Pressure increases on [Canada] to stay or leave F-35 program

Program progress, politics, orders, and speculation
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by optimist » 16 Apr 2019, 03:24

Aren't decades normally counted this way? Full and part of or rounded up to the next. Canada had the Hornet in service from 1983, making it currently 36 years old and in it's 4th decade. It is a 4 decade old plane. The comp from 2010 is 19 years and in its second decade. It will be in it's 3rd decade next year.
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Europe's fighters been decided. Not a Eurocanard, it's the F-35 (or insert derogatory term) Count the European countries with it.


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by Corsair1963 » 16 Apr 2019, 05:56

The "odds" still very much favor the F-35. Only real concern is how the current Canadian Government is going to explain it's selection. Yet, I am sure they will figure out something. As all politicians do.....




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by hornetfinn » 16 Apr 2019, 07:02

Corsair1963 wrote:The Gripen is intended for operations in rugged environments, such as Sweden's Arctic region, Helgesson added.

"We are operating from dispersed bases," he said. "We use highways and small airfields spread all over Sweden in remote places, far away. And the logistics footprint is very small."

The Arctic is, naturally, an important area of operation for the Swedish air force and having far-flung bases has required the force to become creative about warehousing fuel, ammunition and other supplies.

Canada's CF-18s occasionally operate from forward bases in the North, but those deployments are infrequent compared with the routine activity of the Swedes, experts have noted in the past.


Not this crap again. Gripen is not really anything special when it comes to operating from dispersed bases or operating in the Arctic. Yes, it was designed with those things in mind, but so are pretty much all the other fighter jets. I have no doubt that Typhoon, Super Hornet, Rafale and F-35 can operate from dispersed bases or prepared roads in the Arctic about as well as Gripen. It's more about preparations and training than about fighter jet type.

And LOL at describing Sweden as ice-cold place with permafrost. 2 out of 3 Gripen bases are in Southern Sweden where the climate is actually much milder during winter than in most of Canada. Only Northern base in Luleå is about equal in weather to current Canadian CF-188 Hornet bases.


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by weasel1962 » 16 Apr 2019, 07:40

Typhoons have operated from Iceland. Trident Junction saw super hornets above the arctic circle. Rafales at Arctic Thunder. Agreed. Arctic is not a constraint.


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by spazsinbad » 16 Apr 2019, 09:08

How BIG is the circle: "Map of the Arctic, with the Arctic Circle in blue and the July 10 °C mean isotherm in red"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arctic_Circle & https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arctic_Ci ... circle.svg
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ArcticCircleMap.gif


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by ricnunes » 16 Apr 2019, 13:29

hornetfinn wrote:Not this crap again. Gripen is not really anything special when it comes to operating from dispersed bases or operating in the Arctic. Yes, it was designed with those things in mind, but so are pretty much all the other fighter jets. I have no doubt that Typhoon, Super Hornet, Rafale and F-35 can operate from dispersed bases or prepared roads in the Arctic about as well as Gripen. It's more about preparations and training than about fighter jet type.

And LOL at describing Sweden as ice-cold place with permafrost. 2 out of 3 Gripen bases are in Southern Sweden where the climate is actually much milder during winter than in most of Canada. Only Northern base in Luleå is about equal in weather to current Canadian CF-188 Hornet bases.


DITTO!

It's indeed a "gold comedy" everytime that I read that the Swedes are the experts in operating fighter aircraft in ice/Arctic conditions while the Canadians aren't, or more precisely that the Gripen can operate in such conditions while the F/A-18 and other fighter aircraft can't :doh:

By the way, the RCAF uses the Inuvik Airport located in Inuvik (which can be seen on the map shared by Spaz) as a Forward Operating Base for their F/A-18s (CF-18s) and Inuvik is located in a northernmost location (and thus closer to the North pole) compared to Luleå in Sweden.
Moreover, while Luleå is a full airbase, Inuvik is only a Forward Operating Base or more precisely a Forward Operating Location (FOL).

More about Inuvik Airport:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inuvik_(Mike_Zubko)_Airport
“Active stealth” is what the ignorant nay sayers call EW and pretend like it’s new.


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by ricnunes » 16 Apr 2019, 14:49

Oh, and just to complement what I previously said, I attach here a .pdf showing a map of the current RCAF bases (including Forward Operating Locations or FOL).
Below there's an image showing part of the document which I add in attachment:

Image

There's also another FOL located up North which sometimes also operates F/A-18s which is Iqaluit.
Attachments
rcaf-map-compressed.pdf
(2.49 MiB) Downloaded 590 times
“Active stealth” is what the ignorant nay sayers call EW and pretend like it’s new.


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by hythelday » 16 Apr 2019, 17:14

Rovaniemi sits even further north, and, unlike Lulea is actually behind the Arctic Circle. Somehow they operate Hornets there. Elmendorf-Richardson is a little more to the south, at 61 degrees North and I don't know what are the exact effects of the Pacific on the climate there, but judging by the monthly average temperatures it isn't significantly milder. As a matter of fact, both Lulea and Anchorage have what is called a "subarctic climate", apparently.


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by spazsinbad » 16 Apr 2019, 17:16

Thanks for the map (much earlier in this thread there is another version but the PDF here is excellent). However I do not like the small clutter in the original PDF above so it has been removed as seen in the low colour gif & edited PDF below.

