F-35 Cancelled, then what ?
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The reason I posted about 'bias' is merely because somebody who has flown the F35B presumably works for Lockmart or flies for the USN/Marines or RAF/RN - either way their future employment may depend on the F35B going into full production
MSOCS - The "final two words" were something about Raptor, so I was wondering how you intended to fight a combined arms campaign with Raptor. However, even with F-35 and Block 3F, what do you tell the theater commander when he asks for armed overwatch with live video to the ground, or near-real-time LOROP, low-collateral-damage attack on a moving target, or would you mind taking out that frigate?
Yes, these things will come later, possibly - but the Raptor history is one of slow and very expensive upgrades, for one reason or another. I know there is an Advanced EOTS in the work, but it's one more item in the Block 4 list.
Some people are better at delivering on time and on schedule than others. I'm not aware of any program that has slipped as badly as JSF, absent outside factors (budget cuts, requirement changes).
5th Gen isn't an advertising slogan - it's a concept. Being literally unable to get one's head around that, and truly understand what it is and how it changes and challenges one's prejudices and preconceptions, is analogous to the struggle of trying to explain to a religious zealot why gay marriage is 'ok'.
If it's a concept, it was one that was defined five years after the JORD was written, because nobody except the Russians talked about it until 2004-05. I'm very well aware of what the three pillars of 5GenTM - F-22/35-like stealth, sensor fusion and networking - are supposed to achieve, and why all three were incorporated into the F-22. Indeed, sensor fusion and networking (which support EMCON) are pretty fundamental to a stealth aircraft that does more than hit ground targets.
But permit me to be skeptical, because the notion of an entire air force using this technology was enshrined in Pentagon planning 30 years ago - ATF, NATF, ATA (A-12 Avenger) - and we have spent $$$ billions for 140 fighters that we can barely afford to sustain (and 40-some more that are not yet to op standard).
Meanwhile, our adversaries and their armorers are chipping away at non-broadband, limited-aspect stealth via VHF Aesa and IRST - since we conveniently gave them 25 years' notice of our double-or-quits master plan to rely on that technology until 2060 (and put all other approaches out of business).
Yes, these things will come later, possibly - but the Raptor history is one of slow and very expensive upgrades, for one reason or another. I know there is an Advanced EOTS in the work, but it's one more item in the Block 4 list.
Some people are better at delivering on time and on schedule than others. I'm not aware of any program that has slipped as badly as JSF, absent outside factors (budget cuts, requirement changes).
5th Gen isn't an advertising slogan - it's a concept. Being literally unable to get one's head around that, and truly understand what it is and how it changes and challenges one's prejudices and preconceptions, is analogous to the struggle of trying to explain to a religious zealot why gay marriage is 'ok'.
If it's a concept, it was one that was defined five years after the JORD was written, because nobody except the Russians talked about it until 2004-05. I'm very well aware of what the three pillars of 5GenTM - F-22/35-like stealth, sensor fusion and networking - are supposed to achieve, and why all three were incorporated into the F-22. Indeed, sensor fusion and networking (which support EMCON) are pretty fundamental to a stealth aircraft that does more than hit ground targets.
But permit me to be skeptical, because the notion of an entire air force using this technology was enshrined in Pentagon planning 30 years ago - ATF, NATF, ATA (A-12 Avenger) - and we have spent $$$ billions for 140 fighters that we can barely afford to sustain (and 40-some more that are not yet to op standard).
Meanwhile, our adversaries and their armorers are chipping away at non-broadband, limited-aspect stealth via VHF Aesa and IRST - since we conveniently gave them 25 years' notice of our double-or-quits master plan to rely on that technology until 2060 (and put all other approaches out of business).
SSSETOWTF
I don't hold a major brief for Typhoon, but the NAO report notes that development costs doubled and unit production costs went up by 45 per cent or so.
None of this is good, but on the other hand I missed the bit where the USAF spent five years wondering whether to scrap F-35 completely while it fretted over the budgetary stresses of Texan re-unification, and then spent another decade or so grudging every penny spent on production, foot-dragging over each batch &c. Of course this did not happen, but it's just about what Germany did to Typhoon.
And I really don't know what Rafale PR people you talk to, but in fact my briefings from there have been far more consistent and reasonable than what I've heard out of JSF. The F1/F2/F3 plan was executed pretty much as advertised in the late 1990s, I believe.
