Know Your 'Rafale'

[Bhurki]

________________________________

Lets see an F-35 do that!

F35 will sit 30 miles out watching rafale pulling 11g while being chased by an amraam and rafale pilot would be blacking out wondering who's firing.

 

[Armand2REP]

F35 will sit 30 miles out watching rafale pulling 11g while being chased by an amraam and rafale pilot would be blacking out wondering who's firing.

If it was that close it would have a MICA IR up its tail pipe. Of course F-35 can't pull enough Gs to escape a Vietnam era missile.

 

[asianobserve]

________________________________

Lets see an F-35 do that!

F-35A is operationally rated +9G like Rafale. So there's no reason to think that in emergencies the F-35A can reach 11Gs. The 9G operational limit is placed there for 2 very important reasons:

1. To preserve the service life of the aircraft; and,

2. To preserve the life of the pilot which like most fighter pilots can only sustain up to 9Gs with the help of G suits. Fighter pilots on aversge, including those best trained, can only tolerate higher Gs in G suit for 1 to 2 seconds. Going beyond 9Gs for longer periods is considered very dangerous if not fatal.

Besides, in WVR no fighter plane even if it can take a 11G load can outmaneuver modern thrust vectored, with HOBS capabilities and which are rated up to 40-50G load IR missiles. So wise pilots will avoid at all cost ending up in a WVR dogfight. Only fools would want to dogfight nowadays.

 

[abhay rajput]

Why you guys keep comparing Rafale and f35. F35 is better because of stealth . No doubt about it . You can't compare 5th generation fighter jet with 4.5+ .. compare f18 and f16 with Rafale... Nobody is giving f35 and nobody wants f35 in India.

 

[asianobserve]

Why you guys keep comparing Rafale and f35. F35 is better because of stealth . No doubt about it . You can't compare 5th generation fighter jet with 4.5+ .. compare f18 and f16 with Rafale... Nobody is giving f35 and nobody wants f35 in India.

Every country who can afford it will buy F-35 if only it's offered to them. You can see it from all the fighter competitions that the F-35 participated in. It always won.

Thus, I think Indians are simply being realistic about the prospect of F-35 being sold to it. Even UAE a close US ally and funder of F-16 modernization is not being offered the F-35 yet. Eventually however the F-35 will be offered to countries who are not very close US allies.

But what is funny is that there are some people who keep on claiming on the superiority if 70s era (when the idea was concieved) Rafale versus 90s (when the idea was concieved) era F-35.

 

[Armand2REP]

F-35A is operationally rated +9G like Rafale. So there's no reason to think that in emergencies the F-35A can reach 11Gs. The 9G operational limit is placed there for 2 very important reasons:

The British can only pull 7Gs. It is a flying brick that can't turn, can't climb and can't fight. The F-35C can only pull 7.5Gs. Even aircraft from the Vietnam era could pull more than 9Gs. The F-35 has the flight characteristics of a third and even 2nd gen fighter. The F-35A tops out at 9G, the software won't allow it to pull more than that.

 

[asianobserve]

The British can only pull 7Gs. It is a flying brick that can't turn, can't climb and can't fight. The F-35C can only pull 7.5Gs. Even aircraft from the Vietnam era could pull more than 9Gs. The F-35 has the flight characteristics of a third and even 2nd gen fighter. The F-35A tops out at 9G, the software won't allow it to pull more than that.

That's disingenuous.

You know that the Brits uses a STVOL version of the F-35 known as F-35C. That version has a lift fan and and 2 gas diverts connected to its engine. So it's not only heavier but the lift fan is not operationally designed to take on 9G+ loading so it's limited to 7Gs. But if there's a need to exceed that G loading I think the F-35C can do that on very short durations. But why risk it?

Like most fighter jets the G loading of the F-35A is deliberately limited by software to 9G loading. As I said due to the need to preserve both airframe life and pilot. Humans normally can only tolerate upto 5Gs. Fighter pilots on the other hand due to training and G-suit can tolerate upto 9 Gs. But that is the upper limit of a professional pilot. Beyond that pilots will normally pass out (there are a lot of fighter jet crashes due to pilots passing out in extreme maneuvers). So the F-35A is operationally limited to 9Gs. But an F-35A pilot like in other jets can override the G-limiter if there's a need for it.

However, why would a pilot risk passing out on a fight by doing fancy 11G maneuvers when an enemy's short range A2A missile can out turn and outrun him? Besides, these kinds of maneuvers would normally bleed your fighter a lot of energy in the process. It would be better to use DIRCM and EW defenses. For Block 5 the F-35A will be equipped with a DIRCM which is available from Northrop Grumman as early as 2013.

Also, F-35As will rarely end up in WVR or dogfights. The enemies will be shot out of the skies without knowing that they have been targeted by an F-35. Already, the US military is assembling the biggest and most sophisticated flight simulator that stretches different countries and can be integrated together to better train F-35 pilots. Does Dassault have anything approaching this kind of training systems for Rafale that is available to F-35 pilots?

