Slashdot Mirror
F-35 To Face Off Against A-10 In CAS Test
An anonymous reader writes: Lara Seligman from Defense News reports that the capabilities of the Joint Strike Fighter are to be evaluated for close-air support (CAS) missions. She writes, "To gauge the joint strike fighter's ability to perform in a close-air support role, the Pentagon's top weapons tester has declared the sleek new fighter jet must face off against the lumbering A-10. The Pentagon's Office of Operational Test and Evaluation plans to pit the full-up F-35 against the legacy A-10 Warthog and potentially other fighter jets to evaluate the next-generation aircraft's ability to protect soldiers on the ground."
It's a little late for testing with several of these deployed in Europe. Seems more like a marketing/PR stunt.
Custom electronics and digital signage for your business: www.evcircuits.com
I expect the A-10 will have a very strong showing, regardless of how they try to cripple it in the tests.
It's becoming the anti-anti-tank weapon.
sounds like a comparison that the F-35 can't win. It is more expensive to fly, can't hang around for long period's like the A-10 and is relatively fragile by comparison. The only way I see the F-35 coming out on top is with some very carefully crafted scenarios to favour it and some creative weightings on victory conditions.
Airforce has been trying to kill the A-10 for years. Recently they tried to mothball them all and replace them with the defunct F-16 until the F-35 was ready ... congress killed that idea. The troops love the A-10 and the higher ups hate it ... do not expect a fair analysis.
I love the A-10. Don't scrap.
At this stage of the program, they will make the A-10 loose.
"See! A trillion and plus well invested!"
Back in the mid 80s I was on a business trip to an Air Force Base in Utah (Hill, I think, but I visited a lot of AFBs back then). As luck would have it there was a demo happening for some VIPs and I got to watch. They had some old tanks set up, then these ugly-ass airplanes came in and shot them up. I'll never forget the BRRRRR of the gun, the tanks exploding, and about 30 seconds later tinkle tinkle tinkle. I asked the guy I was with what the tinkle was, it was the brass hitting the ground.
That was the first and only time I ever saw an A-10 in action.
the actual enemies we have now use twitter and guerilla tactics. This is just war theater to keep feeding tax money to the the socialist weapons manufacturers.
...and love shiny new, big-budget fighter planes, I can only assume that the test will be rigged to show the F-35 in the best light possible.
Ask yourself: How many Air Force brass made their bones flying A-10s (or cargo planes, or refueling tankers) and the answer is going to be pretty close to zero.
Lawrence Person (lawrencepersonh@gmailh.com (remove all "h"s to mail)
http://www.lawrenceperson.com/
Guarantee that you'll see a test which
-features some contrived anti-air defense that is somehow not good enough to defeat the F-35s rudimentary stealth but is good enough to be a credible thread to the A-10
-doesn't require the aircraft providing CAS to loiter, expend large amounts of ordinance, use the main gun extensively, fly low/slow or do anything the F-35 sucks at
-requires the CAS airfraft to sprint around at higher speeds than the A-10 is capable of
-reconstitutes the CAS mission to consist of dropping a small amount of ordinance from high altitude with no loiter
The F-35 will win, and the pork will continue to flow to the hundreds of congressional districts that get money from the F-35. The A-10 doesn't funnel billions of dollars to congressional districts- all it does is save the lives of troops. For that reason alone, it will be thrown in the trash and replaced with a useless but lucrative pile of garbage.
Put down the bong and step away from the keyboard.
Rather like apples and oysters, these two. Both do CAS but in very different ways. It seems like test parameters could easily be skewed to give one an advantage. Also, the A-10 has the home team advantage because of more mature tactics/doctrine. In any event, it seems silly to choose one over the other as they have such different roles.
Then again, the USAF is looking for any excuse to kill the A-10. Sadly, the A-10 is dying because it bridges the Air Force and Army and neither side wants to pay for it; each claims it belongs in the other's bailiwick. The Warthog is too good a plane to lose to infighting; they should just bring back the Army Air Corps and be done with it.
How can I believe you when you tell me what I don't want to hear?
..the A10 is a proven beast , while hackers can supposed control the electronics of an overpriced under designed wimpy fighter jet ..
I suspect that as the article says, there will be pros and cons of each. Obviously the A-10 has been very successful in this role, while the F-35 benefits from decades of technology advancements.
The A-10 is robust. The F-35 gives the pilot a much better view the of entire situation. The A-10 can put a lot of fire down in a small area as it flies low and slow. The F-35 can start applying fire earlier, while it's still further away. The A-10 is a proven system that has stood the test of time. The F-35 doesn't have to run away when an old Russian surplus fighter is detected in the area.
I really like the A-10 and generally I appreciate systems that have stood the test of time - newer doesn't mean better (aka the fundamental belief that means I'm a conservative) .
ALSO, when improvements are made, when someone "does it better", that's also new. SOMETIMES the new thing IS better is significant ways. We'll see what happens in the testing.
