Gripen NG for Canada?

[mk82]

In addition to Hornetfinn's point.....

Are you aware that a F22 will detect and destroy a Growler with AMRAAMS (no less) from BVR before the said Growler pilot has any idea that he/she is engaging a VLO target. Hmm...I guess your fantasy scenario is possible, if the F22 was flying around like an idiot WVR of the Growler! Jamming a LPI APG 77v1 radar is no easy task.....you have detect the LPI radar source first! You could try broadband noise jamming....good luck....you have just made yourself a big fat target for your enemies' ESM sensor!

Having a HMD and HOBS/OMG its the Russian/Chinese uber IR AA missiles means squat if your "sodastraw" advance IRST is looking at the wrong patch of sky (radar is still the preferred sensor as it can scan large volumes of space relatively quickly at relatively longer ranges). Have fun using your advance IRST in cloudy adverse weather or against a platform with adequate IR supression. Try thinking a little more critically before mindlessly throwing buzzwords in!

[mk82]

One other thing Rhinoceront, read about Package Q and the subsequent F117A Nighthawk strikes on downtown Baghdad during GW1....a good lesson on the effectiveness of stealth technology.

[cantaz]

You should live in Canada to understand what do I'm talking about

I'm a Canadian. I'm also a reg force RCAF member posted to a fighter base.

I understand what you're talking about, you're just repeating the misguided BS floated by CBC and fake experts. Look, it's sweet of you to care about the future of the RCAF, but you're not doing us any favors getting it so horribly wrong. Among other things, we Canadians have to get through our heads that we don't operate in the most adverse environment, the Americans do. They operate fighter bases far further north than our Cold Lake, for one thing.

[rhinoceront]

That was almost a quarter of century ago. In the next campaign in Kosovo the F-117 was shot down. After that, not more Stealth fighters at war.
Even the Russians recognize the Pakfa is a LO airplane, not a VLO one, pretty much as the Advanced Super Hornet. They will built just 200 of them and tonz of new hiper maneuverable Su-35 and Mig29. The New Boogie man, the Chinese J-20 with their big Canards and couple of Big Engines is just another LO bomber, not a fighter. Curiously, the J-21 won't be produced for them, just to be exported as a cheap copy of the F-35 and they will built 1200 agile J-10B for them. The F-35 is VLO just at the front, for sure not at it's corrugated bottom, not at it's flashing back and even worst at the top, with it's whale shape thanks to it's mega round engine and colossal canopy or roof shaft door for the B version blinding the pilot at the back. The only Crazies who wants to use a single airplane and spend Trillions in a LO, Low performance, Low Speed, Low maneuverable, Low armed airplane are our southern Neighbors. I think Canada can do better than that. We need real airplanes for the North, not fancy broken toys.

[mk82]

I am curious Rhinoceront...are you a five year old, a clown, an obvious troll or just a dude who pulls made up "facts" from the ****!?

Wow....no stealth aircraft used after the Kosovo campaign....have you been living under a rock? You know what, don't answer that as the answer is invariably yes!

That is breaking news.....Russia is making "tonz" of SU 35s and Mig 29s. Wait a minute, the facts says otherwise.....Sukhoi is actually planning to manufacture more PAK FAs than SU 35s and future Mig 29 production is certainly not going to be in the quantity of "tonz". The number of SU 35s and new Mig 29s manufactured will be much less than 200 airframes sonny Jim

I am quite sure that the Russians and Chinese were aiming for VLO level of stealth with the PAK FA and J20 respectively. Better not mention that Sukhoi was only aiming for LO level of stealth (PAK FA) in front of Mikhail Pogosyan (do you even know who he is?), he will set you straight buddy! On another point, aiming for and actually achieving VLO level of stealth are seperate issues!

Wow, you are radar stealth expert? I am awed by your "whale" analysis....ahoy there Moby Dick! Bwahahahahaha....and thank god that the bottom of the F35 is not made from corrugated iron

The last time I check, the F35 is real aircraft...people are flying and touching it.

[mk82]

Continueing on Rhinoceront....you seem to be repeating that the F35 is slow and not maneuvrable like a sheep. Baaaa.....I assure you that the reality is very different! Let me give you a hint...load up your favourite "real" aircraft (J11, Gripen NG or whatever is the flavour of the month) with external fuel tanks, targetting pods, ECM pods, air to air and air to ground ordnance and see how well they perform kinematically....let me make this simple for you...obviously not like the brochures!

