Whats the Worst Post 1970s ACM platform

[marsavian]

Its actually the power that makes supersonic flight possible that I see as an advantage. Usually that means better energy and better acceleration.

Not in Sea Harrier's case, it was the shape that stopped it being supersonic not lack of power. It had a fat 21,500 lbf (95.64 kN) dry thrust only engine which it took until the very last Mirage 2000 to match on afterburner. This gave it a 50,000 ft/min (250 m/s) climb rate so there was no shortage of power or acceleration ... in its subsonic speed range. The Tornado ADV was designed differently, modest thrust/weight ratio but great aerodynamic shape giving it great acceleration all the way to Mach 2.2. The poor thrust/weight would have killed it in any sustained turning but for slash and burn fast attacks it was pretty good especially as it was primarily a high endurance fast interceptor.

[madrat]

I see no reason a 10:1 TWR modern engine - able to supercruise - wouldn't have benefited the Harrier program.

The Pegasus engine couldn't sustain the Harrier in supersonic flight. I don't believe for one minute the Harrier shape was too much drag.

That being said, the F-35B simply is an overall superior VTOL platform. The idea is now moot.

[sprstdlyscottsmn]

The Pegasus engine couldn't sustain the Harrier in supersonic flight. I don't believe for one minute the Harrier shape was too much drag.

It was not so much the airframe as the inlets. The whole harrier line has rounded inlet edges to help with airflow at low, zero, negative, vertical, and sideways airflow velocities. The type of shockwave that comes off these "edges" is extremely draggy and could end up stalling out the engine. There were experiments in a "Sharp" inlet edge that would "inflate" at low speed to round the edges but the system proved troublesome.

[zero-one]

Does anyone have any DACT or BFM training info with the Hawk 200 line? I think that would also be a candidate. But the info available is so small.

[marsavian]

The Hawk 200 could sustain 8g turns, it probably killed a test pilot through g-loc.

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source= ... lP52Eu3pPc

(The Hawk 200 had demonstrated its ability to
maintain 8g/300kt indefinitely)

[basher54321]

The Supersonic ASTOVL development of the Harrier wasn't going to look anything like the Harrier.

http://www.harrier.org.uk/P1216.htm

[mixelflick]

The Mig-23 is a great pick, but I honestly feel the Mig-29 is the correct choice.

A MUCH better design vs. the Mig-23, it nonetheless has an abysmal combat record. It has been trounced by F-15's and F-16's, as well as its larger stablemate the SU-27. Its sole air to air victories apparently coming when 2 Cuban examples downed a Piper Cub (or 2). For beating up on Piper Cubs, I have to give it a negative rating LOL.

For whatever reason, her combination of speed, maneuverability and excellent thrust to weight ratio has failed to translate into success. Interesting, given how deadly it seemed especially with the Archer and its helmet mounted site...

[basher54321]

The Mig-23 is a great pick, but I honestly feel the Mig-29 is the correct choice.

A MUCH better design vs. the Mig-23, it nonetheless has an abysmal combat record. It has been trounced by F-15's and F-16's, as well as its larger stablemate the SU-27. Its sole air to air victories apparently coming when 2 Cuban examples downed a Piper Cub (or 2). For beating up on Piper Cubs, I have to give it a negative rating LOL.

For whatever reason, her combination of speed, maneuverability and excellent thrust to weight ratio has failed to translate into success. Interesting, given how deadly it seemed especially with the Archer and its helmet mounted site...

ACM = Air Combat Manoeuvring so in this context not a MiG-29 ever despite the combat record which is no reflection on the platform in that regards.

There really is no mystery here - both Iraq and Serbia not only had the 9.12B version (which didn't help), in Serbias case they were in a right state. There was a video years after with the pilots giving an account of the totally ridiculous situation they were in.
Iraq faired no better in 1991, but again not much they could do in reality - an R-73 and close in capbility not much use if you cant even get there. (There was 1 merge sure but in the light of it being a 2 v 1 the Iraqi pilot may have done all he could)

[F-16ADF]

As Basher said, prolly the Tornado ADV.

