F-35 Joint Strike Fighter News, Videos and pics Thread

[Jura The idiot]

Yes, AFB, that is correct. I did a ball-park outline of the F-35 PLans and commitments...and future buyers and plans and came up with this a little while ago:

...

let me add two details:
I didn't know what's "SCP" it's Security Cooperation Participant;
I checked again for Poland, didn't find any articles newer than the two from spring of 2014 (I think I mentioned them here in summer? they're not too specific, say like "possibly", "up to", "as much as $10b could be allocated")

 

[Scratch]

Not being ROVER capable would indeed be a slight mess, as that "Full Motion Video" capability, as it's also called, is a rather important feature these days in CAS. If the plane can only transmit via Link-16 means, that would require new terminals on the ground I guess, or some kind of a gateway solution via a BACN asset. Could make stuff slightly complicated indeed.
For the IR pointer, it's more important as a tool for the ground troops as they can quickly point out something to the aircrew at night. For air to air handover, there's probably the work-around of lasing the target for the other aircraft to find it with it's spot tracker. Then that pilot gets symbology in the HUD or his JHMCS, for a visual cue. Although that's not the most beautifull solution indeed. Especially when also working with choppers, since besides the Apache no other has a LST.
I guess the main point in this is that these IR pointers have indeed become so common in todays targeting sensors of all types, it seems a bit odd that highly all around super sensor fused jet doesn't somehow come with one.

 

[Jeff Head]

I checked again for Poland, didn't find any articles newer than the two from spring of 2014 (I think I mentioned them here in summer? they're not too specific, say like "possibly", "up to", "as much as $10b could be allocated")

Yes, that is why Poland and those others are listed only as potential buyers.

 

[HMS Astute]

EOTS is the world's first sensor to combine forward-looking infrared, infrared search and track, and laser designator to maximize capability for F-35 pilots.

French will say that their Rafale's Spectra is far superior to F-35's.

 

[Jeff Head]

French will say that their Rafale's Spectra is far superior to F-35's.

Of course they will...and we have heard those comparisons before on this thread.

Let's try and keep it specifically to the F-35 and its capabilities on this thread and stop having the one liner comparisons and "mine is better than yours," comments cluttering up this thread.

...and yes I know, France and the Rafael are not "yours,"...I'm just making the statement.

 

[Air Force Brat]

Of course they will...and we have heard those comparisons before on this thread.

Let's try and keep it specifically to the F-35 and its capabilities on this thread and stop having the one liner comparisons and "mine is better than yours," comments cluttering up this thread.

...and yes I know, France and the Rafael are not "yours,"...I'm just making the statement.

Exactly, and all these people saying all these things is proof of What??? absolutely nothing, I am a pilot, I have flown a few ILS style approaches the good old fashioned way,,,, no one on the Sino Defense Forum has "ever, launched any type of weapon, from any type of aircraft??", nor have any of the internet experts????? NO, so the F-22 is perfectly capable of its mission, even though designed and first flown in the last century??? Capiche?? the F-35 is not the latest super-wazoo target designators, blah, blah, blah, on and on ad infiniteum, so the best we may know for a fact is that the HMS system is well integrated with the aircraft Fire Control System, really it is, and yes capabilities continue to be added and tested and tested and changed/adapted as needed to assure a fully functioning and simple targeting system.

When the pilots and test pilots are coming back from these test flights and saying, Wow! this is so much more intuitive. When the Britsh test pilot of the Harrier AV8B flies the F-35B and says Holy Smoke! that was easy, and compares flying the Harrier to needing to be an Octopus??? and your basic internet expert, use Dave Mujumdar for an example says, hey they won't talk to me???? wonder why??, how much time do you spend trying to explain quantum physics to a 3 year old????