I suspect that you will not let facts get in the way of your delusional rants. Do continue as it provides me with alot of amusement. If you decide not to post further on this site so that the collective IQ of the F16.net forum rises, I am equally happy

[coldman]

I think what Canada needs is a combination of some Super Hornets and Growlers, A lot of Gripens NG, and some UCLAS and Tritons. That way you will have a force not only for day one, but also for the rest of war and sustainable for decades.

Wait hold on a second

As we all (hopefully) know, the real cost driver for airplanes is not the procurement itself, but rather the infrastructure you have to set up in order to sustain them. And you are recommending that Canada procures not just one, but three wildly different airframes, with literally no commonality between any of them. While the procurement of each of these planes may be cheaper than the F-35, I highly doubt those savings would hold in the long run.

[rhinoceront]

The infrastructure for the Super Hornets and Growlers is pretty much there considering that Canada operates already the CF/A-18.
Gripens use a similar engine and almost the same weapons.
Avengers, UAVS and similar Uclass will come even in yuo buy F-35.

You will have to create hole new facilities for the F-35 and larger and better runways in to the northern territories like Yellow knife or Yukon.

[coldman]

The infrastructure for the Super Hornets and Growlers is pretty much there considering that Canada operates already the CF/A-18.
Gripens use a similar engine and almost the same weapons.
Avengers, UAVS and similar Uclass will come even in yuo buy F-35.

You will have to create hole new facilities for the F-35 and larger and better runways in to the northern territories like Yellow knife or Yukon.

The fact about commonality between the hornet the superhornet has been touched on by people far more knowledgeable about the situation than you or I. Essentially (and I take their word over yours) they are two very different airframes. The only similarities to the extent of my knowledge would be the pilot training.

The engine is only one part of the plane, and with the Shornet line closing in 2016 with no new orders on the horizon, replacement parts will get harder and harder to come by. And this includes nothing about the murky upgrade path for the super hornet. (of course with a unified fleet of F-35's they would all share the same parts)

I'd love to address your third point, but I can't make heads or tails of what you are saying.

As for your final point, well you'd have to make facilities for the shornet, gripen, and UCLASS if Canada were to follow your plan, which is exponentially more expensive than what a unified fleet of F-35's would cost. Furthermore, I am completely unaware of any issues regarding insufficient runway length in order to accommodate the F-35. If you can provide me a credible story addressing this, I'll gladly eat my own words. Your comments about reinforcing the concrete might make sense if Canada was purchasing the B, but they're not.

[newmanfrigan]

Anyone who thinks "stealth is a XXth century technology", is bereft of any understanding of the subject whatsoever. That's like saying "the laws of physics are a XXth century concept". It's nonsense... and that's why very few want Eurocanards or F-18s as a future fighter in a competitive airforce. Countries with stealth programs go beyond the premier airforces involved in JSF (USAF, USN, USMC, RAF, RN, RAAF, JASDF, KAF, IAF, Singapore, Italy, Norway, etc etc.), but also include the projects of the S. Koreans (KFX), Japanese (ATD-X), Russians (PAKFA..I agree there that it's not so stealthy, but not for lack of trying), Chinese, Indians (AMCA, FGFA), the UK with Taranis and France with Neuron, Russia's flying wing PAKDA. Conclusively, the facts demonstrate that "stealth" is an absolutely indispensible attribute for any aircraft on the battlefield of the future.

As someone with some background in physics, I can tell you that there is not one single technology (passive, IRST, L-band, etc cellphone tower non-sense) in the non-black world that can solve the problem of targetting todays American VLO fighters. Low Observability is not only effective and neccessary, but quite a bit more effective than is commonly appreciated online (big surprise there, huh? idiots on the internet? ..why, I never!).

If shaping and materials are done correctly, the amount of radiated energy returning to the receiver (enemy radar in targetting bands around the X band, not to mention other bands that are managed) will not be appreciably distinguishable from background noise until the VLO fighter is really damn close. You might get a fleeting detection of an F-35 or B-2 from further out, but you won't be able to track it. Computer processing power is just not going to be able to adequately distinguish noise from noise. It's not possible. Moore's Law, commonly abused in this debate, does not promise any such thing.

The other methods, bi-static, IRST (not too good on a cloudy day and IR LO is also incorporated in US VLO platforms), passive detection, etc. leave a lot to be desired from the standpoint of tracking a target and engaging it.