The F-35 IS expensive _per_unit_. The A-10 does one job, and there are several other aircraft that do different jobs. So the A-10 sits on the ground while there is air-to-air taking place, waiting while another aircraft handles that. IF the F-35 does four different roles, replacing four different types of aircraft, that cuts the effective cost by 75%. It wouldn't be parked on the tarmac waiting for a time when CAS in needed with uncontested skies. It could, supposedly, when the skies while also bombing enemy airfields , then do close air support.
Let's see how it actually does in testing before we declare the result.
That's a 'sleek' jet fighter against a purpose-built ground-strafing plane: I can't predict which will win a ground-strafing contest? Wait, I can.
The A-10 is obviously superior for close support. It was expressly designed for that purpose while the F35 is this insane jack of all trades plane that sucks at everything apparently.
They say in the article "the A-10 wins if nothing shoots back"... bullshit... the fucking thing can take a punch and keep flying. The F35 has a glass jaw.
When they say shoot back maybe they're talking about a serious anti aircraft missile... okay. But why are you doing close support in that kind of environment in the first place? US doctrine says you get air superiority before you advance your ground forces. Which includes pacifying ground based AA.
Then you listen to them talk about the amazing new helmet that the F35 uses... okay but there's no reason the A-10 couldn't use that as well. The A10 has been upgraded many times to take advantage of new technologies. Why not give it that new sensor package and helmet at well?
My issue with the F35 is that its trying to be everything to everyone and generally succeeds so far as I can tell at nothing. That's bullshit.
Now, I'm just as sad as everyone else that we dumped all this money into a shitty plane but buying them anyway when we know they're bad isn't going to make the situation any better. It will just get people killed.
We had a similar situation with the Phantom in Vietnam. Shitty shitty plane. It was fast and carried a lot of missiles... but it couldn't maneuver and if things got tight and close the stupid thing couldn't even fire because the missiles have a minimum range and they don't work if the enemy is close to the ground.
So an enemy Mig would just take the fight to deck and then turn harder to get behind the phantom... and then shoot it in the ass.
There was nothing the phantoms could do about that besides hitting the thrusters and flying away.
The f35 can't even do that.
I believe someone that tested it said:
"It can't fight
It can't hide
It can't run"
Which basically means its a flying fucking turkey. The phantom at least could run away.
Given planes should be specialized for given tasks and do that specific task.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
They keep lowering the bar. Next it will square up against a drunk guy with cataracts in a weathered Cessna.
Table-ized A.I.
The Chair Force has been trying to kill the A-10 since it was born; why would ANYONE believe that this test won't be designed to play to the F-35 strengths and A-10 weaknesses?
The tests will likely be engineered carefully:
- transit speed: likely they'll have a number of targets far apart, to point to the A-10 slow top speed. What they WON'T have is targets that are camouflaged or hard to find (like real life) because that would require loitering and slow passes.
- few targets: sure, the F35 can probably put 2 or 4 guided bombs in a precise 2' circle. But it can't carry anywhere near the payload of the A10 (nor retain it's vaunted stealthiness if it carries external stores) to deal with target after target after target.
- There may a single gun-specific target that the F35 can cheerfully spatter with it's 4 seconds' worth of ammunition. The A10s 30+ seconds of ammunition will not be needed.
- Ground fire - not sure how they're going to test that, but that's a critical value of the A10, it was built to fly over (and survive) the most intensive Cold-War Soviet Armor Wave attacks. Iraqi ground fire proved this time and again that the A-10 was astonishingly rugged.
- Air to Air combat: unlikely they'll give the A-10 a couple of Sidewinders it would carry in uncertain airspace, but in any case, they'll have a "strike" by some Red Force aggressors to "prove" the A-10 can't hold it's own in air-to-air (never mind that in actual deployment, they should be being covered by...F-35s)
- Replaceability: The A10 in 2015 dollars is just under $20 million. The F35 is $100 million. Maybe have FIVE A-10s simultaneously completing courses while 1 F-35 has to cover them all as well? Yeah, ha ha ha, that's not going to happen.
This will just be a Potemkin USAF test to "prove" the F-35 is as capable as they say.
Tell you what: let the ARMY design the test. Then we'll see.
-Styopa
two kids with a butane lighter folding, mounting, lighting and throwing as fast as they can would be more cost effective than the F-35. Besides the poor pilot visibility and the engines that keep failing, they *still* can't land without having to replace *all* the tires.
The F-35 is the systemd of hi-tech, hi-perfermance aircraft, continually burdened with more and more tasks and goals and aspirations and pork barrel funding and doing *none* of the missions well.
I understand why you're a fan of the A-10. It's a good plane, the does what it's designed to do. Re-read what you just wrote:
> The A-10 has demonstrated devastating anti-aircraft ability as well, with at least one known air-to-air kill.
