BV
the Rafale cockpit is a work of art
Do you mean like an un-made bed surrounded by fag ends and used condoms, or more like the Mona Lisa?
What I will say about Typhoon is that it's nice at last to have a fighter that can actually fight in 3 dimensions. Compared to it, the performance of the F3 is an embarassment, though, personally, I am not convinced about the concept of single-seat ops, especially for some of the things we want to use Typhoon for.
I am led to believe that the Typhoon is not terribly popular with some of the civvy ATCOs, who, having got used to the way in which the F3 climbs and descends (or doesn't!) find it hard to believe how quickly a Typhoon can comply with coordination requirements. On more than one occasion I have had to pull radar 'tapes' to prove that a Typhoon reached a particular level in time to maintain agreed standard separation from a civvy.
In the 'fights' I have seen, the Typhoon normally does pretty well against most types, but I suspect it will be a while before the tactics are sufficiently well established to form a reliable opinion. BVR performance with Meteor will be interesting, though in my view, BVR isn't everything as the ROE in most modern scenarios make the use of BVR weapons dodgy at best. For now, I am just delighted that Typhoon will get to where I need it as quickly as it can.
Looking forward to seeing it on QRA(I) duties.
STH