Nobody other than JSF has published claims of being 400-600 per cent better than others in A2A or eight times better A2G. Nobody other than JSF people has told me how they would go (in 09) from being the slowest flight-test program in the world to the fastest, in 12 months' time. (They didn't. Not by a light year.) Nobody other than JSF has given me a Potemkin-village production line tour, told me that a final assembly area that was obviously as well organized as a Mumbai naughty-house during a typhoon was going according to plan, while concealing a bunch of supposedly completed aircraft being stripped, updated and reassembled in flight-line barns.
It gets to you, after a while.
I don't hold a major brief for Typhoon, but the NAO report notes that development costs doubled and unit production costs went up by 45 per cent or so.
None of this is good, but on the other hand I missed the bit where the USAF spent five years wondering whether to scrap F-35 completely while it fretted over the budgetary stresses of Texan re-unification, and then spent another decade or so grudging every penny spent on production, foot-dragging over each batch &c. Of course this did not happen, but it's just about what Germany did to Typhoon.
And I really don't know what Rafale PR people you talk to, but in fact my briefings from there have been far more consistent and reasonable than what I've heard out of JSF. The F1/F2/F3 plan was executed pretty much as advertised in the late 1990s, I believe.
Nobody other than JSF has published claims of being 400-600 per cent better than others in A2A or eight times better A2G. Nobody other than JSF people has told me how they would go (in 09) from being the slowest flight-test program in the world to the fastest, in 12 months' time. (They didn't. Not by a light year.) Nobody other than JSF has given me a Potemkin-village production line tour, told me that a final assembly area that was obviously as well organized as a Mumbai naughty-house during a typhoon was going according to plan, while concealing a bunch of supposedly completed aircraft being stripped, updated and reassembled in flight-line barns.
It gets to you, after a while.
NH-90? From inception to ...
LO on 5th Gen:
But permit me to be skeptical, because the notion of an entire air force using this technology was enshrined in Pentagon planning 30 years ago - ATF, NATF, ATA (A-12 Avenger) - and we have spent $$$ billions for 140 fighters that we can barely afford to sustain (and 40-some more that are not yet to op standard).
Meanwhile, our adversaries and their armorers are chipping away at non-broadband, limited-aspect stealth via VHF Aesa and IRST - since we conveniently gave them 25 years' notice of our double-or-quits master plan to rely on that technology until 2060 (and put all other approaches out of business).
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LO,
You have my sympathy if you take it all so personally and you believe LM are lying to you and the rest of the world. In the years I was hanging around the plant in FW I'm afraid all I saw were very enthusiastic passionate people busting their nuts and working very long hours to make things happen as fast as they possibly could. Did you miss that bit out on your tour and go to some other Ministry of Truth type of facility that I never stumbled upon?
I didn't realise Typhoon was allowed to make excuses, and Rafale too (5 years late according to Wikipedia but you may have better info?), while LM aren't allowed any latitude. Arguably Eurofighter and Dassault really didn't do much in the way of advancing technology - all the RAF got in 2003 with the Typhoon was a twin-engine version of the F-16C of 1984. (That's a probably a bit unfair as the F-16 cockpit and hotas are quite well designed and intuitive, whereas the Typhoon cockpit and hotas are an absolute disgrace.) LM made a pretty good effort at designing 3 different airplanes simultaneously including the world's first STOVL supersonic stealth fighter. They were just a little bit more ambitious than the Europeans so you might want to cut them a little slack? Or not - up to you.
So far, all those literally hundreds of informed analysts from a dozen or more countries have verified and validated LM's air-air and air-ground capability figures and generally agreed with them. Not really sure what the pedigree of your challenge to their figures is other than a feeling in your waters after reading too much Sweetman and PPruNe. Again, I sympathise for you if you weren't given a full read-in to the appropriate compartments and given the capabilities brief to satisfy your general and passing interest while you were at FW. But I saw many a highly skeptical Secretary of State, Minister, MP, General, Admiral, dstl expert and more who did, and not a single one left the room thinking they'd been Potemkin-villaged or 'got to after a while'. I suppose LM might have been filling the air conditioning ducts with mind-altering hypnosis drugs. Maybe the moon landings were faked too - but if so how did the WW2 bomber get up there that the Sunday Sport found?
LM have wheeled airplanes off the production line, through final finishes and into the run stations for upgrade and completion for decades. I don't think they changed anything because they heard you were coming. If you're that much of an expert on organising aircraft assembly areas then you could probably make some serious dime by offering your services as a consultant to LM? One school of thought might be that a company that has built several thousand of the world's best fighters over the last 4 decades might know more than you about that sort of thing. Or not I suppose - believe what you will.
