ErkokiteThe irony is that Germany is indirectly responsible for a larger portion of the delays & cost overuns than any other nation, or even EADS.
Had they not flirted for so long with the An70, then committed to unrealistic order numbers to maximize their workshare (what need does Germany have for 60 A400Ms, let alone 73 originally?), specified stuff they isn’t needed (automatic terrain following), and finally taken 18 extra months to sign the contract, Airbus would have been under much less timing pressure and the A400M’s development wouldn’t have had to be rushed. Rushing development is terribly expensive…
Germany lacks a C-130 type aircraft, which makes transport in some places in Afghanistan very difficult. The automatic terrain following is also useful in that situation.
ErkokiteWell, at least its not a Joint Super Mall or Joint Super Highway. The US Military is even worse than the general populace in this regard. 😀
ErkokiteYeah that would explain why all those Scud and Tomahawk launches started nuclear wars. Oh, wait. . . :rolleyes:
Are those really comparable? Scud is a short range tactical ballistic missile and Tomahawk is a cruise missile. I don’t think you can compare them to a MIRV equipped intercontinental SLBM like Trident, which would likely set off all sorts of warning sensors all over if launched in aggression.
ErkokiteGonna go out on a limb here and say the Rafale’s TWR is most certainly greater than 0.8. 😀
Really what’s the point of these charts anyway? Even if they are using accurate figures (which they’re not), wouldn’t you have to compare the numbers for a variety of flight conditions and payloads? I guess comparing numbers like this can give a rough comparison, but still.
ErkokiteThis chart is awful. There are a significant number of things that are wrong or highly suspect at first glance. And I’m pretty sure everything under the Tejas category is basically made up in the minds of fanboys.
ErkokiteIt’s difficult to assume such a radar can’t interpolate F22’s position in between solid reflections to calculate intercept vector for guns or missiles, particularly since those come much more often at that ranges, then they do at long distances.
I have heard that that the ILIC/Anderwave algorithm(s?) used by CAPTOR, Blue Fox, and other Ferranti designed radars helps the radar track object between solid locks to get around jamming. Whether or not this would be useful in this case is anyone’s guess, especially since everything were are speculating upon is classified or proprietary. Neat stuff though.
ErkokiteThe chinese are belittled and understimated all the time but the J-10B is highly stealthy i think it might be more stealthy than the eurofighter and is as agile as an Eurofighter, it has probably good radar and avionics, in my opinion what you say is uncertain, the J-10B might kill the F-35 first
its frontal RCS might be very small
Preposterous to say the least.
ErkokiteWhy wouldn’t it? It certainly uses TVC for low speed control in its airshow displays. I think it is a reasonable assumption. One could argue that TVC can cause an aircraft to bleed speed, but wouldn’t that be up to the pilot’s discretion?
ErkokiteAFAIK, the F-22 most certainly does use TVC in dogfighting conditions. Saying that the F-22 and F-35 have a similar envelope does not necessarily account for nose pointing ability in a dog-fight. It may be referring to structural envelope, altitude envelope, turning radius envelope, etc…
Erkokitewell DACT will be fun for the fanboys when the f-35 slaps the phoon in a dogfight
i read it has the same envelope/performance as the f-22 up to supersonic
The only real advantage the F-22 has in a dogfight over the Typhoon is TVC, and even that is debatable, and the F-35 lacks this, so…
Just saying don’t count your chickens before they hatch. The Typhoon might be better in some or most situations or the F-35 might be better. When we get public data on WVR DACT between the Typhoon and F-35, then we’ll be able to talk. Do we even have DACT info for the Typhoon and F-22 right now?
Let’s not forget that both the F-35 and Typhoon have HMD’s and HOBS missiles, so this would make things truly interesting.
ErkokiteI vote for 4th gen as well. Su-27, F-14, and Rafale. The rest are either ok or good looking too- I can’t think of 4th generation aircraft that is actually ugly.
ErkokiteStrategypage. Sorry I should have been more clear with that one, but laziness got the best of me.
ErkokiteE-190?
Is that you?
To be fair, SP is pretty awful. :rolleyes:
ErkokiteYou do realize the F-22 radar is classified as a weapon in and of it self right?
I would seriously not doubt the agility or the power of the F-22s AESA radar.More Than Just A New Radar
February 3, 2010: AESA (Active Electronically Scanned Array) radars are becoming standard equipment in modern warplanes, for those that can afford them, and appreciate their power and versatility. This is largely because AESA is more reliable and, increasingly, no more expensive than the older mechanical (a small dish that moves around inside a dome) radar. AESA is also easier and cheaper to maintain, which makes a more expensive AESA cheaper, over its lifetime, than a cheaper (to buy) mechanically scanned radar.AESA type radars have been around a long time, popular mainly for their ability deal with lots of targets simultaneously, and produce a more accurate picture of what is out there. But AESA was also a lot more expensive, and less reliable, than older radar technologies. That has gradually changed. And now more uses are being found for AESA, which has developed into more than just an improved radar.