 

[abhay rajput]

Every country who can afford it will buy F-35 if only it's offered to them. You can see it from all the fighter competitions that the F-35 participated in. It always won.

Thus, I think Indians are simply being realistic about the prospect of F-35 being sold to it. Even UAE a close US ally and funder of F-16 modernization is not being offered the F-35 yet. Eventually however the F-35 will be offered to countries who are not very close US allies.

But what is funny is that there are some people who keep on claiming on the superiority if 70s era (when the idea was concieved) Rafale versus 90s (when the idea was concieved) era F-35.

As I said there is no comparison b/w Rafale and f35 but Rafale is not joke either . I will still rate it higher than f18,f16, Gripen, su35. Probably eurofighter typhoon is in the same league.
Perhaps this article might change a little bit of your perspective.
http://www.defense-aerospace.com/ar...game_changing’-f_35-data-fusion-debunked.html

 

[asianobserve]

As I said there is no comparison b/w Rafale and f35 but Rafale is not joke either . I will still rate it higher than f18,f16, Gripen, su35. Probably eurofighter typhoon is in the same league.
Perhaps this article might change a little bit of your perspective.
http://www.defense-aerospace.com/articles-view/feature/5/197892/claims-of-‘game_changing’-f_35-data-fusion-debunked.html

Neither is Eurofighter a match for F-35, maybe in dogfight scenario. Even that vocal German Air Force Eurofighter pilot that boasted about beating F-35s in mock combat admits that it will be a different affair if it's a BVR combat, meaning the Europfighter will not get the same favorable result against F-35s. But even the boastful claim of that German pilot against F-35s must be taken with a grain of salt or if not caution because we do not know under what ROE the mock dogfight happened. As you know very well the German establishment seem to be on a quixotic quest to discredit the F-35 in favor of the Eurofighter beginning with that laughbale passive radar stunt (when F-35's manufacturer Lockheed Martin has been producing a passive radar of its own for the US Government and military since the 1990s) that followed the German Government's browbeating of its Air Force establishment against considering F-35 (with clear instruction to buy only Eurofighter) as a Tornado replacement.

But as I have said, F-35 operators will capitalize on F-35's strength and will not go WVR of the enemy. The enemy will not know an F-35 has shot it down until postmortem.

 

[Bhurki]

Rafale backers say F35 cant beat them in a knife fight. Well, it doesn't need to, it can shoot you from afar. If and when a F35 pilot uses knife instead of the gun, it'll only be his mistake and not the platforms'.

 

[Neptune]

________________________________

Lets see an F-35 do that!

And it probably can, F-15s have pulled up to 14Gs, even a Mig-25 which is rated at like 4.5 max Gs once pulled 11.5 Gs in combat.

An F-35 almost certainly can pull 11Gs or more given its thrust. For safety and longevity reasons most aircraft won’t pull more then 9Gs, some manufacturers likely won’t ever reveal what the true G limit of their aircraft is or have never pushed them to the absolute limit in testing (see F-15 and Mig-25).

 

[BON PLAN]

F35 will sit 30 miles out watching rafale pulling 11g while being chased by an amraam and rafale pilot would be blacking out wondering who's firing.

always the same BS answer....

So explain us while a fighter built to sit 30 miles away of any threat is embarking AIM9X missiles ???

 

[BON PLAN]

Rafale backers say F35 cant beat them in a knife fight. Well, it doesn't need to, it can shoot you from afar. If and when a F35 pilot uses knife instead of the gun, it'll only be his mistake and not the platforms'.

bla bla bla .....

 

[Neptune]

always the same BS answer....

So explain us while a fighter built to sit 30 miles away of any threat is embarking AIM9X missiles ???

If I may, a missile like the AIM9x would be ideal for low RCS aircraft such as J-20, SU-57, J-31 or some ‘stealth’ drones where the F-35 would be unlikely to detect and lock onto those aircraft far enough to use an AIM-120 like it would for conventional aircraft.

There is also no guarantee that the F-35 would not be caught by surprise, during such wars as the Gulf War, Iran Iraq war, Vietnam War, as well as many others wars Migs, Mirages, F series fighters, etc would catch the enemy off guard, usually by flying low and avoiding radar and then climbed and engaged enemy aircraft.

 

[abhay rajput]

If I may, a missile like the AIM9x would be ideal for low RCS aircraft such as J-20, SU-57, J-31 or some ‘stealth’ drones where the F-35 would be unlikely to detect and lock onto those aircraft far enough to use an AIM-120 like it would for conventional aircraft.

There is also no guarantee that the F-35 would not be caught by surprise, during such wars as the Gulf War, Iran Iraq war, Vietnam War, as well as many others wars Migs, Mirages, F series fighters, etc would catch the enemy off guard, usually by flying low and avoiding radar and then climbed and engaged enemy aircraft.

Basically it depends on situations. Is there enemy long radar intact, awacs, intact, and how many planes are there. 2 Rafale can shoot down 1 f35 with ground radars and awacs support with 1 loss

 

[asianobserve]

If I may, a missile like the AIM9x would be ideal for low RCS aircraft such as J-20, SU-57, J-31 or some ‘stealth’ drones where the F-35 would be unlikely to detect and lock onto those aircraft far enough to use an AIM-120 like it would for conventional aircraft.

