Forum: General F-22A Raptor forum

My personal take is that all of these "reports" coming from french sources is this nothing more than a clever (or perhaps not so) marketing scheme from dassault and the french MOD to drum up some desperately needed sales for the Rafale. You can always tell whos the BS artist in the room, he's the one talking the loudest...

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Looking over the anecdotal evidence provided to-date, I would recommend caution in drawing any conclusions.

I am reminded of the Cope India exercises a few years back, when USAF F-15s reportedly faired badly against Indian Air Force Su-30s. Only later did it become evident that the outcome was largely a function of the rules of engagement, not to mention that the Indian Air Force had only sent their most experienced pilots from their weapons training school, not pilots from operational squadrons. At the more recent Red Flag exercises, with different rules of engagement, and with pilots drawn from operational squadrons, the USAF F-15s proved their capability against the Su-30MKI's sent by India. There are many elements, ROE being a big one, that can alter the outcome of a training exercise such as this.

Everyone should also be aware that Dassault has been reportedly on the verge of closing a deal for the sale of Rafale fighters to the UAE for what seems like an interminable period now. For the RAF, this was probably an excellent training opportunity. For the French, this appears to have been part of a sales pitch. I also recall the reports that filtered out on how the Rafale performed at the last Red Flag exercise, which were anything but stellar.

Pilotasso wrote:

The Eurofighters capabilities beat the living daylight out every F-16 variant regardless. The falcon just isn’t a match at all.

I'd be careful about exagerrating the capabilities of the Typhoon in its current state. The Typhoon is not expected to receive its long-awaited helmet-mounted display and sight - on an operational basis - until the 3rd Quarter of 2010. According to accounts in Janes', the Typhoon has already proven vulnerable during WVR engagements against operational F-18E/F fighters equiped with helmet-mounted sights. The same should be true for a similarly equiped F-16 (or MiG-29 for that matter).

The Typhoon has a lot of potential, as does the Rafale. I would agree that on paper, it should out-perform the existing F-15/16/18 fleets in an air-to-air application. But let's be honest about this. The Europeans do not have the kind of defense budgets at their disposal that the USAF does. Not all of the promised bells and whistles already being retrofitted aboard US aircraft are available as of yet to the Typhoon (or Rafale).

I thought they already had the helmet sight, but anyways I think Jane’s has been committing several misleading articles in their details over the years that are more or less obvious. The same way the F-22 doesn’t have helmet, however they enjoy such advantages in other areas over the rest of planes that unless you do something very wrong by the time you reach WVR range you are likely to have the enemy already in defensive anyway. Just like F-15’s were famed to do in the 80’s.

Jane’s comments also may be referring to some exercises but like you said ROE influences the outcome. I am connected to my countries AF in 2 different ways and I have the possibility get a few unclassified comments from the pilots (no results though) wich seems to confirm indeed that for the time being Eurofighter pilots are yet to take full advantage of the plane due to diversified reasons that do not have to do with the plane directly but may be influencing certain articles portraying the plane with a bad rep.

Pilotasso wrote:

You are seriously misguided. Rafale has currently a PESA radar. Being AESA’s doesnt imply range advantages over PESA. Its main new features are ECM and ECCM, LPI, and target discrimination. Actually PESA’s have typically higher output power capability than AESA equivalent. What the French are trying to do with their new AESA is to have those features without decreasing range compared to PESA. So expect modest range increment, if at all.
French export publicity is already mentioning it to have 55km against the RCS similar to that of an F-16 or Mirage F-1 wich is hardly impressive. The mech Captor is more than twice that.

According french sources the RBE2 AESA will provide a 40% - 50% longer range over the PESA and PESA is actually even lower ranged than MSA at least at the antenna's gimbals. And from where does the "55 km vs F-16 sized target" come from?

Pilotasso wrote:

Would like to see those sources, and hope they are not French.

Flight International, a BRITISH magazine, recently test-flew the Rafale. The writer, an aviation journalist for decades, said it was hands-down the best overall fighter he'd ever flown. He positively gushed and glowed about its capabilities. You can look up the article yourself. I don't have time to go digging for it.

Pilotasso wrote:

Development time has little to do with both aircraft capabilities. Their development scope was different and the typhoon had more partners, manufacturers and infra structures to coordinate with.
BTW the fighters are not toothless without AESA, the Euros CAPTOR is the fastest mech array in the world and like AESA it can do both AG and AA simultaneously and has long range capabilities. So I don’t know where you get the impression the Typhoon is toothless. BTW currently the captor on the Eurofighter vastly outranges the RBE2 of the Rafale.