Respectfully,
Single Seat, Single Engine, The Only Way To Fly
You have my sympathy if you take it all so personally and you believe LM are lying to you and the rest of the world. In the years I was hanging around the plant in FW I'm afraid all I saw were very enthusiastic passionate people busting their nuts and working very long hours to make things happen as fast as they possibly could. Did you miss that bit out on your tour and go to some other Ministry of Truth type of facility that I never stumbled upon?
I didn't realise Typhoon was allowed to make excuses, and Rafale too (5 years late according to Wikipedia but you may have better info?), while LM aren't allowed any latitude. Arguably Eurofighter and Dassault really didn't do much in the way of advancing technology - all the RAF got in 2003 with the Typhoon was a twin-engine version of the F-16C of 1984. (That's a probably a bit unfair as the F-16 cockpit and hotas are quite well designed and intuitive, whereas the Typhoon cockpit and hotas are an absolute disgrace.) LM made a pretty good effort at designing 3 different airplanes simultaneously including the world's first STOVL supersonic stealth fighter. They were just a little bit more ambitious than the Europeans so you might want to cut them a little slack? Or not - up to you.
So far, all those literally hundreds of informed analysts from a dozen or more countries have verified and validated LM's air-air and air-ground capability figures and generally agreed with them. Not really sure what the pedigree of your challenge to their figures is other than a feeling in your waters after reading too much Sweetman and PPruNe. Again, I sympathise for you if you weren't given a full read-in to the appropriate compartments and given the capabilities brief to satisfy your general and passing interest while you were at FW. But I saw many a highly skeptical Secretary of State, Minister, MP, General, Admiral, dstl expert and more who did, and not a single one left the room thinking they'd been Potemkin-villaged or 'got to after a while'. I suppose LM might have been filling the air conditioning ducts with mind-altering hypnosis drugs. Maybe the moon landings were faked too - but if so how did the WW2 bomber get up there that the Sunday Sport found?
LM have wheeled airplanes off the production line, through final finishes and into the run stations for upgrade and completion for decades. I don't think they changed anything because they heard you were coming. If you're that much of an expert on organising aircraft assembly areas then you could probably make some serious dime by offering your services as a consultant to LM? One school of thought might be that a company that has built several thousand of the world's best fighters over the last 4 decades might know more than you about that sort of thing. Or not I suppose - believe what you will.
Respectfully,
Single Seat, Single Engine, The Only Way To Fly
KenV
I was not posting about that particular post - mine was more relevant to SSS post 6601 ; )
Sounds like a reasonable theory. But how does this explain the "leaked" information from the pilot who allegedly flew the F-35 against an F-16 and lost? By this logic, the many pilots who provide good F-35 news must be biased and/or corrupt, but the lone pilot who provides bad news must be a saint and/or heroic. From that perspective, this theory does not sound so reasonable after all.
They were just a little bit more ambitious than the Europeans so you might want to cut them a little slack? Or not - up to you.
The whole F35 program(me) is bizarre,as we have said many times - the non stovl versions design is compromised by the stovl version design.LM have bitten off a whole lot more than they can chew with the F35B and from a technical/maintenance point of view it will be a bit of a nightmare !
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Longeron,
I'd like you to back that statement up with proof please. What do you know?!
LM have bitten off a whole lot more than they can chew with the F35B and from a technical/maintenance point of view it will be a bit of a nightmare !
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LO,
I must be imagining things - perhaps the US and partners are better at keeping such things out of the public domain compared to the Russians - I certainly spoke, heard and discussed the concept way before 2004-5. Yup - that stuff in the ducts must be true then....
You really do seem to have LM and the F-35 permanently in your hurt locker though. It's a shame because, like SSSETOWTF says, their folk work tirelessly and as a company I regarded them as extremely open and very, very good.
If it's a concept, it was one that was defined five years after the JORD was written, because nobody except the Russians talked about it until 2004-05.
You really do seem to have LM and the F-35 permanently in your hurt locker though. It's a shame because, like SSSETOWTF says, their folk work tirelessly and as a company I regarded them as extremely open and very, very good.
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PM's floating fighter jet plan quietly sunk by Defence | afr.com
F35B's might not have been a bad idea for them but it seems it's not doable (for now?).
