OutOnTheOP

F-8 Crusader. Single seat, similar performance (with the MiG21 being somewhat faster and significantly faster climbing), similar weapons loadout, and historically engaged in combat in Vietnam

Not just a little, either. I seem to recall that the paint to cover a Mustang-sized fighter amounts to some 200-300 pounds. I doubt the paint would go on as smooth as the metal itself, so it would also add drag from the surface roughness... though filling in panel joints may reduce more drag than the surface texture adds. *edit: ok, it was over 300 pounds for a B-17, so probably closer to 100 for a Mustang. Also found info that the top speed of the Mustang increased by 21 mph when they stripped the paint off and applied a wax coat instead

The same reason pilots do anything, obviously: because it sounds cool. Duh. :smilewink:

...why would you want to launch a rail? :huh: :smilewink:

I meant the original stabs on T-50-2, not the originals from -1. Either way, there was a REASON to change out to T-50-2 stabs, and with how new the airframes are, it really shouldn't be fatigue. Ergo, something was wrong with the original T-50-2 stabs. Did I ever say it was catastrophically wrong? Heavy retrofitting of strengthening plates goes somewhat further in indicating the design wasn't satisfactory as it was. I'm not saying it's not a basically sound design- just that it appears it's still quite a ways from being ready for primetime

I don't know where you'd even get that. The entirety of north, south, and central America in that chart are mid-level ratings, 5.0 to 9.9 liters. I think you are you seriously mis-read the chart... the lowest consumption is clearly in north Africa, the Arabian peninsula, the Persian lands (for lack of a better geographical grouping... Iran, Afghanistan, and the Islamic ex-Soviets) and Islamic micronesia. The next lowest ratings are clearly in central Africa (Sudan and the surrounding areas), which tend to be mixed Muslim and Christian/ other. It's not rocket science; when the predominant religion in an area explicitly forbids consuming alcohol, one would expect them to, you know, NOT CONSUME ALCOHOL. ...or at least, not tell the poll-taker that they do =P

I STILL don't understand how that was considered funny. Was so bad I never did manage to watch through the whole thing. Just couldn't do it.

There might not be a difference in the design of the two- but if 50-2 needed stabs replaced, it indicates there was something wrong with the original, and that means either a) poor quality control or b) something broke, which means poor quality control and/or a flawed design in the first place. That said, the ribs/strakes on the original T-50-2 design look somewhat more prominent to me. But that may be an effect of the lighting and pattern.

I *kinda* suspect it has less to do with being underdeveloped, and more to do with being heavily Islamic. ... though most of those countries are both.

Straw man argument. Also shows your complete lack of understanding of how an insurgency works: in an insurgency, you don't have to (and usually cannot) defeat the conventional army. The goal is to "beat" the local population (often literally!) into supporting (or at least fearing) the insurgents more than they support (or fear) the conventional army. If the civilian population fears what the insurgents will do to them more than they want what the conventional forces can give to them, the population will support (begrudgingly) the insurgents. The forces in Afghanistan have never, on the tactical battlefield, won a true victory against either the US OR the Soviets (though they came a hell of a lot closer against the Soviets!). I assure you the US has killed a lot more Afghan insurgents than the other way around; problem is that none of that matters, it only matter which side the civilian population decides to cooperate with.

Ohhhhh kay. I'm gonna have to comment, since you seem to be running on the same "if counterfire radars can detect mortar shells, surely they can detect stealth aircraft" thing as a guy a few pages back. Firstly: what is the detection range for PATRIOT/ S300 against a HARM-missile sized target? Second, the F-22 has a SIGNIFICANTLY smaller RCS than even a 60mm mortar bomb. Also, counterfire radars are generally staring arrays that only look at a fairly small part of the sky: they don't actually search the whole sky, they just look at two (sometimes one) horizontal band. They look for where an item breaks that band (on the way up), then breaks it again (on the way down) and calculate the trajectory off those two points. This allows them to REALLY focus their energy, and also to have a very high scan rate, since they're looking at a pretty small sector of sky. Also, they can really only calculate trajectories of BALLISTIC objects. So if the object is, say, a missile that is launched at 30*, flies half it's flight, then turns to 50* and is subsequently detected, then the radar is going to think the launch point was at 310* from the detection point, NOT the true 330*. So, even assuming that the hostile radar DOES detect a non-stealth missile fired by an F-22 (or F-35), that does not make it as simple as "following the track back to the launching aircraft": unlike a mortar bomb on a predictable, ballistic trajectory, the F-22/35 can (and likely will!) maneuver and change course after launch. It will no longer be where it was when it launched. Additionally, the MISSILE is maneuvering, which means that when (if) the hostile radar detects the missile, the reverse azimuth of the missile may no longer point back at where it was launched from. Sure, it might get you close, but knowing where the steath aircraft is to within 10 or 20 km still isn't going to help you out a lot (and the same can be said about the "use an RWR to find where the stealth aircraft is) trick: it might get you in the ballpark, but then you have to survive long enough to get into that search sector and actually FIND the damn thing, and the whole time, the F-22/35 is moving to avoid you. And probably also lobbing missiles at you. Likely from vastly superior airspeeds and altitudes. That's really not much of a recipe for success.

You wouldn't want to eject them overboard anyway- that's a quarter pound of very unaerodynamic metal just waiting to strike some fragile bit of airframe on the way out.

Su27/ Su35 are in no way whatsoever "defensive" aircraft. The MiG21 and MiG29 were, ARGUABLY, defensive, as their role was point defense. However, the MiG29 was built for forward point defense of lead army groups... which is not a terribly defensive thing. The assertion that Russia built weapons "only for defense" is a very misleading bit of (incredibly naive) propaganda. Yes, I am sure that the 50,000 tanks the Soviets built throughout the Cold War were TOTALLY just for purely defensive purposes :music_whistling:

Which the F-22 can also do, and is useful in ACM, because....?

