The Germans are coming!

[talkitron]

Why even compare the Typhoon to the F-15E? One was conceived as a pure interceptor with A2G capabilities added later as an afterthought while the other is a mud-mover. Apples and oranges really.

The F-15C is the premiere A2A aircraft of its generation and the F-15E is the same airframe with some additions for air to ground. Both the F-15 series the Typhoon are high end airframes: two engines and high performance. Both are part of the fourth generation. Both can have comparable avionics installed and the Typhoon program was certainly not mainly motivated by avionics upgrades.

[vilters]

EUROPE?
What Europe, where Europe?

We need at least 10 years of political discussions to find out we disagree more then we agreed to agree.

Europe is a political mess, with all main countries having their own industrial priorities.
- The Tornado mess.
- The Typhoon mess.
- The A-400 mess.
- Take ALL helicopters build after the 80's. ALL of them......

Ya, ya, ya, they all look good on paper, but when you dig a bit below the surface?
Nobody is satisfied.

Oh, did I mention the helicopter mess? Now , "that's what I call a monster fuck-up". Europe? Must be a Joke, right?

Europe; lots of public discussions to satisfy each countries voters, but when the money has to come on the table? Everybody protects its own industry.

And this poison sits even in the F-35.
Because each participant country wants, no => no => no, => NEEDS its own share of the workload to "protect" choosing the F-35 to its own population.

Come on,
without all this, each aviation program (including the F-35) would cost half of what it costs now.

Europe? An paper collection of individual protective countries. Nothing more, nothing less.

[Tiger05]

Why even compare the Typhoon to the F-15E? One was conceived as a pure interceptor with A2G capabilities added later as an afterthought while the other is a mud-mover. Apples and oranges really.

The F-15C is the premiere A2A aircraft of its generation and the F-15E is the same airframe with some additions for air to ground. Both the F-15 series the Typhoon are high end airframes: two engines and high performance. Both are part of the fourth generation. Both can have comparable avionics installed and the Typhoon program was certainly not mainly motivated by avionics upgrades.

The F-15E is a strike-optimized version of the F-15 so yes it is mainly a mud-mover. The USAF certainly use it as a mud-mover in any case. I doubt that they would ever be used to fly classic air superiority missions. That is the task of the F-22 and F-15C. Note that they Saudis who bought both Typhoons and F-15S use the former primarily for A2A and the latter for A2G...

Typhoon is 4.5 gen btw.

[wrightwing]

The E models while primarily used for A2G, are equally adept at A2A. They train for both missions. As for generations, the upgrades the Es are receiving will ensure that they're in no way inferior to Typhoons, with regard to avionics/sensors.

[Tiger05]

- The Tornado mess.
- The Typhoon mess.
- The A-400 mess.
- Take ALL helicopters build after the 80's. ALL of them......

Ya, ya, ya, they all look good on paper, but when you dig a bit below the surface?
Nobody is satisfied.

Oh, did I mention the helicopter mess? Now , "that's what I call a monster fuck-up

Nice exaggeration. You make the classic error of mistaking a program's troubled development for the end product. Were the Typhoon and A400 programs mismanaged? Absolutely. Does that mean they are underperforming junks that failed to live to their promises? No. Most F-35 critics make the same mistake btw.

"Nobody is satisfied". Really? That is a laughable statement. Especially regarding the helicopters since Airbus Helicopters is a global leader in terms of market share. I guess they must do something right after all.

And btw, what is wrong with the Tornado? Not to the first time i see you bashing the plane. I dont recall it having a troubled development or underperforming. It has now been 35 years since it entered service and it is still going strong today so what is the issue here? Please do tell us.

[gc]

- The Tornado mess.
- The Typhoon mess.
- The A-400 mess.
- Take ALL helicopters build after the 80's. ALL of them......

Ya, ya, ya, they all look good on paper, but when you dig a bit below the surface?
Nobody is satisfied.

Oh, did I mention the helicopter mess? Now , "that's what I call a monster fuck-up

Nice exaggeration. You make the classic error of mistaking a program's troubled development for the end product. Were the Typhoon and A400 programs mismanaged? Absolutely. Does that mean they are underperforming junks that failed to live to their promises? No. Most F-35 critics make the same mistake btw.

"Nobody is satisfied". Really? That is a laughable statement. Especially regarding the helicopters since Airbus Helicopters is a global leader in terms of market share. I guess they must do something right after all.

And btw, what is wrong with the Tornado? Not to the first time i see you bashing the plane. I dont recall it having a troubled development or underperforming. It has now been 35 years since it entered service and it is still going strong today so what is the issue here? Please do tell us.

No doubt the Typhoon, A400M and Eurocopter Tiger are great products, but their overall capabilities and flexibility are still significantly limited compared to platforms like the F15E, F-16, F-18E/F, Rafale, C-17, C-130J and AH-64s. Sadly till now the Typhoon has pretty limited air to ground capabilities and weapon choices.

[sferrin]

I doubt that they would ever be used to fly classic air superiority missions.

Tell that to South Korea, Singapore, Israel. . .

What a pig of a mudmover:

[SpudmanWP]

The F-15E is the core of the F-15I, F-15K, F-15SG, F-15S, F-15SA, F-15QA, etc.

In all of these instances, the F-15 is the most advanced A2A fighter in their force with the possible exception of the Saudi Eurofighters.

The are multirole fighters with a strong A2A heritage, pure and simple.