One kill. In decades. One. That's devastating capability? Once, a rubber band killed someone. Therefore a rubber band is a devastating weapon? Again, the A-10 is a good ground attack plane. It's not a fighter; it's not a bomber, it's not a frankfurter. It's a slow-flying ground attack plane that is very useful when you want to attack something small on the ground AND don't have to worry about any enemy planes shooting it down. It's utterly defenseless against virtually any aircraft armed with missiles, including 1970s and 1980s era Russian planes that are now owned by little tyrants around the world.
The A-10 flies at about 420 MPH. Even 1980s fighter jets fly at mach 2, about the same speed as the bullets from the A-10 gun. An A-10 going after a fighter is literally the same ratio as a scooter going after a Ferrari.
Don't misunderstand, scooters are good. They are useless for chasing down sports cars, and an A-10 is just as useless for engaging enemy fighters. The fighters would (and do) fly by as if the A-10 is standing still.
> no known aircraft can survive the A-10's gun. It is the most powerful dogfight cannon
The bullets from the A-10's gun go about the same speed as the fighter. So if somehow, magically, the A-10 got on the fighter's tail and fired, the bullet probably couldn't catch up to the fighter. If it was fired off angle, it might hit the fighter at 30 MPH relative speed - not enough to dent the sheetmetal.
Survive that A-10s gun? No jet fighter in the last 40 years can be HIT by the A-10 gun unless the fighter is either a) parked or b) intentionally flying toward the A-10 without shooting it down.
These days, a lot of the people who sign up to be on the receiving end of the US Air Force's arsenal are not afraid of death. I imagine that some of them who have survived USAF bombing runs or drone strikes are only emboldened in their cause.
On the other hand, just hearing an A10 perform a gun run, I imagine that some of these same people would come to believe that there's a demon in the sky which rains fire upon the land.
Something tells me they won't integrate that factor in to this test.
The A-10 flies at about 420 MPH. Even 1980s fighter jets fly at mach 2, about the same speed as the bullets from the A-10 gun. An A-10 going after a fighter is literally the same ratio as a scooter going after a Ferrari.
Don't misunderstand, scooters are good. They are useless for chasing down sports cars, and an A-10 is just as useless for engaging enemy fighters. The fighters would (and do) fly by as if the A-10 is standing still.
Actually, even fighters from 1950's can fly at mach 2, BUT:
Even those 1980's fighters won't be flying at mach 2 at 95% of their time. They can only fly at mach 2 at high altitudes on straight line, full afterburner, wasting huge amount of duel.
Practically all dogfights happen at subsonic velocities. When you start doing high-g manouvers the velocity drops to subsonic very quickly.
> no known aircraft can survive the A-10's gun. It is the most powerful dogfight cannon
The bullets from the A-10's gun go about the same speed as the fighter. So if somehow, magically, the A-10 got on the fighter's tail and fired, the bullet probably couldn't catch up to the fighter. If it was fired off angle, it might hit the fighter at 30 MPH relative speed - not enough to dent the sheetmetal.
Survive that A-10s gun? No jet fighter in the last 40 years can be HIT by the A-10 gun unless the fighter is either a) parked or b) intentionally flying toward the A-10 without shooting it down.
This part is so incorrect....
The speed of bullets from GAU-8 is 1070 m/s.
Top speed of the worlds fastest jet fighter(mig-25) is ~890m/s flying on straight line on high altitude, with afterburner, but only ~333 m/s on low altitude.
Top speed of most modern jet fighters is in the class of 700m/s. (high, straigt line, full afterburner)
Common speed of modern jet fighters during dogfight is about 250-350m/s , 3-4 times slower than the bullets from GAU-8.
A-10 is actually quite good plane for shooting down slow low-flying aircrafts such as helicopters. It can use AIM-9 missile from slightly longer range, and from the close range the GAU-8 is very deadly. And because it can fly lower and slower it can more easily hit those slow low-flying targets than faster, higher-flying aircrafts can.
I never realized there were so many pilots and military strategists hanging out on Slashdot. I wonder if the DoD is aware of the awesome array of air combat experts that are just waiting to be recruited and revolutionize how we fight wars. [/sarc]
Overpriced toys that kill to keep the rich in power. Doesn't matter which one wins, we all lose.
The F-35 is the 'all-in-one' printer of aircraft and equally unable to perform any of its roles most effectively.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
I had a friend who was in the Navy and he told me about a wargame between two F14 Tomcats and an A-10.
The objective was simple, there was a bunker in the middle of the testing ground that the A-10 was supposed to take out with its main cannon. The Tomcats were to protect the bunker.
All the planes had "live" missiles, but the missiles had no propellent or warhead, once the pilot had a lock and hit the trigger the missile just dropped off and a ground computer determined if it hit. And only the A10 had real ammo in it's main gun for the bunker.
Easy kill by the tomcats right?
Wrong.
