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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."
Hate to break it to you dude, but that guy was either misinformed or pulling your leg;
The GAU-8/A ammunition is linkless, reducing weight and avoiding a great deal of potential for jamming. The feed system is double-ended, allowing the spent casings to be recycled back into the ammunition drum,[12] instead of ejected from the aircraft, which would require considerable force to eliminate potential airframe damage.
bend like the reed
Worse, it was replaced by what it replaced, the U-2.
The ammo feed may be linkless - I can't confirm one way or the other - but the round itself absolutely has a cartridge housing that holds the powder / propellant. It looks exactly like a standard rifle shell, upscaled quite a bit. I doubt the plane stores the expended brass, so the tink-tink-tink sound is entirely plausible. Source: The dummy A-10 round sitting on my bookshelf.
Sorry to self-reply: Looks like you are right and spent rounds are recycled, not ejected. And, looks like it has been that way since day 1. Mea culpa and good call!
Your causality is backwards. The cost to build each F-35 isn't all that much. What makes it "expensive" is the total development cost divided by a small number made. Same problem the F-22 had. Cost a fortune to design and progress the technology, but each individual airplane cost less than half what their overall cost is, since they only made 187 combat aircraft.
The F35 is a lot like a dual sport motorcycle. It can't keep up with the sport bikes (F-22, F-15, F-16) at track days, and it can't keep up with MX bikes (A-10) at the dirt track, but it is awfully good at the 90% of the rest of the time uses.
Its second big issue is that the Pentagon canceled the engine that was designed to go in it, which had twice the power of the current engine. That is also why it lost VTOL capability. Then they cut the dual engine dogfigter which was proposed after the more powerful version was cut.
The end result is that we have a QB with one leg broken, and thefans are demanding pushing contests with defensive linemen and races with running backs.
while(1) attack(People.Sandy);
Your causality is backwards. The cost to build each F-35 isn't all that much. What makes it "expensive" is the total development cost divided by a small number made. Same problem the F-22 had. Cost a fortune to design and progress the technology, but each individual airplane cost less than half what their overall cost is, since they only made 187 combat aircraft.
Most of your post is simply wrong information...
Thousands of F-35 planes will be built, for many nations... It is meant to replace a whole lot of airframes, so it isn't going to be a short production run...
The F35 is a lot like a dual sport motorcycle. It can't keep up with the sport bikes (F-22, F-15, F-16) at track days, and it can't keep up with MX bikes (A-10) at the dirt track, but it is awfully good at the 90% of the rest of the time uses.
Actually, it isn't really good at anything, just average at a number of things. Average is not what you want in wartime, you want to be really good, or you have to overcome not being the best with a huge numbers advantage.
Its second big issue is that the Pentagon canceled the engine that was designed to go in it, which had twice the power of the current engine. That is also why it lost VTOL capability. Then they cut the dual engine dogfigter which was proposed after the more powerful version was cut.
What makes you think it lost VTOL? That is still there, they canceled the second OPTION engine, it sure as heck wasn't going to be TWICE THE POWER...
Most of what you understand about the F-35 appears to simply be incorrect information.
A jdam is a complete package of dumb bomb, sensors and guidance package. Think of it as the short range JSOW (all of the above + large fins that let it glide long range to target. Source - I'm a former EOD tech.
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. Similer to most high powered rifles, but much larger and heavier.
Unless said scooter and Ferrari are IN TRAFFIC.
All tools are superior in their intended use cases.
The a-10 gun aims DOWN 2 degrees, so to shoot another aircraft it must be intentionally mis-aligned with the target.
That same angle makes sure the A-10 can strafe without diving directly at the ground... which is why 0 angle deflection aircraft like fighters are lousy at ground strafing targets.
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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.
> It's a little late for testing with several of these deployed in Europe.
You are confusing the F-22 Raptor with the F-35 JSF. The F-22 has recently been deployed to Europe because of the russian attack on the Ukraine. The F-22 is a twin engine stealth fighter with extremely high operating costs and not exactly stellar reliability/availability levels, even after 15 years of service, but at least it works and is VERY capable.
In contrast, the F-35 JSF is a single engine stealthly fighter-bomber, which hasn't been deployed anywhere yet, still being essentially a prototype with many tech problems, despite 100 of them having been assembled. Most problems stem from the fact that it is actually based on a russian prototype called Yak-141, whose design the drunkard Yeltsin sold to USA (L-M) for 300m USD in the late 1990s. L-M company had no experience whatsoever in vertical landing planes and relied on this tech import to compete against Boeing-BAE-Rolls-Royce, who bidded with the X-32 prototype as a very distant successor of the Harrier. L-M won, but proved unable to integrate a russian-derived airframe with western electronics. On the other hand, Pentagon was asking for too much, landbased, marine and naval fighter in a single basic arframe, constant mission creep, etc.
LMAO - I didn't say "A-10 Warthog", now did I? I said "hog". I said "Warthog" as well. WTF has the time or the inclination to say "A-10 Thunderbolt"? Hog. Warthog. One or two syllables - short and to the point.
"Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br
The whole comparison is silly anyway. The question is, is the F35 as good as a few dozen A10's? Because in terms of cost, that's what we're talking about.
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.
> Most problems stem from the fact that it is actually based on a russian prototype called Yak-141 ...snip ...
L-M won, but proved unable to integrate a russian-derived airframe with western electronics.
That really would have been an amazing trick, since the Yak-141 (aka Yak-41) had THREE engines. One main thrust engine, and two VTOL engines. The F-35 airframe has NO similarity to the Yak-141 except for the fact that it has wings and a cockpit. The three engine design is documented in several web pages and books about the Yak-141.
I have no love for the F-35 or JSF program. However, I have to call out arguments that are just patently wrong. I suppose it is possible L-M borrowed some VTOL ideas from the Yak-141. However, the F-35 is drastically different.
- speaking only for myself, as always
Regardless of which role CIA played in the Ukrainian events, the presence of Russian ground troops in Donbass does amount to an invasion of Ukraine (and said presence has been repeatedly confirmed informally by the rebels themselves - I've personally spoken to two people who have participated in the Debaltsevo operation on the rebel side who have said that it was only made possible by Russian troops and esp. armor).
Its a true story. The A-X (experimental attack) program was modified in 1970 specifically to make the 30 MM rotary canon the main focus of the vehicle. The design revolved around making an aircraft stable enough to fire that thing continuously.
Brilliance without wisdom, power without conscience. Ours is a world of nuclear giants and ethical infants.