Restarting F-22 production

[talkitron]

IIRC it was programmed in ADA, so....

It has been mentioned here that there is nothing wrong with Ada. Ada first appeared in 1980, eights years after C and only three before C++.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ada_%28pr ... anguage%29

[talkitron]

Don't be so sure of that. A well-trained pilot with the latest AESA (APG-63v3) and BVR missile, make for a deadly adversary. The Eagle can hold its own, even against some of the latest threats. It is a stick and rudder plane, but a good pilot makes all the difference.

It is reasonable to speculate that the Eagle would not be survivable in BVR against the stealth aircraft in development in China and Russia, simply because the Eagle is not a stealth aircraft itself.

[jetblast16]

The only thing "wrong" with ADA, is that its syntax is not like C or C++. This made it hard for programmers who are accustomed to those languages to learn (you're looking at one). What matters ultimately, is the quality of the compilers and any optimizers that produce machine instructions. ADA is well-known to have some industrial-strength compilers that are capable of making tight machine instructions, for fast execution on target hardware.

[jetblast16]

'in development in China and Russia' That remains to be seen. The Eagle is old but to say it is defenseless is inaccurate.

[cosmicdwarf]

I honestly don't think that more F-15s are on the table overall. It would be cheaper and more economically viable than restarting the F-22 line, but I'm fairly sure the USAF wants to spend it's money on a more modern design than the F-22. Air combat requirements have probably changed since the 80s when the F-22 was started.

At this point its a matter of what's best for long term, not for the political points scored for looking at restarting what was considered a horrible jet but now everyone loves.

[rented]

Long time lurker here, just decided to post because I also have an appreciation of IT and software development.

The age or the processor design and the language used is of less importance than the availability of the hardware, and availability of programmers to work with the language.
Another example of hardware being used in a recent design which appears to be old is the 486 chip used in the Ka-50. However, up until the last few years, this chip design was still on sale for embedded systems, and has in reality, plenty of power to run the Ka-50 avionics when it doesn't have to deal with a fairly fat general purpose operating system sitting on top of it (ie: Windows).
I am not terribly familiar with the F-22 avionics shenanigans, but it would appear that they went with a custom designed hardware package that didn't do so well when the production run was scaled down, and was then difficult to support and upgrade.

I have never used Ada, but as I understand it one of the major attractions for its use in military and commercial applications is (according to a lecturer I had for software design) is that it has compilers that have been extensively mathematically proven in some aspect. However, as was pointed out by jetblast, finding and retaining programmers is difficult because it is a difficult language to actually find in the industry.

The only thing "wrong" with ADA, is that its syntax is not like C or C++. This made it hard for programmers who are accustomed to those languages to learn (you're looking at one). What matters ultimately, is the quality of the compilers and any optimizers that produce machine instructions. ADA is well-known to have some industrial-strength compilers that are capable of making tight machine instructions, for fast execution on target hardware.

[mixelflick]

Don't be so sure of that. A well-trained pilot with the latest AESA (APG-63v3) and BVR missile, make for a deadly adversary. The Eagle can hold its own, even against some of the latest threats. It is a stick and rudder plane, but a good pilot makes all the difference.

It is reasonable to speculate that the Eagle would not be survivable in BVR against the stealth aircraft in development in China and Russia, simply because the Eagle is not a stealth aircraft itself.

Would be sweet if an F-15 waxes a SU-35 Flanker before its all over...

You're probably right about it not being survivable in BVR against newer LO aircraft being developed elsewhere.But they are LO, not VLO and we know the Eagle has the most powerful radar flying. There's also talk of using an IRST pod to find stealth aircraft, so who knows...

[accessdenied]

I honestly don't think that more F-15s are on the table overall. It would be cheaper and more economically viable than restarting the F-22 line, but I'm fairly sure the USAF wants to spend it's money on a more modern design than the F-22. Air combat requirements have probably changed since the 80s when the F-22 was started.

At this point its a matter of what's best for long term, not for the political points scored for looking at restarting what was considered a horrible jet but now everyone loves.

The F-22 just entered service a mere decade ago. Are you saying all the work done on it during the 90s is now irrelevant? Because that is exactly what you are saying. The F-22s capabilities are irrelevant to today's modern battle space? You do remember the ATF design requirements were for the AC to be relevant for decades, not 5-10 years like previous AC.

So what is best for the long term is what matters? Then a 44 year old airframe with new radar, that has parity the Russian Flankers and their derivatives is better than an AC that will club them "like baby seals" A 44 year old airframe that will die in every engagement with the new stuff coming from Russian and China makes more sense than the F-22? Honestly?

The US is quite capable of building another 200 F-22s and chewing it's F-35 flavored gum at the same time. And if the F-35 fails we have the insurance of the F-22 production to maintain air superiority. Continued F-15 production is guarantied to make the USAF irrelevant in the today's and tomorrow's battles, unless you're talking about a skirmish with Belize or Argentina.

[uclass]

Don't be so sure of that. A well-trained pilot with the latest AESA (APG-63v3) and BVR missile, make for a deadly adversary. The Eagle can hold its own, even against some of the latest threats. It is a stick and rudder plane, but a good pilot makes all the difference.

It is reasonable to speculate that the Eagle would not be survivable in BVR against the stealth aircraft in development in China and Russia, simply because the Eagle is not a stealth aircraft itself.

Would be sweet if an F-15 waxes a SU-35 Flanker before its all over...

