F-35 internal fuel, range

[ricnunes]

Yeah it's useful having this capability but let's be serious, it's not everyday that you want to drop a 2000 lb bomb from a strike fighter, you usually use cruise missiles from land or ships to do that since the big targets are well known, i think carrying some stealth cruise missiles or smaller ordinance in big number is more useful for a strike figther..

1- The biggest warhead that some of those cruise missiles (the biggest/more powerful) carry are 1000lb class warheads (and NOT 2000lb class warheads!). For example: Storm Shadow, Tomahawk and JASSM carry 1000lb class warheads. Other cruise missiles carry even smaller warheads.
And you can refer to my last post why 2000lb bombs are better than 1000lb (resuming, more destructive power with small diference in terms of collateral damage) or resuming.

2- Cruise missiles fly for much longer time and distances which means that the probability of being detected and shot down by enemy air defenses is much bigger compared to a 2000lb bomb like the GBU-31 whose flight path is much shorter. In order to reduce their vulnerability, cruise missiles usually fly at low (nap of the Earth) altitudes but while this can technically reduce detection by enemy radars and long range air defense systems, this makes such missiles vulnerable to a myriad of other weapons such as MANPADS, all sorts of AA Guns and Machine Guns.

3- 2000lb bombs are far, far and far less expensive than cruise missiles and this together with all the advantages previously mentioned - Cruise Missiles are more expensive and more are needed to take out targets compared to 2000lb bombs which by its turn makes Cruise Missiles even more expensive.


Also and directly replying to your post: If you're going to perform a one-off strike then you can indeed use Cruise missiles, of course. But if you're waging an all-out war such as in Desert Storm in 1991 or Allied Force in 1999 then it's simply NOT sustainable to hit and destroy every enemy static target resorting to Cruise Missiles (due to reason also mentioned above).

[ricnunes]

it's not everyday that you want to drop a 2000 lb bomb from a strike fighter, you usually use cruise missiles from land or ships to do that since the big targets are well known, i think carrying some stealth cruise missiles or smaller ordinance in big number is more useful for a strike figther..

I think you have this backwards. Until the F-35, you COULDN"T use a strike fighter to penetrate advanced IADS and drop the bomb on the target (which may be the IADS itself). You HAD TO use cruise missiles. There has been a graphic around as well that shows that direct attack (LGB, JDAM) is over an order of magnitude less costly than cruise missiles.

That and also steve2267's F-117 point are also very true indeed and of course I fully agree.

[Gums]

Salute!

Since we are getting into philosophy and war games and such......

Maybe Steve is becoming one of my acolytes, not a disciple yet, but learning/thinking/playing "what if" assets I have to play with, and the beat goes on.

The deal with the cruise missile attack scenario is that some or most of the critters could be benign and they will waste the enemy IAD missiles and interceptors. Back when I was a nugget defending us from the Bisons and Bears, we worried about the dunb drones that would divert us from the real folks hauling the nukes. Of course, our attack side had the Quail for decoys and the Hound Dog for cruise doofer.s Those were scary times, folks, and we didn't have Red Flag and only very scripted scenarios heavily biased in our favor.

You do not have to take out every pissant missile site. You go for the ones with longest effective tracking range and you go for the regional radar sites that provide the individual missile sites with specific targets of a heads up. You also try for the command and control places as we did in Desert Storm. Think about the FUBAR in Iran last month. I can vouch that the Vee had their act together and we had very few missiles sent at the A2A guys, and zero at airliners coming into Hanoi.

Gums sends...

[weasel1962]

Defensive AEW changes the equation. 4G will need to out-stick the CAP which will see them coming. That's where 22-35 will be needed.

[spazsinbad]

Did someone say 'bunker buster'? THIS IS A BUNKER BUSTER buster.

[weasel1962]

:shock: Did someone say 'bunker buster'? THIS IS A BUNKER BUSTER buster.

...and just to be clear, is that the plane, pilot or nose job?

[spazsinbad]

CLEAR? Clear. Charge the PADDLES to whapitywop. CLEAR! BumpF - we nuked 'em from orbit boss. CLEAR. BOOOMPFFF!!!!

http://steeljawscribe.com/2006/12/08/fl ... ear-fleas/ [A-4B has much shorter nose than C & follow ons]

“A4D-1 139925 carries another T-63. Tail and fuselage stripes were dark green bordered by white. The nose of the aircraft and the T-63 were day-glo red (usn via SDAM) VX-5 ‘VAMPIRES’ Air Development Squadron Five (AIRDEVRON FIVE)” Naval Fighters 49 — Douglas A-4A/B Skyhawk in Navy Service by Steve Ginter"

[ricnunes]

:shock: Did someone say 'bunker buster'?

That would have been me

THIS IS A BUNKER BUSTER buster.

