pfcemTooCool_12f,
For the umteenth time from the GAO ruling…
We find from our review of the solicitation that the offerors were unambiguously informed that their proposals would not receive additional consideration or credit for exceeding a KPP objective. This is true whether we look to the express provision itself, the meaning of which is plain, or whether we view this restriction within the context of the whole solicitation.
Please try & keep up. We are takling about EADS, not NG/EADS. NG has dropped out but EADS is ‘considering’ trying to bid without NG. The EADS KC-30 does not meet all USAF requirements. EADS needs more time because it was relying on NG to develope the systems which would allow the KC-30 to meet a number of the USAF requirements – so EADS needs to determine if it can develope said systems itself or with other partners.
Where do you get that Boeing does not see why? And just what am I acting in denial of?
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Some corrections to the Article from Defense-Update…
In general terms, the two platforms – Boeing 767 and Airbus 330 represent two different approaches to the mission, one aimed at lower life cycle cost, higher versatility of the fleet & more economical use of the entire air refueling assets while the other trys to trump that with greater capacity at a discount price made possible by illegal subsidies.
*
In the previous round the KC-X Source Selection Team ‘selected’ the larger Airbus but failed to assess the relative merits of the proposals in accordance with the evaluation criteria identified in the solicitation in doing so. And by its own calculations (once corrected for methematical errors in it initial calculations) the KC-30 was more costly over the program’s entire life cycle – although the difference was quite small. Boeing could have offered a larger aircraft but the 767 provided a lower cost platform that better conformed with the requirements set by the Air Force for the competition. Boeing asked the USAF if it wanted/preferred the 777 (with capacity greater than the A330) & was told no.
pfcemIn the future of air combat, noone really turns on the active radar unless wants to be shot at. Hence, I think the development of better passive sensors for the T-50 far outweights whether it has the best reduction in RCS.
Not true. Even the mighty AN/ALR-94 is intended to CUE the radar rather than be the actual targeting device itself. Of course if you are willing (or feel the need to in order to reduce the propability of being detected yourself) you CAN go for a “passive” shot but expect your pk to be rather poor compared to a proper ‘active target lock’ shot.
pfcemno shouting please!
It is NOT the RCS of a mable/golf ball, it no shouting please the RCS the size of a mable/golf ball (also expressed as -40/-30 dBsm).
A RCS is a no shouting please value requesenting the equivalent radar reflective no shouting please area of the object.
F-22 frontal RCS: -40 dB ~ ‘size of a marble’ ~ 0.0001-0.0002 sq m
F-35 frontal RCS: -30 dB ~ ‘size of a golf ball’ ~ 0.0014 sq m
And no shouting please they are only “ballpark” figures really only good as to infer the no shouting please of size.
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Detected only once, the F-35 is dead.
Not even close. IF you have any hope of your missile having a even double digit pk then you had better no shouting please have a fairly accurate track of the F-35 over a period of time (& then hope that the F-35 does not change speed, course or altitude). Even IF you are able to obtain a lock at the moment of firing it can easily be lost before the missile reaches the F-35 by which time the F-35 can be miles away from your last best detection/track/target data.
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You can often tell those who have no argument by looking at how they debate. It is pretty funny and very revealing to watch how sferrin and pfcem twist around like a fish out of the water.
Nic
I am not the one twisting.
pfcemErr just remind me again which set of figures has most accurately tracked the JSF price and its development.
Is it the Jet estimates or LM?
The JSF Program (that is LM & the USAF/DOD).
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Do you have a source for this?
Yes, much of what has been released by the Program Office/LM/USAF/DOD.
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The F-117 was also called a stealth “fighter” but we all know what it really was…
It is called propaganda to fool our enemies.
So far, there is no indication of that, whatsoever.
Yes there is. Of course it takes a little knowledge of aerodynamics, thrust, drag, et cetera.
BTW, I don’t know where you get that M1.5 BS from, supercruise is cruise @ >Mach 1 without afterburner.
The USAF/DOD says Mach 1.5. Sorry but SUPERCRUISE dones NOT = supersonic cruise no matter how much some would like it to be.
I see just loads of wishful thinking and no data.