You're probably right about it not being survivable in BVR against newer LO aircraft being developed elsewhere.But they are LO, not VLO and we know the Eagle has the most powerful radar flying. There's also talk of using an IRST pod to find stealth aircraft, so who knows...

And the Eagles are getting new DEWS, which could help nullify LO BVR advantages. I'd definitely like to see more F-22s though.

[mixelflick]

'The f-15, even with new avionics, is irrelevant and cannot survive against the new fighters now flying in China and Russia.'

Don't be so sure of that. A well-trained pilot with the latest AESA (APG-63v3) and BVR missile, make for a deadly adversary. The Eagle can hold its own, even against some of the latest threats. It is a stick and rudder plane, but a good pilot makes all the difference.

THIS..

The Eagle air to air guys are among the best in the world. I'm sure they're not resting on their laurels, as the Russians roll out their SU-35's, T-50's etc.. I realize the Eagle may no longer have all the advantages, but their training, new radar, advanced AMRAAM's and especially the 9x level the playing field.

Besides, wouldn't their new AESA's be able to jam a Flanker's radar looking for them?

[les_paul59]

The F-15C Eagle with the AESA, new DEWS and AMRAAM is most likely a very formidable opponent for any russian jet including the PAK FA, because if it's true that the PAK FA's signature is between (.3-.5) than the eagle will still be able to detect and track the PAK FA before the sukhoi can launch a missile,essentially making it a fair bvr fight in terms of SA. The APG 63 V3 is thought to have maybe the best range of any fighter radar, it has no concern for being LPI because of the eagle's huge RCS.

Concerning kinematic performance, I would give a slight edge to the newer flankers (SU-35) and the PAK FA for sure, but in avionics the upgraded F-15C's will be superior to the Russian jets.

The only wild card is, no one can know for sure how good the Russian electronic attack capability is, we know that the U.S. has the advantage in ESM which aides identification and targeting, but it doesn't seem like the USAF has put too much of an emphasis on electronic attack.

The U.S. just wants to upgrade the f-15's and f-22's, get their full desired number of f-35's and get the 6th gen. train rolling

[accessdenied]

The F-15C Eagle with the AESA, new DEWS and AMRAAM is most likely a very formidable opponent for any russian jet including the PAK FA, because if it's true that the PAK FA's signature is between (.3-.5) than the eagle will still be able to detect and track the PAK FA before the sukhoi can launch a missile,essentially making it a fair bvr fight in terms of SA. The APG 63 V3 is thought to have maybe the best range of any fighter radar, it has no concern for being LPI because of the eagle's huge RCS.

Concerning kinematic performance, I would give a slight edge to the newer flankers (SU-35) and the PAK FA for sure, but in avionics the upgraded F-15C's will be superior to the Russian jets.

The only wild card is, no one can know for sure how good the Russian electronic attack capability is, we know that the U.S. has the advantage in ESM which aides identification and targeting, but it doesn't seem like the USAF has put too much of an emphasis on electronic attack.

The U.S. just wants to upgrade the f-15's and f-22's, get their full desired number of f-35's and get the 6th gen. train rolling

The F-22 was designed to penetrate and persist in hostile airspace, knock down Migs and Sukhois, and return home. Not even the Silent Eagle can do that. Any F-15 that tries that is dead. Signature, speed, fuel are all against the Eagle.

You argument about an F-15 getting first look, first shot, on a PakFa is conjecture - perhaps even wishful thinking. Firstly the Russian has a smaller signature (*you* simply don't know what a production PakFa will be in RCS), and secondly the Russian is launching AAMs from at least M1.6 (at greater range than the Eagle can launch) at something with the RCS of the Empire State building. After the Eagles bleed away all their energy to evade, they are toast. The Eagles also don't have the fuel to persist unless they are using drop tanks which further make things worse for them. Even the conformal tanks have a penalty.

Furthermore, in A2G the advanced F-15 will never -- can never -- penetrate today's battle space. Period.

I have an idea, let's bring back the Phantom's out of mothball. New engines, radar, displays, AMRAAM, and 9X.... Wow! Those new Russians and Chinese are dead meat.

[cosmicdwarf]

The F-22 just entered service a mere decade ago. Are you saying all the work done on it during the 90s is now irrelevant? Because that is exactly what you are saying.

No, I'm saying that the requirements for an air to air aircraft are different now than they were in the 80s, when the ATF program was started. When the F-22 entered service or how well it did is irrelevant to be being based on air to air requirements in the 80s.

You keep on going back to F-15s, which I'm not even talking about being a good idea so I'll ignore the rest of what you wrote. If there's a short term shortage due to F-15 retirement it will be made up by the F-35 until the 6th en fighter is ready, the later being what the USAF is much more interested in getting at this point than more F-22s.

[jetblast16]

No one here is arguing that the F-15 is better than a Raptor. PakFa has yet to enter into production and prove itself. I find it strange that Kadena STILL operates Eagles to project power in the Pacific.

'Furthermore, in A2G the advanced F-15 will never -- can never -- penetrate today's battle space. Period.' Then why does Lakenheath operate Mud hens (F-15Es) for USAFE?

'I have an idea, let's bring back the Phantom's out of mothball. New engines, radar, displays, AMRAAM, and 9X.... Wow! Those new Russians and Chinese are dead meat.' - I detect some sarcasm there

[les_paul59]

The Pak Fa hasn't impressed me in anyway except for being a sexy bird, check out how the indians feel about the pak fa and the r-77 for that matter....thats why i think the f-15 stands a chance

The F-22 is the best air to air fighter in the world everyone knows that