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Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch
I've never bought the Super Hornet argument based on the oh well it should be an easy transition because its a you know. Hornet.
Its got completely different avionics, a different power plant, its a larger airframe with different flight characteristics.
Its not like you can take a F-18 pilot and throw him in a super hornet and its fine.
Its not like you can take regular f-18 parts and toss it into this new jet.
As well, its at best a transitional fighter, that's fine if your America where you can afford to go through multiple purchases. The Standard for Canada seems to be a 30 year purchasing barrier.
Strategically Canada is actually downsizing their airforce, going from I think 85 fighters down to a airforce with about 60 fighters in it. Because of that you need the maximum effective fighter. Like it or not that's the F-35. while the F-18 is low observable for example the F-35 is stealth and next generation in terms of interoperability.
As well people ask me all the time about the one engine versus two argument and its pretty irrelevant to me, Its getting fairly rare that you see engine failures in flight with advanced single engine fighters. As well the engine replacement on the F-35 is suppossed to be fairly quick.
I like the Super Hornet. But in the case of a very small airforce that's expected to hold on to an airframe for multiple decades and can frankly be upgraded to fight future wars, a plane like the F-35 is probably the best bet. You can't go the budget option in my mind.
Also if you look at the 1977 purchase of the CF-18 at $35,000,000 per copy, in todays dollars that's something like $128 million dollars
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Stealth is becoming less and less of a factor as militaries are using different bands of RADAR to detect stealth aircraft. The F22 was tracked by French RADAR years ago as it flew to the Farnborough airshow. Stealth is not infallible and when you strip that strength away from the F35 and you are left with a plane that can't run, can't turn, can't climb and can't dog fight. It's payload is only better than the Gripen, it's single engine has been catching fire lately, produces a massive IR signature that makes it a great target for even older generation heat seeking missiles and can't be transported on the Greyhound transport plane to US carriers.
Next generation anti radiation missiles like the Meteor cannot fit in its bays leaving it stuck with older missiles like the AMRAAM. The carrier version suffers from a weak tail hook (something canadian jets need for northern operations), and the RADAR absorbent skin is easily damaged by salt water and cold climates. The proposed parachute pod increases its RADAR cross section and reduces range by increasing drag.
Worst of all, the F35 relies on the F22 for cover during operations as it is terrible at air superiority missions (that's from General Hostage himself). The ratio for hours flying to hours grounded for maintenance is the worst out of the fighters competing for replacement. That means more time parked on the Tarmac, less time in the sky compared to other fighters. Canada would lose its ability to train its own pilots and would rely on US training instead.
The F35 is an expensive, slow, sluggish lemon. The increased communications abilities are a myth, all NATO aircraft can communicate with each other with the updated comms suite data links except for the F22 as it has its own comms suite and must relay through a third party. The recent campaigns in Libya and Ukraine have demonstrated interoperability between coalition aircraft of all kinds.
65 aircraft are not enough, especially given the downtime of the aircraft and attrition.
Finally, the economic returns are not great. Nations that were on the fence like Japan received big financial incentives to get on board while small partners like Canada did not. Two other aircraft manufacturers Saab and Dassault are offering full data codes and the ability to build our own aircraft. This is beneficial on numerous levels especially with allowing Canadian aviation firms the ability to build an aircraft already developed and gain expertise as well as altering the aircraft to Canadian specs through the data codes.
The F35 is no good.