[optimist]

- The Tornado mess.
- The Typhoon mess.
- The A-400 mess.
- Take ALL helicopters build after the 80's. ALL of them......

Ya, ya, ya, they all look good on paper, but when you dig a bit below the surface?
Nobody is satisfied.

Oh, did I mention the helicopter mess? Now , "that's what I call a monster fuck-up

Nice exaggeration. You make the classic error of mistaking a program's troubled development for the end product. Were the Typhoon and A400 programs mismanaged? Absolutely. Does that mean they are underperforming junks that failed to live to their promises? No. Most F-35 critics make the same mistake btw.

"Nobody is satisfied". Really? That is a laughable statement. Especially regarding the helicopters since Airbus Helicopters is a global leader in terms of market share. I guess they must do something right after all.

And btw, what is wrong with the Tornado? Not to the first time i see you bashing the plane. I dont recall it having a troubled development or underperforming. It has now been 35 years since it entered service and it is still going strong today so what is the issue here? Please do tell us.

Tell that to the aussies who are dumping the tiger and not doing a MLU, as it would be throwing good money after bad.

[Prinz_Eugn]

And btw, what is wrong with the Tornado? Not to the first time i see you bashing the plane. I dont recall it having a troubled development or underperforming. It has now been 35 years since it entered service and it is still going strong today so what is the issue here? Please do tell us.

Tornado ADV maybe? Delays with the Foxhunter radar, not initially having the capability to do mid-course updates for AMRAAMs which made them worse than the Skyflash they replaced, just being a really weird decision to turn a low-level strike aircraft into an interceptor. Basically Industrial Base: the Airplane.

[talkitron]

Tornado ADV maybe? Delays with the Foxhunter radar, not initially having the capability to do mid-course updates for AMRAAMs which made them worse than the Skyflash they replaced, just being a really weird decision to turn a low-level strike aircraft into an interceptor. Basically Industrial Base: the Airplane.

If you are interested in issues with the Tornado F3/ADV, read David Gledhill's Tornado F3: A Navigator's Eye on Britain's Last Interceptor. He admits the plane was a disappointment compared to the F-15 and F-16, both in terms of its handling and its avionics. Also, the UK government did not lavish the F3/ADV with expensive upgrades until maybe the 1990s. Here is a one sentence quote:

"My personal view is that the F3 was a step forward but not the major leap which had been made with the latest generation US fighters which I had flown as a NATO Tactical Evaluator."

[ricnunes]

Nice exaggeration. You make the classic error of mistaking a program's troubled development for the end product. Were the Typhoon and A400 programs mismanaged? Absolutely. Does that mean they are underperforming junks that failed to live to their promises? No. Most F-35 critics make the same mistake btw.

"Nobody is satisfied". Really? That is a laughable statement. Especially regarding the helicopters since Airbus Helicopters is a global leader in terms of market share. I guess they must do something right after all.

And btw, what is wrong with the Tornado? Not to the first time i see you bashing the plane. I dont recall it having a troubled development or underperforming. It has now been 35 years since it entered service and it is still going strong today so what is the issue here? Please do tell us.

Tell that to the aussies who are dumping the tiger and not doing a MLU, as it would be throwing good money after bad.

optimist, you beat me at this!

But just to complement:
The Tiger program was not only messed up during "development" but it was/is also messed up big time during "concept".
Who in it's right and sane mind would develop two very different helicopter version (of the same baseline helicopter) where one is a version for Close Air Support (CAS) intended to be armed with rockets and Air-to-Air missiles while the other version is for Anti-Tank roles and meant to be equipped with Guided Anti-Tank missiles?? Why didn't they develop a single version for both CAS and Anti-Tank?? Well, only in Europe...
This concept is almost "as good" (sarcasm) as the Soviet/Russian Single-Seat gunship helicopter concept, a.k.a. the KA-50!

The only ones smart enough to put the roles of CAS and Anti-Tank into a single Tiger helicopter variant were actually the Australians and look how it turned up for them?? A Tiger variant (ARH) which is basically a different/new helicopter compared to the other existing variants of the Tiger helicopter and thus it became an orphan helicopter (Tiger) fleet

Oh, and last time I checked the A-400M wasn't doing any better!

[SpudmanWP]

Shouldn't this thread be in the "Program & Politics" or "General" section?

[vilters]

The "bright" idea that got us all under the table from laughing, crying, tears flowing, enfin, you get the picture.

The A-400.
Where on earth did they "re-invent" the long abandoned idea that a "T" tail is/was a good idea for a supposedly all terrain cargo/support aircraft.

How, somewhere in their deepest darkest minds could they forget that a "T" tail is and never will be a good idea for a military "all terrain" aircraft because structural fatigue will shorten A/C life drastically.

A "T" tail on a C-5, OK.
A "T" tail on a C-17, OK. They are never supposed to land in the dirt anyway.

But on a cargo A/C that is "supposed" to compete with a C-130? Only twisted minds can come up with pfffft a "T" tail.

[vilters]

Oh, and the helicopters?

Grounded in Australia and many other countries.

Twisted versions, just to increase costs and reduce sales. Who invents those things?

That newer thing??? Euh, N-90 or something?
Well, they are so overweight they might as well be build from concrete, and that wiring...
Is there wiring or are the electrons just flowing around in good luck.

And again, so many versions that there is ABSOLUTELY no sensible standard to be found. Result? Increasing costs.