F35 - Bad idea made worse over time?

[Staggerwing]

Do they mix in flakes of Invisibilium and Disappearium?

[mirth]

Do they mix in flakes of Invisibilium and Disappearium?

I don't see why they wouldn't.

[GDS_Starfury]

you can do this with special commercial automotive paint by changing the voltage:

it wouldnt suprise me in the least to know that current military grade aviation paint has a number of materials as microparticles suspended in whatever medium that can do interesting things to the thermal and electronic properties of the plane.

[Mr. Bigglesworth]

Witchcraft!

[Staggerwing]

Witchcraft!

Quickly! Consult the The Malleus Maleficarum!

[mirth]

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/12/26/newest-u-s-stealth-fighter-10-years-behind-older-jets.html

http://foxtrotalpha.jalopnik.com/is-the-f-35s-targeting-system-really-10-years-behind-cu-1676442535/all

[GDS_Starfury]

I'll address the first article.
well fucking duh a bit of kit is going to be outdated.  however it will be fixed and brought up to spec.  what I found interesting is that all of the technology being talked about concerns externally mounted pods being compared to the F-35 internal sensors.  take off the pods, which arent carried by every plane, and those legacy aircraft are now behind the 35.  its a bullshit comparison.  there is no external store that is in operational use today that the F-35 cant carry and use.  that being said the whole idea of the fraking plane is to not use external stores so it can be stealthy.  stealthy: not a trick Tornado's and F-18s are very good at.
and then theres this fucking nugget of stupidity:

One Air Force official said that with enough time and more money, the EOTS could be fixed. "Because in five years when the USAF [US Air Force] comes to Lockheed Martin and says we absolutely need an upgraded EOTS with an infrared pointer and [video down-link], Lockheed Martin says... OK no sweat, that'll be $5 million per jet," the Air Force official said. "Thus lies the problem in the U.S. military industrial complex. They purposefully build products that require mass amounts of money to 'upgrade' when in fact, they could have planned ahead and built an easily upgradable ship / aircraft / radio / weapon system."

the whole fucking cost overrun problem with the program is they've been trying to build the final version first!
FFS!
care to guess how much money has been spent on F-15, F-16 and F-18 upgrades over the last..... shit... 40 years.  hell, a couple of years ago we re-winged the whole A-10 fleet at $3 million a pop just in time to retire them.
if these asshole had just bought the damn thing and had it in service 10 years ago this whole fucking bit of cunty poofiness wouldnt even exist.

[GDS_Starfury]

2nd article:

You would think that over the last decade retrofitting this somewhat simple capability into the F-35 would have been a top priority, but to this day there are no apparent plans to fit the F-35 with ROVER or anything else like it.

and in a low threat environment like A-stan the F-35 can carry the same pods so theres no reason to refit this internally and delay the plane more and drive the cost up.

[mirth]

I'll address the first article.
well fucking duh a bit of kit is going to be outdated.  however it will be fixed and brought up to spec.  what I found interesting is that all of the technology being talked about concerns externally mounted pods being compared to the F-35 internal sensors.  take off the pods, which arent carried by every plane, and those legacy aircraft are now behind the 35.  its a bullshit comparison.  there is no external store that is in operational use today that the F-35 cant carry and use.  that being said the whole idea of the fraking plane is to not use external stores so it can be stealthy.  stealthy: not a trick Tornado's and F-18s are very good at.

The point is that the 35 is supposed to supplant other types in the CAS role. It's going to have to carry external sensors and weapons in that role to equal the capabilities of other types that are currently in service. And you're wrong that it can currently use the all the same current external stores. It can't but could with more time and money pumped into it.

In the end, one would think that adding an advanced targeting pod to the F-35's external stores list would be a no-brainer and satisfy many of these concerns, but I have a feeling that doing so would put Lockheed and the JSF program into a place of trying to explain why a very unstealthy targeting pod is now an option on their stealthy and very expensive jet fighter that supposedly fields this capability internally. So far the program has a had real challenges being open and honest with the public about its trials and tribulations, with much of the media being blacked out on direct access to the program as a whole. So it is doubtful that admitting their own aircraft's limitations, along with coming up with novel solutions for those limitations, will happen anytime soon.

[GDS_Starfury]

neither article states that the F-35 cant carry the pods.  they both compare current external pods to the 35's internal sensor suite.

[mirth]

2nd article:

You would think that over the last decade retrofitting this somewhat simple capability into the F-35 would have been a top priority, but to this day there are no apparent plans to fit the F-35 with ROVER or anything else like it.

and in a low threat environment like A-stan the F-35 can carry the same pods so theres no reason to refit this internally and delay the plane more and drive the cost up.

The 2nd article isn't making a case for refitting the internal sensors, though the author acknowledges that is one option.

What is not acceptable is deploying the F-35 to provide precision close air support in a permissible air combat environment, as we have done for the last decade and a half, and have it rely on its clearly limited internal targeting systems. But seeing as the F-35 will replace so many other aircraft, such as the F-16, supposedly the A-10, not to mention the Hornet and the Harrier, it will have to be able to provide an equal or superior capability mix. Thus hanging a state-of-the-art targeting pod off the jet's wing, and integrating into the 'sensor fuzed' F-35 pilot interface, will be an absolute must if the EOTS system cannot be upgraded and a video downlink added. Still, just going with the pod would probably be a much cheaper and future-proof option.

[GDS_Starfury]

you also have no argument for my point, which is this:  at some point you have to freeze a design in order to move forward and have that design grow.  at this point every fuckstick in the Pentagon has held up the F-35 program with a interest study.  theres probably some butter bar butthead grunt, whos a mouth breather, that wanted to know if the damn plane could microwave his God damned MRE from 35000 feet.  and that fuckstick cost the taxpayer $350,000 in research costs and held the plane up by 2 months.

now dont piss me off.
I found the gloves.

[GDS_Starfury]

one could also take a step back and realize that the sensors being complained about are still better then everyone elses.  8)
they seemed to do a pretty good job in both Gulf Wars and were designed to crush the Soviets running across West Germany.

[mirth]

neither article states that the F-35 cant carry the pods.  they both compare current external pods to the 35's internal sensor suite.

Because the internal sensor suite was supposed to replace external pods.

Show me proof that right now the F-35 can use the latest USAF external targeting pod without any additional time or cost. It can't and it's supposed to be the aircraft that can replace all other types in the CAS role.

[GDS_Starfury]

God damn kids and their apps today.

app this and app that and stick an app up your ass ya hipster poof!

back in Smucks day they called in air support with a sextant and some purple smoke.

and hell!  in Windy's day planes werent even invented yet.

motherfucking kids want an app for air support.