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This is a sorry excuse of an aircraft. It's shaping up to be worse than the F111 fiasco. At least out of that, we got the Tomcat and Eagle.
In this, we get nothing, but a soured attitude by the taxpayer and congress. The damage that's being inflicted by this program is starting to add up.
ExactlyI do believe that deficiences and all things ought to be found in a test programme. It would be rather boring to discover things in a combat situation ("blue screen" on the computer monitor springs to mind, but that is just a horror thing).
That's why god created "test pilots." As mentioned earlier, I think this is going to be the most extensively tested aircraft in aviation history.We should not have a situation where lives are lost due to a less than thorough test plan.
Not all the time. There are certain systems that have to be flown operationaly to be verifiedAre the things discovered "more" or are they "less" than other projects of similar type? Or did we have not have the same abilities to test things (computer simulations, etc) as we have now; hence we tested less and found less?
The other point is probably that if a country only have X amount of money and the F-35 keeps increasing in price, will they end up with simply too few aircraft to do the job? If you budget for X number of airframes and end up with significantly less, you would simply run out of airframes. Numbers are after all also essential.
What will the budget cuts in the US do the project? that I think is the most significant risk to the entire project. Is Obama OK with $400 bn and more to come?
Yours,
To be fair, in the article itself they do say that the required testing has yet to be completed, not that there is a design fault.
But will the average person understand the subtlety of what that means? Bottom line is the newspaper is deliberately misleading with its headline to drum up more negativity about the programme.
Just read the final report on the LPT crack. Looks like it was a manufacturing defect and will NOT impact the flight test schedule like the engine issue for the B model in the past.
I am interested to see where you think the F-35 "total package still beats the Flanker series in the air-to-air role". It certainly won't outfly it in the traditional sense.
Missile wise in the air to air role the F-35 will likely carry 2 AMRAAMs and 2 sidewinders in the internal bays. Carrying extra externally ruins the stealth profile. F-35 is less likely to be able to defeat a missile by manoeuvring than the Su-35. That may be impossible anyway, I don't know.
Sidewinders are 50 years old(!). There is a replacement used by some NATO countries, but not, apparently, the US or Australia.
The F-35A has a gun (-B and -C I understand don't). If it comes down to using this to try to shoot down a Flanker I would think the F-35 is well and truly stuffed.
Other issues:
Other costs associated with the F-35 (for Australia) is that we will likely need to double our tanker fleet.
Air to surface missiles cannot be carried internally. So an anti-shipping strike would leave the F-35 without its stealth cloak.
The aircraft was AF-02. It is a flight science aircraft, which test all flight performance envelopes. From turns, to climbs and dives. Everything. Also includes speed flights. Lots of speed, lots of time in After Burner. The engine has been used and abused. Pratt found it on a routine inspection they always do here. It was a caution to ground the aircraft to make sure none of the other jets were affected.
The Lift fan actually has a clutch connecting it to the drive shaft. Think of a clutch on your car connection the PTO shaft. Same idea.
On some good news, we just Got our frist STOVL model here at Edwards. I am lucky enough to be assigned to it. BF-17 is the tail number. We all are very excited...
But an aircraft as a system-of-systems is more than just the airframe
(assuming your assertion is correct that the F-35 can't outmanouevre the Su-35 which I'm not sure you can say with certainty)
Modern air combat isn't so much about close-in knife fights - it's about killing the other guy at maximum range. The sensor package in the F-35, coupled with its low-observability, should mean it can schwack (that's a technical term) most opposition before it's even seen/detected.
Aircraft can't outmanoeuvre modern air-to-air missiles. Not even your much-vaunted Su-35.
So what? Sidewinder is a bolt-on missile requiring less integration with an aircraft's systems than pretty much any other AAM out there. They put sidewinders on Nimrods during the Falklands Conflict for goodness' sake! I agree the Sidewinder isn't the greatest short-range AAM but it's not like we're still flying with the original variants, indeed I'm pretty certain there isn't a single common component between the original Sidewinder and those currently in the front-line. If Australia uses Sidewinders today, I imagine they would still use Sidewinders on Su-35s unless you're suggesting that Australia also replaces all its current missile inventory with Russian alternatives?
As mentioned before, modern air combat isn't about the close-in knife fight. That said, since Australia is getting the F-35A you have nothing to worry about, correct?
Compared to what? According to that most utterly reliable of sources, Wikipedia, the F-35 has a longer combat radius than the F/A-18 it's replacing. Not sure I understand your logic here.
No, it would reduce the effectiveness of it. The F-35 would still have a smaller radar cross section than a non-stealth design because the major radar returns (like from the engine front) are mitigated.
A couple family members mentioned they saw on the news that the F-35 is now out of contention for Canada due to cost, but I have been unable to find anything online to confirm it, as I missed it myself. Has anyone heard similarly?
Gents - take heed in what this man tells us - he's right there on the front line!!!!!!
Exactly!!!!Okay gents.
The F-35 is supposed to be used as a penetration platform that exploits not only stealth, but weapon and sensor fusion to exact the maximum impact from all available assets.