Originally posted by Werty

Surprisingly, when I saw some video types from the manufacturing procedure I was impressed to see that the production line of Rafale looked more let’s say “traditional” rather than the one of EF. The EF team has done great job in developing manufacturing procedures.

Which production line ?
the old one or the new one ?

Originally posted by user
The JSF is cheaper yes ? and it beats the EF hollow yes ? so why not buy the JSF ? its the future of all combat aircraft to come,

For all experts, the obvious future is UCAV, something that the JSF isn”t.
anyway, you’re just speculating here.
The JSF was supposed to be twice cheaper than EF2000/Rafale, that won’t be reach.

Originally posted by user

whats more its American.
:rolleyes:

And what ?

Originally posted by PILOTHGT
E-2 is great for ship ops but airframe much, much, much too small to be any use like AWACS and Phalcon.

Like comparing Renault Twingo with MPV Scenic

does size really matter ? Except for range of course.

An hawkeye with the state of the art electronic + radar must be quite good if you campare with an E-3 with older stuff.

Originally posted by Distiller
In a realistic aerial scenario? Sukhoi any time because there will always be far more Sukhois than Rafales around, purely on numbers built.

And what about the price of the maintenance ?
The manpower needed for a higher numbers of Su and of course, the reliability of the Su.

Originally posted by matt
HUH ?? Germany bargained stealth in exchange for the X-31????? :confused:

No, the USA asked Germany to give up the stealth project and in exchange offer them to join the X-31 studies.

A 5th gen fighter isn”t only a stealth fighter.

I think ppl still underestimated the F-22 on most aviation forum.

Anyway, about stealth only, the european ETAP r&d program has a target closer to the stealthness of the F-35 than F-22 and will be ready in several years (forget when).
Stealth projects from dassault are made with really small aircraft.
BAe would have problems if they wanted to do a stealth aircraft with european countries.

About Indian or Chinese 5th gen fighter, I would like to see a correct 4rth fighter first from them.

About Russia, perhaps they got enough technologies and knowledge to make a stealth firghter, but I would like to see some to confirm it.
The press release of RAM coating worth the Pravda articles of the USSR.

BTW the Lampyridae was so succesful that the USA had to accept Germany over an X-project (the X-31) to convince them to stop it. 😀

Originally posted by Srbin
no I meant Saudi Arabia not South Africa, Saudi Arabia was viewed as an potentional customer, what happend?

DAsasult had two main potential customers, Iraq and Saudi arabia.

But Iraq have been in war in early 80’s and didn’t want to buy a brand new system.

SA bought F-15 and Tornados and since the french decided to use a specific version of the mirage 2000 (the 2000N) for nuclear strike, the mirage 4000 fate was to stay a prototype.

For SA, I think that the choice mirage 2000 and 4000 would have been a much better one from an economical and operationnel point of view.