F-35 Joint Strike Fighter News, Videos and pics Thread

[stardave]

re: F-35 Joint Strike Fighter Thread

As I said, I really do like the C, but if you recall the B was in "deep serious", and some where calling for her cancelation, when the PM called for the C, but lots of folks got serious and addressed those concerns and the B is being delivered, as noted and "operational status B, as well as three A's, also operational status, to the Schoolhouse At Eglin this month! So IMOH the B is still the best option, and it will likely turn out to be a good choice, all humor aside the Brit's have lots of experience with lift jets and their ops, it really is part of the national psychie, and a good part at that. It is expensive, but cheaper than the option of modifying to carriers to EMALs, so I think they are well equipped to help the USMC bring the B up to full on ops. again IMHO? Cheers Brat

Don't feel too bad, lots of us are second guessing all these decisions, the one that really sticks in my craw is my beautifull Raptor, killed by a bunch of sorry politicians, and ground pounders, no offense guys, but some folks have no more idea about flying machines than I do about tanks or troop carriers, I stik to my area of expertise and listen to folks who know more than I when it comes to Army, Navy, etc.!

I am on you on the canceling of F-22, really stupid move. The primary reason they cancel that is because it is too expensive, and that F-35 will be 1/4 of the cost of Raptor. But it turns out that F-35 will soon be just as expensive as F-22, but worse performance. Shorter range, worse stealth, lesser payload, less agile etc... the only thing it have over F-22 is the vstol ability, which only not all 3 version will have.

Not to mention all the tens of billions gone into the research of F-35. This is just a horrible decision overall imo, instead they just have just keep making F-22, keep refine it to make it perfect, and even make down grade versions for expert. But NOOO they have to went ahead and cancel it, wasting tens of billion of dollars spend on R&D for nothing, and have to spend another tens of billions all over again on the worse performance F-35. I mean it is not like we are so rich we can thrown money down the sink.

 

[cn_habs]

re: F-35 Joint Strike Fighter Thread

I am on you on the canceling of F-22, really stupid move. The primary reason they cancel that is because it is too expensive, and that F-35 will be 1/4 of the cost of Raptor. But it turns out that F-35 will soon be just as expensive as F-22, but worse performance. Shorter range, worse stealth, lesser payload, less agile etc... the only thing it have over F-22 is the vstol ability, which only not all 3 version will have.

Not to mention all the tens of billions gone into the research of F-35. This is just a horrible decision overall imo, instead they just have just keep making F-22, keep refine it to make it perfect, and even make down grade versions for expert. But NOOO they have to went ahead and cancel it, wasting tens of billion of dollars spend on R&D for nothing, and have to spend another tens of billions all over again on the worse performance F-35. I mean it is not like we are so rich we can thrown money down the sink.

Well the lobbyists working for the military-industrial complex are good at what they do.

 

[Air Force Brat]

re: F-35 Joint Strike Fighter Thread

LOL...none taken. Man, you won't let that go would ya(politicians canceling of the F-22)?

Well the Raptor and the Lightning II were designed to work together as a team, The F-22 is far more capable in almost every aspect, particularly A2A, while the F-35 is more technologically superior and does have some interesting, though complex capabilities. I waited a long time on the Raptor, but it wasn't untill I saw it up close and personal that I realized what an outstanding aircraft it really is.

 

[Inst]

re: F-35 Joint Strike Fighter Thread

Maintenance costs on the F-22, however. The Western militaries tend to do a lot of training compared to other militaries, and while it might be attractive to build an F-22, have it achieve its likely K-D ratio, then get it shot down, the total ownership cost of the F-22 can be quite high due to the RAM coatings. The F-35, for all its faults, uses RAM embedded into its structure, which cuts down on maintenance costs and reduces the total cost of ownership.

So even if the F-35 and the F-22 costs about the same, which is disputable given how the F-35's costs will plummet as mass production ramps up, the F-35 will cost less to operate than the F-22.

 

[Kurt]

re: F-35 Joint Strike Fighter Thread

The F-35 and the F-22 are part of an intended high-low mix. The F-22 is flying in assigned squadrons, the F-35 is still the most expensive military development program. So taking less capable and less expensive kit into a downgraded F-22 airframe design, switching to a single engine and have some STOVL and carrier airframe and engine modifications costs so many billions?
Most nations with less flush of money would have taken an evolutionary approach and made a devolution on most components and an evolution on some - spending a fraction of the costs for flying bombers. If done cleverly it would be even possible to upgrade the devolution design low F-35 to high F-22 capability on demand. That are economies of scale!