We have some very bright people here on the Sino Defense Forum, but honestly sometimes what I hear from the attempts to explain basic aircraft handling for example, make me chuckle,,,, whats that Coke commercial???? nothing like the real thing baby???? that's right, nothing like the real thing, and I can assure you, that our little throttle jockeys are way beyond most of us here, they just are, half of them could probably design and build the F-35 themselves, why so many of them end up as defense contractors, and yes lots of them do have engineering degrees.

 

[Brumby]

Not being ROVER capable would indeed be a slight mess, as that "Full Motion Video" capability, as it's also called, is a rather important feature these days in CAS. If the plane can only transmit via Link-16 means, that would require new terminals on the ground I guess, or some kind of a gateway solution via a BACN asset. Could make stuff slightly complicated indeed.
For the IR pointer, it's more important as a tool for the ground troops as they can quickly point out something to the aircrew at night. For air to air handover, there's probably the work-around of lasing the target for the other aircraft to find it with it's spot tracker. Then that pilot gets symbology in the HUD or his JHMCS, for a visual cue. Although that's not the most beautifull solution indeed. Especially when also working with choppers, since besides the Apache no other has a LST.
I guess the main point in this is that these IR pointers have indeed become so common in todays targeting sensors of all types, it seems a bit odd that highly all around super sensor fused jet doesn't somehow come with one.

I think your post sums it well in regards to the situation with EOTS. There is a blog entry by Eric Palmer which is complementary to what you have described regarding EOTS, ROVER and VDL which I am taking the liberty to reproduce the relevant part below :

"The image quality of EOTS is outstanding for assisting in target identification, reconnaissance of points of interest for intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) and bomb damage assessment (BDA). Just as useful, the visual information collected from EOTS can be shared. How this will be done is a matter for debate. Certainly the visual data can be shared post mission. Efforts are still under way to see if there is a network of any kind in the future that can support streaming visual data in quantity. Network bandwidth limits in today’s battlefield are far from being solved. The realities of net-centric warfare don’t agree with the marketing hype. Short video streams or still images should be possible. All of this is no small matter when the quantity of visual information that a flight of four F-35s could collect in one mission is taken into consideration.
As an aside, the F-35 planning people come up a little short by not having

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capability built into this system right away for the first F-35 combat unit as opposed to having it as a later block upgrade. Something to think about as ground forward air controllers known as

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are rather fond of ROVER capability.
So if the F-35 works out, it will have all of this wonderful visual capability going for it in stock trim. Sensor fusion, where passive emitter detection, radar sensor ability, EOTS,

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, the pilots helmet and on-board and off-board network appliances will be processed into cockpit displays that the pilot can manage properly is a prime F-35 design goal. With all of this, you can now see why the F-35 has over 3 times the quantity of software as an F-22. There is still a lot of work to do."

 

[A Bar Brother]

The EOTS is a non-issue. There will soon be a new competition launched by the Pentagon to replace the current EOTS with a next generation system. Rafael is already taking part with the next gen LITENING.

 

[Jura The idiot]

The EOTS is a non-issue.

I admit you surprised me, I thought you'd laugh at F-35 for not having that laser pointer

There will soon be a new competition launched by the Pentagon to replace the current EOTS with a next generation system. Rafael is already taking part with the next gen LITENING.

could you please elaborate? by combining keywords in google, I found

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which might be related to what you've said ... but maybe you meant something else

 

[A Bar Brother]

I admit you surprised me, I thought you'd laugh at F-35 for not having that laser pointer


could you please elaborate? by combining keywords in google, I found

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which might be related to what you've said ... but maybe you meant something else

I'm not a F-35 basher regardless of how my posts have come out to be. I only like facts. The facts I have posted recently are merely not in favor of the F-35.

The lack of a ROVER poses problems, but EOTS is not an issue. And you got the right link. The USAF and USMC may accept a less than required F-35 for now, but some of the obsolete equipment on it will be upgraded based on affordability. It may be impossible to upgrade the radar right after FOC, but less expensive electronics can be upgraded.