[neurotech]

The infrastructure for the Super Hornets and Growlers is pretty much there considering that Canada operates already the CF/A-18.
Gripens use a similar engine and almost the same weapons.
Avengers, UAVS and similar Uclass will come even in yuo buy F-35.

You will have to create hole new facilities for the F-35 and larger and better runways in to the northern territories like Yellow knife or Yukon.

I'm not sure your background, but I was around both models (F/A-18A/B/C/D and F/A-18E/F) together. When I said "infrastructure" that includes maintenance shops and parts supplies etc. That said, most of the ground servicing equipment is similar and compatible. Most weapons on a CF-18A/B will go just fine on a F/A-18E/F. The pylons are similar but using older pylons on the E/F model has limitations.

When going straight from an F/A-18A/B (or CF-18A/B) to a F/A-18E/F Block II there practically no shared components. Initial spare parts, and support services are a significant cost of acquiring a jet.

The F404-GE-402 (F/A-18C/D) uses some support components that are common to the F414-GE-400. Neither, Canada, Korea or Sweden uses the -402.

The F404-GE-400 used on the CF-18 is a different engine to the RM12, or the F414-GE-400 in the Super Hornet. Since we are talking about Gripen NG, its going to be a F414G engine, not a RM12 or F404-GE-400. They require separate shop maintenance because very little is common between those variants.

As for Yukon and Yellowknife, The biggest limitation is landing on icy runways during a gusting crosswind. 7,500 ft of runway is enough for a F/A-18 to operate from, considering the load they fly with. I'd be surprised if a F-35A can't takeoff loaded on a 7,500 ft for an operational patrol.

The CF-18, F/A-18E/F and F-35A/C models all have tailhooks. The Gripen NG does not. I don't think the CF-18s do operational arrested landings routinely, but the Swiss and Fins do.

The F-35A will do fine on a windy runway, and they can deploy up north with field arresting gear if needed.

[rhinoceront]

I'm not an aeronautical designer, not a military officer or technician. Just an architect specialized in industrial buildings.
I use Revit for years (autodesk software), that applies the parametric concept of concurrency. I've done huge industrial projects in Quebec and Alberta, even an industrial building in Fort McMurray where the temperatures can drop to -50º Celcius in Winter.
Managing those projects for a while, I've noticed the over excitement of juniors when they use parametric models fro the first time, thinking you can solve anything during the process of design. If you don't have clear parameters from the beginning and nobody knows what's going on, thinking somebody else will resolve all the discrepancies and glitches, there is a moment when you have hundred or thousands of elements conflicting with each other, and the process to correct them is more painful, extensive and costly than just to solve them from the beginning.

There was an expansion project in Vancouver where the kids made a hole single parametric model for a mall, 5 new buildings and 2 towers. When I arrived to the office there was a total chaos and everybody was recriminating each other. Unfortunately it was too late to fix the mess.

That's why I truly believe it's too late to solve this problem, there are so many discrepancies, delays, over cost, overweight, software delays, etc. etc. in this project that there is no way they can make it affordable for any one in decent numbers. Australia had the wisdom to buy Super Hornets and Growlers. It seems the UK is going to upgrate their Tornados and Typhoons and to buy fewer F-35B. The Canadian public and press didn't buy the L. Martin promises of affordability for a Good reason.

Let's see what the Royal Canadian Air force and the economy decide at the end, not just the lobbyist of the parliament

[basher54321]

It seems the UK is going to upgrate their Tornados and Typhoons and to buy fewer F-35B. The Canadian public and press didn't buy the L. Martin promises of affordability for a Good reason.

What's your source for that? - Not seen anything that detracts from the 2010 government SDR in that regards - which stated a future fleet of Typhoon and F-35 only by 2020.

The Tornados are ancient so somewhat doubtful they will be sticking around.............

[coldman]

It seems the UK is going to upgrate their Tornados and Typhoons and to buy fewer F-35B. The Canadian public and press didn't buy the L. Martin promises of affordability for a Good reason.

Wait what the hell, where did you get this info? Britain still seems fully committed to purchasing the 48 Bees for their carrier fleet, with a final figure of F-35 purchases being decided during the Strategic Defence and Security Review in 2015, which definitely raises the possibility of A purchases to replace typhoons.

