F-35 Flies Against F-16 In Basic Fighter Maneuvers

"IOC in few months"...... for the F-35B. But you quoted a USAF general. He is less interested in that airplane, because his service doesn't fly them.

The F-35 is so software dependent, that the services are going to be a lot more interested in the other variants than they were with other planes. They're doing a good deal of training together and will be collating all that maintenance data together so that all the services can benefit. If the Air Force general has any sense (and I imagine he does), then he very much cares about how the IOC for the F-35B goes. All of the weapons software that was accelerated into 2B so that the Marines could get up and running is the same code that goes into the Air Force 3i code for IOC.

I take your point mrigdon, the good General does have a lot of integration activities and reporting coordinating duties, and does Care about the project progress intended to assist the Marines on their 'B' IOC. He won't loose his job if the 'B' should stumble on the way to 'IOC-land' however. And that would be unlike the hot lights that will shine on him directly if there are 'A' project issues. That is what I meant about him being LESS interested in the B than the A.

I originally brought that up because the poster above didn't seem to grasp that there were different airplanes and was mixing information and quotes freely (assisted by the shifty and dubious reporting methods of one Mr de Briganti).

"IOC in few months"...... for the F-35B. But you quoted a USAF general. He is less interested in that airplane, because his service doesn't fly them.

Also, they plan to have that F-35 platform around for a very very long time so they are indeed looking at the future and how to equip it for that future.

So USAF doesn't bother that USN's F-35 IOC doesn't work.

"Doesn't work"

WOW

You may need to define that just a little bit better.
I don't think that you will get very far creating a believable scenario where MARINE version of the F-35 will not be vastly superior to the aircraft that they are replacing.

Just give it a try.

A great overview of PAST, PRESENT & FUTURE air combat is contained herein (mentioned - or will be - multiple times here

TRENDS IN AIR-TO-AIR COMBAT IMPLICATIONS FOR FUTURE AIR SUPERIORITY
18 Feb 2015 JOHN STILLION CSBA

Source: https://www.scribd.com/document_downloa ... ension=pdf (10Mb)

Back in the dreamtime FEB of Round Table West 2014 Conference about the F-35 this F-35C test pilot LCDR Burks (sniff) was trash talking the Cee for all to hear: Main ONE HOUR VIDEO HERE: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=461ug8Jjn-0

Joint Strike Fighter Roundtable: What Do Pilots Who Are Flying It Today Have to Say?
Published on Feb 12, 2014 DODnews

"Joint Strike Fighter Roundtable: What Do Pilots Who Are Flying It Today Have to Say? at the WEST 2014 Conference.
Moderator: Mr. Ward Carroll, Editor-in-Chief, Military.com
- CDR Luke Barradell, USN Fleet Intergration Team and Operations Officer Carrier Air Group ELEVEN (CVW-11)
Panelists: - LCDR Michael Burks, Senior Navy Test Pilot for F-35
- CDR Frederick Crecelius, Commanding Officer, VFA-101
- William Gigliotti, F-35 Lighting II, FW Site/Production Lead Test Pilot Lockheed Martin Corporation
- LtCol Steve Gillette, Commander Officer, VMFA-121. (1hr)"

Sound excerpt - ONLY - about F-35C, wot has comparable performance to a clean no tanks Super Hornet below:

In a post in the official norwegian ministry of defence JSF programme blog, the norwegian captain Morten Hanche, test pilot on F-35 with a background on F-16s in the 338 Squadron RNoAF, writes some about how an F-35A compares to the Viper in air to air. Unfortunately in norwegian, but the translation to english is decent. Best passage in my opinion is this, as it provides some numbers:

[translated on Google]

Pierre Spey and other critics have pointed out that the F-35 is not as fast or maneuverable as modern Russian fighter. In a previous section I argued that the performance of the F-16 at air display is theoretical and not available in a war situation. Combat aircraft like the F-16 carries the load out. This reduces the practical range, speed, maneuverability and maximum altitude. (This also applies to your opponent's aircraft, which carries the load out).
F-35 will have a performance with weapons that far exceeds what we have with the F-16 today.