The end result was the bunker looked like swiss cheese and both the Tomcats had been "shot down". Turned out the slower speed of the A10 allowed it to stay in the valleys and under the ridge lines so the Tomcats couldn't get an easy lock on it with their radar guided missiles, and when they tried to get a heat lock with their Sidewinders all the A-10 had to do was throttle back, duck into a side branch of the valley and the Tomcats would overshoot, giving the A10 a lovely hot target for it's Sidewinders.
What it boiled down to was the simple fact that the A10 was made for that kind of mission, slip in, fill the target full of holes, get out. The Tomcats weren't designed for protecting ground targets from slow. nimble and well piloted threats.
Since this was told to me back in the 1980's I can't guarantee it really happened but it was fun to listen to the story.
The F35 faces the large and looming issue that it is not made to be perfect in any one role, it is "OK" in many roles. And while the old saying "Jack of all trades, master of none, but better than a master of one" does apply a JOAT can't compete with a Master and win. The JOAT doesn't have the experience a Master does.
The F35 for all it's abilities is going to be out classed by an aircraft purpose built for just one specific role flown by a pilot who knows how to use it in that role.
I did not think the F35 was a replacement for the A10? Seems like this is a weighted test in favor of the F35 to make it look good over a much older and slower A10. But as any pilot will tell you in ground troop support. The slower plane can be more effective detecting and accurately attacking the enemy. Besides the fact the A10 is a much cheaper plane with just as much abilities to support ground troops. If I was on the ground, the A10 would be what I would want flying over head.
This is ridiculous. Why even bother?
I guess the F-16 and even more the F/A-18 should qualify.
Fighter-bomber, (light) fighter roles, F-18 should be in air superiority role too, since the f14 was retired, probably recon, and wasn't there a electronic warfare version of the f16? (might be wrong on that one).
Because only with repeated embarrassments will the F35 shitshow ever end.
The F-35 is the 'all-in-one' printer of aircraft and equally unable to perform any of its roles most effectively.
http://www.pulsionerotica.com/video/1670_Hot-soccer-chick-get-fucked
F35: Fat, slow, stupid, not-stealthy, unable-to stay on station, cant turn, cant shoot, cant run and kids with a slingshot can bring it down.
They built a plane based on an actual warthog!
Reopen the A-10 production line.
Not really economically feasible. While it is technologically possible, supply chains are fragile things and once they are taken apart it is VERY expensive and difficult to put Humpty Dumpty back together again. I speak from personal professional experience. I'm both an industrial engineer and an accountant and I run a manufacturing company. A large part of my job is putting together supply chains. Once you stop production on something complex like an aircraft there is SO much tribal knowledge lost that it would be FAR cheaper in most cases to start from scratch.
For the programmers out there the analogy would that it is like trying to duplicate an entire operating system with huge amounts of source code missing, none of the build tools, and the original programming team scattered to the four winds. Yeah you can do it but it's easier and cheaper to start over most of the time.
Even with the cost of retooling and reopening the A-10's production line, we could probably build five of these for the cost of a single F-35. Ignoring the cost of tooling and opening the production line, we can build ten or eleven A-10's for the cost of an F-35.
I think we could come up with something brand new but very similar for a LOT less money than trying to redo the A10. Plus we could probably update for lessons learned in the last 30+ years presuming the A10 continues to make tactical/strategic sense. If they kept the A10's philosophy of being tough and inexpensive then it might make sense. Although honestly I think the Army should be given control of their own CAS even for fixed wing aircraft. (Yes I know they reasons why this won't happen)
On the other hand as good as the A-10 reportedly is, there is always the danger of trying to fight the last war. Surface to Air missiles have improved substantially and the A10 reportedly isn't much use in contested airspace. The A10 is apparently very good at what it was designed for but it's unclear (to me anyway) how long that will continue to be the case. Maybe it will be like the B52 and it will serve for 50+ years but then again, maybe not. I don't pretend to know.
> Dude, you are so stupid... Try a A-10 on a simulator, is a very, very ninble aircraft.
A late model A-4 can turn at 16-18 degrees per second (but lose airspeed in the process).
An F-16 or MiG-29 could do about 24-26 deg/s. And has the power to weight ratio to keep doing it all day long.
In other words, in the time a fighter does a complete 180 degree turn, the A-10 will have turned only 120 degrees.
A semi truck is a useful thing to have. A semi is not a motorcycle.
An A-10 is a ussful thing to have. An A-10 is not a fighter.
WWII demonstrated that with Nazi Germany producing vastly superior tanks but because of their complexity, they were swarmed by cheaper, mass produced tanks.
The reasons the Nazi's lost were FAR more complex than you are implying here. Furthermore the Soviet T-34 tank was among the best tanks in the world at the time and even the German's thought and said so. The German's ultimately lost because they picked a fight with a much larger country with deeper resources including more land, more people and more natural resources. The only reason the German's did as well as they did was because the Soviets were behind the curve technologically and organizationally early in the conflict. Once the Soviets got their shit together the German's were pretty much screwed. They probably would have been screwed even if they hadn't tried to pick a fight with the rest of the world at the same time.