Click the graphic twice to ZOOM in to make it readable.
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rcaf-map-compressedCROPed Text MAP ONLY prn.pdf
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rcaf-map-compressedCROPed Text MAP ONLY tif 22.gif


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by zerion » 16 Apr 2019, 18:44

hythelday wrote: Elmendorf-Richardson is a little more to the south, at 61 degrees North and I don't know what are the exact effects of the Pacific on the climate there, but judging by the monthly average temperatures it isn't significantly milder. As a matter of fact, both Lulea and Anchorage have what is called a "subarctic climate", apparently.

The Pacific affects Anchorage less than Seward but more than Fairbanks. It’s not really a coastal climate city in terms of being warmer and wetter than the surrounding areas, and was generally cooler than the city I was living in further to the North.


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by ricnunes » 17 Apr 2019, 01:07

spazsinbad wrote:Thanks for the map (much earlier in this thread there is another version but the PDF here is excellent).


You're welcome.

By the way, I used smallpdf (a website which allows conversions with pdf files) in order to reduce the size of the original file which has a size of around 15.2 MB and thus too large to attach here in the forum's posts. After using smallpdf or more precisely its webapp that allows the compression of pdf files whose direct link is the following:
https://smallpdf.com/compress-pdf

I was impressed (actually quite astonished) to see that it managed to compress the original file to a new file whose size was only 2.5 MB and basically without losing any quality in terms of images and text compared to the original.

Nice site indeed (and is also free).

spazsinbad wrote:However I do not like the small clutter in the original PDF above so it has been removed as seen in the low colour gif & edited PDF below.


You did an excellent job with the image editing. I like it a lot and it has a much better readability than the original, namely when inserted as image here in the forum.
Thanks for sharing the image.
“Active stealth” is what the ignorant nay sayers call EW and pretend like it’s new.


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by spazsinbad » 17 Apr 2019, 01:30

ricnunes wrote:
spazsinbad wrote:Thanks for the map (much earlier in this thread there is another version but the PDF here is excellent).
...size of the original file which has a size of around 15.2 MB and thus too large to attach here in the forum's posts. After using smallpdf or more precisely its webapp that allows the compression of pdf files whose direct link is the following: https://smallpdf.com/compress-pdf

I was impressed (actually quite astonished) to see that it managed to compress the original file to a new file whose size was only 2.5 MB and basically without losing any quality in terms of images and text compared to the original. Nice site indeed (and is also free).
spazsinbad wrote:However I do not like the small clutter in the original PDF above so it has been removed as seen in the low colour gif & edited PDF below.

You did an excellent job with the image editing. I like it a lot and it has a much better readability than the original, namely when inserted as image here in the forum. Thanks for sharing the image.

I would in some respects consider myself an Adobe Acrobat Expert however I use only some of the DTP portions of it - the rest of the many and varied functions of the program I NEVER USE. A lot of 'amateur' PDF files have NEVER been RESAVED. Resaving gets rid of heaps of unneeded prior editing junk. Every day I work on a 4.4Gb PDF (link always at btm of my posts here) however extracting relevant pages always has an overhang of unwanted fonts I just cannot get rid of with the utility in Acrobat 2017 (about 9+Mb fonts). So the pages attached here have often been REPRINTED (PRN) to get rid of this unnecessary file size and to get the overall file size down to forum limit (there are effects from this reprinting though).

Would you be able to post the URL for the original large RCAF map mentioned please? The 'editing' of the original PDF with 'smallPDF'? may have made my editing of it more TEDIOUS than I could stand. :roll: I enjoyed the embedded editing puzzles to solve though. :mrgreen:


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by XanderCrews » 17 Apr 2019, 03:27

Corsair1963 wrote:If, the F-15EX is so capable and cost effective. Then odd that Boeing isn't pitching it to Canada for it's future fighter??? :wink:



They wouldn't risk the narrative they've been laying down with the Super Hornet for years. Besides half of Canuckistan is convinced the Hornets are completely interchangable. :roll:
Choose Crews


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by kimjongnumbaun » 17 Apr 2019, 06:05

hornetfinn wrote:
Not this crap again. Gripen is not really anything special when it comes to operating from dispersed bases or operating in the Arctic. Yes, it was designed with those things in mind, but so are pretty much all the other fighter jets. I have no doubt that Typhoon, Super Hornet, Rafale and F-35 can operate from dispersed bases or prepared roads in the Arctic about as well as Gripen. It's more about preparations and training than about fighter jet type.

And LOL at describing Sweden as ice-cold place with permafrost. 2 out of 3 Gripen bases are in Southern Sweden where the climate is actually much milder during winter than in most of Canada. Only Northern base in Luleå is about equal in weather to current Canadian CF-188 Hornet bases.


Agreed. This is one of the most ignorant thing I hear thrown out. These planes fly at 30,000+ feet where the ambient air temperature is around -50 degrees celsius. All modern planes can do it. Cold weather is nothing special and only those ignorant about aircraft like to throw it out.


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by kimjongnumbaun » 17 Apr 2019, 06:07

XanderCrews wrote:They wouldn't risk the narrative they've been laying down with the Super Hornet for years. Besides half of Canuckistan is convinced the Hornets are completely interchangable. :roll:



Well, the other problem is the F-15EX is as much of a thing as the F-15 Silent Eagle. It doesn't actually exist and there has to be funding to even develop it.


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