There is also no guarantee that the F-35 would not be caught by surprise, during such wars as the Gulf War, Iran Iraq war, Vietnam War, as well as many others wars Migs, Mirages, F series fighters, etc would catch the enemy off guard, usually by flying low and avoiding radar and then climbed and engaged enemy aircraft.

Even if the enemy does not turn on its radar the F-35 can still fire its AIM120 since F-35s EOTS and DAS (360 coverage with proven ability to detect and track rockets more than 1,300 kms away, so it should have no problem tracking enemy fighters from more than 100 km range) are networked to its radar. The targeting solution from DAS or EOTS in A2A mode is automatically transmitted to its AN/APG81 radar which can turn on to target a specific area with agile beam steering to preserve F-35s stealth, and in turn gives the firing solution to AIM120.

With 360 degrees DAS coverage it's very hard to surprise an F-35. And it shows in its records at Red Flag where even new pilots sre able to defeat seasoned veterans.

So far, none of the potential F-35 adversaries you mentioned comes close to sensors and sensors integrstion of the F-35.

 

[Neptune]

Even if the enemy does not turn on its radar the F-35 can still fire its AIM120 since F-35s EOTS and DAS (360 coverage with proven ability to detect and track rockets more than 1,300 kms away, so it should have no problem tracking enemy fighters from more than 100 km range) are networked to its radar. The targeting solution from DAS or EOTS in A2A mode is automatically transmitted to its AN/APG81 radar which can turn on to target a specific area with agile beam steering to preserve F-35s stealth, and in turn gives the firing solution to AIM120.

With 360 degrees DAS coverage it's very hard to surprise an F-35. And it shows in its records at Red Flag where even new pilots sre able to defeat seasoned veterans.

So far, none of the potential F-35 adversaries you mentioned comes close to sensors and sensors integrstion of the F-35.

Did the F-35 practice against SU-57 or J-20s? I didn’t think so, it’s irrelevant if the F-35 defeated legacy aircraft using NATO tactics. The F-35 would be seen by IR without problems just like the F-22 was over Syria by an SU-35 OLS-35. Fly low enough and it’s unlikely that any aircraft will pick you up on radar due to ground clutter. This is not speculation but fact and a reason why most modern air forces practice low altitude penetration missions.



As for target solution, there won’t be any targeting solution if the enemy aircraft’s RCS and IR signature is too low to engage with an AIM-120, that’s one of the reasons canons and short range missiles are installed on most “stealth” aircraft. As for the F-35 sensor suit, no one is denying its impressive the problem is the SU-57 has, more or less similar capabilities and one can argue even more capabilities when you factor in its side lobe radars and S-70 wingman forging ahead and scanning enemy air and ground targets and beaming back information.

 

[BON PLAN]

If I may, a missile like the AIM9x would be ideal for low RCS aircraft such as J-20, SU-57, J-31 or some ‘stealth’ drones where the F-35 would be unlikely to detect and lock onto those aircraft far enough to use an AIM-120 like it would for conventional aircraft.

There is also no guarantee that the F-35 would not be caught by surprise, during such wars as the Gulf War, Iran Iraq war, Vietnam War, as well as many others wars Migs, Mirages, F series fighters, etc would catch the enemy off guard, usually by flying low and avoiding radar and then climbed and engaged enemy aircraft.

AIM9X was unable to lock on a old and not IR stealthy Syrian Su, so against a J31 or anything a little bit modern.....

I don't understand : how that marvellous a near AWACS F35 can be surprised ? The 360° coverage EOTS without any blind sector can't be surprised no more.

 

[BON PLAN]

Basically it depends on situations. Is there enemy long radar intact, awacs, intact, and how many planes are there. 2 Rafale can shoot down 1 f35 with ground radars and awacs support with 1 loss

:hippo:

With the same propaganda the F35 was supposed to be affordable, agile as a F16, supercruiser as a F22, and all model able to carry internally 2 x 1000Kg LGB.

But except on old LM powerpoint, in the real life it's not true.

 

[BON PLAN]

Even if the enemy does not turn on its radar the F-35 can still fire its AIM120 since F-35s EOTS and DAS (360 coverage with proven ability to detect and track rockets more than 1,300 kms away, so it should have no problem tracking enemy fighters from more than 100 km range) are networked to its radar. The targeting solution from DAS or EOTS in A2A mode is automatically transmitted to its AN/APG81 radar which can turn on to target a specific area with agile beam steering to preserve F-35s stealth, and in turn gives the firing solution to AIM120.

With 360 degrees DAS coverage it's very hard to surprise an F-35. And it shows in its records at Red Flag where even new pilots sre able to defeat seasoned veterans.

So far, none of the potential F-35 adversaries you mentioned comes close to sensors and sensors integrstion of the F-35.

so what about AIM9X ??? I don't remember LM saying that there is a lot of space and free weight available on the flying LO Brick.