Forum: Program and politics

jayraptor wrote:

Do you know the meaning of Freedom of Speech and Consumer Rights? If you don't, you should migrate to North Korea.

Common misconception: forums are not governed by free speech rules. Your ability to speak is completely at the pleasure of its owner. Usually that is regulated by the rules of the forum.

When you're being called out for being a troll by multiple people, its best you start reconsidering your posting behavior. ITs a possibility that you might have to take your god given right to speak somewhere else.

F-16.net Sponsor

jayraptor wrote:

Dear Conan,

In fact, since the F-117 was first shot down, USAF immediately halted all F-117 and B-2 sorties, at first have doubt whether Serbians had acquired any sort of high tech sensor that could detect stealth. Please check again. Only later after intel found out and Serbians gave away the reason, US allowed only B-2 to fly in at high altitude beyond reach of SA-6. Reason why Serbs could down the F-117 because Americans are so lazy to plot new course and would use the same path that they think safe again and again. Stealth aircrafts especially F-117 with generation 1 stealth layer could be detected and tracked by normal GCI and mobile radar when at less than 5Nm away.

Dear Jayraptor, as confident as you presently are, I'm sure it won't be any trouble for your to please provide a single credible link that proves that the USAF immediately ceased all F-117 and B-2 operations between March and June 1999, post the infamous F-117 shootdown?

Especially considering the dubious "damaged" F-117 incident was widely reported as having occurred AFTER the initial F-117 shoot-down?

Such would not be possible if your assertation were correct...

Hey J-man, lets stick to the thread topic. I am happy for you to start a new thread on the unrelated issues you recently posted in this thread and I am looking forward to vigorously debate those issues/ideas on a new thread.

Good Lord, I clicked on this thread after a few weeks' absence expecting some news on the RoKAF F-35 affair, and found this... Confused

Southernphantom, its unfortunate that there are always new posters with ridiculous and often moronic ideas coming out of the woodwork derailing the thread. You should check out J-mans posts on other threads...comedy gold Very Happy

. Seriously, I have learnt my lesson, better ignore these wacky posters to get the thread back on topic.

Dear all,

Agree, get back to topic. Besides, since this is still part of military forum, it is fine to debate, question, doubt, think of, etc anything about military.

"jayraptor' asks us to: "...Stick to topic, this is about Korean's rejection of F-35 and replacement for aging fighters...." Hmmm. Topic of this thread (headline) is: Korea threatens to disqualify F-35. Has South Korea rejected the F-35? News to me."

My comment : South Korea and any other countries that are US allies would not reject the F-35 after all as there aren't many option available. Even if the F-35 might not become their primary fighter fleet, they do prefer to have numbers of F-35 rather than not. For South Koreans, they would need a dozen F-35s at least for high risk missions that require to fly past enemy lines of defenses without being detected to destroy high importance vital or strategic targets such as the regime's hideout, radar stations, C&C, supply line, etc.

Whereas when comes to invasion, for weapons platform role, it will be handled by F-15K and F-16C/Ds. Most countries even US prefer to use F-16C/Ds for strike missions (CAS/Down & Dirty/Nest attack) mainly because of it's cheaper (less heartache if got shot down), smaller (making it harder to hit by AAAs) and consumes less fuel (lower operating cost). The F-15E despite being a better attack aircraft, US would use it for distance attack & quick stike rather than using it for search and destroy mobile targets that would require to loiter around danger zone. The B-1B is supposed to replace B-52 entirely but because of practical running cost in terms of fuel consumption and maintenance, the B-52 is still in use and turns out the SAC flew B-52s more than B-1B and B-2 in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Besides, Korea, it is evident that the UK and the few NATO countries would still operate the EF2000 for long range air to air intercept and ground attack role more than F-35s. Same thing, it's all about cost and practicality. Unless Lockheed decides to sell more affordable conventional low RCS variant, NATO would replace the aging F-16s and F-4s with conventional F-35s.

Dear Conan,
It was reported on the news generally. What else could commoner military fans like us could dig out other than reading news and articles. Besides the stealth aircraft incident, there was 1 incident involving AH-64 crashed over Yugoslavia theater and they halted all AH-64s operation until the cause of crash is confirmed before allowing them to resume operations.