AESA radar consists of thousands of tiny radars that can be independently aimed in different directions. An AESA radar made the JSTARS aircraft possible, as it enabled it to locate vehicles moving on the ground. A new, smaller MP-RTIP AESA radar for the RQ-4 UAV can also spot smaller objects on the ground. As a result, with the RQ-4 UAV equipped with AESA, the U.S. Air Force has a choice between extending the life of the E-8 aircraft, or replacing them with the UAVs.
While AESA makes fighters much more effective, it’s the many other uses of AESA that make this technology so attractive to warplane designers. For example, the U.S. Air Force has been equipping some of its fighters with electronic ray type weapons. Not quite the “death ray” of science fiction fame, but an electronic ray type weapon none the less. In this case, the weapon uses the high-powered microwave (HPM) effects found in AESA radar technology. AESA is able to focus a concentrated beam of radio energy that could scramble electronic components of a distant target. Sort of like the EMP (Electromagnetic Pulse) put out by nuclear weapons. The air force won’t, for obvious reasons, discuss the exact “kill range” of the of the various models of AESA radars on American warplanes (the F-35 and F-22 have them). However, it is known that “range” in this case is an elastic thing. Depending on how well the target electronics are hardened against EMP, more electrical power will be required to do damage. Moreover, the electrical power of the various AESA radars in service varies as well. The air force has said that the larger AESA radars it is developing would be able to zap cruise missile guidance systems up to 180 kilometers away.
When I speak about frequency agility, I am referring to the ability to transmit on certain frequencies- perhaps I worded that incorrectly. There is no way the APG-77 radar can reach VHF frequency. The spacing of T/R modules is far too small and the antenna itself is too small to work efficiently at VHF frequencies. The MMIC’s on each T/R module could very well not work at VHF either. RF circuitry is very dependent upon spacing and geometry and this plays a huge part in determining what frequency range such a device operates. The APG-81 on the F-35 has a frequency range of 6-20 GHz, and this is considered a more advanced, though less powerful radar than the APG-77 IIRC.
As for the electronic attack capability, you are correct. I didn’t take this into account as far as ranging goes, as I didn’t see it as relevant to detection range. However, transmitted power varies with the 4th root of range, so I can’t realistically see any electronic attack capabilities at long range, at least as far as causing physical damage to the SAM site’s electronics. Perhaps it would turn out to be relevant if the F-22 can get close enough though. Or perhaps it could degrade performance of the SAM radar far away, but who knows- if the frequencies of the APG-77 antenna are not somewhat matched to the frequencies of the SAM radar antenna, which in this case we are talking about VHF, so they won’t match, any electronic attack capabilities are probably likely to be less damaging at any meaningful sort of range. That’s all just educated guesswork though. Also, I would imagine that advanced SAM’s such as the S-x00 are shielded against EMP and EA.
The 180 km figure for cruise missiles is probably for a large AWACS type radar, not a fighter radar.
ErkokiteIf you think those systems have the mobility to be survivable, then I’m really not sure what to tell you. Secondly did you pay attention- for every 10 fold decrease in RCS, there’s halving of range. Which means that against a 1m^2 target, the detection range would be ~123.5nm.
.1m^2 – 61.75nm
.01m^2 – 30.375nm
.001m^2- 15.18+nm
.0001m^2- 7+nm
Well that’s really rough. I’ve heard that for every -12 db, you half the detection range- -12 db is the same as 6.3% of the original RCS. If you really want to get more technical, you can look up the radar range equation, rearrange and combine all constants such that you have:
R^4 = k*RCS
Solving for K we get K = (457^4)/2, which we can then substitute back into the equation above, and solve for R:
R = ((457^4)/2*RCS)^0.25
Now, the RCS of an aircraft in VHF is not going to be the same as the RCS in X-band. I think that Let’s say it is 0.07 m^2 for the F-22. We find that detection range is 197.67 km. If we bring it down to 0.01 m^2 we find it is 121.52 km. Let’s go to the extreme and bring it down to 0.00001 m^2- we find it is 21 km.
However, remember that the RCS varies greatly with frequency. The F-22 was optimized for X-band stealth. Also, for a flat plate, RCS will increase quadratically with a decrease in frequency. For a cylinder it will increase linearly with a decrease in frequency. For a sphere, there is no frequency dependence. The RCS in VHF of the F-22 in my opinion, as it is a complex object not a sphere, could very likely experiences a very significant increase in RCS with a decrease in frequency. VHF is less than 1 Ghz. X-band is 10 Ghz. RAM coatings are generally frequency dependent as well and have to be optimized for a certain frequency in the design process. So it would not be unreasonable to expect a significantly higher RCS in VHF for the F-22 than in X-band. I find it quite believable that the RCS of the F-22 in VHF could be above 0.01 m^2.
All of this together suggests to me that the S-300/400/500 are capable of at least detecting (not necessarily firing upon though as the main fire control radar is still X-band I think- whether or not this can be worked around I do not know) the F-22 at relatively long range- neglecting jamming that is. However, the F-22’s only jamming provisions (that are unclassified) are its radar, which lacks the frequency agility to get anywhere near to VHF. So in the presence of these advanced SAM’s it would need to be using either standoff weapons or be operating inside the safety of an EW network.
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