Please do explain how the Su35 has a terribly useful maneuvering advantage. Both are limited in turning largely by the pilot's G tolerance- they can both do 9+. Both are capable of sustained high-angle, low-speed controllable flight. They have roughly comparable thrust-weight ratios (with the F-22 having a slight advantage). In dry weight it's F-22 at 43k pounds vs Su35 at 40k pounds, but they respectively generate 23.5k/35k lbs thrust per engine, vice 19.4k/32k per engine. That makes 1.09 dry/ 1.63 reheat TWR for the F-22 (dry weight) and 0.97 dry/ 1.60 reheat for the Su35. Oh, and the F-22 is flying aerodynamically clean, without any of that crap hanging off the wings... so I find it hard to believe that the Su35 would accelerate faster, or even AS fast as the F-22. Any "advantage" the Su35 has in thrust/weight is solely because it was computed with a lighter fuel and weapons loadout. F-22 is going to maneuver damn near as well as the Su35 (close enough that it isn't really a factor)... it just has stealth in addition. Divest yourself of the illusion that it's a choice between stealth OR agility. *edit* oh, and weren't you one of the blokes arguing that high wing loading is the main reason why the F-35 allegedly "can't turn"? I would swear you are. I should note that the F-22 has significantly lower wing loading (77lb/f2) than the Su35 (84.9 lb/f2). That must mean the F-22 turns better, right? Remember what I said about how you don't apply the same logic and evidence equally depending on what side of the argument you're taking? Yeah, THAT.

Yeah, not a chance I'm biting on that one. I've seen your other posts when it comes to how "useless" stealth (and US kit in general) is and your strident defense (in the face of logic) of everything Soviet. You have previously stated that you believe F-22 and F-35 would be hopelessly outmatched by anything more modern than an SA2. You don't debate from a base of good logic, and certainly not from consistent logic applied equally to both sides. Also, it's a lot easier, given the relative agility of the systems in question, to mass 10 aircraft over one SAM than it is to mass 10 SAMs under 1 aircraft. Highly unlikely scenario you've got there.

I think they mean Suck-oys are better for the pilot's health when he's not busy flying them into crowds of spectators. -_-

It would require more than just an experienced pilot in the I-16; it would also require a fairly incompetent one in the Mustang, to give away all his energy and positional advantages.

Yeah! Not like those cannon projectiles, that hit each and every time! ...sorry, but that's just a smarmy slogan that doesn't even address the issue at hand. No one is saying missiles hit every time; they're saying modern missiles hit often enough to make closing to a guns fight relatively unlikely. After all, if you're fighting numerical parity, and fighters each carry a fairly pedestrian 4 medium-range active radar missiles, it only takes a whopping 25% hit rate. If we start considering something like a 4-on-4 fight, you really only need a 12% hit rate- because if half the flight was shot from the sky at BVR, do you REALLY think the other half would continue to push? Also, I would like to point out the screaming hypocrisy of simultaneously claiming that air-to-air missiles aren't reliable enough to decide aerial engagements, yet also claiming that surface-launched missiles are some kind of magical stealth anathema. Because, you know, it's even EASIER to hit stealth aircraft, while shooting from a position of huge energy disadvantage vis a vis gravity. Seriously, I'm a little impressed. How do you manage to state such obviously diametric views in a single post without your head exploding?

How does his posting an animated explanation of the shortcomings of a maneuver put him in the same league as folks who have had no exposure to actual physics-constrained airc combat maneuvering? I thought the video was a pretty good illustration: it showed that the average gun engagement is at significantly greater range than would be required to force an overtake before a gun shot could be taken, it showed that it removes almost all lateral motion of the target aircraft, and it shows that the target aircraft presents a large, plane-view target. About the only thing it really missed was how little energy the Sukhoi is left with on exit of the maneuver (assuming it survives that long!).

Beat me to the draw regarding Vietnam-era BVR missile technology. Yes, there IS a reason they still teach bayonet drill, but it's not because they really expect bayonet fighting to be a common enough occurrence to require it- it's because it instills aggression and fighting spirit into soldiers. Also note that the article doesn't actually mention the bayonets inflicting casualties- merely that they fixed them, and aggressively moved into close combat. Either way, how many hundreds or thousands of enemy do you think were disabled through rifle, heavy weapon, mortar, artillery, or aerial fires for each casualty inflicted through bayonets? In short: yes, put enough Spitfires in the sky and they'll eventually shoot down an F-22, but that doesn't make it efficient.

1) this is irrelevant, as MOST aircraft gunsights do 2) Oh, REALLY? And where do you have it on such good authority that the F-35 does not use radar to compute gun solutions? 3) Do please explain how it is silly to point out that basing one's assessment of comparative air superiority performance on guns-only dogfighting is stupid, when it's the single least probable form of aerial combat?

Yes... if you are using a white noise jammer, this is true. Most modern jammers are not white noise jammers.

I *think* the car one is supposed to be funny because the driver keeps consistently bouncing the tach off the rev limiter repeatedly before shifting. I don't really get the humor, either. Seems to be working just fine for him, if he's competitive in rally!

You mean, the same reason that infantry still carry bayonets? Just because you plan for all eventualities does not make it probable, or even likely, that such event will come to pass. *edit* also, you are quite incorrect: most modern gunsights compute based off the radar data and range. You CAN in fact jam them, vastly reducing their effectiveness. AAA systems even more so, as they cannot maneuver coplanar.