This kite had double the range compared to those…read the previous page. Engines burns 500 liters at economy cruise at 1000 km/h for 4 hours and 6 hours at drop tanks. And there seems to be very very little avionics in those cavities in X-32..as you can see yourself. We already fitted the radar there ( AN/APG-67 ).

This craft has second to none empty/loaded ratio. Mentioned several times here..all systems and solutions aimed to make it happen.

Bop was longer than X-32; http://www.seattlepi.com/business/article/Boeing-makes-once-secret-subsonic-Bird-of-Prey-1098820.php

This craft with monster size primitive jet was just 19.8 ft long.

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your design is laughable.
you have a puny radar in there.. but where’s the space for the avionics boxes, the computers.. your design doesn’t even have space for the HUD and there’s no room for an engine.
nice parking lot plane!

Well I think it is for the same reason they haven’t purchased far more Chinese fighters they are not that impressed with their Russian and Chinese jets.

here’s a dumb link I found
http://www.grandestrategy.com/2007/06/light-sabre-for-third-world-fc-1-jf-17.html
this guy thinks the jf-17 will be exported to 26 countries! 6 years later, still only 1 operator lol.
most of the countries on that list has since moved on to other aircraft.. that are much larger and heavier.

MiG-35 has never been built. The demonstrator is a MiG-29M2.

for customers.. better to take the less riskier alternative and go Su-35. its already been ordered by a major customer. its being built. its already got all its systems being worked on.

your designs look similar to the size of the bird of prey. but the bird of prey is just a tech demonstrator.. it cant be a fighter.

your designs have no room to house a radar and avionics that are useful for air combat. they are so small that the missiles are large in comparison meaning they will be very draggy.
Even if you could fit a radar in there, it would have poor range because its small..so you have no ability to effectively use a BVR missile
the designs are so small that the engines will also have to be small and with weak thrust, how will they carry all that up?
also no room for gas. the designs will fly nowhere.
nothing can also be placed internally.

lets look at the shortest 5th gen fighter

the entire interior is taken up by the engine. the area around the cockpit is entirely taken up by avionics. it can stay small because it has a big delta wing where the fuel is stored

The whole cheap JF17 thing hasn’t caught on with anyone, so I think it is a waste of time. Better solution than cheap fighters is a smaller number of quasi-stealth birds with a strong ground component (S-400) working in synergy.

What I would like to see is a single engine “Pak-fa” lite built on the basis of the new engines that will be entering service later this decade.
The other option is two advanced RD-33MKM variant.
Really I think it depends on what the RuAF decided to do in terms of MiG-29 replacement, and their engine choice will drive the Light Fighter (whatever and whenever that will appear, if ever).
So far they seem exclusively two engine interested (PAK-FA, PAK-Sha, potential MiG-31 replacement, not to mention Super Fulcrums and Flankers).

I used to think the JF-17 cheap thing was good for exports..but seeing as how the JF-17 is failing and how many of the “poor” countries end up going for Flankers, and rich countries going for Eagles to replace their light fighters.. makes me realize that small and cheap doesn’t really have a place when air combat is becoming more complicated requiring more range, avionics, and other things that take up space.

that said if Russia wants a single engine stealth, a x-32 type would be nice.. its quite compact yet has lots of range for its size and can lift quite a lot making it a medium fighter the size of a fat tejas.

Should Mig or Sukhoi look to build a single engine multi role jet using radars engines and avionics already in production to keep costs down something like a F-16 – J-10 a better JF-17 with a view to supporting Russian aliened air forces as a lot of them are now looking to replace they Mig-21’s and 23’s

Sukhoi did have an idea but unfortunately didn’t go with it

Hi Glendora,

Interesting stuff.

I found this article stating Italy will operate 58 Tornados up to 2025 with about 78 in service.

http://www.ainonline.com/aviation-news/ain-defense-perspective/2013-03-15/italy-will-further-upgrade-tornados-weapons

Tornado upgrades are:

RET6 – 18
RET7 – 15
RET8 -25

So will RET6 a/c be retired soon as well as 20 non-upgraded aircraft?

Also do tell more about AMX Squadrons and operations – we English speakers seldom here about this plucky little jet.

Storage is often as good as retirement. Very often “stored” aircraft are not stored well and require extensive rebuilding to make them operational. More often than not they rot on airfields before being scrapped.

I think most of Eastern Europe will head that way too.

Turkey has a toe hold on Europe. Kazakhstan does not.

I also didn’t include Armenia, Georgia and Azerbaijan as I don’t think they’re really part of Europe even though they have more of a claim than Kazakhstan.

Still awaiting details of latest defence cuts just announced. I wouldn’t be surprised if they do settle on an all F-16C/D Blk 50 fleet – it would make sense.

Finally added Montenegro and Moldova in the 0 jets category.

there’s a few ex soviet countries who’ve taken things out of storage and put then in active service again and I believe Ukraine did that with their mig-29s.
as for Kazakhstan, 12% of the country is in Europe. but then again if you don’t count Armenia, Georgia, and Azerbaijan..then you wouldn’t count this 12% either.