With the F-35, we get more of all this, compared to what we are used to today. To discover how much more was a positive surprise for me. In full war equipment operates F-35 effortlessly 10,000 to 15,000 feet higher than our F-16 can, without using afterburner. The speed in 'cruises' is without further 50 to 80 knots higher. In the F-16, I must use afterburner and take running speed before a missile shot. F-35 "cruiser" both faster and higher. Therefore, I am ready to shoot far anytime.

F-35 also has more fuel than we are accustomed to, it carries the load inside and is not as dependent on afterburner. Therefore we are left with more range than the F-16 and similar aircraft can achieve. "Combat radius" for the F-35 is between 30% and 70% longer than we get with the F-16! The extra range comes in handy in our elongated country. Range may alternatively be replaced in endurance over a given area. This is useful for our little organization, which disposes tanker and relies on versatility in all aspects.

http://blogg.regjeringen.no/kampfly/201 ... #more-1050

Which is what many have been saying for the longest time, ie while the F-35 might no have the best "clean" kinematics, it's "wartime" configuration is better than most 4th gen airframes.

At the 'gabriele' post above there is this photo. What a classic: http://blogg.regjeringen.no/kampfly/fil ... -01-23.jpg

Photo Caption: “Here Coach Morten called "Air Combat manouver" against another Norwegian F-16. F-35 will also operate this way, but with future sensors and weapons will F-35 could settle a dogfight long before it is discovered by your opponent. Photo: Morten Hanche”

Source:http://blogg.regjeringen.no/kampfly/2015/04/20/moderne-luftkamp-the-right-stuff-top-gun-eller-noe-helt-annet/#more-1050

Good blog - like his sprinter analogy


If an opponent with " old-fashioned " radar signature meets an aircraft as the F-35 , with very small radar signature , it becomes difficult to exploit the benefits that provides superior performance . Imagine a meeting between a highly trained sprinter and a sniper . The mission is to shoot counterpart. Both are armed with hunting rifles , but only marksmen have riflescope . Sprinter has to return a more powerful rifle , but he is dressed in neon colored tracksuit , and takes up on the short end of a football field. Marksman is camouflaged somewhere on the opposite end. Sprinter is the fastest and the most powerful rifle , but what is he shooting at ? While sprinter gallops across the track in search of his opponent , he must take shot after shot . This is not a smooth match. Unfortunately I have found that it is extremely frustrating to train to dogfight when we can not find the opponent with its own sensors. It ends rarely well ..

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My point with this post was to show that many variables affect the outcome of the dogfight. The situation is rarely black and white. One of the most diffuse might skill of the individual pilot. I am often surprised when I read cocksure posts in newspapers and comment fields. Common to many such posts is a "digital" interpretation of performance data. A speed XY, B rate YY = A is best, period . One problem is the source data referenced. Another is that it tends to focus on a few isolated parameters. Our experience with the F-35 so far has shown us a fighter that will surprise many in air-to-air role. The combination of high performance, good sensors and low signature makes the F-35 to a dangerous opponent in air campaign. Finally; remember that even Arnold Schwarzenegger had to resort to lavsignatur in the old classic "Predator." When using mud. Brute strength is good, but camouflage also works ...

At the 'gabriele' post above there is this photo. What a classic:

Nice - IRIS-T on the F-16AMs stbd wing as well.

A Six Page 0.4Mb PDF made with/from the GOOGLE TRANSLATE function of the original website is attached below.

Modern air combat; The Right Stuff, Top Gun or something else entirely NORWAY pp6.pdf (0.4Mb)

Another good quote from the article above is this one near the end (btm page 4 in the PDF above):

"...The outcome of a dogfight between two identical fighter decided finally by the individual pilot. It requires time and significant resources to cultivate a skilled pilot. Especially important is perhaps a steady supply of flying time, a good and constructive learning environment, access to appropriate airspace and an organization that facilitates training. During exercises have my colleagues in the Air Force and I many times flown against more modern fighter than our F-16. Yet, "wins" we occasionally air war against more advanced adversaries, technically speaking. Often the explanation is that we meet inexperienced pilots. More interesting is perhaps when we meet pilots with completely different culture for learning and collaboration. My impression is that cultures where the distance from the conductor to lead is large, fail to cultivate equally skilled pilots. In such highly hierarchical organizations it is perhaps impossible to be honest with your boss in "debriefing" after the flight. Therefore they miss out on important learning...."

