenger/Solomon air vehicle you are referring to here and which roles it would not be capable of achieving?.
No absolute need for MPA’s in de-lousing the Faslane approaches….
Merlin, ideally a hunting pair, is quite up to the task of rattling unfriendly sub skippers and de-lousing is about as good as ASW training, against fleet boats, gets these days. Too good a chance to pass up for the Merlin lads.
Sorry Jonesy I was interpreting the report referenced in the article Fedaykin’s post, where they said “In particular, the system has been touted as a means to take on some of the maritime surveillance tasks left unmet by the cancellation of the Nimrod MRA4 program”, which to me means that there are some maritime surveillance tasks that Scavenger could not handle.
I get that Merlin is the dog’s boll*cks, and the T23 is cutting edge ASW frigate, but is it really the best combo? Would it not be better to build a specialist ASW picket, with a smaller crew, and no secondary capabilities that operates in UK waters to screen the “boomers” as they exit Faslane, to free up the T23 for all the other roles we need it for?
nocutstoRAFInteresting story Fedaykin, if you take the links you have supplied which suggest us sending crews to operate with US P3/P8’s (and I have read over on PPRUNE Military that we are also trying to do the same with NZ’s P3’s when the come back into service), the fact that Scavenger will not be able to fill all our maritime patrol requirements, the fact that the Coastguard is thinking about buying maritime patrol aircraft to fill the gap, and the story a while ago that the RN was looking to spend a billion on new ASW aircraft, it looks like the MoD are really regretting cancelling MRA4.
nocutstoRAFIs there any more news on our negotiations with France for them to buying refuelling hours from our contract? I could imagine that if France does not buy refuelling hours (last I heard it was to expensive), and given the reduced sized of the RAF we would have more tankers than we need, so making them ISR platforms with off the shelf kit is a good idea.
nocutstoRAFHopefully no-one from the MoD read your post Badger, otherwise they might get a crazy idea to give them “popular names” in order to make sure that the public backs the carriers. I shudder at the thought of HMS Simon Cowell and HMS Katie Price :eek::eek::eek:
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