The Harrier never VIFF’d in combat or in combat training. It was a “paper” capability.

I said “relatively cold” meaning cold when compared to temperature of a PC.

Ingestion of these gases was a problem, yes, and I never said it wasn’t, simple, the exhaust from the engine without PC is necessarily colder than with PC, and it is spread between several nozzles (not vanes, sorry) rather than a single large blowtorch of the F-35

The rear nozzle of the X-32 was a single “torch” and the forward nozzles were of the same temp as the rear. No such thing as “relatively cold” as the forward nozzles wer not only the same temp, but had to actually provide more thrust than the rear nozzle as they were much closer to the CoG than the rear nozzle.

Arguing the F35 is agile/maneuvrable compared to most 4th jets is simply silly. It has plenty of other qualities but maneuvrability is not its strong area.

You should let the pilots know since they haven’t got the memo yet.

The F-35A was not designed to be an air superiority fighter, but the pilots interviewed conveyed the picture of a jet that will more than hold its own in that environment—even with its current G and maneuver restrictions. In the words of an F-16C Weapons School Graduate and instructor pilot now flying the F-35A, “Even pre-IOC,[26] this jet has exceeded pilot expectations for dissimilar combat. (It is) G-limited now, but even with that, the pedal turns[27] are incredible and deliver a constant 28 degrees/second. When they open up the CLAW, and remove the (7) G-restrictions, this jet will be eye watering.”[28]

http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2016/08/operational-assessment-of-the-f-35a-argues-for-full-program-procurement-and-concurrent-development-process?_ga=1.243634117.1508700244.1481755348#_ftn28

No he does not.. he want’s prices for F-18s that are “comparable” in order to foster competition. Unfortunately that may be illegal as LM already won the X-32/35 battle and to make them compete again when the F-18 is most definitely NOT “comparible” may be a non-starter.

I did not say he lied, I said that his comments were not in context and could be easily explained by the “setups” of the simulation.

Given that the F-35 has been playing in multiple real-world exercises (which are not scripted like that simulation) and has been handing 4th gen fighters their a$$es, it’s safe to assume that not only can the F-35 hold it’s own, it’s living up to the hype. When 12 F-35As (with Block3i) go to Red Flag in 2017 and dominate, what will the excuse be as to why it was so good? Will you claim that even the foreign guests were in on the hoax?

btw, Please stop comparing that CLAWs test to any kind of combat scenario… you’re just embarrassing yourself.

er, so, according to you, a Lt-Col (basically, a combat pilot that was doing it for a couple of decades at least, who is part of a huuge program doesnt “understand” how the testing is supposed to go??? talk about a ridiculous statement…

Not any more ridiculous to say that when he held back talking about it for over a decade (not even in his own country) and waited till just before he took a job with an F-35 competitor, that his comments had nothing to do with his upcoming job.

Well, what is a lie, especially when cost is discussed?

Fighter prices have always been quoted in Flyaway and could relate to a given year or be the average over the lifetime of the program. Nobody involved thinks that this is the “only” cost involved, but it is the cost of the airplane & engine itself.

Wheeler tried to imply that the DoD is not being honest about the costs by saying things like:

They do not include money the Pentagon will spend to fix design errors discovered in testing now and in the future.

and

These figures are not the “sticker price.”

On the concurrency prices, any new items found will be paid for 100% by LM, just as they did with the PAO insulation issue. Current (ie LRIP9+) buys are almost devoid of concurrency issues anyways since they are almost through with the SDD program and the jets will be delivered Block 3F.

He also tries to include the R&D contracts into the price calculation.

The funny thing about his $31 FY94 quote is that it specifically states what is involved, ie Flyaway Cost.

These are the projected “flyaway costs” per aircraft in FY1994 dollars, which program officials have
stated as affordability goals. As noted above on p. 4, flyaway cost represents a significant part
of an aircraft’s procurement cost but does not include the cost of all procurement items nor the
costs of R&D and military construction.

Note two things from that: 1) it was a “goal” and not a “promise”. 2) It was before the X-32/35 fly-off so capabilities & final spec were not known.

A more accurate calculation would be to look at the cost quotes when all the Specs & Features where known and the contract signed. The Dec2001 SAR says the Flyaway price of the F-35A was quoted at $45.66 mil in FY2002 dollars ($62.91 mil in FY2017 dollars). Bogdan’s $102 is not only not twice the $63, the $63 is the AVERAGE F-35A Flyaway price for the whole program and certainly should not be used to compare LRIP pricing. On a side note, the Dec2001 costs were based on a quick transition to 110 F-35As per year and they have since dropped that to 80 and even then much later in the ramp cycle. That will have a significant impact on pricing that is completely out of LM’s control.

Wheeler’s main argument failed on it’s face since he is trying to compare the Average cost of the F-35 to it’s LRIP cost while the whole time not explaining the difference to his readers thereby being intentionally deceptive.

Wheeler certainly puts the “D” in Disingenuous.