From a European perspective this reminds one very much about the old joke: "The Americans discovered that there would be problem writing with ink in space under zero gravity. So they spent millions for many scientists to develop within several years the ballpoint pen. The Soviets used lead pencils." It's similar with the new Fritz-helmet. The US designs aren't bad, but I get the feeling that there's a tendency in the US to subsidize a kind of over-development in order to secure production funding due to sunk costs. Don't get me wrong, this development leads to a massive accumulation of know-how and in the end often outstanding products. But it has an inherent requirement for large scale production of each developed item with a very high risk if expectations of the design fail due to unexpected problems (F-104 stall speed accidents for example).

It's part of the Airbus-Boing controversy who gets more state subsidies. Airbus argues that the US-MIC development spendings are subsidies for lots of non-military applications. From a European point of view that's right because numerous publications on research in the US have a reference to military funding. It's a mentality issue, the US wants most new things to be suitable for military applications, the European military picks useful ideas from civilian research results and funds only some research on topics that seem necessary to cover.
From that angle, the question of F-35 seems rather what will be the related effects overall and how much will the partners profit from these? At least, it's perfectly clear that this thing is less about a cheap bomber in a high-low mix, than about an idea about future bombers with the typical US-science-engineering-intensity of a culture that seems to have a problem creating anything low in a high-low mix. Better call it highest-higher mix or let Ford&Chrysler&General Motors design bomb-trucks instead of pick-up trucks.

A very good idea about the F-35 development is the maintenance cost reduction that doesn't seem to have been that much of a concern with the F-22. It's my guess that much of the current F-35 research will help to resurrect a kind of F-22-derivate with much improved maintenance. The training issue with fighters is very interesting. You can train with the expensive to fly warplanes or you can train with trainers and simulators. The less you want to use the warplanes, while having good training overrall, the more you have to invest into trainer aircrafts. Simulators will likely be a support application to reduce overall costs by enhancing the training effectiveness of each flying hour. Looking at the Soviet concept shows that they invested a lot into their trainers with lowered production, but higher maintenance costs for their warplanes. That's no bad idea if you want to have numerous aircrafts that can conduct massive strikes. Whether or not the pilots have enough performance to match their opponents who did lots of training on their warplane depends a lot on the didactics and selection of teachers and pupils (like the Israeli scouting system for fighter pilots similar to scouts for professional sports). I don't think you can simply deduce that from flying hours or equipment ratings and it's not necessary that the current NATO-US approach will always have the best results for such a multidimensional problem.

 

[Air Force Brat]

re: F-35 Joint Strike Fighter Thread

Maintenance costs on the F-22, however. The Western militaries tend to do a lot of training compared to other militaries, and while it might be attractive to build an F-22, have it achieve its likely K-D ratio, then get it shot down, the total ownership cost of the F-22 can be quite high due to the RAM coatings. The F-35, for all its faults, uses RAM embedded into its structure, which cuts down on maintenance costs and reduces the total cost of ownership.

So even if the F-35 and the F-22 costs about the same, which is disputable given how the F-35's costs will plummet as mass production ramps up, the F-35 will cost less to operate than the F-22.

As you and Kurt both point out, training and maintenance are expensive, and while I see your point, and if I were in a position to lighten the load on our 185 Raptors I would, the Raptor has already benefited from cost reduction resulting in new tech coatings etc on the F-35. While you acknowledge that "mission creep" has already cost the F-35 most of its "affordability", and that maintenance cost for the F-22 will likely be higher, you seem to miss the Mach 1.8 supercruise, TVC for supermanueverability, and superior stealth to any other operational or in design aircraft, and the ability to "survive" and fight another day. We need 500 Raptors, and should place it back in production at our earliest opportunity and take the time to work the "bugs" out of the F-35 as we bring it into full production. The partners will find out soon enough about how economical the F-35 is, and I know I shouldn't "chuckle", but misery loves company. As for our design philosophy, the F-22 is proof that it works, the F-35 has a more European Flair, so I guess we will see, but I'm still "chuckling"! As for getting our bird "shot down", well the liberal pols already did that.

 

[Kurt]

re: F-35 Joint Strike Fighter Thread

Ask Sweden to send you some Gripen or Russia for some new Sukhoi if you need cheap aircrafts. The F-35 has a European flair? Ok we really made an example of cost overruns and delays with the Eurofighter Typhoon, but having the F-35 top that is quite ambitious.

