VanshilarMsphere is claiming ignorance and yet this topic has already been brought up before:
Note that:
1. Msphere claims ignorance of updated F-35 SAR combat radius figures. Yet previously another poster specifically told him it was out of date and cited the newer version, and his responded specifically to the citation by saying that he’s not accepting the updated SAR’s “613 nm” estimate until Lockheed Martin’s website’s spec sheet figure of “>590 nm” is updated. Now he’s claiming he was unaware of updated figures because he doesn’t keep up with the program forcing other posters to repeat the same information again. Simply spreading outdated figures.
2. Once again claiming that the combat radius includes the range of sensors. Once again cluttering up the thread by repeating these claims.
VanshilarNote that actually all those different flight profiles seems me to have been substituted in the minds of military planners by: fly at optimal cruise condition, drop your Jdams on predetermined location and come back.
So I wonder if also this has to be considered in this sort of apple to cucumber comparison…
Military planners no, Internet commentators yes. This is why it’s sort of dumb to quote the F-35’s SAR radius and compare it with another plane’s maximum radius, as is constantly done.
Vanshilarhttp://www.secnav.navy.mil/fmc/fmb/Documents/17pres/APN_BA1-4_BOOK.pdf
2017 Fly Away Unit Cost F/A-18E/F – 77,791 million US$
2017 Fly Away Unit Cost F-35C – 166,829.500 million US$
And yet from the same document:
2017: $166,829.500 each for 4 total planes
2018: $134,769.000 each for 6 total planes
2019: $124,382.000 each for 12 total planes
2020: $116,522.833 each for 18 total planes
So the cost for FY2017 is artificially high only because of the low number of planes being ordered that year. In fact for FY2016 it was at $132,829,500 each for 6 total planes. As opposed to the Super Hornets and Growlers, where Boeing is building 2 or more per month (i.e. 24 or more per year) since they’ve said that’s the minimum for it to be economically viable.
VanshilarNo, they already say that the F-35 has a radius of over 700 nm “in low observable combat configurations” such as here: https://www.f35.com/global/participation/canada
I know Obligatory is now going to claim that it assumed the F-35 was using stealth external fuel tanks or was hooked up to a stealthy tanker or the cold Canadian air let the F-35 fly farther, but reported ranges for the F-35 have been pretty consistent for years; somewhere over 600 nm radius for air-to-ground missions and somewhere around 700-800 nm radius for air-to-air missions where a more optimal flight profile is assumed, all on internal fuel only. This is in contrast to Obligatory using a single website quote that is 200 km more than every other source (including every official Saab presentation) for his claim of the Gripen’s radius, and Msphere continuing to claim that the radius of the F-35 is 584 nm even though that’s taken from a SAR which is not only 5 years old, but just happens to be the lowest combat radius ever quoted in any F-35 SAR:
<br />
SAR F-35A F-35B F-35C<br />
2005 644 509 701<br />
2006 625 498 642<br />
2007 606 503 641<br />
2008 (no SAR for this year)<br />
2009 610 481 651<br />
2010 584 469 615 <-- this is the one Msphere chooses to cite<br />
2011 584 469 615 <-- this is the one Msphere chooses to cite<br />
2012 603 455 610<br />
2013 613 456 610<br />
2014 614 456 610<br />
2015 625 467 630<br />
Not above a bit of cherry-picking, are we? I don’t know why the posters who keep making the same misleading arguments every couple months about the F-35 are allowed to keep posting about it. At least try to find a new argument or new data instead of just repeating the same claims and getting slammed for it every time, cluttering up the thread. The F-35 thread would be only 1/5 the size if people would just stop posting the same stupid claims about it and other people having to correct them for the sake of random people happening to read the thread and not knowing its history.
The estimated combat radius for the F-35 has been increasing every year since then as they start adding back margins as they get more definitive test results (not to mention make engineering changes, since the F-35 is still in development), yet Msphere is still stuck in 2011. It’s also assuming a strike profile, which seems to always be lost on those people who compare these numbers with optimum cruise profiles for their favorite planes.
I’m not going to bother to repeat the stuff about the F-16 that others have already said, other than to note that we’re comparing the F-35 on internal fuel only with an F-16 configuration which is devoting nearly 9,000 lb of its payload (i.e. over half of its payload) to fuel, doubling its fuel carried at takeoff. This is the type of argument used to claim that the F-35 is shorter-ranged than the F-16, really?
