It's been a long time since I posted on this thread but I wanted to speak about the missile carrying capacity of the AMCA. As the AMCA is projected to be a fifth generation fighter, it makes more sense to first take a glance at current fifth generation aircraft such as F-22, J-20, F-35, Su-57 that are in operational service with various Airforces around the world.
1. F-22: In air-to-air configuration, the F-22 can carry a total of
8 AAM, that is
six AIM-120 AMRAAMS &
two AIM-9 Sidewinders.
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2. J-20: The J-20 can carry a total of
6 AAM, that is either 4 medium/long-range AAMs in the main bay and 1 short-range missile in each side weapon bay.
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3. Su-57: The amount of missiles that Su-57 can carry is the same as that of J-20 that is the Su-57 can carry
four long range AAMs and
two Short range AAMs.
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4. F-35: In air to air configuration, the F-35's primary AAM is the AIM-120C, of which it can carry
4 of in its weapons bays, this is the current configuration of F-35, in the future when the newer block of F-35 comes, the F-35 will be able to carry
6 AAM courtesy "Sidekick Weopons bay", so after the newer block upgrade, F-35 will be able to carry as many missiles as J-20 and Su-57, while all three will still lag behind F-22 in terms of maximum missile capacity.
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So as far fifth generation fighters are concerned, the F-22 has highest missile carrying capacity of any fifth generation fighter in existence. I have not taken J-31/J-35 or Su-75 in the comparison because I don't want to discuss about those, I don't know anything about J-31/J-35 and Su-75 is still on paper only though we do have figures for their missile load out.
So now let's speak about AMCA: So how many missiles will AMCA be able to carry internally? From what I have heard, the AMCA will be able to carry 4 to 6 missiles, but there was a source which said that the mark-1 work carry 4 AAM. To be honest, this is not bad, see the F-35 in its current configuration can carry just 4 AAM, but in subsequent block will be able to carry 6 AAM. The same can be expected from the AMCA, the AMCA Mark-2 can be expected to have a missile carrying capacity of 6 to 8 AAMs. I simply cannot find much information about the AMCA's AAM capacity/configuration. I sincerely hope that the AMCA MK-1 would be able to carry 6 AAM and the subsequent Mk-2 would be able to carry 8 AAM because for a fighter coming out in the early 2030s, even be it a fifth generation plane, anything less than 4 AAMs would be kinda unacceptable to me. Fingers crossed on this.