So in a shooting war against an enemy that can defend itself, the fighters we have dont matter as much as the fighters we can build.
In modern wars you aren't going to have the time required to build an entire supply chain for a modern jet, even a relatively simple one. Even if you do chance are good The fighters of WWII were FAR simpler and they didn't have to contend with enemies that can literally strike from halfway around the globe. It's simply not an analogous situation to WWII.
The thing about multirole aircraft is you take a good airframe and kit it out differently for different things.
The 737 for example, good passenger jet, cargo plane, military transporter, large jet trainer and maratime patrol aircraft. But it's never kitted out for all five at the same time because that would be pretty silly.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
Put a new tech pack on the A10 and voila, it can do everything the F35 can just slower.
No it cannot. The A10 is a great plane but physics is a harsh mistress. The choices made in the design of its airframe mean that there will be some things it simply cannot do well. There are unquestionably things the F35 will do better just as a virtue of its design and vice-versa. And flying faster isn't some unimportant little detail, particularly in a contested airspace. I'm by no means suggesting we get rid of the A10 but let's not pretend we can drop in some avionics and turn it into a slow F35. Likewise the F35 by its very design will have to utilize different tactics than the A10. I have no idea which one would perform better (though my money would be on the A10 for the missions the A10 was designed for) but it would be hard to find two more different aircraft no matter what tech you pack into the A10.
The A-10 ia very, very good at CAS in uncontested skies. Meaning it operates after the opposing air force has been eliminated, and sits idle until then.
It seems like it would be a good idea to be able to do CAS in a hostile environment as well.
The A-10 has demonstrated devastating anti-aircraft ability as well, with at least one known air-to-air kill.
The A10 shot down a couple of helicopters. That's hardly "devastating anit-aircraft ability". It's a great plane for shooting stuff on the ground of almost any description but let's not pretend it is some amazing air-to-air fighter because it is not.
This is an area that could easily be expanded: no known aircraft can survive the A-10's gun. It is the most powerful dogfight cannon ever put in the air.
Having the biggest gun in a dogfight doesn't mean much. It is FAR slower and less maneuverable and those matter hugely in a dogfight. The 20mm cannons on other jets are more than adequate to the task of shooting down other aircraft (including the A10) and having a big gun isn't much use if you cannot put the rounds on target. The A10 *might* win an engagement here or there but I certainly wouldn't bet on it winning against a purpose built fighter.
> The basic fact that you're forgetting is, a tool that is engineered for one specific purpose always performs that task or purpose better than some awkward multi-purpose tool.
A purpose-specific tool OFTEN does a better job. On the other hand, a Core i7 renders graphics far than 1970s area GPU.
> Let's assume that you are an electrician. You have a tool box with a couple dozen pairs of "pliers" in it. You have wire ststrippers in multiple sizes ...
I thought so too! Then I talked to my master electrician friend. It turns out that an electrician walks around the building with a tool BELT and there is one multi-purpose tool that is normally in his hand. It's a stripper/cutter/pliers that lets him strip and terminate a wire in seconds, in less time than it takes me to dig my strippers out of my tool box. It's kind of impressive to watch.
They come in basically two sizes - building wiring size and automotive wiring size. It turns out that a) switching tools costs more time than specialized tools gain and b) carrying a bunch of tools around all day costs time and energy.
The gau-8 fires projectiles at a velocity of 3500 feet per second. A jet traveling at mach 1400 miles per hour is moving at 2053 feet per second. So even if the jet was flying away from the a-10, the projectiles are still closing at 1500 feet per second.
So what? Even if your figures are accurate it doesn't matter. First off that only matters if the jet is flying in a straight line and not turning even a tiny bit. Second, having the biggest gun in the fight is NOT the most important factor. Having a big gun is great but being able to put bullets on target and evade bullets is FAR more important in air to air combat. Third, bullets slow down after leaving the gun barrel. Several thousand meters out and that bullet will be traveling at substantially less velocity than it left the gun barrel. Fourth, this discussion of the A10 in air to air combat is stupid. It's not designed for it and will never be particularly good at it.
Take an F-35 and an A-10, put them on the tarmac, and empty a clip from an AK-47 into each broadside from 100 yards. Start a timer and have crews commence repairs, wartime maintenance rules, first jet to lift off for the next sortie wins.
My money says the A-10 could be turned in less than 2 hours. The F-35 would probably be a write off.
For extra credit, evaluate each jet for flyability without repair (engine power, flight control authority, fuel, etc..).
The F-35 in the CAS role is like a ballerina in a heavyweight fight - everything will be great until the first punch lands, then it is all over.
Left MS Windows for Linux Mint and never looked back!