VanshilarPOGO report “F-35 Continues to Stumble- http://www.pogo.org/straus/issues/weapons/2017/f35-continues-to-stumble.html#conclusion
Entirely predictable, entirely flawed. At least they could have stuck with the latest DOT&E issues rather than devoting so much space to issues that have been fixed, addressed, or simply wrong. POGO should stand for: Purposely Omitting Guilelessness & Objectivity. But their track record is impeccable (if one considers being incorrect, irresponsible, and ill-informed on defense issue a positive):
There’s so much stupidity in it, but here’s one that stuck out a lot:
Of course, the F-35’s limited range—less than legacy F-16s
Over 700 nm combat radius on internal fuel but it has less range than an F-16! And of course they always talk about the F-35’s “limited range” and “limited payload” but I have yet to see a plane with “unlimited range” or “unlimited payload”.
(I should also mention that the link it uses as a citation for this claim doesn’t even talk about the F-35’s range, other than that they accepted a range reduction in 2012 during the program restructure.)
Vanshilaraccording to this guy, that uses DAS on a, if not daily, so at least monthly basis,
he can guesstimate that if its some really big thing that DAS display on the ocean, its most likely a boat,
since murphy dictate he isnt lucky enough to see a whale
What does that have to do with using a sensor with more precision than DAS for triangulation? He even says you can’t really target with it, much less have the precision for good triangulation. It’s basically as good as the Mark 1 eyeball.
Vanshilarlike i stated: triangulation works well on the modest <100 km ranges that is A2A,
but not on the >1000 km away ballistic launch
So…the F-35 has this nice EOTS with zoom and can distinguish windows of a building from 90 km away…and yet you’re assuming it uses its DAS to triangulate a target?
Not to mention that the F-35 is a moving platform (and the EOTS is gimbaled), which means its angular accuracy is going to be better than the width of a pixel.
Vanshilari dont buy that the issue only occur when taking off on fuel fumes, no one ever does it,
Sure, it’s only what Bogdan directly said:
F-35 Program Executive Officer Lt. Gen. Christopher Bogdan told reporters during a Dec. 19 roundtable at his office in Arlington, VA, “there’s no doubt” his team has to find a solution to the nose gear.
However, he stressed, “the only time that is a problem with the C model is at very light gross weights. At medium weights and at heavy weights you don’t see this problem at all.”
Of course, it’s one of those little details that the DOT&E “forgot” to mention in its annual report about ongoing issues with the F-35 program.
VanshilarNot a high priority but quoted as “to fix” by navy. Saying it’s unimportant just show… Well nvm. The day you are a pilot and have to take off lightly loaded (eg QRA), will you sit in ?
The question was why was it not put in for a fix in 2014 when it was discovered. It’s not that it doesn’t need to be fixed, it’s that they had much bigger issues on their plate at the time. If you recall, that’s when they were testing the new version of the arresting hook, for example. It’s not as if they’ve been working day and night to fix the vertical oscillation problem since 2014 — just that it’s only recently that the issue is coming to the forefront because other bigger issues have already been resolved.
The Navy, doing a QRA? Don’t they have CAP?
VanshilarThanks I had seen that the work was to start soon and be a two stage “fix”. My point was if this had been known about since 2014 why was the work not put in the schedule then?
Simply not a high priority. It’s only an issue when the F-35C is lightly loaded, and that pretty much only happens during carrier quals and maybe some short-range hops. Once you put enough fuel and weapons in it to carry out an operational mission the problem disappears.
It does demonstrate the hyperbole in media reporting about the F-35 though — the plane being too bouncy on take-off when lightly loaded (i.e. not a problem in most missions) is reported as “debilitating” and yet Russian planes are crashing every several weeks in the Mediterranean and apparently that’s fine.