Maybe the Shenyang J-8II.

Or the HAL Ajeet.

[geforcerfx]

Mig-31?

[zero-one]

There were a lot of reasons for the Mig-29's poor combat record:

-poor training of some of the pilots vs the highly trained coalition pilots they came up against.
-poor support from from external sources like AEWACS and EW platforms
-and lastly, speed and maneuverability is only one part of the story, the Mig-29s that most coalition forces came up against had inferior sensors (some say the Serbian Fulcrums had no working radar) inferior weapons and probably inferior maintenance as well.

but in the hands of competent pilots with adequate support, the Mig-29 can prove very formidable:
https://www.airspacemag.com/military-av ... 03/?page=3

Plenty of the Fulcrum’s smug “show us what you got” adversaries—F-16 Fighting Falcon, F-15 Eagle, and U.S. Navy F-14 Tomcat and F/A-18 Hornet jocks among them—became humbled, and often bloodied, after their first Fulcrum tangle. “With some experience, you could outmaneuver any jet, even Vipers [F-16s]and [high-angle-of-attack] Hornets,” says Steiniger.

[pmi]

If you keep reading the article, it isn't as glowing.

...
As good as the Fulcrum was in a knife fight, most Western pilots soon discovered its flaws. Mike Jaensch, a former F-16 pilot and Air Force Weapons School graduate with a background in air defense, returned to active duty in 1994 after being furloughed from American Airlines. Fluent in German, he won a spot in a small group of exchange pilots posted to Laage in 1998 with a combined MiG squadron. Jaensch loved the MiG’s power and maneuverability, but felt hampered by its radar and associated systems. “The Soviet philosophy was that basically pilots were stick actuators,” he says. “It was obviously very different from what we were used to. The avionics were marginal. That same philosophy meant [the Soviets] didn’t see the need to pass information on to the pilot.” Since the MiG’s systems couldn’t convey a complex battlespace to the pilot, combat deployments were vetoed. In 1998, NATO forces had considered dispatching the Laage MiGs to Kosovo but scrapped the idea. The Airborne Warning and Control System operators would have had to offer the MiGs special handling. “With AWACS calling out [information] to three to six combat air patrols, they’d have to give us extra information,” Jaensch says. “We decided we’d get more in the way than help.” In addition, the Serbs also flew Fulcrums, making identification in the air difficult.

In 1996, Fred “Spanky” Clifton became the first American MiG-29 exchange pilot with JG 73. A Weapons School graudate in the F-16, with thousands of hours in F-15s, F-5s, and MiG-29s as well, he turns an analyst’s cold eye on the Fulcrum. “It’s a great [basic fighter maneuvers] machine,” he says. “But of the four fighters, it’s easily the worst-handling of any I flew.” Before becoming a Fulcrum driver, Clifton had his first pilot-scholar assignment as an aggressor, flying F-5 Tigers in intensive training aimed at honing the skills of experienced pilots against known threats, including the MiG-29. When he joined JG 73, it was a unique opportunity to judge the Stateside syllabus. “I got to see if what I was teaching as an aggressor pilot was correct,” he says. “Much of what we ascertained through intelligence was indeed accurate.” Yes, the Fulcrum was a highly capable dogfighter, and its ability to fire a shot regardless of where the nose was pointed was impressive. (The Russians lost the aiming advantage by 2002, according to Fred Clifton, when the U.S. military fielded the AIM-9X missile and the Joint Helmet-mounted Cueing System.) But it had low fuel capacity, a head-down, knob- and switch-congested cockpit, a so-so radar, and not much versatility: It wasn’t designed to do much besides intercept and shoot down adversaries who were flying not far from its airfield. Eastern bloc pilots were trained to slavishly follow ground controllers, so the Fulcrum’s systems, including its head-up display, were not highly developed, and the situational awareness the pilots got was very limited.