Not wishfull thinking at all. YOU DO NOT NEED TO GO SUPERSONIC TO INTERCEPT AN ATTACKER!
More wishful thinking and still no data. 🙂
It hase been posted MANY times on this forum.
With the recenmt quotes I’d pray that it wasn’t three soon.
What recent “quotes”? The only thing ‘recent’ are BS projections that are not even based on the actual status of of the program.
What exactly do you know about maintenance cost of the F-35? At this stage not even its designers have slightest idea, just projections.
I know that the most recent cridble projection put the maintenance cost of the F-35A similar to the F-16 (was hoped to have been lower).
So we got here Wheeler vs two forum fanboys. Guess which figures would I take for granted?
No, we have Wheeler vs USAF budget documents. There are a number of governement wepbites where you can obtains a copy in pdf &/or xls format dating back to FY1998 (the individual service sites go back a bit further).
PLEASE, do not take the numbers I or SpudmanWP or ANYONE else posts for granted! Do some research & discover the truth for yourself.
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No, the reason LM uses M1.5 is because the F-22 did it, & no other fighter had.
No, LM uses it becasue that is what the USAF/DOD defined it as when chosing the term SUPERCRUISE to describe that specific requirement of the ATF.
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Always the squabbling about definitions!!
If people who did not like the established definitions for their own purposes would stop trying to change them there would be no need to.
Instead of picking up a dictionaryto look up the definition of a fighter, Pfcem, do some research on the history of the F-35 and how it evolved to JSF from JAST and from CALF. The requirement was for an affordable attack aircraft which could deliver ordinance with impunity, through the use of stealth and an excellent ability to defend itself with fighter-like qualities. I would say LM succeded in meeting all the requirements except, by all estimates, affordability.
It is YOU who needs to do some research. The F-35 & every previous (USAF) program which eventually lead up to it was FIRST & FORMOST A FIGHTER TO REPLACE THE F-16 FOR THE USAF. The USN had its F/A-18C/D replacement programs & the USMC had its AV-8B replacemement programs as well but eventually these programs merged to become the JSF program.
Just because the job of a modern fighter has changed to include attack abilities does not mean all attackers are now fighters.
NOBODY has ever said “all attackers are now fighters” but with very few acceptions most all fighters are used as attack aircraft.
pfcemI would question whether anyone posting here has enough inside knowledge of the engineering details of KC-X requirement and the Boeing and EADS designs to be able to categorically state that:
The truth is that EADS does have a product but it does not meet the requirements.
Boeing’s bid is MORE than competative & won’t change (except perhaps a greater possibility of GEnX engines) with any further delays WITH OR WITHOUT a competing bid.
It does not require ANY inside knowledge. The knowledge to make those statments is all public & well known to any who have even bothered to pay attention.
For example. We know that the EADS KC-30 does not meet all the USAF requirements since the SDD of the NG/EADS KC-30 is not zero (time OR money) AND NG/EADS even complained about the fixed cost of the SDD portion of the contract in this latest RFP since the KC-30 (I am not 100% sure if they mean the EADS KC-30 or the NG/EADS KC-X KC-30 they bid last round) does not meet 20% MANDATORY requirements & they are not sure as to the cost to develope what is needed to meet all MANDATORY requirements.
And as for…
The US has already shown it is serious about buying from allied nations. We buy plenty from allied nations AND if we were not serious about buying from allied nations we would not even allow them to bid for ANY us defense contract.
…can anyone name a major US weapon system that was procured from Europe in the last 40-50 years? AV-8A is the best example I can think of, and it was hardly a major acquisition. The follow-on AV-8B was a McDonnell Douglas programme.
In the late 1970s, the US Roland surface-to-air missile programme was hailed by the US as an example of how it was now prepared to adopt a major European weapon system. But look what happened to that – ‘nibbled to death’ by endless cuts in procurement and finally fielded briefly and in only token numbers by the National Guard.
Why does it have to be a ENTIRE MAJOR WEAPON SYSTEM? We buy bullets, guns, guidance systems & all kinds of other major & minor components to all kinds of systems from Europe (too many to even try to list them all). It is amazing what you can find out if you even bother do a little research yourself instead of asking others to do it for you.