Prime Minister Tony Abbott's proposal to put F-35 fighter jets on the Navy's two 27,000-tonne troop transport assault ships has been quietly dropped ahead of the government's defence white paper after it was found the ships would require extensive reworking and the project was too costly.
I suppose this is close to completely irrelevant please do not take too much notice.
I worked for a big technical company full of nice people of whom many were extremely clever and able. We nevertheless spent many many many millions trying to "take hills" that could not be taken because that was what we were told to do.
Our competitors had a long time to look at our failing ways, chose different priorities and now cannot spend the billions of dollars they earned while we were all made redundant and the company exited the business.
I'm just saying that it seems emotional to claim that X engineers are good people or evil people. They are totally constrained by what they have been told to do - by the excessive optimism of the people writing the cheques. With the wrong goals, the quality of the engineers is not really relevant to the outcome.
What is more, each of them in their narrow area can do superlative work, making the best tradeoffs possible without the end product being successful.
I worked for a big technical company full of nice people of whom many were extremely clever and able. We nevertheless spent many many many millions trying to "take hills" that could not be taken because that was what we were told to do.
Our competitors had a long time to look at our failing ways, chose different priorities and now cannot spend the billions of dollars they earned while we were all made redundant and the company exited the business.
I'm just saying that it seems emotional to claim that X engineers are good people or evil people. They are totally constrained by what they have been told to do - by the excessive optimism of the people writing the cheques. With the wrong goals, the quality of the engineers is not really relevant to the outcome.
What is more, each of them in their narrow area can do superlative work, making the best tradeoffs possible without the end product being successful.
Last edited by t43562; 8th Jul 2015 at 08:58. Reason: spelling & idiom
Ecce Homo! Loquitur...
and from a technical/maintenance point of view it will be a bit of a nightmare !
I'd like you to back that statement up with proof please. What do you know?!
I'd like you to back that statement up with proof please. What do you know?!
Troubled Logistics System Critical to F-35’s Future
Originally Posted by ORAC
If there's anything which in comparison with the F-35 which shows it in a good light, its ALIS.....
Originally Posted by USMC 30 Jun 2015
MARINE CORPS AIR STATION YUMA, Ariz. – -- The U.S. Marine Corps’ F-35 program took another step forward as two key capabilities were delivered to support the service’s first operational squadron...
ALIS 2.0.1 is the latest release of the software and has been released to the USMC on new mobile equipment. Aircraft maintenance, mission planning and debrief capabilities continue to be enhanced under an incremental development approach...
ALIS and the F-35 Lightning II Training System will continue to advance over time, improving the capabilities of the F-35 series as a whole, from the mission capabilities of the aircraft and the pilots to the maintainers on the ground. The systems will help the Marines of VMFA-121 declare Initial Operating Capability in July. The aircraft will be ready for future deployments aboard U.S. Navy amphibious carriers following the declaration of IOC.
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F-35 Cancelled, then what ?
Alis says that this plane cannot go to war today because it needs to be plugged into widget xyz124 - sadly this widget is back being calibrated.......
Does Alis have a STFU override?
Does Alis have a STFU override?
Originally Posted by Finningley Boy
Does anyone have any idea by what significant margin the F-35B will fall short of the performance standard of the F-35A and F-35C?
FB
FB
Significant enough?
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Internal bomb load.
having to go back twice to deliver the equivalent number of weapons (after the glide bombs have been AAA'd out of the sky)
still less payload means more performance 
First, MSOCS & SS - T43562's post is dead on. Everyone looks hard-working and dedicated from the inside. I'm sure the Boulton-Paul production line was working flat out, night and day, delivering Defiants to our boys.
And as for the people walking away as converts from the classified briefings - I would be far more impressed if I hadn't had the same line from people trying to sell me the F-22. That was before LM realized it had far more upside in the F-35, and consequently (in 2009) backed up Bob Gates' decision to cut the F-22 line off (over the severed heads of AF leaders), assuring Gates that F-35 was on schedule. Since then, nobody's talked about the F-22's super-classified superpowers.
SS
I didn't realise Typhoon was allowed to make excuses, and Rafale too (5 years late according to Wikipedia but you may have better info?)
Talking about "excuses" is judgmental and unrealistic. I'm not saying either program was problem-free, but that you can't set the timescales alongside F-35 without considering the macro factors, not excuses, that delayed them. Germany's huge post-cold-war wobbly came close to freezing Typhoon in place, spending lots of money but making little progress except playing with the DAs.
