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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
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!
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 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.
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