.../snip/...

Peter Steiniger runs a website that enthusiastically chronicles the German MiG experience, and is replete with stunning photos and heartfelt tributes to the Fulcrum. And yet Steiniger says: “Would I want to go to war with it? No. Except for the [AA-11 Archer system], the cockpit was terribly labor-intensive. Our overall [situational awareness in beyond visual range] setups was in the map case.” In other words, the pilot had to put his head down, break out the paper, and figure out where he was.

Although a small number of Fulcrums continue to be upgraded—Poland’s MiGs are receiving new mission computers, navigation technology, and even a Rockwell Collins UHF/VHF radio—other air forces, except for an inordinate number of former Soviet-aligned states, never queued up to buy the Fulcrum after the cold war. “The MiG-29 really got exposed with the fall of the Iron Curtain,” Clifton says. “You don’t see further foreign sales. Who’s bought it? Nobody.” As to the wisdom of upgrading the Fulcrum into a modern, data-linked, multi-role fighter, Clifton says, “Go buy an F-16. It would be more economical, and it’s a better airplane.”

...

[gtg947h]

The point of the Harrier FAA defence as I understand was to intercept the large Soviet Naval recon jets that would have found the fleet and directed the Nuclear bombers - as proven in the Falklands it wasn't really much cop as an interceptor against low level Daggers etc. Subsonic it seemed pretty good to a point.

That's kind of the impression I get from the Forger, too. It wasn't intended to knock down fighters--look at the ships it was intended for. The Kiev class protected boomer bastions; the Forgers would have been intercepting things like Orions, Nimrods, etc.

I suspect the A/G weaponry came about partly as a secondary role for antiship use, and then later during the Afghanistan experiment. I think the Soviets saw the Harrier and figured "maybe there's something to this VSTOL for attack use" and decided to see if it worked.

[zero-one]

If you keep reading the article, it isn't as glowing.

yes, I'll agree. I was simply responding to the comment that the Mig-29 deserved to be in the list of worst ACM platforms.

The Fulcrum is not a great plane overall, but if there is one thing that it is very very good at, its ACM. In fact, thats the only thing it might be good at.

[mixelflick]

The Mig-23 is a great pick, but I honestly feel the Mig-29 is the correct choice.

A MUCH better design vs. the Mig-23, it nonetheless has an abysmal combat record. It has been trounced by F-15's and F-16's, as well as its larger stablemate the SU-27. Its sole air to air victories apparently coming when 2 Cuban examples downed a Piper Cub (or 2). For beating up on Piper Cubs, I have to give it a negative rating LOL.

For whatever reason, her combination of speed, maneuverability and excellent thrust to weight ratio has failed to translate into success. Interesting, given how deadly it seemed especially with the Archer and its helmet mounted site...

ACM = Air Combat Manoeuvring so in this context not a MiG-29 ever despite the combat record which is no reflection on the platform in that regards.

There really is no mystery here - both Iraq and Serbia not only had the 9.12B version (which didn't help), in Serbias case they were in a right state.
Iraq faired no better in 1991, but again not much they could do in reality - an R-73 and close in capbility not much use if you cant even get there. (There was 1 merge sure but in the light of it being a 2 v 1 the Iraqi pilot may have done all he could)

OK... but how can combat record NOT be included in this assessment. Every time people bring up the Mig-29's combat record, I hear excuse after excuse. It was an early model. They weren't maintained properly. They were flown by monkeys.They were outnumbered. From what I saw on the dogfights channel, Iraqi Mig-29's were in close (WVR) combat with F-15's, not BVR. They weren't flown by monkeys, they were flown by combat tested Iraqi pilots (on some accounts, their best pilots).

So why is it they couldn't score a SINGLE victory? I dunno. I can see the point the Mig-29 has better maneuverability than say, a Mig-23. It just seems that every time one gets involved in a real life situation to use that vaunted ACM, it ends up being turned into spare parts, hair, teeth and eyeballs...