BAE Systems Inches Out In Public On Electronic Warfare

[garrya]

That's the SatComm antenna

wow where do you get those image from ? can i have the source ?
Btw , how about the underbelly bay that hold the hook ? , A and C version doesnt have hook so may be they can have the decoy there

[mrigdon]

wow where do you get those image from ? can i have the source ?
Btw , how about the underbelly bay that hold the hook ? , A and C version doesnt have hook so may be they can have the decoy there

The A version has a hook. They've been testing it recently.

https://theaviationist.com/2016/05/20/t ... wards-afb/

And the C version better have a hook or else it's a one way trip off the carrier.

[hornetfinn]

AFAIK, pretty much all self-protection jamming systems cover only front and rear sectors and have rather limited bandwidth for jamming. Also towed decoys have been found to be more effective than aircraft mounted jammers for protecting rear sector of fighter as they can also act as fake target if required and also because they have wider coverage due to being so far away from aircraft itself. I think F-35 will have roughly equal offensive EW coverage as best current operational systems and superior performance as individual systems. Together with VLO stealth and sensor fusion and networking, it probably has orders of magnitude better total performance.

With VLO stealth, a single F-35 can probably use only small number of T/R modules of AN/APG-81 for jamming purposes and radar performance will not be much affected.

[popcorn]

Nothing much on ALE-70 but should be similar to ALE-55.

http://www.militaryaerospace.com/articl ... decoy.html

[eloise]

Since lower RCS reduces jamming power requirements, i reckon that it can make terrain bounce jamming useful even at high altitude ? what do you guys think?

[SpudmanWP]

wow where do you get those image from ? can i have the source ?

That was in a PDF from Harris.com that I found a few years ago but I can't find it now (that's why I have imgur )

However, I do think I figured it out. The door that I had previously associated with the flares is likely the ALE door. My reasoning it two-fold, flare eject direction and interface size.

1st, let's look at the door in question from this pic.



Note a few things. A: It ejects horizontally, B: It looks like it mounts 4 items across. Since we know the flares are 1 inch square, it seems like something much bigger goes here.

Here is the area in question with the dispencer removed



2nd, assuming that the above is the ALE dispenser, where is the flare dispenser? Simple, right behind it. Lets take a close look at the area behind the ALE dispenser.



A = ALE dispenser door
F (x2) = Flare doors

Note the "Beware of blast" warnings on both areas and that the weapons bay is right up against the flare doors. This means that they would eject perpendicular to the F-35 whereas the ALE is pointing aft in the traditional manner.

Here is a shot of the F-35 ejecting flares and you will note that



If you zoom in, you will see the doors open. The position of the flares and the distance from the F-35 supports a perpendicular launch from the area in question.

Yes, I have a job, this isn't it, and yes, I have too much free time

[spazsinbad]

From 1st 'SWP' photo above of an F-35 Rear End is zoom with ALE door open & from 2nd photo F-35B ALE door removed.

[SpudmanWP]

thanks for the zoom...

[cantaz]

With regards to all aspect jamming, the F-35 does have a system that can selectively radiate in all directions, that being the MADL. For the same reason that the APG-81 might be able to jam outside of its optimal bands, there might be some future growth (classified capability) of the MADL as a defensive jammer, especially if they have/get GaN T/R modules.

[SpudmanWP]

Trigger warning... pure speculation ahead

Zooming in on the PDF (attached) of the ASQ-239 reveals interesting aspects of the -239 apetures. They appear to have the traditional hill & valley layout of AESA T&R antenna apertures (ie, Tapered Slot Antenna aka Vivaldi antenna). One of the benefits of a Vivaldi antenna is that it is inherently a broadband antenna. Kind of makes you wonder about not only the -239's jamming capability, but also why the APG-81 uses a Vivaldi antenna instead of a tile-based AESA layout.

Do receive antennas also use the hill & valley layout as maybe needed for angular direction finding?

[garrya]

2nd, assuming that the above is the ALE dispenser, where is the flare dispenser? Simple, right behind it. Lets take a close look at the area behind the ALE dispenser.



A = ALE dispenser door
F (x2) = Flare doors

Note the "Beware of blast" warnings on both areas and that the weapons bay is right up against the flare doors. This means that they would eject perpendicular to the F-35 whereas the ALE is pointing aft in the traditional manner.
Here is a shot of the F-35 ejecting flares and you will note that

You seem to be correct , btw, here is a gif of F-35 releasing flare , very big picture so we can clearly see the 2 small bay door open
https://gfycat.com/FormalCheapApatosaur

[SpudmanWP]

nice gif... Google/YouTube did not come up with the source vid... likely buried in an "annual update" vid.

[garrya]

Here are some clearer pictures of F-35 Flares bay open




ALE-70 bay open

viewtopic.php?f=22&t=27294&start=15

[garrya]

Do receive antennas also use the hill & valley layout as maybe needed for angular direction finding?

hill , valley layout isnot needed for angular direction finding ,interferometry can be done with 2 antennas.
IMHO , the reason for the hill, valley layout is so that the jamming beam could be steered electronically.

nice gif... Google/YouTube did not come up with the source vid... likely buried in an "annual update" vid.

I found that Gif purely by chance when looking for some Gif for my blog a while ago

[SpudmanWP]

It's looking more and more like the ASQ-239 is active jamming capabilities outside of the APG-81.

Other things that it might be.. part of the IFF system or a way of sending midcourse updates to weapons that are not within the forward arc (ie update-able by the APG-81).

The plot thickens....