Dear Mk82,
If you would like to buy a new car, aren't you supposed to find out the disadvantages of that car model before you decide to buy? Same thing when comes to buying military assets especially when you have limited funding and you are smaller NATO country. When you are buying weapons from others since you do not manufacture the weapons on your own, buying the wrong fighters or if the specs was not up to your expectation, you will have to stick to them till you have save enough cash to replace them. Tomorrow is always a mystery, who knows you might end up offending unfriendly neighbor and they would throw everything they got at you. You won't have time to purchase new fighters if you found out that the maintenance is not practical in time of emergency.

Fair point J-man, if you are a smaller NATO country with a limited defence budget and don't really need VLO stealth, the F35 will be a "luxury" acquisition as you understand it. A few smaller European nations have decided that the F35 is the best fighter aircraft to acquire in terms of cost vs capability and ability to interoperate with allied forces especially with US armed forces. Time will tell if they were right. Mind you though, alot of their current fast jets are highly dependent on electronics (EF 2000, F16 MLU, Tornado) and they have not been hangar queens in terms of electronic/avionic problems. Whether Lockheed has really improved the maintanability of radar absorbent coatings/structure since the F22, only time will tell when F35 is subjected to wear and tear and tempo of an operational jet in the combat arm of the air force. To be fair, Lockheed has made many significant changes to their radar absorbent coating/structure technology to try to improve the durability and maintainability of radar absorbent coating/structure of the F35, especially the C version which will be in harsh marine environments. If you are inclined, search the interweb or old threads on F35 RAM/RAS.

'mk82' said above: "...Whether Lockheed has really improved the maintanability of radar absorbent coatings/structure since the F22, only time will tell when F35 is subjected to wear and tear and tempo of an operational jet in the combat arm of the air force. To be fair, Lockheed has made many significant changes to their radar absorbent coating/structure technology to try to improve the durability and maintainability of radar absorbent coating/structure of the F35, especially the C version which will be in harsh marine environments. If you are inclined, search the interweb or old threads on F35 RAM/RAS."

'mk82' the 3 models A/B/C share the same 'fibermat RAM' structure, not just for the C model. The robust stealth material is well described in this forum. Remember the B model will be at sea and at expeditionary airfields also. It is not that 'time will tell' but that it has been explained clearly how robust this stealth material is already. It needs to be physically damaged by harsh treatment to have the stealth properties in any way impaired. 'J-man' is just rehashing old bollocks as far as I know. No need to repeat it. Thanks.
_______________

Sometimes searching this forum on one word can be tedious so here are some (easy for me repeatable) quotes about F-35C (and of course the others) stealth signature maintainability:

F-35C STEALTH ON THE CARRIER DECK MEANS HIGH PERFORMANCE, LOW MAINTENANCE

http://www.jsf.mil/news/documents/20080 ... ARRIER.rtf

"....The F-35 achieves its Very Low Observable stealth performance through its fundamental design, its external shape and its manufacturing processes, which control tolerances to less than half the diameter of a human hair. Special coatings are added to further reduce radar signature.

The package is designed to remain stealthy in severe combat conditions, and tests have validated that capability. After obtaining baseline radar cross section (RCS) measurements from a highly detailed, full-scale Signature Measurement Aircraft (SigMA), a team of Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman engineers intentionally inflicted extensive damage – more than three dozen significant defects – on the model. The damage represented the cumulative effect of more than 600 flight hours of military aircraft operations. RCS measurements taken after the damage showed that the stealthy signature remained intact.

“Even operating in harsh carrier-deck conditions, the F-35C will require no special care or feeding. In fact, its stealth adds very little to the day-today maintenance equation,” O’Bryan said. “We’ve come a long way from the early stealth airplanes, which needed hours or even days of attention and repair after every flight. The F-35 not only avoids that intensive level of upkeep, it will require significantly less maintenance than the
nonstealth fighters it is designed to replace.”
________________

Production techniques gear F-35 for stealth

http://www.navy.mi.th/nrdo/jane/dev_w/p ... July48.pdf

"...In addition to machining advances that allow LM to achieve high manufacturing tolerances, advances have also been made in the composition of the radar-absorbent structure (RAS) of the aircraft. This Linhart said, is "completely different" from earlier RAS materials in the way it is resistant to chipping, even in the face of bird-strikes...."
______________________________