VanshilarYou can try to split up the different parts of the deals if they’re known. For example, the India Rafale deal’s breakdown is:
7.87 billion euros for 36 Rafales, consisting of:
3.42 billion euros for the 36 airplanes (so this should be flyaway)
1.8 billion euros for support and infrastructure
1.7 billion euros for India-specific changes on the aircraft
710 million euros for the weapons package
353 million euros for performance-based logistics support
I don’t know why but that comes out to 7.983 billion euros, not 7.87 billion euros, but that’s what’s stated in the DefenseNews article: http://www.defensenews.com/articles/india-inks-deal-with-france-for-36-rafale-fighter-jets
Assuming the article’s conversion of 7.87 billion euros to $8.85 billion, this means:
$3.84 billion for 36 Rafale planes ($107 million each)
$2.02 billion for support and infrastructure
$1.91 billion for India-specific changes on the aircraft ($53 million each — but this should not be considered part of the plane’s flyaway cost because they are specific to India; other countries may not have the same changes and India probably would have had them with any other plane)
$796 million for the weapons package
$396 million for performance-based logistics support
For U.S. planes sold to the U.S. government, it’s relatively easy to look up via Senate reports and the like, such as here:
http://www.fi-aeroweb.com/Defense-Spending.html#Top-Programs
For example, the F-35A is given as $4257 million for 43 planes ($99 million each) flyaway, with an additional $605 million for support for a total of $113 million each as its weapon system cost. Similarly, the F-35B is given as $127 million each for 16 planes flyaway, or $140 million each for weapon system cost. The F-35C is given as $167 million each for 4 planes flyaway, and $235 million each for weapon system cost, but it’s because they’re only procuring 4 for FY2017; for FY2016 and FY2018 where they procure 6 planes, it’s around $134 million flyaway and $175 million for weapon system cost instead. For the F/A-18E/F Super Hornet, it’s $78 million flyaway and $93 million for weapon system cost (each).
Another apples-to-apples comparison would be Danish claim to purchase 27 F-35As for the price of 38 Super Hornets which would make the F-35A ~41% more expensive than the F/A-18E/F.. That would mean you could get two Gripen-Es for the price of one F-35A, a claim that makes a lot of sense to me..
Actually the report said 28 F-35As would cover their requirements whereas they’d need 38 Super Hornets or 34 Typhoons to cover the same requirements, not that the costs of those sets of aircraft are the same. I’m sure you know the difference between cost and capability. Source: http://www.fmn.dk/temaer/kampfly/Documents/type-selection-denmarks-new-fighter-aircrafts-english-summary5.pdf#page=8
Vanshilaryou wish for F-35 to increase range from 600 nm to 760 nm radius, a 27% increase in range,
by reducing total weight 6%, as in swapping a couple of bombs for amraam.i’m lost for words
That’s because you’re still refusing to answer whether or not you believe there’s a difference between an air-to-ground mission profile and an air-to-air mission profile.
VanshilarAnd Obligatory does have a point, even F-22 are using wetbags out from Alaska and even on US own southern borders. There are ample picture out there to support this.
So it means, the F-35 would also see the use of wetbags.
This is a FACT!
Eventually, sometime far off in the future when drop tanks are developed, tested, etc., sure.
However, Obligatory asserts without evidence that whenever the F-35’s range is quoted, it assumes the use of external drop tanks — even though they don’t exist yet, despite the range for stealth aircraft typically given for clean configuration (i.e. no external payload) unless otherwise stated, and despite the description for those profiles saying something along the lines of “internal air-to-air” and the slide directly preceding specifically talking about internal fuel tanks. This even though last I checked the drop tanks are still on the drawing boards, it’s still in the CFD and wind tunnel stages, etc., without an actual production or even prototype model built or final design specs/dimensions decided. On the other hand, Obligatory also says that we cannot assume that the F-35 will be able to carry 6 AMRAAM’s in the future despite it being slated for Block 4, even though the drop tanks he always assumes, when last I checked, is under a future Block 6/7 (under “range improvements”). In other words, we can’t assume F-35 will receive Block 4’s 6 internal AMRAAM capability, but we can assume future Block 6/7 external drop tanks when discussing the F-35’s current stated performance.
Vanshilari cant tell what you want me to answer,
i think you are butthurt because of either
1] F-22 operate with internal missile and external drop tanks,
or 2] that gripen E out-ranges F-35.
hope that helps
So you’re still butthurt that others called you out for claiming that “internal air-to-air” means “with external fuel tanks”, huh. Tell me, when they say the F-22 has a maximum combat radius of 595 nm, does that include external drop tanks?
(Source of Raptor having 595 nm radius: https://web.archive.org/web/20070221130634/http://www.afa.org/magazine/jan2005/0105raptor.pdf#page=4 )
P.S. The F-35 cruises higher than 30k ft, limiting it to 30k ft is decreasing its range.
VanshilarThe concept is easy to understand. That you chose not to demonstrates that, as I expected, I wasted my time responding.
Yup Obligatory isn’t even willing to answer a simple “yes, I seriously believe that an A2A flight profile is the same as an A2G flight profile” whether for the F-35 or any other plane, or “no, I know they’re different, I was just trolling SpudmanWP again by giving a false assumption to try to counter his facts”. Either ignorant of different mission profiles, or just trolling and wanting someone to take the time to refute him again.
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