PhilipG,
I totally agree with you about simulation vs live trials and I was very interested in NoHoverstop's use of the phrase,
Originally Posted by NoHoverstop
However SRVL has been done for real by a digital STOVL jet pretending to be an F-35B
which seems a strange way to describe a simulation. They did a lot of hard sums on other stuff (helmet, 469 bulkhead, the engine, the hook, etc), but some of those didn't measure up when they tried them for real, in the real, non-digital world.
As things stand, it has long been widely acknowledged that SRVL will be the preferred recovery for improved bring back, but it doesn't come without limitations. I was challenged on this last week so I'll address a couple of them now. Deck space for landing at or above 60 kts. Stop other operations from the deck while SRVLs are undertaken. Sea state limits for SRVL, don't know what the limits are, but then who does yet?
That said, if you don't want to throw away your perfectly serviceable Storm Shadows, they will need to sort it out. As far as anyone can tell, they almost certainly will make it work.
As for trials on a QE sized carrier deck, like you, I have seen nothing on this yet. Indeed, the Marines are declaring that they will only do VLs on the smaller ships (yes, I know how big a GE is). But then they are having to accept IOC very soon with a lot of "acceptable" or, at least, "accepted" shortfalls. I gather they are referring to the missing bits finally arriving late as "upgrades" now, perhaps implying that they are making the jet even better.
End of ramble.
Edited to add: Just seen Engines' post. Yes, at this point the situation is very much "ops normal" with regard to this landing mode.