Lockheed Gives a Peek at New JSF Stealth Material Concept by Amy Butler May/17/2010

http://www.aviationweek.com/aw/blogs/de ... 80e3609ae1

"It is called "fiber mat," and Tom Burbage, executive vice president of F-35 program integration for Lockheed Martin says it is "the single, biggest technological breakthrough we've had on this program." He says that a new process to blend stealth qualities into composite material avoided the need for stealthy appliqués and coatings. Using a new process, Lockheed officials are curing the stealthy, fiber mat substance into the composite skin of the aircraft, according to Burbage. It “makes this airplane extremely rugged. You literally have to damage the airplane to reduce the signature,” he said in an interview with Aviation Week in Fort Worth. This top-fiber mat surface takes the place of metallic paint that was used on earlier stealthy aircraft designs. The composite skin of the F-35 actually contains this layer of fiber mat, and it can help carry structural loads in the aircraft, Burbage adds. Lockheed Martin declined to provide further details on fiber mat because they are classified. But the disclosure of this new substance comes at a time when Lockheed Martin officials are arguing that maintenance costs for the F-35 will be lower than anticipated by operators...."
_________________

New Stealth Concept Could Affect JSF Cost By Amy Butler - May 17, 2010

http://www.aviationweek.com/aw/generic/ ... el=defense

"FORT WORTH — As the debate rages about Joint Strike Fighter life-cycle cost, Lockheed Martin officials are raising a previously unheard point to bolster their low-price claims — a new low-observability (LO) substance called fiber mat. Lockheed officials avoided the need to use stealthy appliqués and coatings by curing the substance into the composite skin of the aircraft, according to Tom Burbage, executive vice president of F-35 program integration for the company. It “makes this airplane extremely rugged. You literally have to damage the airplane to reduce the signature,” he said in an interview with AVIATION WEEK. This top-fiber mat surface takes the place of metallic paint that was used on earlier stealthy aircraft designs.

The composite skin of the F-35 actually contains this layer of fiber mat, and it can help carry structural loads in the aircraft, Burbage adds. The F-35 is about 42% composite by weight, Burbage says, compared to the F-22 at 22% and the F-16 at 2%. Lockheed Martin declined to provide further details on fiber mat because they are classified...."
____________________

Composites Machining for the F-35
Aug? 8/3/2010 Article From: Modern Machine Shop, Peter Zelinski, Senior Editor

http://www.compositesworld.com/articles ... r-the-f-35

“...Lockheed Martin’s precision machining of composite skin sections for the F-35 provides part of the reason why this plane saves money for U.S. taxpayers. That machining makes the plane compelling in ways that have led other countries to take up some of the cost. Here is a look at a high-value, highly engineered machining process for the Joint Strike Fighter aircraft....

...The F-35 features “supportable” VLO. That is, the VLO on this plane comes with very low maintenance cost. Stealth aircraft of the past couldn’t make that claim. Because radar detects sharp edges, even small mismatches between exterior parts on past VLO planes were smoothed out using epoxy. The epoxy would dry, harden and separate in the field—meaning it had to be frequently inspected and replaced.

By contrast, adjacent parts of the F-35 match so fluidly and precisely that no epoxy is needed...."

Spaz, the patience you and some others display here for fools is amazing! Cheers

It is more for my benefit.

Jay could conceivably be fishing for sensitive information, I suppose.

Certainly not a native English speaker, for whatever that's worth.

These inarticulate posts are ad nausiem and contribute nothing more than "what if" scenarios of no importance. Legacy acft cannot and will not enjoy what the F-35 offers. It is not a single service, single type platform. Its design and construction is not something for simple discussion.Wrap your head around that first then reply with something worth of discussion.

Here is one of the previous threads I could not find late last night. Oh well. There are some good graphics which round out the text about stealth:

UK's first F-35 flies [the IRONIC 'B' Model] Smile

stroll down

http://www.f-16.net/index.php?name=PNph ... p;p=221682

jayraptor wrote:

Dear Conan,
It was reported on the news generally. What else could commoner military fans like us could dig out other than reading news and articles.

Well then it should be very straight forward to provide us with some supporting evidence for your claims, a single link to one of those generally reported articles would suffice.

A bit of Google-fu and pasting of the link here, isn't too much to ask is it?

Quote:

Besides the stealth aircraft incident, there was 1 incident involving AH-64 crashed over Yugoslavia theater and they halted all AH-64s operation until the cause of crash is confirmed before allowing them to resume operations.

So you're equating a temporary grounding of a completely separate platform for safety reasons, to the total cessation of all military operations of your two most important strike aircraft in the middle of a reasonably intense NATO operation, because of a unique occurrence that was caused not by some special sensor, but rather extremely poor mission planning and routing and a huge amount of luck on behalf of the enemy?

And on this basis countries might become hesitant in purchasing low observable aircraft in future?

Hmmm....