[hb_pencil]

Hello rhinoceront

Welcome to F-16.net. First, let me state that this isn't a forum you can troll in. There are a lot of people on here that have a LOT of technical expertise (military, government, aerospace ect.), and can provide you with factual information and perspectives. If you want to post like you did when you first come here, you'll have a short life. Its really not tolerated, because the people on here participate because they want a higher quality of discussion.

As someone who actually has some expertise in Canada and military capabilities, I will tell you this: the information that goes around in Canada is woefully inaccurate. The problem in Canada is that there are very few people who actually have training in these issues. There are less than a half dozen people outside of the military that actually have training in modern fighter development and procurement. Most of the commentators you see, and the arguments being made are highly misleading. Boeing's Super Hornet is not 1/2 the price. Its actually 1.15 times the price when you get into equivalent comparisons. Why? Because its the difference between producing 30 aircraft a year, versus 120 or more. Boeing's claim to CBCwas them using the 2001 SAR value for an aircraft without all of its equipment, then comparing it to the 2012 F-35 cost. They didn't account for the inflation between those years, which is why there is a huge discrepancy. However if you properly account for all of the capabilities, add the foreign military sales fees, you get a F/A-18E that is actually more than an F-35.

So we're willing to discuss this stuff with you. But you have no real expertise in this area, and telling us that we're wrong, when some of us have dedicated our lives to these issues, isn't right... is it? Keep an open mind please and I think you'll see that the situation is a lot different than you might believe.

Here's a suggestion for you. Instead of telling us what you think, why not try asking us questions? I think you'll find that you'll get much better answers and an understanding of what is going on.

I'm not an aeronautical designer, not a military officer or technician. Just an architect specialized in industrial buildings.
I use Revit for years (autodesk software), that applies the parametric concept of concurrency. I've done huge industrial projects in Quebec and Alberta, even an industrial building in Fort McMurray where the temperatures can drop to -50º Celcius in Winter.

Well, Defence projects are completely different than civilian programs for a number of reasons. First off, your buildings are fairly static pieces of technology. You might see one or two innovations every few years, but most of them are evolutionary improvements. And the costs of that are well understood.

None of that is true in military procurement. The big problem is that military capabilities tend to be revolutionary in their development. Countries like Russia and china are investing billions into their Air to Air and Surface to Air capabilities. They are trying to develop military capabilities that can challenge the dominance of the United States and its allies.

We're also witnessing a new epoch in warfighting capabilities. In the 1990s the US military started investing heavily into battlefield networking, which allowed them to detect and identify opponents, while managing their units at a much greater scale than before. Unfortunately these capabilities are not easy to retrofit into older aircraft, like the Super Hornet. Really for that generation, Link-16 allows the sharing of target tracking data. However the newest generation of communication gear (MADL and BACN), has sharing of sensor data, which is the next level of computing, which allows for much higher quality of analysis. However to develop these systems requires billions in custom development, and years of hard R&D work. Then you have to incorporate those technologies into an operational package within a fighter. Finally, manufacturers need to discover how to manufacture it in sufficient qualities. And thats where concurrency comes in.

Managing those projects for a while, I've noticed the over excitement of juniors when they use parametric models fro the first time, thinking you can solve anything during the process of design. If you don't have clear parameters from the beginning and nobody knows what's going on, thinking somebody else will resolve all the discrepancies and glitches, there is a moment when you have hundred or thousands of elements conflicting with each other, and the process to correct them is more painful, extensive and costly than just to solve them from the beginning.

Concurrency is a bit of a double edge sword. One way of looking at production is a program in stages.

First: Technology stage -> when the underlying technologies that gird an capability are developed (stealth materials, engines, radars)
Second: is design stage ->basically incorporating all the technologies into a single design to be manufactured.
Third: manufacturing stage. -> Learning how to produce an design.

Now the ideal approach would be to reach 100% maturity in each stage before moving onto the next one. Unfortunately that may add years, if not decades to actual delivery, because some technologies may take much longer to develop, but won't affect other systems. You'd be held up, waiting years at first or second stage waiting for one development to be completed. Concurrency is an example of that. While the services are waiting for the development to be completed, they purchase concurrency aircraft so that manufacturer can learn how to build the aircraft more efficiently, and the military can train on the jet. The problem with the nature of avionics development means that its difficult to do in a timely manner. Remember that the aircraft's physical design was largely completed by 2010: the vast majority of the work is software driven rather than hardware driven.