The US has MORE THAN welcomed EADS in its efforts to recapitalize its tanker fleet. From talking with them in the late 1990’s about what commercial airframes could be utilized for as future tankers to sending them a RFI for the tanker lease to altering its requiremnt/criteria to accomodate the otherwise noncompetative KC-30 (which the USAF had already rejected) for the sake of competition, ALL THE WAY to now the latest 60 day extention to submit a bid to the latest RFP.
The last time I looked, the A330 had a backlog of almost 400 aircraft, and had delivered around 600 since 1993. So it seems to have a good production run ahead of it. But who knows what the A330 order book will look like when the first KC-X are due to become operational?
As of Feb 28, 2010 it is 386 but at a production rate of 8.5 PER MONTH that is not even a full 4 years worth of production. With the A330’s replacements ALREADY TAKING ORDERS (the 787 with 866 orders as of Feb 25 & the A350 with 505 orders as of Feb 28), the A330’s order book will look rather bleak when the first KC-X are due to become operational.
pfcemA semi “S” duct and blocker solution is probably as good for RCS reduction as a full “S” duct – unless you believe Sukhoi engineers are blundering idiots.
What they got out of it though is probably more fuel and armament space.
I seriously doubt it is ‘as good’ but have no problem accepting that it is ‘good enough’ to obtain a quite low RCS.
pfcemSound thinking, MadRat, on the coulda-been F-111 potentials. I’ll agree with you there.
Going forward though, perhaps the best and most realistic US 4.99 class potential could be in a full-circle F-16Xx modernization development.
First block could be a simplified delta/cranked-delta config and the optimal off-the-shelf upgrades (simply amazing to hear gen. Schwartz finally utter the OTS words, btw). Add 33k lb class engine. Call it a day.
An evolved Block II could ultimately conform more along the tailless F-16X airframe concept envisioned. I’m pretty sure it would still have legs as satisfying the most economical, efficient and upgradeable ‘low mix’ capabilities through 2035.
But would ultimately both cost MORE & take MORE time to developed then to continue with the F-35 at this point.
pfcemThat’s funny it described as the U.S. Air Force Multirole aircraft (primary-air-to-ground) to replace the F-16 and A-10 and complement the F/A-22 on the JSF website.
You STILL do not get what fighters are today. No matter HOW you try to spin it the #1 reasoning/design purpose of the F-35(A) is to replace the F-16. More F-35s will replace F-16 around the world than they will ALL OTHER TYPES COMBINED.
You have to admit it would be called the JFS if it was a fighter first!!
Pick up a grade school grammer book. The ‘joint’ AND the ‘strike’ in Joint Strike Fighter are adjectives.
I suppose you can call the JSF a fighter in much in the same way a Tornado GR.1 is a fighter, it has a cannon and carries AtoA weapons, if your generous is could be on par with the Tornado F.3 😉 Which is a pure fighter optimised design. I think you know what I getting at.
No the F-35 is a muti-role fighter in the same way the F-16, F/A-18, Mirage 2000, Rafale, Typhoon, Mig-29 et cetera are. That is a FIGHTER with significant ground attack capability (since procuring & operating FIGHTERS with significant ground attack capability) is more cost-effectibve then procuring & operating separate FIGHTERS & attack aircraft.
Yes because of supercruise -the Typhoon and others can supercruise which means the JSF having to engage burners if it want to merge unless the Typhoons mission planners actually want to come right down the throat of the opposition for some obscure reason only known to the JSF combat modelling simulations.
Except that in all likelyhood the F-35 CAN cruise supersonically. The F-22 & T-50/PAK FA are the only fighters today that can truly SUPERCRUSE (cruise @ >Mach 1.5 without afterburner). And the attacker can be going Mach 3 but an ‘interceptor’ does not need to even go supersonic in order to intercept it, it just needs to be in the right place at the right time – something MUCH easier to do when the attacker does not know where the ‘interceptor’ is.
Ahh I see what your driving at, the JSF is totally different as it doesn’t need to be capable of using “lethal precision weapons to suppress, defeat, destroy, deceive or influence a range of enemy targets,”
Did you actually read it?, OK what is the JSF primary mission??