AESA for the EF will inclue a range increment, integrated ECM and ECCM features and faster refresh. That’s the difference.

Captor outranges the Rafale's radar? Really? And you know this for sure? How? What source? Or should I just take your word for it, and the Tiffy's manufacturers? British-designed fighters are notorious for having extremely poor and unreliable radars. Look up Tornado ADV, ballast in the nose in place of radar, to educate yourself on their excellent track record...

Now, if a mechanically-steered array were so damned good, why in the world would both Rafale and Tiffy look at AESA as an upgrade??? What you write makes no sense.

Pilotasso wrote:

You must be kidding right? Are you talking about an Eurofighter or an Alfa jet? The Eurofighters capabilities beat the living daylight out every F-16 variant regardless. The falcon just isn’t a match at all.

A Tiffy without an AESA is like a Tornado ADV with ballast in the nose. A compromise to get the thing into service, with sharply reduced capabilities. A Block 60 F-16 right now is superior to any Tiffy rolling out of the production line. This will continue to be the case if and until such time as a Tranche 3 Tiffy is developed and produced.

Pilotasso wrote:

EF has similar electronic and BVR capabilities as the Super bug but is much faster and more agile and has better T/W ratio. It will also supersede all F-15’s not upgraded with APG 63V3, wich constitutes 90% of the fleet at BVR (it will still be competitive with those and have first shot capability with the meteor) and beats them all at WVR regardless of the version.

The Tiffy is a vastly better aerodynamic performer than the Superbug, no argument from me there. It is nowhere near as developed electronically, however, and the Superbug's AESA is vastly better. Therefore, Tiffy gets smoked BVR vs. Superbug. Even more so against a "Golden Eagle," with its significantly bigger radar aperture. WVR, however, you are absolutely correct: Tiffy should smoke both. That is if it survives that long...

sextusempiricus wrote:

The optical devices actual ranges are figures highly classified, where are you getting this info from?
Tranche 3 has no “if” as it is necessary to replace AG aircraft, and its biggest difference wont be the radar, but true multirole capability.

Rafale is acknowledged to have a highly capable, passive Optical/ESM suite. What makes it better than the Tiffy's? It is operational. The Tiffy's is not.

Tranche 3 may never happen. And if it does, its additional capabilities may be severely limited due to budget constraints. Have you actually read any news reports about the Rafale and Tiffy, or are you just a fan boy getting your info from other fan boys???

Pilotasso wrote:

You are seriously misguided. Rafale has currently a PESA radar. Being AESA’s doesnt imply range advantages over PESA. Its main new features are ECM and ECCM, LPI, and target discrimination. Actually PESA’s have typically higher output power capability than AESA equivalent. What the French are trying to do with their new AESA is to have those features without decreasing range compared to PESA. So expect modest range increment, if at all.
French export publicity is already mentioning it to have 55km against the RCS similar to that of an F-16 or Mirage F-1 wich is hardly impressive. The mech Captor is more than twice that.

Again, your assertions regarding Captor are baseless. Also, any AESA radar of equivalent size to any mechanically scanned array will have significantly greater range. There is a wealth of literature documenting this fact. Maybe you haven't read it?

sextusempiricus wrote:

Flight International, a BRITISH magazine, recently test-flew the Rafale. The writer, an aviation journalist for decades, said it was hands-down the best overall fighter he'd ever flown. He positively gushed and glowed about its capabilities. You can look up the article yourself. I don't have time to go digging for it.

I marked what is relevant. As Peter Collins left the RAF in 1993 and hasn't flown any meaningful fast jets since, his experience is limited to Hawks, Jaguars and Harriers, plus some other types including the Mirage 2000 at that time. That he is totally blown away by the Rafale is not surprising. He hasn't flown any recent version of other types.
The article can be found here:
http://www.flightglobal.com/articles/20 ... afale.html

Quote:

Captor outranges the Rafale's radar? Really? And you know this for sure? How? What source? Or should I just take your word for it, and the Tiffy's manufacturers? British-designed fighters are notorious for having extremely poor and unreliable radars. Look up Tornado ADV, ballast in the nose in place of radar, to educate yourself on their excellent track record...

Based on the data available the Captor well outranges the RBE2 PESA. Well beyond 160 km tracking range vs. ~130 km detection range of the RBE2 both against fighter sized targets. So because the ADV started off with ballast means the brits can't design any radars? Laughing

Quote:

Now, if a mechanically-steered array were so damned good, why in the world would both Rafale and Tiffy look at AESA as an upgrade??? What you write makes no sense.

