Changes to F35 weapons fir

[Navaleye]

Thanks to Richard B on the Navy board for spotting this. The NAO has reported some changes to the weapons carriage requirements for the F35.


Reviews of the external missile systems for JCA resulted in the removal of the requirement for integrating an externally
mounted Brimstone (-£41m) and ASRAAM (-£49m), and Paveway II and III (-£1m) capabilities.

Anyone care to comment?

[rivetjoint]

So what will it be armed with? Feather duster? Colourful language?

[althenick]

.... I think what it means is that the External stores will be limited to non-Avionics dependent stores ie dumb bombs. I assume that even with the halving of the internal stores bay that the A/C can still carry those weapons?

Still not good news mind

:{

[Navaleye]

I can't figure this out, so please help me if I'm being dumb. On a normal strike mission, it would internally carry 2 X AMRAAM for self defence plus 2 PGMs in the internal bays. Why would you want to replace AMRAAM with ASRAAM? Sounds to me like the requirement for ASRAAM has been dropped - full stop. OK, carrying big PGMs on the external hardpoints would compromise the steath characteristics of the airplance, but not Storm Shadow because of its stand off range., so maybe that is the angle the MoD are taking. ;)

[Gainesy]

Navaleye,
Do you have a link to that please?

[rivetjoint]

But surely Storm Shadow costs a lot more than a Paveway and won't there be a period in a conflict where you'd rather have externally mounted munitions over stealth?

[Navaleye]

Gainesy,

Your link (http://p216.ezboard.com/fwarships1discussionboardsfrm3.showMessage?topicID=3917.topi c) is here.

[artyhug]

Don't you just love jumping to conclusions, personally I know the square root of f all about CAS but by taking the effort to read three posts further down the situation is not quite what is portrayed above.


The report simply says Brimstone, Asraam and Paveway II & III will not be carried externally.

As I read this that means AMRAAM, Maverick, the Joint Common Missile, SDB, Paveway IV and Stormshadow will still be available externally. Internally F35 will be able to carry AMRAAM, ASRAAM, Brimstone, JCM, SDB and, I think, despite the shrunken weapons bay, Paveway IV



But hey don't let that stop you railing against the injustices of the world.

You could of course perhaps analyse the situation then put across your viewpoint, rather than the regurgitation of a couple of snippets of info. Heaven forbid it might even instigate a reasoned argument.

[Gainesy]

Naval,
Many thanks mate.