The F-22 cannot be matched by any known or projected fighter aircraft,

Is the F-22A the best air superiority fighter in the air right now? Yes

Has it been victorious in simulated combat against insane odds? Yes

Has it been combat tested? No.

Can it defeat future threats? No one can say for sure, but remember that the airframe and its avionics can and will be upgraded. Just as the F-16 Block 60 would kill a Block 10 that is decades old.



Stealth, speed, persistance, situational awareness, net centric warfare.

There are many planes in the air now that have 1-2 of these virtues. The Ef-2000 can supercruise and once the AESA radar is in place will have the situational awareness etc. The Su-????? aka the endless variant has that wow em at the airshow manuverability. etc etc etc

But the Raptor has all of the above plus stealth and that is the key edge. Not only can it go hunting over vast distances on its own, it also has the ability to data link other fighters and aircraft in a package to deconflict missile launches in the manner of a foreward deployed mini AWACS

Originally posted by yellowcard
The F-22 is absolutely amazing, I honestly can't see it being out performed by any jet even in concept in current times. In 10-20 years that will change

It very well could in fact change. However, one must take into considerations the considerable upgrades the raptor will see in that time period. The Raptor of 20 years from now will be a completely "new bird", and would absolutely dominate the raptor of today. Ive heard talk that the Raptor could in fact have DEW capabilities (a laser for attack and defense purposes). The F35 will have DEW capabilities in the not so distant future as well (at least the American made ones).

Also another interesting twist is, that the Raptor of 20 years from now will be more than capable of taking on a 5th gen fighter of 2028, as the raptor is the only aircraft today that will have the experience and known capabilities of going up against 5th gen fighters (the raptor and raptor training exercises) no other nation today, or 20 years from now can, or will, be able to boast such a reputation.

[edit on 15-7-2008 by West Coast]

Howdy

The F-22 and F-35 are thee only 5th generation fighters, as low observability is a requirement for a aircraft to contend as a 5th generation fighter.

The F-35 has had a lot of talk about it having a directed energy weapon. This mainly focuses around the the fact that the drive shaft used in the F-35B could be adapted to an F-35A/C to drive a generator for laser. Range would take a hit however.

THe raptor (F-22) is a very capable aircaft. the black widow (YF-23) was also a very capable aircraft. The raptor has thrust vectoring to allow it to perform tight tunrs at slow speeds. This is because hte airframe was ooptimised for high agility at high speeds and altitudes. Thrust vectoring at hte higher speeds and altitudes is adds less to the aircraft. The US miltary put a premium on htat extra manuverability in a knive fight, over the extra stealth of the black widow. The black widdow could not mount thrust vectoring nozzles because its nozzles where desighned to allow outside air to mix with the exhaust be for it left the plane, dramatically reducing the heat signature of the aircraft (This method was leveraged form northrops B-2). The blackwidow was stealthier and faaster. It however could not perform as well in a close in knife fight. It also had a very unconventional weapons bay were weapons where stacked above each other. The USAF is scared enought to mount weapons above each other on the outside. Try doing that on the inside of a plane and you got no chance. That significantly disadvantaged the black widow and proberly ultimately killed of YF-23.

The raptor will loose approximately 1 aircraft for every 10 su-35 flankers in simulations done approx 10-15 years ago and that is by itself without support.

cheers

sorry, my only comment is on the TOTAL IRONY that
the DEADLIEST JET is being FEATURED on "Christian Today"

man ...what a crazy backwards, bizaro world we are in

In 20 years time low observables will be old hat - radar processing power will be so much improved nothing will be hidden.


You cannot hide wingtip vortices or underexpanded exhaust plumes - particularly on a low aspect ratio high performance fighter.




The key will be laser power (range). Expect "fighters" to consist of something like 747 ABLs.

reply to post by kilcoo316


They said that 20 years ago.

And it isn't true.



[edit on 16/7/2008 by C0bzz]

reply to post by C0bzz


they said it 20 years ago - and an F117a was shot down

reply to post by Harlequin

True, but that does not, with the shoot down of the F-117 in Allied Force, mean that stealth was 'old hat' in 1998

[edit on 16/7/2008 by C0bzz]

Originally posted by C0bzz
They said that 20 years ago.

And it isn't true.

You mean - and that is why they retired the F-117.


Oh, and the power of computing - particularly FLOPS in compact, lightweight machinery is exploding at the moment through GP-GPUs.

That will have a large impact on radar back-ends shortly (not GP-GPUs but the hardware concepts and SMP programming models).

reply to post by C0bzz


no it does not mean stealth is `old hat` - it means that radar`s are catching up alot faster than anyone could have predicted.

Current radars (in order of performance):

1. F-22's APG-77
2. Eurofighter's CAPTOR
3. Su-35's Irbis-E

Although performance margin is very small.

2/3 can see an F-22 at ~90km (F-22's 0.001m2 RCS).


Personally I think although the F-22 is the best atm, for its price it's not really worth it, since you could get 3-4 Su-35's/2 Eurofighter's per F-22.