This thing does it better and longer… and I’ll warrant its much cheaper too…
No, the F-35 is totally different because it is a multi-role FIGHTER while what you linked to is ‘just’ an armed drone. If YOU had read it (& better yet done more reseach – such as reading the actual RFI) you would have know that it was ‘just’ an armed drone like the Reaper/Avenger.
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How the JSF will match/exceed the speed of a Supercruiser without lighting up like a Christmas tree.
It doesn’t need to.
How does the JSF know there is a bogey inbound?, you could say AWACS, but a few Awacs killing AtoA missiles will flush the JSF out, either they fire their limited AtoA weapons on destroying the inbounds or they lose the tanker either through it being destroyed or moving back to safety.
The same ways ANY ‘intercepor’ would. :rolleyes: The BIG difference however is that the attackers are MUCH less likely to ‘see’ the F-35s in order to know they are being intercepted.
You could say LPI radar but once detected the distance between JSF and target must be closed to less ~50km this is where a Supersonic dash is required, but the JSF will require afterburner thus negating its stealth advantage.
You have no clue what you are talking about. IF the F-35 were to require afterburner then the only current fighters in its place that may not is the F-22 & T-50/PAK FA.
OK whats the target?, if its fixed then a cruise missile does the job far better than a JSF who’s carrying a potential hostage if it all goes tlts up.
If its mobile then a JSF wandering around looking for targets of oppertunity in a double digit SAM envelope is sheer madness.I can’t think of one mission where the JSF is the most suitable aircraft for the job! AtoA = F-22, destroying a fixed site = cruise missile, destroying a moving target = brimstone from a UAV, the list goes on. (I’d be interested if you can think of one?)
IMHO the JSF is an aircraft looking for its mission and at its current price it’s not looking good.
Cheers
You clearly do not understand modern air warfare.
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The a-10, one of the planes that this thing has to replace holds 16 000 pounds
The F-16 holds 17,000 lb
this means that 16000/4000 = 4 JSF are needed to do the same job as a single f-16 or A-10
If the F-16 sacrifices half of its payload for external fuel then one still needs 2 JSF for each F-16
unless, of course, you give up on stealth and use external stores.
also 2 2000lb JDAM is not the same as 4 500lb JDAM. Can the JSF store 4 500lb JDAM or is it by default limited to two shots?
The A-10 & F-16 VERY RARELY carry anything anywhere near 16,000 lbs of ordanance. The most common ground attack loadouts these days are TWO ‘2000 lb’ munitions or FOUR ‘1000 lb’ munitions or SIX ‘500 lb’ munitions. In the future (for the US anyway) the most common will be EIGHT ‘250 lb’ SDB for the most common targets (said to be adequite for 80% of all targets) or TWO ‘2000 lb’ munitions for those that require the extra punch – which the F-35 can carry internally.
Even WITH external stores the F-35 is more stealthy than any 4th or 4.5 generation fighter with an equivalent payload. And as for external stores the F-35A has the same number of weapons stations rated at the same weight as the F-16 (F-16 has two wintip stations good only for AAMs but the F-35 has four internal stations – and can fly farther on ‘just’ internal fuel than a F-16 can with two 370 gal drop tanks).
We don’t need the F-35 for air superiority or first day of the war. This is F-22 domain
The only service with F-22s is the USAF & it isn’t even getting HALF the number of them as it needs.
It can’t compete with 30 year old designs for CAS or gound attack
Quite the opposite, 30 year old designs for CAS or gound attack can’t compete – which is why they are to be replaced with the muh superior F-35.
Its STOVL capacities are put in question (as is the need to have those capabilities)
Not by any who currently operate or have a future need for STOVL capacities…
and there are persistent rumours that it is less agile than an old F-105
No rumers just complete BS by those with ‘reason’ to see the F-35 fail. A COMBAT LOADED F-35A is as agile as a CLEAN Block 50 F-16C!
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if i need stealth, i will use f-22
Again, only ONE service in the entire world has (or is going to get) F-22 & it does not (& unlikley will get) even HALF the number of them it needs.
if i don’t need stealth, I will use the two F-16 that I bought instead of a single f-35
First you won’t be able to by two F-16 for the price of one F-35 by the time the F-35 reaches full rate production.