Perhaps because an AESA solution was out of question at the time design choices were made...

Quote:

A Tiffy without an AESA is like a Tornado ADV with ballast in the nose. A compromise to get the thing into service, with sharply reduced capabilities. A Block 60 F-16 right now is superior to any Tiffy rolling out of the production line. This will continue to be the case if and until such time as a Tranche 3 Tiffy is developed and produced.

Yawn, yeah it's not AESA so its crap, the aircraft is blind and everything else is superior it just needs an AESA radar. How I love those stupid assertions. So you tell us the technical data and describe us the modes and demonstrate to us all of the capabilities of both radars. I'm waiting, oh you can't what a pitty.

Quote:

The Tiffy is a vastly better aerodynamic performer than the Superbug, no argument from me there. It is nowhere near as developed electronically, however, and the Superbug's AESA is vastly better. Therefore, Tiffy gets smoked BVR vs. Superbug. Even more so against a "Golden Eagle," with its significantly bigger radar aperture.

When do you day dreamers understand that an AESA alone doesn't tell you much about the radar itself and even less so about the aircraft's entire avionics?

sextusempiricus wrote:

Rafale is acknowledged to have a highly capable, passive Optical/ESM suite. What makes it better than the Tiffy's? It is operational. The Tiffy's is not.

Oh those PIRATEs on all the block 5 & 8 Typhoons are just dummies...

Quote:

Tranche 3 may never happen. And if it does, its additional capabilities may be severely limited due to budget constraints.

You seem have to missed this:
http://www.eurofighter.com/news/200900731.asp

To some it up a lot of strong claims, but weak arguments.

Couldnt have put it better Scorpion, though I will try find more internet sources. Cheers.

Enthusiast Joined: Apr 23, 2009 - 08:44 AM Posts: 97

scorpion82, just some dot points of which I'm pretty sure you're aware of due to commentary I've made elsewhere.

we had a briefing on Tiffy by one of our RAF exchange pilots earlier this year.

I'll just dot point the issues rather than drag out a long winded post.

The intention was to field AESA late 2010 as in RAFs view CAPTOR was more than able to deal with latent "red" threats, they regarded it as near peer except against an AESA set, but as no red threats had AESA systems capability and/or performance, the issue was not to spend early on development when the need was not apparent and needed. (funds/urgency/relevancy issue) or in absolute terms, bang for buck

although no one is going to post genuine relevant systems performance data (IMO they'd be either lying or waiting for a visit from their respective oversight agency), there is enough allegorical and technical inference that AESA does have performance advantages over PESA systems due to tracking, slewing, even real estate relative efficiencies etc.... even something minor as the weight and size of the gimbals can have an impact because it generates a weight and balance issue, if you save on gimbal weight then you can improve performance (its not a trivial item by any means), or you can substitute the space and weight with systems enhancements such as amplification, redistribution of the main system (further back for balance issues) etc....

I'm not stating that these things necessarily will be done, but that if you change from PESA to AESA you have greater systems design flexibility to improve extant issues.

AUST you are correct however sextusempiricus and lets face it, along with the vast majority of oblivious weekend aviation fans that radars rate like this:
Mech<PESA<AESA
independently of country of origin, manufacturer (level of know how), dish size and signal processor. Hence his evaluation:
Eurofighter<Rafale<F-16 block 60<F-18F<F-22 Could probably fit in there Gripens Mig-35 AESA/PESA array in front of Eurofighters radars.

Wich is skewed, distoreted and largely lacking scietificaly.

Enthusiast Joined: Apr 23, 2009 - 08:44 AM Posts: 97

Pilotasso wrote:

AUST you are correct however sextusempiricus and lets face it, along with the vast majority of oblivious weekend aviation fans that radars rate like this:
Mech<PESA<AESA
independently of country of origin, manufacturer (level of know how), dish size and signal processor. Hence his evaluation:
Eurofighter<Rafale<F-16 block 60<F-18F<F-22 Could probably fit in there Gripens Mig-35 AESA/PESA array in front of Eurofighters radars.

Wich is skewed, distoreted and largely lacking scietificaly.

in absolute terms though, one would have to say that sextusempiricus is on the money. Smile

eg at the AESA product development and implementation level, the US is a golden mile ahead of everyone else in iterative and parallel development of fighter based AESA systems.