Although I guess the F-22 may be handy while flying low against IR guided missiles (reduced IR signature).

the raptor an amazing aircraft... but i'm kind of a big fan haha, enough has been said by everyone else. i would like to see it go up against an SU-37 (no i don't want a war, i'm just saying it'd be amazing to watch the two birds go head to head) at any distance though, the F-22 will take another plane down just because its radar can see so much farther than 4th generation fighters. also an interesting story, i have a family member who's involved in the project and he talks about how they'd fly an F-22 against upwards of 4 F-15's and the 22 would take down all 4 of the 15's before they even knew it was their. i still find this story amazing every time i think about it. anyways just my thoughts,

raptor1

Originally posted by kilcoo316
In 20 years time low observables will be old hat - radar processing power will be so much improved nothing will be hidden.

You cannot hide wingtip vortices or underexpanded exhaust plumes - particularly on a low aspect ratio high performance fighter.

While all this may be true a low observable will always be more difficult to hit that a non- low observable aircraft.
I rather think that countermeasures and stealth will always be around only in more advanced forms and with various active jamming systems, because air warfare with a standard aircraft is simply inconcievable once you can see "wingtip vortices or underexpanded exhaust plumes -" I mean at that point, what must you be able to actually lock onto? A standard aircraft would have a zero lifespan in such an environment. At that point the only way to go would be a more advanced form of stealth with electronic countermeasures.

Originally posted by kilcoo316
The key will be laser power (range). Expect "fighters" to consist of something like 747 ABLs.

by that time solid state lasers will be extremely powerful and operating in variable bandwidths - a fighter sized aircraft would do just fine with a laser and there would be no need for a behemoth of an aircraft as the 747 - lumbering through the airspace (or just outside of the airspace) of a warzone.

bios






[edit on 7/16/2008 by bios]

Does anyone know if they brought the f22 over India for those mock dogfights yet?

Originally posted by alienstar
Does anyone know if they brought the f22 over India for those mock dogfights yet?

No they have not done that yet.

I don't have any any doubt that radars are catching up, it was simply the statement that stealth will be 'old hat' in 20 years that I disagree with.

I always thought that the F-117 was retired because it was expensive to maintain, couldn't fly far, relatively slow, no defense, & standoff capabilities were more capable of taking the roll of it, as was the F-22. Not that stealth, while a significantly reduced advantage, was non-existant.

2/3 can see an F-22 at ~90km (F-22's 0.001m2 RCS).

Irbis can see 0.01m^2 at 90km, - according to published data. Frontal RCS for the F-22 was described as being "marble sized", and math concludes that is from 0.0001m^2 to 0.0014m^2.....global security.com states 0.0001m^2..... However, when the F-117 was shot down in Allied Force, 1999, LM stated- "Even a standard turning maneuver could increase the aircraft's radar cross section by a factor of 100 or more". And that's why RCS isn't so simple, detectability is dependant on where it's viewed from and the frequency the radar is operating at.

[edit on 17/7/2008 by C0bzz]

Originally posted by C0bzz
I don't have any any doubt that radars are catching up, it was simply the statement that stealth will be 'old hat' in 20 years that I disagree with.

I always thought that the F-117 was retired because it was expensive to maintain, couldn't fly far, relatively slow, no defense, & standoff capabilities were more capable of taking the roll of it, as was the F-22. Not that stealth, while a significantly reduced advantage, was non-existant.

2/3 can see an F-22 at ~90km (F-22's 0.001m2 RCS).

Irbis can see 0.01m^2 at 90km, - according to published data.

Frontal RCS for the F-22 was described as being "marble sized", and math concludes that is from 0.0001m^2 to 0.0014m^2.....global security.com states 0.0001m^2..... However, when the F-117 was shot down in Allied Force, 1999, LM stated- "Even a standard turning maneuver could increase the aircraft's radar cross section by a factor of 100 or more". And that's why RCS isn't so simple, detectability is dependant on where it's viewed from and the frequency the radar is operating at.

[edit on 17/7/2008 by C0bzz]

Yes you're right, probably should have looked it up instead of using my memory

Also this new info makes the F-22 the best, making it practically invisible to the CAPTOR radar as well.

[edit on 17-7-2008 by otester]

Originally posted by C0bzz

Frontal RCS for the F-22 was described as being "marble sized", and math concludes that is from 0.0001m^2 to 0.0014m^2.....global security.com states 0.0001m^2.....

Move away from direct frontal - even by a few degrees - and that will shoot up.

That RCS is quoted for funding - and hence is almost certainly the minimum RCS the aircraft returns under absolute optimal conditions (wavelength and azimuthal angle).

However, when the F-117 was shot down in Allied Force, 1999, LM stated- "Even a standard turning maneuver could increase the aircraft's radar cross section by a factor of 100 or more". And that's why RCS isn't so simple, detectability is dependant on where it's viewed from and the frequency the radar is operating at.

I would place large emphasis on "or more"...

In fact, I would guesstimate another zeroes on the end of 100 and still put emphasis on "or more".

reply to post by Canada_EH


Good info thanks for posting that.
BUT....
he was talking about the yf-23 not the f-22

I think a problem they had with the F-22 was it was risky to do an VTOL or an Vertical landing maneuver because of issues with ground debris getting in the engines. The test vertical takeoffs and landings were done on a specially designed landing pad.

Personally, I think Armies spend waaay too much money on advanced fighter jets when much of the world's jets are second or even third generation. For example, F-16's could be classed as second generation and MIG-21's are third generation.

I think a wing of cheap F-16's is superior to a single super-expensive F-22, but I have no idea of the full capabilities of the F-22. Perhaps F-22's can enter space, much like the Aurora, rendering quite a few air-to-air missile types useless.