Second, procurement cost is a surprisingly low % of total cost of ownership. For example the KC-X which has a projected $35-40 million developement & procurment cost will have >$100 million in total life cycle cost. Even IF you could buy two F-16s for the cost of one F-35 it would cost SO much more to own those two F-16s vs one F-35 (yes I know there is a need for a certain minimum number of airframes & that one F-35 can not do all that two F-16 can do).
by the way; which enemy requires stealth in the next 10 years?
Why limit it to the next 10 years? The USAF won’t even get its last F-35A (which will remain in service for a couple decaded after) for three decades – for the math impared the F-35A is projected be in USAF service into the 2060s. You go to battle with what you HAVE, not what you wish you had.
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Would’ve thought that you of all people would’ve known that its primerily designed as a bomber not a fighter.
Quite the opposite. It is primarily designed as a FIGHTER. But of course these days, being a FIGHTER it was designed to have significant ground attack capabilities as well as air-to-air capabilities.
But go ahead & keep on spinning. Here is hoping our future enemies are in as much of a denial about the F-35’s air-to-air capabilities are you are. 🙂
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8% increase in range with 30% increase in fuel by using external tanks is … not really impressive, to say the least. Are those numbers correct?
No, the “8% increase in range with 30% increase in fuel by using external tanks” numbers are not correct.
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See
$200m JSF
or the actual details here
OMG how much!!it’s like shooting fish in a barrel isn’t it.
No those numbers are VERY pessimistic (based on JET II projections) & not based on reality. But even IF you ignorantly accept the latest cost projections that is STILL an average flyaway cost of ~$81.91-97.27 million in FY2010 dollars – so STILL not the $>100 million wet dreams of many naysayers.
And Wheeler’s cost data for the F-22 & F-35 are incorrect. Both SpudmanWP & I have posted the ACTUAL budget numbers a number of times now which paint a VERY differnet picture than Wheeler is trying to pass off.
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Reading details and doing research is never a waste of time..:)
But expecting/hoping that many people will bother to do so IS – even when other have done most of it for them.
pfcemOne doesn’t have to try very hard. Full ‘S’ duct, half ‘S’ duct or whatever, the engines are certainly not straight-thru, line-of-sight “as some were trying so hard to convince everyone…”
On the contrary. If not for the radar blocker there would be a direct line of sight from head on to ~50% of the T-50/PAK FA engine face. Not a ‘staight on’ 100% like the Flanker (for example) but no s-duct that COMPLETELY conceals the engine face like the F-22 & F-35.
…Oh, I’m sorry. I forgot you’re the same guy who set up that de facto ‘Anti PAK-FA’ thread that got you infracticulated & banned. In which case you can totally ignore this post.
It wasn’t an ‘Anti PAK-FA’ thread. I knew full well you would not get its intnet (as some did) but incorrectly assumed more of the moderators here.
pfcemI think you are right there, only with a non-afterburner can you hide the butt,
like B-2 and a plethora of UCAV, those can claim “all aspect stealth” (meaning, including rear aspect).With afterburners, it is more appropriate to claim “various aspects, various degree of stealth, some without”
Its called a radar blocker. 😉
pfcemThe JSF is a jack of all trades, it isn’t primarily designed as a fighter so has to suffer the engineering consequences of being dual purpose (its actually much worse than this in reality as its three aircraft types trying to be dual use.)
The F-35 IS primarily designed as a fighter. But fighters have become a ‘jack of all trades’ – dedicated/single mission oriented interceptors & attack aircraft have gone out of style (primarily for economic reasons).
Ok the AtoA issue really is the speed x distance, a supercruiser gives shorter time to react and an even smaller time to intercept, the game for the attacker is to use supercruise to bypass the JSF, the JSF will be forced to use reheat to play catch up ( or to get into a firing solution) exposing it to IR detection, or to not use reheat and fail to intercept the target.
And (aside from an attacker being MUCH less likely to know where the F-35 intecepting it is) is that any different from any 4th or 4.5 generation fighter?
