why doesn’t the US allow transfer of F-22 to countries like japan and australia that are desperate for it ?

it would also reduce the price tag and allow the USAF to get a few more F-22’s from the re-opened production lines.

Maybe because the thing is so faulty that any foreign user would scream like hell over poor quality and performance.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/09/AR2009070903020_pf.html

I think if the Rafale radar was better, more powerful, more modules or anything like that they would be shouting about it from rooftops rather than giving vague statements

You are discussing current military technology!

-> The buyer does not want anybody to know the real performance of what he has bought so that potential enemies can’t adapt their strategy and tactics

-> the seller has the same interest making sure that the buyer can not exactly know if there is a competitor with a much better product around

No wonder that information supplied is vague.

We will only know what the real status:

-> in case of war (let’s hope not)
-> in 30 years time when these things are military outdated and no-one cares anymore

You are aware that the F-35 can carry ~15-18k lbs of stores right? It’s only limited to 5k lbs for first day of war missions where stealth is essential.

So the US will buy 2400 airplanes which main characteristic (with attached exuberant cost) makes it useful on the first day of a war and then throw stealth away for the rest of the war and make it act like an f-16?

20 or 30 F-117, a few B1 and B-2, and some cruise missiles used to be enough for this “first day of the war”. Now they have 183 F-22 that can be used for that all-determining moment. Where is the need for a further for an extra 2400 F-35?

Which country is it that has developed such an enormous anti aircraft system, and such huge set of “first day of the war targets” that it warrants a fleet of first day fighters like that?

sorry if this sounds a bit harsh but I just can’t dig the f-35. If it would have been a bargain (as was promised), with other words if we would have gotten a modern day F-16 (avionics, netcentric…) with stealth for free on top of it then yes, of course.

But a superexpensive monster which kills all options and alternatives by consuming twice all the budget available, no i don’t get it. I have been advocating for some time to kill that monster project before it kills us.

So it is in LMA’s financial interest that the JSF is managed well and goes smooth…

I am not so sure about that;

Suppose that the F-35 project is cancelled completely. LM will at that moment sit on top of a mountain of research already paid for.

There would be an immediate need for alternatives for US (often f-16 replacement) and for foreign buyers.

Under time pressure all these buyers will have to accept whatever seems to be the best offer, but with that alternative being (at least on paper) less performant than the F-35, all will require higher numbers of planes.

LM is still building the F-16. It would be feasible to spice the most recent F-16 version with the best of the failed F-35 electronics, radar tech… and bring it to the market cheaper and faster than whatever the competition can bring (considering low research need).

The consumed budget per plane would be lower, but so would construction cost be which means that perhaps (in combination with higher build numbers) profits could remain high…

And a failed F-35 may re-open interest for more f-22, again a good deal for LM.

and not being a stealth fighter, some of the restrictions for foreign sales may be removed for such plane, possibly leading to more sales…

and at the end, such plane would become vulnerable against developments from China or Russia in 10 years time, possibly leading very soon to a new call for a superplane… and there we go again…

[But filling a bus-like aircraft with soldiers and relying on two vertically positioned propellers seems to be a disaster waiting to happen at any time. Bri

The chinook also has 2 vertically positioned propellers, most helicopters only have one.

The V-22 with propellors horizontal should be evaluated just like any airplane

with the props placed vertically it should be evauluated as a chopper

and then there is the third step that nobody else has, the evaluation of changing from horizontal flight to hovering or vice versa and this is probably the big difficulty because it has never been done before, at least not with propellors

but i don’t see why the v-22 concept would be more dangerous than any helicopter

[QUOTE=Wilde;1738950]Well they can always save money on stealth and electronics for the JSF. QUOTE]

This may be a good way to reduce production and maintenance costs.

For some platforms (like apache) things got so complicated that it becomes impossibel to train a pilot to know and master it all.

This makes that you end up with planes including all hardware and software to do “everything” with a pilot which is mainly trained for air to air, or CAS, or strike.

this makes most of that expensive hardware redundant.

So, we could have a development of an all singing/all dancing multitasker, and the production of an air to air, a cas or a bomb truck based on that single design.

A sort of modular superplatform.

Does that make sense?

Did the f-35 project come too soon?

Suppose that the F-35 development costs and 50% of the F35 production costs and 50% of the through lifetime maintenance and upgrade costs would have been allocated to build more F-22, to mature F-22 technology and to keep that force operational.

Would that not have given a more formidable force a lot cheaper?

The money saved could then (starting in 2015) be used for a new project developing a cheap F-22 (if still relevant by that time)