Is agile, manuverable aircraft relevent in the era of advanced avainoics and BVR Miss

Re: Is agile, manuverable aircraft relevent in the era of advanced avainoics and BVR

Titanium said:

Absolutely awsome dispaly, Whether it is hanging in midair, lowlevel flight or the sharp turns and roll!!! Does your J-10 do all this, corbato??

Now do I need one of those Agile aircraft ??? Absolutely!!!!

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That's a J-10's aerodynamic model there (its a scaled down copy), but one of the important things here is that it has a TVC engine.

The Su-35 dropped its canards, not its TVC.

How would the Gripen fare against modern fighters with every bit as good as avionics? Probably quite well. Also the Gripen with its canards is quite a very agile aircraft. Its only short in power, not agility.

What makes you think the Gripen is a "practical" concept compared to the Typhoon and Rafale. The main difference between the Gripen and the other two is the scale, basically a light fighter vs. medium fighters. In terms of agility, the Gripen is quite close to the other two, but only lacking the power for sustained turn rates, dives, zooms and climbs. By itself its a very expensive light fighter filled with bells and whistles.

Re: Is agile, manuverable aircraft relevent in the era of advanced avainoics and BVR

Gripen for me is practical, pragmatic solution, in the sense it is not designed to be the best-- incorporating all "nice to have" toys. When you look at the Typhoon/Rafale price tag and the marginal improvement they bring.. it is all the more convincing about Grippen practical nature.

This agains bring the very nature of the modern aircraft needed for most the medium scale countries like Libya among others. What kind of aircraft is the needed for such countries??
Large NO of small fighters backed by CGI/AWACS.
Limited No. of Medium/large.
Mix of both?

Re: Is agile, manuverable aircraft relevent in the era of advanced avainoics and BVR

Gripen is a light fighter filled to the gills with frills. I remember long time ago the contract price was at least 40 million. It should have seriously gone up since then. I don't really want to know or pretend what countries should have. I don't see that much difference between having a lot of light fighters or a mix of low and medium. Personally I prefer to have all light, all the same aircraft, from a single vendor in order to have volume unit amortization to lower contract cost; logistical and training standardization. The risk however is that the vendor can have a monopoly over you.

For smaller countries, nothing beats having a SAM network because unless your opponent is the US, most countries don't have the resources to take apart a properly done SAM network. A SAM network should be in a higher priority than the fighters themselves. And they are after all, much more survivable. If the enemy launches a missile or air strike against your air bases and knocks out your aircraft on the ground, it won't matter if the aircraft you bought are Typhoons or J-7s.

Likewise I believe many countries do not have the financial and technical logistic resources to maintain a high tech fighter fleet complete with AWACS, etc,. You may end up doling billions for stuff that will spend most of its time in the hanger. One or two accidental crashes of these very expensive planes, and you got a scandal in your hands. And for the cost of the AWACS how many ground stations and mobile radars can you put instead?

Re: Is agile, manuverable aircraft relevent in the era of advanced avainoics and BVR

Corbato,

Again a very good analysis.......may I say Practical and Pragmatic solution. Still why do you think nations go after these expensive Fighters, when all they profess is defense?? Why is the genral neglect of SAM all around, even though its effectiveness is demonstrated in 1973 Ramadan war.

If you have played strategy games more often you want to launch offensive ...against enemy.....just to make your hme base safe!! How different is reality, as played out by Israel in 1965?

SAM no doubt is more cost effective, .... but you need a limited strike package, however small you are.

Re: Is agile, manuverable aircraft relevent in the era of advanced avainoics and BVR

Your fancy limited strike package will get nailed by SAMs if you don't have the ability to neutralize an elusive and redundant SAM network. The numbers are against you; having less planes because each is more expensive doesn't help either.

Nations go after expensive fighters because there is an image thing to it.

If you are to launch strikes against enemy bases, you would have figured out the obvious; having more aircraft is to your advantage. More aircraft means your enemy has to work harder. Having more aircraft means you can attack more targets simultaneously. You're going to have casualties, and having more means more can get through. More aircraft also means more total payload delivered. More aircraft means more mission turn arounds.

I think if you look back at all aerial warfare discussion in this forum and in other forums, too much has been made out to aerial engagement, both BVR and WVR. In terms of war, the first things planes would do is bomb each other's bases. All aerial engagement ends prematurely with smoking aircraft that never got left off the ground. Its not really who sees each other first, its really about who bombs each other's bases first.

And its not just strike aircraft but ballistic missiles and cruise missiles.

Interceptors and AEW aircraft can't be in the air 24/7. But SAMs with its radar network can act as quiet sentries.

Now lets say, you did your SAM homework. You bought and set up your SAM network. Now what aircraft are you going to buy and use for a strike package to take out the other guy's bases. Now that's the question. Its hard to say who is better, the Mirage 2000, the Su-30MKV, the Su-30MKI, the Typhoon, the Rafale, or the Gripen. Need to see each and everyone of their strike options.