In the case of the F-35 concurrency doesn't matter for Canada as much, because we're purchasing the aircraft in a specific time frame and not paying for the early concurrency costs. If anything that means concurrency for us is a good thing, because it drives down the purchase cost of the aircraft we buy. As for overall delays, it probably added a couple of months due to duplication of software efforts maintaining test and operational blocks, but its relatively minor. When your firm and product are designed to operate with concurrency, you tend to be better able to cope with its issues.

There was an expansion project in Vancouver where the kids made a hole single parametric model for a mall, 5 new buildings and 2 towers. When I arrived to the office there was a total chaos and everybody was recriminating each other. Unfortunately it was too late to fix the mess.
That's why I truly believe it's too late to solve this problem, there are so many discrepancies, delays, over cost, overweight, software delays, etc. etc. in this project that there is no way they can make it affordable for any one in decent numbers.

So many of these are so overblown that its really not worth commenting on (or others will). Let me take one example: the recent cracks on the F-35B. First off, that is not a version we're using, which is exposed to different stresses. Second, the aircraft was into its second lifetime, something like 8000 hours. When we bought the CF-18 it was barely after 2000 hours that we discovered major cracking, that threatened to ground the fleet well before its planned lifetime. Yet due to good aircraft management, some upgrades and better tracking, we've extended them far past their original expected lifetime.

Australia had the wisdom to buy Super Hornets and Growlers.

Australia bought Super Hornets because its F-111 fleet was retired prematurely due to its exorbitant operating costs and they wanted something to fill the gap between 2011 and 2017. The F-35 remains its primary force option, which is why they didn't buy many Growlers early last year. There are several RAAF officers on this board that can back that up.

The Canadian public and press didn't buy the L. Martin promises of affordability for a Good reason.
Let's see what the Royal Canadian Air force and the economy decide at the end, not just the lobbyist of the parliament

IF the RCAF had a choice it would pick the F-35. It chose it four years ago, and it would still chose it today. The individuals who actually can assess modern pilots, pretty well agree that its the best choice. Economically it makes the most sense. The main issue that emerged was that DND did not disclose the entire cost of the aircraft (using a 20 year costing versus a full life one.) But that had nothing to do with the F-35's cost relative to other aircraft. Assessments showed back then that the costs still were not comparable and that the F-35 was cheaper. Nothing has really changed. The aircraft has not seen any major cost increases since the 2010 SAR, while other aircraft are going much higher than before due to sagging production rates and DMS issues.

That was almost a quarter of century ago. In the next campaign in Kosovo the F-117 was shot down. After that, not more Stealth fighters at war.

The first wave of Kosovo involved B-2s and F-117. The problem with the Nighthawk was that by 1999, it was a dated platform due to lack of avionics investment, not its stealth. Its likely the aircraft had very limited RWR, and no other sensors that other fighters had. IT generally flew the same path night in and out into Kosovo, meaning the Serbian crews could rely on the intermittent contacts they could get when F-117s opened their bomb-bay doors. I believe the missiles themselves were command detonated. In Libya, the United States deployed B-2s in the first wave. However Libya's Air defences were extremely weak, and the US wanted to devolve as much of the responsibility to its allies, so it did not send F-22s. I believe most of the units came from European bases.

I think however the best counterpoint to your claim is that F-22s are constantly deployed to the most critical situations around the world. It seems that a detachment are in the middle east at all times, as the recent drone confrontation illustrates. They are also in Okinawa or Guam, to defend the Western Pacific. These aircraft are viewed to be the sharpest point of the USAF's sphere.

Even the Russians recognize the Pakfa is a LO airplane, not a VLO one, pretty much as the Advanced Super Hornet. They will built just 200 of them and tonz of new hiper maneuverable Su-35 and Mig29.

Russia's design has little to do with your so-called limitations of Stealth and everything to do with the limitations of their technology and economy. They have made very little investment into this area from the fall of communism until the mid 2000s. Put it another way, Canada has a larger aviation industry than Russia... yet somehow people expect it to produce competing aircraft to the Americans. A good example is them reusing the canopy design from the SU-27: There is no inherent advantages for using such a design from an operational or stealth standpoint. It doesn't provide better visibility (compared to the F-35's one piece affair) and it will actually be more visible to radar due to its exposed frame. Why did they reuse it? because it was there and its cheap.

The United States, after the F-22 program, now has the technological and industrial prowess to produce these aircraft on a vast scale... that's why the United States is is able to produce thousands of these type of fighters, while other countries try to build dozens.