It makes zero sense to have the most expensive weapon system development in human history to create the downgraded offspring, with some airframe modifications, of an aircraft that has been flying in service for some years.
It's my gut feeling that a lot of F-35 expenditure is in a way creating a better F-22 capability, because the current F-22 didn't turn out as expected (curtailing their numbers makes it most evident to industry that there's some dissatisfaction with the current status). It doesn't make much sense if you take the news at face value. The F-35 supporting nations are very likely in a for a very good bargain. The F-35 has silently split into a high-low mix development and we will see a F-35&F-22 based fighter offspring of this official "cheap" bomb-truck development that has the advantage of cross service avionics development (much more important than the airframe differences). To create the fighter I bet on a F-35B derivate that lacks the Sea-Raptor counterpart.
But try to sell the F-22 failure openly in US politics and ask for a refunding? The development under F-35 label of the planned high-low mix in order to have a high value fighter at lower costs for operational capability sounds like the way to go politically and please add the usual subsidies slotted through the military channel in the US that require all expensive creep in 50 Republican&Democratic states at least!

It sounds much better if you say that the F-22 is so superior that all information about it has to be most closely guarded and not even close allies – Japan&possibly UK&Australia - could have it, but share even more sensitive intelligence and electronics with them? - for fear of information leaks to some enemy - instead of more information leaks to the news of the ground crew's opinions. Espionage is not really any more problematic than for the introduction of any other new US aircraft design over the last decades. How was security during the Cold War with a very resourceful enemy?

A lesson learned might be to label the development of a mix as the development of a mix next time and not run officially two separate projects. But the F-35 debacle's outcome will be a leap ahead again with a very interesting birth history for future generations to read and enjoy.

 

[delft]

re: F-35 Joint Strike Fighter Thread

The Harrier made some sense at the time, an aircraft based close to the battle front not needing expensive and vulnerable airbases. But with long range multiple rocket launchers and much more powerful earth moving equipment the use of larger improvised bases further from the battle and using STOL fighter bombers is much more reasonable. Having to develop a STOVL aircraft because your flattop cannot be fitted with traps and ski ramp or cats for political reasons is ridiculous. To compromise your air force and navy aircraft because they should have some commonality with the aircraft of the marines is just as bad. This is costing years and billions.

 

[Air Force Brat]

re: F-35 Joint Strike Fighter Thread

The Harrier made some sense at the time, an aircraft based close to the battle front not needing expensive and vulnerable airbases. But with long range multiple rocket launchers and much more powerful earth moving equipment the use of larger improvised bases further from the battle and using STOL fighter bombers is much more reasonable. Having to develop a STOVL aircraft because your flattop cannot be fitted with traps and ski ramp or cats for political reasons is ridiculous. To compromise your air force and navy aircraft because they should have some commonality with the aircraft of the marines is just as bad. This is costing years and billions.

Well I do in principal agree with you, However the various versions of the F-35 are "tailored" to the needs, wants, desires of the end user, as far as allowing individual nations to "plug and play" their own weapon system. Fighter aircraft are a rather "niche" market, in that every user seems to want theirs to do something the other guys can't? While I agree this costs money, all aircraft are expensive as opposed to various other platforms, due to performance, weight, ie other considerations. In theory there should be some savings as you excercise a "common platform"? How that works out in the real world basically depends on the soundness of the design and the resourcefullness of the end users.

Given that the USMC and Great Britain are customers for the B, I think you'd have to admit that it still makes sense to some, especially in light of the fact that the Marines continue to operate the Harrier, and quite happily at that.

 

[Kurt]

re: F-35 Joint Strike Fighter Thread

It's a question of perspective whether the Harrier is an outstanding fighter aircraft or an outstanding successor to the attack helicopter. Grouping VTOL-capable fixed wings among the more expensive fighters instead of helicopters, like the Osprey and its tilt-something competitors, has a major impact on the price tag.
You could give the marines instead of their few F-35 and Cobras more numerous attack-Osprey/Harriers similar fixed wing aircrafts in order to cooperate and push the Osprey-transport-idea to fulfill the range and speed intended in an integrated system of cooperation between attack and transport. If the Osprey works as officially claimed, there's a serious gap to the armed attack aircrafts of that service, cutting full capability exploitation.

Runway length is still a problem due to detection and destruction, the shorter a runway is, the more surviveable and the easier to maintain despite enemy interference. STOL was an original Eurofighter requirement and still is for the Swedish fighter aircraft very naval centered air role. All services can make good use of STOL aircrafts - creating an economy of scale. Shorter runways have less overall security requirements because there's less length to defend, making it possible to move them much closer to any enemy who has more capability than the Taleban. Closer to the enemy has a major impact on rate and depth of bombs delivered. It comes with a weight and a price tag, but such an obstacle would be far easier to master in a concerted effort for one goal, rather than dissipated efforts for many conflicting ideas.