Nobody else comes within a bulls roar. eg look at how many AESA developments are in service, operational and used day in day out. apart from the swedes, nearly everyone else is at that point where fielding AESA will mean development and doctrine changes, the US however rode that horse many moons ago.

and in the big picture, they are the big dog because their systems solution (ie fighters don't fight in isolation of other theatre feeds etc...) noone else can provide the same degree of space based, and overhead ewarfare/esensor support. that doesn't concatenate their warfighting capability - it exponentially explodes their capability to fight at the real theatre systems level

Your view of US advantage in AESA technology is probably correct but you missed the point when considering that neither the rafale or Eurofighter have American radars, both will feature European AESA.

Also when you put in antenna size and output power, assuming similar signal processing capability, the game no longer is linear as to rate them. They are all very different in the various variables.

Enthusiast Joined: Apr 23, 2009 - 08:44 AM Posts: 97

Pilotasso wrote:

Your view of US advantage in AESA technology is probably correct but you missed the point when considering that neither the rafale or Eurofighter have American radars, both will feature European AESA.

I haven't ignored the euro developments at all, what I'm reinforcing is that the US has the critical mass to go out and develop concurrently disparate AESA systems for a range of aircraft and still achieve relative economies of scale. the europeans cannot afford the same luxury - and that brings along its own development limitations

Pilotasso wrote:

Also when you put in antenna size and output power, assuming similar signal processing capability, the game no longer is linear as to rate them. They are all very different in the various variables.

nope, not assuming identical capabilities at all, its directly related to the fact that the US has a suite of AESA solutions available on a disparate range of platforms and all inherently offer a flexible path of disparate mods. the US has a bigger electronic gene pool to play with. the development and history associated with all those discrete solutions means that they are further up the curve. They have the choice of electronic natural selection by the way that they've gone out and allowed multiple companies to concurrently develop iterative as well as spiral solutions. Euro companies have a very much smaller electronic gene pool to work with. In any development, that attaches its own negatives.

You missed my point altogether. But thats okay I probably didnt make mayself udnerstood either.

BTW Europe has no "electronic small gene pool to play with". Thats a myth. Your forgetting the ammount european subcontractors for US military as well as the reverse on various systems, and how many times Europe has been US resource for technological advances.

Enthusiast Joined: Apr 23, 2009 - 08:44 AM Posts: 97

Pilotasso wrote:

BTW Europe has no "electronic small gene pool to play with". Thats a myth. Your forgetting the ammount european subcontractors for US military as well as the reverse on various systems, and how many times Europe has been US resource for technological advances.

Europe certainly doesn't have a shortage of capable and competent individuals, but one of the considerations for any country making procurement decisions is the end product and fielded state of the capability.

in that sense (where countries need to be able to defend decisions that they haven't gone to bleeding edge capability and have made decisions on established extant capability to support the decision) then the US can quite happily trot out a family of capability, a history of iterative development, different solutions from multiple suppliers etc....

the problem at the "continental" level is that when you draw up the capability matrix and selection matrix for a decision (which is how we start to assess technology sets), the grid will start to lean to the US pretty quickly. That for a lot of countries starts to qualify the US product in a number of definition requirements - and all those points add up.

In real absolute terms there are less available and fielded non US products than US products. This is also a touchstone point in an assessment. The electronic gene pool reference relates to fielded and gold systems in service. In service has an advantage because it provides historical data for the reviewing team to look at and establish things like through life and service maint costs.

none of this stuff is done in isolation, so any capability that has a long history, or where the capability in the "selling" country is obviously present and not just latent will start to weight the decisions.

Procurement is very much based on the assessment team being able to apply levels of confidence of what can be delivered against baseline requirements and assoc risk

Spotted this very interesting bit of info over on another forum:

From Paris Air & Cosmos on 29/01/2010
"Although French aviators showed off a great deal about the "beatings" inflicted by their Rafales on British Typhoons during the last ATLC exercise in the United Arab Emirates, very little was said about the confrontation between Dassault's delta-wing aircraft and the American F-22As. In out-of-visual-range engagements, the American Raptors did not even condescend to turn on their radars, remaining invisible to the Rafale's RBE2 [radar system] and Spectra [self-defense system] while precisely locating the electromagnetic waves from the French fighter, thus securing their AMRAAM [missile] launches from a secure distance. On two occasions at least, the F-22As also "tangled" with the Rafales in close combat, securing a "gun kill" each time without much difficulty."

Seems the Raptor is f'ing superb!

Forum: General F-22A Raptor forum

F-22's at Dubai