France's PCW action was to retire their oldest fighters and upgrade M2000s and Super Etendards, deferring the need for Rafale. You need to be aware of these facts before you criticize Dassault's performancee.
Arguably...
I try to avoid this word because all too often it means "I just pulled this dubious assertion out of my ear."
...Eurofighter and Dassault really didn't do much in the way of advancing technology - all the RAF got in 2003 with the Typhoon was a twin-engine version of the F-16C of 1984.
In 2003, perhaps. Typhoon and Rafale today (according to what I have heard) offer a larger controllable/usable maneuvering envelope, the ability to carry large A2G and A2A loads at the same time, all-digital, automated and DRFM-based EW. Typhoon has supercruise and Rafale can haul a lot more than an F-16. Both have some degree of built-in RCS reduction that works in tandem with the EW.
LM made a pretty good effort at designing 3 different airplanes simultaneously including the world's first STOVL supersonic stealth fighter.
I'll agree with that. The original design is about as good as it could be, although its execution was not good (FW tried to insert new assembly tech while adhering to an unnecessary call for 9g, resulting in the 2003 weight crisis). The requirement they were working to was a disaster, resulting in the $150 million Marine jet, even with compromised goals for the USAF and USN.
To invoke Concorde again, it was a huge technical achievement and it met the requirement to haul 100 people from Paris to NY at Mach 2.
And as for the people walking away as converts from the classified briefings - I would be far more impressed if I hadn't had the same line from people trying to sell me the F-22. That was before LM realized it had far more upside in the F-35, and consequently (in 2009) backed up Bob Gates' decision to cut the F-22 line off (over the severed heads of AF leaders), assuring Gates that F-35 was on schedule. Since then, nobody's talked about the F-22's super-classified superpowers.
SS
I didn't realise Typhoon was allowed to make excuses, and Rafale too (5 years late according to Wikipedia but you may have better info?)
Talking about "excuses" is judgmental and unrealistic. I'm not saying either program was problem-free, but that you can't set the timescales alongside F-35 without considering the macro factors, not excuses, that delayed them. Germany's huge post-cold-war wobbly came close to freezing Typhoon in place, spending lots of money but making little progress except playing with the DAs.
France's PCW action was to retire their oldest fighters and upgrade M2000s and Super Etendards, deferring the need for Rafale. You need to be aware of these facts before you criticize Dassault's performancee.
Arguably...
I try to avoid this word because all too often it means "I just pulled this dubious assertion out of my ear."
...Eurofighter and Dassault really didn't do much in the way of advancing technology - all the RAF got in 2003 with the Typhoon was a twin-engine version of the F-16C of 1984.
In 2003, perhaps. Typhoon and Rafale today (according to what I have heard) offer a larger controllable/usable maneuvering envelope, the ability to carry large A2G and A2A loads at the same time, all-digital, automated and DRFM-based EW. Typhoon has supercruise and Rafale can haul a lot more than an F-16. Both have some degree of built-in RCS reduction that works in tandem with the EW.
LM made a pretty good effort at designing 3 different airplanes simultaneously including the world's first STOVL supersonic stealth fighter.
I'll agree with that. The original design is about as good as it could be, although its execution was not good (FW tried to insert new assembly tech while adhering to an unnecessary call for 9g, resulting in the 2003 weight crisis). The requirement they were working to was a disaster, resulting in the $150 million Marine jet, even with compromised goals for the USAF and USN.
To invoke Concorde again, it was a huge technical achievement and it met the requirement to haul 100 people from Paris to NY at Mach 2.
FB -
The B has 440 nm combat radius, versus 590 nm for the A. That's with internal fuel and 2 x 1000 lb JDAMs + 2 x AIM-120, (2000 lb bombs on the A), and it's HHHH versus HMMH.
The B has no internal gun.
Air combat performance will be affected by 3200 lbs greater OEW and somewhat smaller H-tails.
The B has 440 nm combat radius, versus 590 nm for the A. That's with internal fuel and 2 x 1000 lb JDAMs + 2 x AIM-120, (2000 lb bombs on the A), and it's HHHH versus HMMH.
The B has no internal gun.
Air combat performance will be affected by 3200 lbs greater OEW and somewhat smaller H-tails.
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The whole F35 program(me) is bizarre,as we have said many times - the non stovl versions design is compromised by the stovl version design.LM have bitten off a whole lot more than they can chew with the F35B......
.....and from a technical/maintenance point of view it will be a bit of a nightmare!