I have to laugh reading these posts because it just proves why DOD procurement is so broken. Even the "experts" and "enthusiasts" have fallen for "DoEverythingItis".
Wildchild wrote:
And, the F-35 does not have super cruse, unlike the F-22. so the 35's will be fuel hogs. And having a gun pod removes a belly mounted tank!!!
The F-35 is not primarily an Air Superiority Fighter. Thus, supercruise is superfluous, expensive, and wasteful. Supercruise is
not some magic fuel economy creator. The F-22, without external fuel tanks (18,000 pounds of fuel) has a 410nm combat radius with 100nm in supercruise. The F-15 meanwhile on roughly the same fuel load has a combat radius 1,061nm.
Also, where did you get the information about the gun pod taking away a (stealth killing) externally mounted tank? Have you actually looked at the L/M website or any of the articles on the F-35? No? Okay. Come back when you have.
67Cougar wrote:
The C model is turing into an overweight mess. Being able to leave the gun pod off for what will be the vast majority of missions (especially training) will make it easier to get off and on the boat. However, uploading it kills the 'stealth'. As far as cutting the warload because of the extra 1000 pounds, the warload is tiny anyway - the internal bays can't hold much at all, and as soon as you start hanging pylons and other crap off of it, well, there goes that nasty 'stealth' thing again. Isn't that why this thing is so blasted expensive, because it is supposed to be a 'stealth' jet? It is, along as you don't want it to actually do very much. Its not a replacement for the F-18/F-14/A-6/A-7.
1) The F-35 is
NOT an F-14 replacement. It's also not an A-6 replacement. It's sole purpose was to replace the Legacy Hornet which replace the A-7. The Super Hornet replace the F-14 and the A-6.
2) The internal bays can carry up to 12 GBU-39/40 SDBs or 4 JDAMs. Considering most F/A-18Cs launching off the deck today carry only a pair of JDAMs, I think you've got more than enough. If you need more, yeah, you can use the hardpoints externally. The aircraft is supposed to be
stealthy, not pure stealth. Then again, you do realize that the F-22's carry a pair of drop tanks on almost every mission right?
Quote:
Oh, and by the way, the whole back end is being redesigned because they can't get the hook to engage the wires.
Wrong. The redesign is the hook itself which was modified at the
demand of the US Navy despite Lockheed telling them it wouldn't work. Might want to do a little more research on that one.
Quote:
Oh, and by the way - this jet may be stealthy from a distance, but if it is in visual range, it sticks out like a sore thumb. You can always see (and hear) it long before you can the ever present F-16 chase. And LOUD!!!!
Sounds like a typical Navy Jet to me. Nothing new there and no worse than the Super Bug certainly.
As for the weight of the airplanes - find me a single airplane built for the US Military in the last 60 years that came in under weight. You can't. Every single one of them got heavier. Why? Because of "DoEverythingItis". Once they started developing the thing, someone (whether the USAF, USN, USMC, or US Army) decided they wanted to add this or that capability to the aircraft but somehow forgot that adding more equipment meant more weight and then tried to throw it on the designers when the plane got heavier because the service added 3000 pounds of weight to the aircraft. The test aircraft and early production aircraft are always overweight. Once they get them going they find ways to start trimming off weight and then where they can, retrofit the early aircraft as they go through depot maintenance. Look at the 747-8F/-8i. It's having the same problem, and it's a
CIVILIAN aircraft.
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