Re: Is agile, manuverable aircraft relevent in the era of advanced avainoics and BVR

Just one thing I would like to add on the subject of TVC/supermanuverability vs. off-boresight/full aspect missles and the overall significance of both:
We should not underestimate that a supermanuverable fighter will have a much better chance of escaping after a missle has been fired at it; the more Gs you can pull, the faster you can go and the sharper you can turn the more likely you are to escape an incoming missle. Of course, this is a losing battle to begin with and stealth is far more important (don't get shot in the first place) but its worth pointing out.

Re: Is agile, manuverable aircraft relevent in the era of advanced avainoics and BVR

Finn McCool said:

Just one thing I would like to add on the subject of TVC/supermanuverability vs. off-boresight/full aspect missles and the overall significance of both:
We should not underestimate that a supermanuverable fighter will have a much better chance of escaping after a missle has been fired at it; the more Gs you can pull, the faster you can go and the sharper you can turn the more likely you are to escape an incoming missle. Of course, this is a losing battle to begin with and stealth is far more important (don't get shot in the first place) but its worth pointing out.

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Turn rate has nothing to do with supermaneuverability. Turn rate and pitch rate are two entirely different attributes.

This was covered to good effect by the recent Air Forces Monthly article on this same subject (March 2008). I suggest that anyone who hasn't already read the article, should find themselves a copy. To quote from the article,

Contrary to popular perception, changing the direction the jet's nose points does not alter the flight path of the aircraft. This has been demonstrated most aptly during air show performances by the MiG-29OVT, as it pitches its nose end-over-end, while its existing momentum continues to propel it along the original trajectory.

Changing the direction of an airplane's flight path without flying into the ground is a demanding task. Consider, for example, that the jet is undergoing even a modest, 5-g turn - whether on a transient or a sustained basis - its wing and other lifting surfaces generate a force five-times the weight of the aircraft. A modern figher, even with a thrust-to-weight ratio that slightly exceeds one, will see only marginal gains from siphoning-off thrust to increase its overall lift. There just is not enough thrust available, under ordinary flight conditions, to both overcome drag and contribute to lift in a meaningful way. . . . Thrust vectoring technology has no meaningful impact on traditional measures for turn rate.

Rather than being a lift enhancement device, the thrust-vectoring nozzle is an attitute control mechanism, allowing the pilot to maintain control of the aircraft deep into the post stall regime, under conditions that were previously unthinkable.

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The point-and-shoot capability that TVC nozzles confer should not be confused with the ability to change the airplane's trajectory. Any experienced pilot would want to enter and exit post-stall flight as quickly as possible - take his shot, and then recover. Sitting there only works in the movies. In the real world, a fighter that has exhausted its airspeed is just a slow moving target for incoming missiles, with no chance left of evading them.

Re: Is agile, manuverable aircraft relevent in the era of advanced avainoics and BVR

unknauthr said:

Turn rate has nothing to do with supermaneuverability. Turn rate and pitch rate are two entirely different attributes.

This was covered to good effect by the recent Air Forces Monthly article on this same subject (March 2008). I suggest that anyone who hasn't already read the article, should find themselves a copy. To quote from the article,



The point-and-shoot capability that TVC nozzles confer should not be confused with the ability to change the airplane's trajectory. Any experienced pilot would want to enter and exit post-stall flight as quickly as possible - take his shot, and then recover. Sitting there only works in the movies. In the real world, a fighter that has exhausted its airspeed is just a slow moving target for incoming missiles, with no chance left of evading them.

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Then you should know that that article states the main disadvantage of TVC nozzles is that it trades energy and speed to get a firing solution. Helmet mounted sights and off boresight missiles don't have to.

Re: Is agile, manuverable aircraft relevent in the era of advanced avainoics and BVR

IDonT said:

Then you should know that that article states the main disadvantage of TVC nozzles is that it trades energy and speed to get a firing solution. Helmet mounted sights and off boresight missiles don't have to.

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Agreed. Which is one of the reasons why so much of the western world - including those air forces that still emphasize WVR tactics - have elected to deploy high off-boresight missiles and helmet-mounted sights, but have not embraced TVC technology.

TVC still delivers very real advantages - but at what price?

Re: Is agile, manuverable aircraft relevent in the era of advanced avainoics and BVR

unknauthr said:

Agreed. Which is one of the reasons why so much of the western world - including those air forces that still emphasize WVR tactics - have elected to deploy high off-boresight missiles and helmet-mounted sights, but have not embraced TVC technology.

TVC still delivers very real advantages - but at what price?

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That is exactly the reason, for the original question. TVC, New airframe of Typhoon/Rafale is advantageous, but at what cost is this advantage justifiable, in the face of Quantum leap of Avionics and HMD/HOBS tech during the development of these ultra-manuverable aircrafts?

Case being F-18, good enough, but pales in comparision to SU-30, Rafale etc in manuverability. But, it is picking new customers just for TOP CLASS Avionics!!!