A very interesting article.
F-22 Raptor VS F-35 RAA
- Thread starter BlueOvalFitter
- Start date
Pretty tough call. Neither are true fighter jets. Their mostly point-and-shoot (air to air) and get away fast.
Have you seen an F-22 in person? It is a first rate dogfighter when needed. It shouldn’t get to that point, but modern air combat is almost alway BVR.
I wonder how BVR an F-22 vs F-35 fight is...
They both probably have similar sensor and fusion technology since both are Lockheed Martin planes. Even though the F-22 is older tech, it has a continuous modernization program (like all fighters) that upgrades hardware and software as needed to keep it more upto date. As far as stealthiness, the F-35 might have an edge due to size. I think a BVR engagement advantage would basically come down to the stealth factor between the two. It could be so close that it comes down to pilot skill of being completely tuned in and one with the plane.
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I mean, if their respective BVR weapons can't lock each other due to x-band stealth, then what?
Yep, up close and personal. The F4 didn't need a gun neither in Viet Nam.
Yes it did. They had to put gun pod on belly.
That's what they thought, but didn't work out that way...
Amazing planes(F22, F35) I got to see at an airshow near my home beyond the Thunderbirds. The US military did an amazing job hosting and organizing it.
A lot of assumptions, mostly false, some specious, in the comparisons made here. The actual answers remain classified, however. Sorry. No comment.
What's that supposed to mean. Both aircraft have guns.
The initial F-4 produced for the US Navy didn't have guns. And when the USAF got its first F-4s they didn't have guns and a gun pod was fitted. I don't believe the Navy F-4 models ever had any internal cannon.
I'm not so sure of that. @Astro14 would you say modern air combat is almost always BVR?
With stealth vs. stealth, VR combat should theoretically make a comeback, if true. But I'm thinking about most recent (past 30 years) kills have not been mostly BVR. But I could be wrong.
My thought is that you'd better be 100% sure of what you are shooting at if you go BVR. I doubt it is always that easy.
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Let's leave missiles out of it and go guns only. I'll take the F-22 and you can have ANY other fighter ever in service, anywhere in the world.
If the F-22 isn't a true fighter jet, then the definition needs to be examined.
What!?
Have you ever seen an F-22 fly?
Climb rate, turn performance, high alpha maneuvering, thrust/weight, acceleration.
It crushes every other fighter on the market in every single one of those performance areas. It makes the F-15 look slow and clumsy by comparison.
The F-22 was built, among other things, to be the world’s best dog-fight platform.
It succeeded.
I saw one doing a demo over San Francisco Bay during 2016 Fleet Week. I was touring a cruiser during the demo and even the crew members were staring at it. It was showing off thrust vectoring and it was just insane how tight a loop it could perform.
If found this video. I guess it's kind of hard without an extreme telephoto lens and maybe image stabilization but this is better than another vid I saw of it.
Stealth is relative depending on technology, and what can be seen by the ground stuff is different than what can be seen from the cockpit. BVR is ideal of course because something like an F-22 could smoke something before the other guy even knows he's around. That guy would only get an indication of an incoming missile at some point, and have to scramble to avoid being blown out of the air.
The most vulnerable time for any aircraft with stealth capabilities is when the weapons bay is open or when the landing gear is down. That's supposedly the primary reason why an F-117 was shot down, besides a lot of hubris.
Watching it almost just “snap” into position or seemingly “drift” mid air when they perform a high speed maneuver is mesmerizing.
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