Vote for Bernie in 2016!
Without a proper evaluation of how the aircraft take to having a few holes in them (and some bits missing), the performance at close air support can't be evaluated.
I love how you said "at 1400 mph". I guess if the fighter slows down, and places it's engines 2 feet from the A-10's muzzle ...
Calculate the velocity of the gun round 2,000 feet down range, after it's encountered air resistance, and compare that to even a 1980s fighter like the F-16. The F-16 is literally faster than a speeding bullet.
That being said, the A-10 is actually getting old, and could use a capable replacement.
Old isn't necessarily a fatal problem in and of itself. The B52 is much older than the A10 and is still serving with distinction. It does cause some supply chain issues but nothing that cannot be solved. The biggest problem is really attrition in the number of airframes because they aren't building new ones obviously.
and durr big gun is good. what? fulda gap no more you say? derrrr me no need worry bout enemy fighters me big penis gun
What we SHOULD HAVE done, is to revamp that A-10 production lines
What production lines? The A10 ceased production in 1984. There are no production lines to revamp. To get production started again you'd basically be starting over almost from scratch. Most/all the tooling is long gone. The assembly lines and supply chains are gone. The tribal knowledge from the team that built them is scattered to the winds and the original design engineers mostly retired or dead by now. There are drawings but I assure you that after 30 years there is a lot of missing information. Basically you cannot put it all back together again. It would be easier and cheaper to start over.
> The a-10 gun aims DOWN 2 degrees, so to shoot another aircraft it must be intentionally mis-aligned with the target.
That brings up an interesting point. In air-to-air combat, there is a huge advantage for a plane firing down at the other plane. The diving plane maintains speed and energy, while the lower plane, pointed upwards, is losing speed and energy. So you REALLY want to be able to get above your opponent.
The A-10 can climb 6,000 feet per minute. That's almost twice the climb rate of the Boeing 777, at 3,500 fpm. The F-16 can climb 50,000 fpm. Which aircraft do you think is going to end up on top, literally?
The MUZZLE the velocity of the A-10 rounds are just below and just above 1000 m/s. Then the hit air and immediately start slowing down. At high velocities, drag is approximately proportional to the SQUARE of velocity, which means that an object loses most of it's velocity in the earliest portion of it's flight.
At the design range of 4,000 feet, the rounds will be traveling at somewhere around 200 m/s or so. My ballistics tables don't cover that exact round at that exact distance, so I'm extrapolating.
> your right, the f-35 won't sit on the ground, it will engage in A2A. Then the troops won't have any air support, as it will get chewed up by the existing enemy jets.
There are enemy fighters in the area? Then you can't fly the A-10. At all. It does nothing but sit on the tarmac until the air is clear of enemy planes.
Watching the trials would be entertaining. But what they really need to do is shoot them up for a survivability test which the A-10 is known for among other things.
If they can pull apart a rocketdyne motor from the apollo program and reverse engineer it I think they can manage an A-10.
It's not that they can't do it. It's that it's not economically sane to try in most cases. A lot depends on how much of the original documentation still exists and what sort of condition it is in. I've had to do that professionally myself on much smaller scale products and I can absolutely guarantee you that there will be considerable amounts of data missing. Worse, a lot of the tribal knowledge that went into making it and the problems they dealt with has been lost. Could it be re-engineered? Sure. But it would be needlessly expensive and they could probably develop a better product with a new(ish) plane if they went about it the right way.
What would be economically sane to do is to pull the information still available about the A10 and do a clean sheet design while cribbing as much of what works as possible from the existing plane. There has been a lot of technological progress in the last 30 years. Simply copying an old but good design verbatim would be pretty short sighted. If the A10 continues to make tactical/strategic sense AND if we need more of them then a new design would be the best way to make it happen.
The A-10 is better at close support, and the f-15 still smokes the f-35 is air to combat. The f-35 exists because of marketing... and now lets start looking for excuses on why our, "new paradigm in air combat" fell flat.
If you care to listen, and I doubt you do, the "long loiter" A-10 mission has already been replaced by reaper. Lon Loiter isn't relevant against a vaguely modern air defense system. While the pundits have been talking, we've replaced the A-10 with reaps, and it's only those missions where you NEED a man in the cockpit that keep the A-10. The astronomically better sensors in the F-35 (cooled IR sensors with radar fusion) are so much better than the A-10 (mark I eyeball, NVG's, and maybe peering at a tiny HUD with LANTIRN if you have one that works) will more than make up for the lack of low and slow (i.e. orbiting in the "hunt me, fuck me, kill me" zone)
definitely a PR stunt just read the wording in Defense Weekly "To gauge the joint strike fighter's ability to perform in a close-air support role, the Pentagon's top weapons tester has declared the sleek new fighter jet must face off against the lumbering A-10".
Sleek, new, jet fighter
or
lumbering A10
hmm words have as much power as depleted uranium 30mm rounds.
