gta4 wrote:OK, here is what French pilots have admitted finally in a later publication of air&cosmos, if that could shut you up:
french comments on raptor.jpg
Translation for non-french speakers
There are mainly two things that
give Raptor advantage in dogfight: its thrust vectoring and the immense power given by its two engines, which delivers almost twice as much thrust as that of M88! Even though it is significantly heavier than the Rafale, the F-22A retains a formidable maneuverability which allows it to succeed in most of the dedicated BFM situations. Even though it loses lots of energy in
very high AOA maneuvers, the energy is quickly recovered. However,
the french pilots are reluctant to consider F-22 as invincible: "when facing a F-22A, the Rafale could be put into a fire position, but it must to it very quickly, otherwise F-22 gains an upper hand if the battle drags on"
-------------------------
1. F-22 is better angular-wise (high AOA nose authority)
2. F-22 is better energy-wise (energy retention)
So how come they are evenly matched?
Sorry, but still not...
First of all, these comments aren't from the french pilots, but from Air & Cosmos, which isn't the magazine of the french air force... i don't know how it work in the USA, but in France, the press is independent...
"give Raptor advantage in dogfight" : in general, not especially against the Rafale.
" Even though it loses lots of energy in very high AOA maneuvers, the energy is quickly recovered.": Exactly what i pointed out, the F22 is excellent at recovering energy, not at keeping it. So perhaps, thanks to the TVC, it could have an excellent instantaneous rate of turn, but maybe not a good sustained turn. The Rafale for is part, thanks to it rear placed Delta, is very good at keeping energy ( but probably not at recovering it cause it lack of power).
" the french pilots are reluctant to consider F-22 as invincible": one more time, "are reluctant" isn't a good translation for " se gardent bien de qualifier", a typical french expression. I would say: " They take great care to do not say that...", in French, such a long sentence could be considered as ironic. One more time, our language is more twisted and literary.
And now, the quotation of a french pilot ( according to A&C):
You translate " sous peine de" by "otherwise". "Sous peine de" mean "there's a risk of". So even if the battle drags on, it doenst mean necessary the F22 will be victorious, just it's in a good configuration to win. Prove of it: 5 ( or 4 according to the US version) draws mean probably 5 long fights.
f-16adf wrote:Hello Niafron,
I have a question. Do you happen to know if the French Rafales that fought against Saudi F-15C Eagles were clean or did they have fuel tanks on? Also, I am guessing the Rafales and Mirage 2000-5 flew cover for the Mirage 2000D's in this exercise (Green Shield 2014 @ Nancy).
https://defence.pk/pdf/threads/saudi-an ... le.330385/The RSAF is kinda known for not having the most skilled pilots. While ADA pilots are some of the best. So pilot skill aside, and if they were both fighting clean; Rafale (at least on paper) is superior to F-15C in nearly every WVR metric (maybe not climb rate, acceleration)and BVR. Yet aging F-15C seemed to perform pretty good vs ADA Rafale. Also, do you know if these Saudi Eagle "kills" were all WVR?
Sorry, no french report about that. Many things about the exercise, but there's no mention of the "score". In fact, even in english, this "article" is the only one i found to speak of it...
Honnestly, i don't believe it. But well, i could be wrong... Let's say the source don't look very serious to me.
Do the Rafale carry tanks in exercise? I guess yes for they are suppose to do it in operation! The Rafale is designed for long range and Low altitude penetration without support of air superiority fighters.
A typicall scenario is to penetrate an hostile airspace and if needed, to treat opponents fighters and ground targets in the same time ( including SAM launchers), thus, at distance of security. With the tanks still attached.
( This is also why there's no great deal to make about the ATLC, cause a Dogfight involving F22 and Rafale is very unlikely. Either the F22 could shoot the Rafale at long range, either, provided the F22 is in his frontal sector, the Rafale will detect and identify it at let's say 20 or 25 NM with the OSF... Well, if the F22 is on the flanks of a Rafale, Radar turned off and same for the Rafale, and if no other sources could give them any informations, perhaps, perhaps a WVR encounter is possible... and i'm not even sure of that, cause both of them got 360 degrees sensors...)