Re: F-35 internal fuel, range
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I find it 'faskinatin' not that there is endless B/S about Soviet Aircraft on a thread about 'F-35 internal fuel, range'. Why.
weasel1962 wrote:However, doesn't change the fact that the su-27 was designed as a long-ranged fighter, not a point defence fighter like the Migs.
hornetfinn wrote:And it seems that range has become more important than ever recently even in US. Fighter aircraft are getting more and more CFTs and F-35 was specifically designed to carry a huge amount of internal fuel with really high fuel fraction.
weasel1962 wrote:Factually at least 28% more thrust than the F-35. Do kindly share your drag coefficient "sauces" to demonstrate...
knowan wrote:weasel1962 wrote:Factually at least 28% more thrust than the F-35. Do kindly share your drag coefficient "sauces" to demonstrate...
There's been discussions of how well Flanker and F-35 accelerations compare to other aircraft on these forums. IIRC, the F-35A compares well with F-16C, which puts it well ahead of the Flanker.
And there's this thread: viewtopic.php?f=55&t=52510
Flanker accelerating worse than F-35 means it has less excess thrust over drag, despite possessing greater thrust. This means the Flanker has significantly more drag than the F-35.
steve2267 wrote:
Well... it's larger, so all things being equal, yeah, it's going to have more drag. Or were you meaning to state that the Flanker has a higher zero lift drag coefficient than the F-35?
ricnunes wrote:weasel1962 wrote:However, doesn't change the fact that the su-27 was designed as a long-ranged fighter, not a point defence fighter like the Migs.
Yes, indeed.
I agree and echo mixelflick's words that the Russian design philosophy has apparently shifted in the relatively recent past (I would say since the 1980's) with the Su-27 family that you mentioned and also with the Mig-31 and apparently and more recently with the Su-57.
Anyway, the point of my previous post was to correct the "always liked" part of the "Russians have always liked long ranged planes" sentence.
steve2267 wrote:knowan wrote:weasel1962 wrote:Factually at least 28% more thrust than the F-35. Do kindly share your drag coefficient "sauces" to demonstrate...
There's been discussions of how well Flanker and F-35 accelerations compare to other aircraft on these forums. IIRC, the F-35A compares well with F-16C, which puts it well ahead of the Flanker.
And there's this thread: viewtopic.php?f=55&t=52510
Flanker accelerating worse than F-35 means it has less excess thrust over drag, despite possessing greater thrust. This means the Flanker has significantly more drag than the F-35.
Well... it's larger, so all things being equal, yeah, it's going to have more drag. Or were you meaning to state that the Flanker has a higher zero lift drag coefficient than the F-35?
knowan wrote:For aircraft range, subsonic cruise and drag are most relevant, and the Flanker does appear to be inferior to F-35 in that flight regime.
While I did not mention subsonic flight in regards to drag previously, it was what I was talking about.
weasel1962 wrote:Which again is not conclusive because that also depends on air density i.e. altitude. drag increases the lower one goes, hence the most efficient cruise ranges are often at higher altitudes which again may not suggest a significant difference throughout the entire subsonic envelope. That's also why the Su-30 brochure states a 3000km cruise range and a 1270km range at low altitude. I would not be surprised if the f-35 can go beyond 1270km range flying low but the standard cruise range should not be very far from that of the Su-30mk2.
spazsinbad wrote:I find it 'faskinatin' not that there is endless B/S about Soviet Aircraft on a thread about 'F-35 internal fuel, range'. Why.
ricnunes wrote:hornetfinn wrote:And it seems that range has become more important than ever recently even in US. Fighter aircraft are getting more and more CFTs and F-35 was specifically designed to carry a huge amount of internal fuel with really high fuel fraction.
Yes, I agree.
In the case of the US/West, I'm pretty sure the reasons are rather obvious. Air superiority together with Tactical, Interdiction and Strategical Air-to-Ground strikes is the cornerstone of US/Western/NATO strategy to overcome any enemy and as such having longer range and as such inevitably associated with more fuel is of paramount importance to achieve this.
Regarding the Russian (or even Eastern) perspective, I wonder if the Mig-29's colossal failure - doesn't matter which excuse a fan of this plane may come up with, there's no other wording to describe the Mig-29's real combat performance! - which was even a failure against the Su-27 (during the Ethiopia-Eritrea War of 2000) played a significant role in Russia's decision to go with bigger and longer ranged aircraft (Su-27 family and later the Su-57)??
Of course that short range doesn't fully excuse the Mig-29 poor record but I would say that "short range" would likely be among the Mig-29's top three (3) or so shortcomings.
I think the original idea was to compare F-35 range with one of the longest legged and largest 4th gen fighters. And it does compare very favourably there and also to all other current fighters.