It's not like US military R&D hasn't produced outstanding results in the past. All the planes people are comparing the F-35 to are really strong assets.
Who, in the chain of command, was responsible for "fixing" an approach that wasn't broken?
This is a joke... right? There is no way a POS F-35 can provide the kind of firepower the A-10 can. That's why there's an "A" in it's designation, stands for "Attack". This is some seriously marketing PR, BS right here.
As I understand it, "kitting out" the F-35 is limited by the fact that anything mounted externally compromises the stealth characteristics it needs to survive.
I've calculated my velocity with such exquisite precision that I have no idea where I am.
Some in the Pentagon and AF want to kill the A-10 but this is a huge mistake. My first ever job was maintenance on A-10s. This dear old bird was a badass in the 70s and is still a badass. Slow, yes, but she needs to be. I know of no other bird in any countries' arsenal than can take the beating the A-10 can. She can fly with half a wing, one stabilizer, barely a rudder either side, you name it. I used to love painting the shark's teeth pattern onto my A-10s when in the UK. A fond job. Ours were to play a role in defending the European western front should the USSR have decided to invade. Our livery was ghost grey with black stencils and other muted serial numbers, call signs, warning texts. Perfect for flying in the grey of the UK and northern Europe.
I still love that gorgeous drone the A-10s make as they take off and fly over. Fond memories.
The A-10 may not be a dogfighter, but we still have nothing better for ground support against hard targets. Helos come close, but they are easy targets and do not carry the A-10 payload. Fairchild and McDonnell Douglas were the finest aircraft manufacturers in my opinion. Politics, politics.
It isn't even going to be close. The A-10 is purpose-designed to provide CAS. That's it's only role, and it arguably performs that role better than any other aircraft in history.
Palaces, barricades, threats, meet promises
You may have seen a AC-130 up close, but obviously never seen one flying or in action. An AC-130 can not replace an A10. They are not even close to the same thing. It is slow moving with no ability to boost/burst speed in flight, and it flies crooked due to the guns all hanging off the same side of the ship. It's as maneuverable as a flying battleship.
The AC-130 is a gunship. It's job is to lay down an assload of metal as quickly as possible. It does just that very well, but that's not what close air support is about. I'll let you do the homework and figure out what that role is supposed to be, and why the A-10 is the king.
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
It's politics. Being in an around the Air Force and Marines for 26 years, I can tell you first hand it's political. The aircraft builders play nice with the state politicians for jobs and bennies and the politicians that man the appropriate committees see to it that so and so companies are rewarded with contracts and special favors. It's disgusting.
McDonnell Douglas and Fairchild made some of the finest aircraft in the inventory. Now? Current stuff is not so good. My favorite thing is still the C-130. Man, I love flying in those things. The drone of the engines, the shaking about on takeoff and landing, the jump seat configurations, the lack of a proper latrine (read bucket and curtain), so many good memories. Ditto the Huey. Such a sweet, tolerant helo. Most of them now are Vietnam-era airframes held together with bubblegum and bailing wire.
I worked on A-10s back in the 80s for the Air Force. The pilots would tell you that there was never a more tolerant to mistakes bird made. Easy to fly, easy to understand, simple avionics package, devastating CAS payloads and cannon. Could fly with damage that no other plan in the inventory in any country could equal then or since. Very good bird. It will be sad to see when the A-10s are gone.
I'm already using the phrase "Joint Strike Fighter" to describe anything that's a massive overwrought boondoggle. Fir example: "Atom, the Joint Strike Fighter of text editors."
N4st0r, trixx0r h0bb1tz0rz! Th3y st0l3 0ur pr3c10uzz!
Modern radar looks for wingtip vortexes which can't be hidden by the plane. The result is this thing can't even do what the F15 can do even at several times the cost.
The JSF program was created only to make sure that the US maintained the R&D needed to keep making fighters in the future but since the project is so over budget, that is broken.
I wonder if they should drop Lightning ][ and rename it the Maginot or the Bismarck.
The A10 is known for how tough it is. Pilots have lots engines and half a wing and still get home safely. To this day, A10 is still bad ass at close air support against tanks. Many jets wouldn't make it home with half the damage the A10 takes.
Anyone know?
How may air-to-air kills do the F-15 and F-16 have in decades? And those aircraft were purpose built to do that job...
The F15 reportedly has 104 air combat kills. Not sure on the F16 but its certainly a lot higher than the A10 which I understand has two helicopter kills.
No kidding, those pictures eloquently make a lie of the condescending quote in the article:
"Can [the F-35] do close air support? Sure," Aboulafia said. "But there's nothing like an A-10 in a world where nothing shoots back."
What...an...asshole.
They should be compared dollar per dollar. Six A10 Warthogs per single F35.
F35 no low altitude ability
A-10 may be slow, but still has to slow down for CAS role. F35 can't fly slow and low and relies on smart systems.