I can only go on my experience in the RAN FAA where honesty counted between pilot / maintainer ranks not only for ACM but for all aspects of a flight - not only but also FLIGHT SAFETY. This (as I have mentioned earlier) one of the great changes of culture from the 'say nothing' old RN FAA influence (a bad generalisation but worthwhile for my purposes here) to the new 'shine a light' USN NATOPS culture for FLIGHT SAFETY - ACM Honesty with the A4G/S2E era. BZ RAN FAA.

How convenient: War is Boring supposedly has a damning 5-page report on the mock dogfight which proves the F-35 is terrible. We can't see the document, of course, and the test pilot who wrote it is "unnamed".

https://medium.com/war-is-boring/test-p ... db9d11a875

In above article the test was in Jan 2015 - no note of the software Block loaded (along with a bunch of other details) what struck me as very odd was this almost penultimate paragraph quoted: [no mention of the geewhiz DAS avionics in F-35?]

"...And to add insult to injury, the JSF flier discovered he couldn’t even comfortably move his head inside the radar-evading jet’s cramped cockpit.

“The helmet was too large for the space inside the canopy to adequately see behind the aircraft.”

That allowed the F-16 to sneak up on him...."

Well, january is the month when air combat trials versus F-16 were made, according to earlier reports. We also know that AF-2 was used, apparently with the final flight envelope opened up. The test pilot, who talked about it to AviationWeek later on, was David “Doc” Nelson.
War is Boring does not have the name of the author of the supposed document they talk about.

This is what Nelson said to Aviationweek a while ago:

“When we did the first dogfight in January, they said, ‘you have no limits,’” says Nelson. “It was loads monitoring, so they could tell if we ever broke something. It was a confidence builder for the rest of the fleet because there is no real difference structurally between AF-2 and the rest of the airplanes.” AF-2 was the first F-35 to be flown to 9g+ and -3g, and to roll at design-load factor. The aircraft, which was also the first Joint Strike Fighter to be intentionally flown in significant airframe buffet at all angles of attack, was calibrated for inflight loads measurements prior to ferrying to Edwards in 2010.

http://aviationweek.com/defense/f-35-te ... -maneuvers

That does not tell us the avionics capability of the aircraft however. IF DAS with HMDS was not able to be used then - yes - as ONE former F-16 jock transitioning to the F-35 several years ago now, with some basic hardware/software only in the 'first training evaluation' mentioned: that HE could not see behind and 'would be gunned every time' or words quoted to that effect by all and sundry. With DAS / HMDS functioning there is no way the F-16 can 'sneak up' on the F-35 - that is just plain ludicrous. I'll guess that quote comes from the 'years ago' initial training eval but of course NOT SEEING THIS FIVE PAGE report - that could be easily uploaded for verification - then I will surmise that the mouthbreathing AXE has only excerpted some bits and made up the other bits. BUT I COULD BE TODALLY RONG and a dancing fool. What does AXE write that engenders his trustworthiness/truthfulness? NOW a quote from that AvWeak article mentioned above:

"...The operational maneuver tests were conducted to see “how it would look like against an F-16 in the airspace,” says Col. Rod “Trash” Cregier, F-35 program director. “It was an early look at any control laws that may need to be tweaked to enable it to fly better in future. You can definitely tweak it—that’s the option.”

“Pilots really like maneuverability, and the fact that the aircraft recovers so well from a departure allows us to say [to the designers of the flight control system laws], ‘you don’t have to clamp down so tight,’” says Nelson. Departure resistance was proven during high angle-of-attack (AOA) testing, which began in late 2012 with the aircraft pushing the nose to its production AOA limit of 50 deg. Subsequent AOA testing has pushed the aircraft beyond both the positive and negative maximum command limits, including intentionally putting the aircraft out of control in several configurations ranging from “clean” wings to tests with open weapons-bay doors. Testing eventually pushed the F-35 to a maximum of 110 deg. AOA...."