If the F-35 shall be roughly equally costly, then I somehow can’t understand the complaints about its extraordinary cost when SH is praised as rather affordable workhorse :confused: It clearly does not add up..

It comes down to which version of F-35 you need to buy. If you need to fly from an aircraft carrier then SH is going to be cheaper than F-35C. But if you don’t have an aircraft carrier, as is the case with Canada, then you would always purchase F-35A. In the Canadian context F-35A is likely cheaper or equivalent to SH while offering greater range, payload, better sensors and cheaper overall life time cost. The Canadians get to purchase at partner price and take advantage of all the benefits this offers. Not so with the Sh which would at best be FMS, has only two operators and will be out of production in 5 years max.

Thx for the explanation. Even SpudmanWP couldn’t do it better.
So they will manage to stay clear of the problematics later block upgrades like on EF T1-T-3 etc.

They will try. As SpudWP said above there will be hardware changes and eventually the fleet will diverge, likely when the ADVENT is put into the jet as this may require some internal changes to make use of the additional airflow. That will probably mean two distinct fleets that will likely share everything except engine and some internal mods.

Still.. I feel the F-35 development has taken so long time now that it has seen multiple block upgrade, and the Jury is still out..
For me it speaks about putting out fire, rather than chasing the golden dragon.

I would put that down to development in the internet age over actual time frames. We are spoilt today with access to the F-35 program and I cannot think of any military fighter project that has been so open with project information.

I cannot recall having seen a detailed roadmap for when different capabilities will be rolled out?

Have you seen such a thing? If yes, when and where?

The radar modes that will support A2G employment of weapons won’t be available until at least 2023 but given the ongoing delays I expect it may be a year later than expected. The timeline was posted on here a number of months, perhaps even a year ago now and pretty sure it is in this thread.

Does anyone know the status of Botswana’s potential order for 8 Gripen C/D, was it signed or are the two governments still in negotiation?

typical David Axe partial truth and partial “Axisms”. But there is no doubt in the uptick of losses this year. Also no doubt that stretching the service life of Marine and Navy legacy Hornets was/is questionable in terms of financial and feasable outcomes.

I thought David couldn’t make himself look any stupider he has excelled himself and gone to a new level… A clearly knee jerk article that has little research into actual Hornet fatigue and expected life.

Curious if the Canadian F-18 fleet avg. service life is available.

Pretty sure they released the entire fleet age maybe 6 months ago but I can’t seem to find it.

In the mean time, here is a reasonably comprehensive report on the whole replacement option including expectations on CF-18 sustainability, http://www.tpsgc-pwgsc.gc.ca/app-acq/amd-dp/air/snac-nfps/eorfcf18-eorcf18ff-eng.html#no4b

Save the PDF though, the facts don’t match with current Liberal thinking and the report will likely be removed, like a host of others already have…

http://www.jsf.mil/contact/con_faqs.htm

Just so we are clear, your source is a quote from 2006, before any of the F-35 variants flew?

Given that you have taken this as 100%, does that mean we can take every other statement that is/was ever made by the JSF program Office and LM as 100% accurate too?

http://www.hilltimes.com/2016/12/07/government-quietly-signed-f-35-memorandum-march-despite-election-promise/90257

Here is the root of the problem; duplicity in what the Liberal gov is saying publicly, then signing a tentative aquisition schedule as required by partner nations. The Trudeau government wants to continued to reap the industrial benefits of staying in the program while generating negative publicity. Paying JPO to stay a partner nation and submitting updated aquisition schedules every six months, all while championing an “open competition” and sole sourcing an interim buy.

The amusing part remains that Canada would almost certainly see overall lower acquisition and sustainment costs by purchasing via the proposed F-35 schedule than going for an interim and then subsequent buy as well as overall higher industrial participation.

This also confirms, for those who still cannot grasp the concept, that acquisition of the F-35 is required to stay in the program.

http://www.thespec.com/news-story/6998448-department-of-national-defence-removes-report-critical-of-interim-fighter-jet-purchase-from-websit/

No surprise here, operating two fleets will be more expensive long term.

That is quite amusing. I have posted that exact document here a number of times and now apparently it has classified information… The Liberal party has taken another step down the ladder of credibility. If only anyone in Canada actually cared about the selection.

Canada could opt to buy Super Hornets wired to become Growlers, but to fill what need? Certainly one could argue that an extra squadron of Growlers would be useful for coalition operations etc, but operating/maintaining/training for that mission would entail a significant ongoing devotion of resources. Normally that sort of decision wouldn’t be made in such a hurried manner and with such weak justification.

Money is not the only issue. Canada would need to be brought into the Growler community. So far the only nation to be admitted into the US tactical EW squadrons are the Australians and that came after years of negotiation. It is far from a certainty that Canada would be admitted…