A-10 is cheap to operate. F35 purchase cost for one plane would build and maintain 5 A-10 aircraft for their operational life, F35 still needs to be maintained. F35 is multiple mission role aircraft, under AirForce control. CAS may not be "available" in theatre as F35 is busy elsewhere. A-10 is dedicated to CAS role.
F35 takes damage and either is destroyed or if minor limps home. A-10 can operate with half a wing missing, and engine out, and one of the two tails missing. If the hydraulics are compromised there is a manual "cable" system for backup.
A-10 doesn't require electronics to fly, so EMP doesn't destroy the aircraft's ability to get the pilot home.
A-10 has the avenger cannon. Bigger than a Volkswagen. Shoots bigger than a longneck beer rounds. Destroys tanks with its cannon. No missiles required, but available if desired.
F-35 relies on smart weapons (as in a few in munitions inventory) dropped from 35K.
F35 fewer potential kills from a more expensive aircraft that costs more to maintain.
A-10 is a specialist that kills tanks and enemy with a personal touch.
Well the other side to that is that jets never fight at top speed and that Mach 2+ top speed always involves the active use of an AB (afterburner).
The AB doesn't get used in combat unless and until you are neck deep in the shit and even then its only use is to extend and escape, aka bugging out.
You are clearly an L-M $hill. How can it be "more expensive" to reopen A10 manufacturing lines and all the supply chain, as compared to the super-fragile stealth stuff, the STOVL stuff and all the fancy sensors of the F35. The latter sounds vastly more complex than re-starting the A10 manufacturing effort.
The "A10 2.0" should be done by some upstart aerospace company, not the established players. Just hand them a physical A10, let them reverse-engineer all parts for which no blueprints exist. Use the latest engines which fit the bill.
I bet you can make one of these for 15 millions a piece in 500 pieces lots. 7500 millions is a shitload of money and if you don't waste it with LM or Boeing, you can get real value.
1.) Nice engine. Mount in a Super Viper or Hyper Hornet or a Super F15.
2.) Nice sensors and computers. Mount them on A10s, F15s, F15s, F22s and any American Su27 copies.
3.) Maybe an increase of the wing area is going to help in the dogfighting business.
Yeah, the F35 project is big time shit, but it contains quite a few nice subsystems which will be used in other projects.
Built a Forward Improvised Airfield, 20kms behind the frontline and have the A10 operate from this airstrip. With a low speed airplane this is much easier to do than with a high speed jet like the F16 or the F35.
the A-10 is much better for the close air support role... the air force just doesn't like it's close air support role... give the A-10's to the army and let the Airforce circle jerk w/ their expensive cluster **** F-35
That's the answer i was hoping for!
It's going to be a pitbull vs mops battle / freak fight
This has to end it.
... when the prosecutor handed OJ the glove to try on?
How about instead of paying ~$178M per plane for sexy and utterly stupid human-in-the-plane stealth concepts, we refit the existing A10s to fly as cheap, reliable, remotely piloted drones. I'll do it for $10M per plane. If we refit all of the 238 existing planes in service, total cost would be $2.38 billion. Since I'll be a government contractor I'll up-charge $10 billion for the entire program, and it will still cost less than 1% of the F-35 program costs so far.
As of 2001 census:
24.0% of Crimean population were Ukrainians.
10% Tatars.
That's one clear example of how fucking rigged was the "referendum", in which " 96.77 percent vote for ..." "integration" with Russia.
Earlier case studies have shown about 30% of the Crimea's population supporting separatism.
Shouldn't they also factor the trustworthy AC-130 into the CAS mix?
The A-10 was designed to fly low and slow to provide CAS. It's not going to win a beauty prize or a dogfight in the air. Anything on the ground is in a world of hurt, however. The underside of the cockpit is specially armored to protect the pilot from ground based fire. It can effectively disassemble a tank from several hundred yards away and play hell with dug in ground targets.
It has ONE JOB and it does it VERY WELL, thank you.
There are only a few AC 130s in actively use and less than 50 were ever built. The air frame is a C 130 cargo plane, not a fighter class ship. The computer controls for the Gun systems is custom built, as are various cannons and cannon mounts. The platform for the 105 was custom built for each plane, as is the fire control and loader. Meaning that the AC 130 would not only cost more money than A10s to build in bulk, but lack all survive-ability on the battlefield. The AC 130 has no loiter time or capacity for damage, it's too slow for hit and run missions. This means it would not be able to perform as close air support.
You may as well claim that the U-2 should replace the F117, because that is the level of ignorance and stupidity you have shown (and you may actually think something so ridiculous). I have worked with AC 130s and A 10s in the field (US Army) so I know very well what both are capable of. Instead of repeating ignorance go do the goddamn homework so you have at least a chance of looking partially intelligent in a conversation.
I never said the F35 was a suitable replacement, so stop inventing words I never said. Go back and read it again! Prick!
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.