I would say that reference to nuclear weapons/bombs should be considered cheating when it comes to the discussion at hand

[weasel1962]

Odds of the pilot missing...? Oops I actually flipped the drop switch,

[spazsinbad]

Pictures of 'nukes' under A-4s are more likely 'SHAPES' (inert) nobody carries such a weapon lightly for that OOPS moment.

[energo]

The F-35’s High Angle of Attack Explained 12 Jul 2016 LM [this is a quote from LOCKHEED MARTIN hisself]
https://www.f35.com/in-depth/detail/the ... -explained
-
“...The F-35 was also designed to turn at nine Gs, with a full load of internally-stored fuel & weapons...”

Ok long wait, but had a chat with LM.

Basically: the Bowman report is confirmed. It was a "requirement", but that the program has since "moved on". F35.com article is neither denied nor confirmed. That's it, not surprisingly.

[wrightwing]

The F-35’s High Angle of Attack Explained 12 Jul 2016 LM [this is a quote from LOCKHEED MARTIN hisself]
https://www.f35.com/in-depth/detail/the ... -explained
-
“...The F-35 was also designed to turn at nine Gs, with a full load of internally-stored fuel & weapons...”

Ok long wait, but had a chat with LM.

Basically: the Bowman report is confirmed. It was a "requirement", but that the program has since "moved on". F35.com article is neither denied nor confirmed. That's it, not surprisingly.

Billie Flynn has confirmed it on a number of occasions. 9G/50° AoA/M1.6 with full internal payload and fuel.

[spazsinbad]

Some recent OLD bunker BUSTER info: U.S. Navy 1950s Light-Attack Jet Programs 13 Mar 2020 Tommy H. Thomason

http://thanlont.blogspot.com/2020/03/us ... grams.html

[doge]

From the Finnish HX Challenge. (I saw this video before, but I missed an important part.)
USAF F-22/F-35 pilot Major Jordan “Burn” Levine made a commented like comparing Fuel/Ranges of the F-22 and F-35.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xgDZNXHs6KY (I extracted closed caption subtitles from Youtube.)

@43:10~
[Major Jordan “Burn” Levine] A: The one thing we haven't talked about yet on this slide that I like to highlight is that last one on the left column says significant internal fuel capacity.
This jet can carry 18,000 pounds just, about 18,000 pounds of fuel internally without any sort of external tanks.
With the single pratt & whitney motor that we have there it is the ability it has the ability to provide endurance and they and a fight.

Flying the F-22 awesome airplane two big motors and the same amount of gas so it was always a challenge to stay on station and do the job that I needed to do.

So now in this airplane as I maybe don't even hit the tanker and I'm sitting in the airspace doing my mission, and all the other folks that are either have internal fuel because they don't want to have the RCS, hit they're going back to the tanker how good is an airplane if it's on the tanker it's not really all that useful.
Whereas I can stay on station for a lot longer and that is a good thing.

He also mentioned the takeoff and landing of the F-35 on the Finnish runways. wow (Interesting)

@72:30~
Q: Our thinking in Finland right now is that in the crisis situation.
We would need to leave our fixed bases and operate from roads or road network bases that changerapidly if you may.
And also operate on runways way below NATO standard 2000 meter runways.
How do you see your aircraft fleet its name its it operates like that?

[Major Jordan “Burn” Levine] A: The takeoff and landing performance with this airplane is very similar to the Hornet.
And just like the Hornet and I've seen the videos I've talked to some of the pilots I've.
Executed that mission no matter what airplane you're flying you're going to need some level of straight road that allows us to have clearance after you take off.
All gonna be based on fuel weight on the weapons weight on the time of year on the time of day fully loaded.

I don't have an answer of time my head I mean we have told data so takeoff and landing data.
The engine right now is producing 43,000 pounds of thrust if you're in max reheat we call that up here max afterburner.
So, if you think about you have about a 30,000 pound airplane if you want to put 18,000 pounds of gas in 18,000 pounds of weapons on it you're exceeding the 43,000, but you're not that far off you're so probably somewhere in like the point-8 thrust-to-weight ratio so as far as being able to take off the capability is there.

A longer Range than the F-22 ...! it's a single engine advantage, and the POWEEEEEEEEER!!!!!!!!!

[mixelflick]

I don't understand this talking bad about F-22's range..

In TFPP, it was stated that an F-22 with full internal fuel has the same endurance as an F-15C with 2 bags. Which itself has been said to have superior range to an F-15C with CFT's. It might not fly as far or as long as an F-35, but all things considered... the design team at LM accomplished something extraordinary in both cases IMO.

All things considered, an F-22 with full internal fuel is quite quite a leap vs. an F-15C under the same circumstances. I can only imagine what kind of legs it would have had, had they retained the additional 5,000lbs of fuel used in the prototype.