If the JSF is forced to use reheat, the fuel issue becomes a problem, is probably a moot point with the JSF now as I see it’s time is nearly over see JSF’s Replacement
Do you even bother to read what you link to? That is no F-35 replacement. It is a USN carrier-borne equivalent of the Reaper armed recon drone.
pfcemList the problems with Many S-ducts vs Single S-ducts. A simple fan-blades like radar blocker is one thing and 3-d extension of blocker into many s-ducts is another. From a purely technical radar returns standpoint, how is many s-ducts approach(Multiple-Ducts-before-Engine) going to give more(or less) returns compared to Engine-in-a-duct approaches F-22(full s-duct) and YF-23(partial s-duct)?
I still fail to see absence of the S-duct as any “problem”. So don’t tell me about my serious reading comprehension problems, especially you not.
STILL missing it. I never said there was a problem with the T-50/PAK FA radar blocker. What I said was there was NOT an s-duct as some were trying so hard to convince everyone was there.
S-duct means little if the engine face still could be seen from many angles. In the configuration as it was, the YF-23 could not rely solely on the S-duct.
http://www.aim120.com/yf23blackwidow.asp
[4th one from top]
I never said the YF-23 did not ALSO have a radar blocker but that UNLIKE the T-50/PAK FA it DOES have a very noticable s-duct.
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None did claim said except pfcem. 😀
Wrong. It is well known “rule of thumb”. YOUR numbers are obviously BS YOU made up for the purpose of making you point of ‘diminishing returns’ more significant.
Your limited understanding aside, my claim was about the level of reduction. From a given point the efforts are no longer justified by the gains from that.
The best compromise of that is dependent from the demands of the related system to even out the advantages in some areas. 😎
Of course the ‘big picture’ reduction from say 1/8 to 1/16 is less overall from say 1/2 to 1/4. BUT it is still ~1/2 reduction in range for ever order of magnitide reduction in RCS. Some might say that 1/8 vs 1/16 is not THAT significant – but that is today, what about some time from now if/when some counter to stealth MAY be found…
pfcemI don’t see any S-duct there. And I don’t think there will be any in the future. If YF-23 was perfectly happy with a radar blocker, then why not T-50?
From what I know, the concept of S-ducts was known way before T-50 was born and I suppose that Russians evaluated this approach, as well. If they have decided for a radar blocker instead, then they probably know why.
You have a serious reading comprehension problem. THERE IS NO S-DUCK (unless like Otaku you count the radar blocker as many S-ducks)! That IS the ‘problem’. There have been plenty of people who were adamant that there WAS an S-duck & tried to show there fantasy of duck path.
The YF-23 HAD an S-duck.
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Of intrest is the X-band of the firing radar mainly.
The related RCS is not linear and the reduction level will be a compromise for the main need in mind. To be a factor 10,100 or even 1000 better does not bring much for the practical needs.
0,1 does nearly half the range of the firing radar
0,01 does bring that down to one third
0,001 just one fifth
0,0001 just one tenth
More like…
0.1 ~1/2
0.01 ~1/4
0.001 ~1/8
0.0001 ~1/16
You have a serious separation from reality if you think reducing the effective range of a radar by 1/2 ‘does not bring much for the practical needs’.
pfcemSo the F-35C – because it’s been neglected to this point – had it’s price spike to reflect setting up the lead in to the prototype. That’s a cruddy way to paint it as a failure considering it had relatively mild goals to hit compared to the F-35B program.
No the F-35C has not been neglected BUT because (chronologically) it is the lowest priority fewer F-35C airframes have been built so far (resulting in a comparatively higher price) & prior to FY2011 the F-35B & F-35C were lumpred together in the budget (it is the change to the F-35B & F-35C ‘finally’ being separate items in the budget that has caused the appearant spike).
pfcemI don’t quite get what the huge problem with the supposed T-50’s intake blocker is.
The problem is not WITH the radar blocker but rather that a number of people have come up with some rather ‘interesting’ ideas of the T-50/PAK FA supposed ‘s-duct’ (including representing the location of the engine faces further inside & higher than they actually are). As (I hope) everyone can now see, the engine faces are ‘blocked from radar’ by radar blockers (which Otaku calls ‘many s-ducts’) like the X-32, F/A-18E/F, Su-35 et cetera rather than by an ‘s-duct’ like the F-22 & F-35.
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