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F-35 Beaten By F-16 In Simulated Dogfight

PoS

PoS

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https://medium.com/war-is-boring/test-pilot-admits-the-f-35-can-t-dogfight-cdb9d11a875

The F-35 was flying “clean,” with no weapons in its bomb bay or under its wings and fuselage. The F-16, by contrast, was hauling two bulky underwing drop tanks, putting the older jet at an aerodynamic disadvantage.

But the JSF’s advantage didn’t actually help in the end. The stealth fighter proved too sluggish to reliably defeat the F-16, even with the F-16 lugging extra fuel tanks. “Even with the limited F-16 target configuration, the F-35A remained at a distinct energy disadvantage for every engagement,” the pilot reported.

“Insufficient pitch rate.” “Energy deficit to the bandit would increase over time.” “The flying qualities in the blended region (20–26 degrees AoA) were not intuitive or favorable.”


The F-35 jockey tried to target the F-16 with the stealth jet’s 25-millimeter cannon, but the smaller F-16 easily dodged. “Instead of catching the bandit off-guard by rapidly pull aft to achieve lead, the nose rate was slow, allowing him to easily time his jink prior to a gun solution,” the JSF pilot complained.


And when the pilot of the F-16 turned the tables on the F-35, maneuvering to put the stealth plane in his own gunsight, the JSF jockey found he couldn’t maneuver out of the way, owing to a “lack of nose rate.”
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Ouch. This is the world's most expensive weapons system and cant even beat a 70's era fighter? This thing needs to get canceled. :doh
 
PoS said:
https://medium.com/war-is-boring/test-pilot-admits-the-f-35-can-t-dogfight-cdb9d11a875



Ouch. This is the world's most expensive weapons system and cant even beat a 70's era fighter? This thing needs to get canceled. :doh
Click to expand...

Some things to understand: the F-35 is a BVR(beyond visual range) aircraft, the exercise was WVR. Basically, in very artificial circumstances, at a range the F-16 is designed and excels at, with a pilot who is intimately familiar with the F-16, going against an aircraft that is supposed to kill enemy aircraft before they ever get to that range(and is very capable of doing just that), with a pilot who has a ****load fewer hours in that aircraft, the F-16 won. It is certainly an issue, but it is not nearly the issue that many are trying to make this out to be(this happened last month IIRC, and there has been a ton of talk on it). AF-2, the F-35 prototype used for the exercise, lacked stealth coating, mission, sensor and weapon systems that would have afforded off-boresight missile shots.

Now, it is important to note that there was one very real, very significant problem that the exercise found, which was poor kinematics. In other words, it moved like a brick. Not a fatal flaw, and these exercises are to find issues so they can be fixes, but a flaw nonetheless.
 
AH, here it is, an article from a couple weeks ago(opinion piece, take it for what it is worth) on this, presenting a different view from the OP:

Why The "F-35 v F-16" Article Is Garbage | Fighter Sweep

So while this particular article may lead you to believe the two aircraft went out there mano y mano and duked it out, the reality is that we don’t know where each deficiency was found. My guess is the critiques on the pitch rates for gunning and abilities to jink happened in the canned offensive and defensive setups. But one has to remember this is a test platform and they were out to get test data, not find out who the king of the mountain is.

The article talks about energy bleed rates, high-Alpha maneuvering, and the F-35 pilot’s “only winning move” to threaten with the nose at high angle of attack. What does that sound like?

To me, it sounds like a Hornet fighting a Viper. Of course, a Hornet is not going to do well against an F-16 in a sustained rate fight. Its strength is to get slow and use its angle of attack advantage, much like the F-35 did here. It also bleeds energy rapidly and struggles to get it back once bled down. The fact the heavier, drag-encumbered F-35 had this problem is not surprising to me–despite its monstrous amount of available thrust, and it doesn’t mean much in the grand scheme of things.
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Redress said:
Some things to understand: the F-35 is a BVR(beyond visual range) aircraft, the exercise was WVR. Basically, in very artificial circumstances, at a range the F-16 is designed and excels at, with a pilot who is intimately familiar with the F-16, going against an aircraft that is supposed to kill enemy aircraft before they ever get to that range(and is very capable of doing just that), with a pilot who has a ****load fewer hours in that aircraft, the F-16 won. It is certainly an issue, but it is not nearly the issue that many are trying to make this out to be(this happened last month IIRC, and there has been a ton of talk on it). AF-2, the F-35 prototype used for the exercise, lacked stealth coating, mission, sensor and weapon systems that would have afforded off-boresight missile shots.

Now, it is important to note that there was one very real, very significant problem that the exercise found, which was poor kinematics. In other words, it moved like a brick. Not a fatal flaw, and these exercises are to find issues so they can be fixes, but a flaw nonetheless.
Click to expand...
Well this kind of reminds me about the F-4 Phantom when they first deployed it for combat. I read that they didnt bother to put in a cannon on the first versions because they felt that dogfighting was an outdated concept and enemy aircraft would be shot out of the sky by the F-4's missiles before they could get close. Then all of a sudden our planes were getting shot down left and right in Vietnam and the top brass realized their mistake and began to teach pilots how to dogfight again as well as putting in an internal gun for the new versions of the Phantom. Its beginning to feel that way all over again.
 
PoS said:
Well this kind of reminds me about the F-4 Phantom when they first deployed it for combat. I read that they didnt bother to put in a cannon on the first versions because they felt that dogfighting was an outdated concept and enemy aircraft would be shot out of the sky by the F-4's missiles before they could get close. Then all of a sudden our planes were getting shot down left and right in Vietnam and the top brass realized their mistake and began to teach pilots how to dogfight again as well as putting in an internal gun for the new versions of the Phantom. Its beginning to feel that way all over again.
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Several things in that. First is that the F04 rarely used it's cannot in air to air combat. Secondly, the situation is significantly changed from Vietnam where visual confirmation of target was required, and AIMs where notoriously unreliable. And lastly, the F-35 can dogfight. This example is of an F-35 taking on a dedicated dogfight aircraft, fighting the F-16 with one arm tied behind it's back(without the avionics it cannot score on anything other than what would be a gun hit, despite reality being it could fire on anything in front of it).

There are things you an take away from this exercise. That is why they do these type exercises. But the truth is it would have been shocking if the F-35 would have done well against an F-16 with an experienced pilot in a dogfight situation without missiles.
 
What I wanna know is what ever happened to the F19-34..... and how much did that cost!
 
Redress said:
Some things to understand: the F-35 is a BVR(beyond visual range) aircraft, the exercise was WVR. Basically, in very artificial circumstances, at a range the F-16 is designed and excels at, with a pilot who is intimately familiar with the F-16, going against an aircraft that is supposed to kill enemy aircraft before they ever get to that range(and is very capable of doing just that), with a pilot who has a ****load fewer hours in that aircraft, the F-16 won. It is certainly an issue, but it is not nearly the issue that many are trying to make this out to be(this happened last month IIRC, and there has been a ton of talk on it). AF-2, the F-35 prototype used for the exercise, lacked stealth coating, mission, sensor and weapon systems that would have afforded off-boresight missile shots.

Now, it is important to note that there was one very real, very significant problem that the exercise found, which was poor kinematics. In other words, it moved like a brick. Not a fatal flaw, and these exercises are to find issues so they can be fixes, but a flaw nonetheless.
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Well said. The F-35 takes essentially a sniper type approach, while the F-15 likes to get get up close and personal. This was an up close and personal test, so it's not truly indicative of what the F-35 can do. Take the F-16 into a tank killing exercise against an A-10 and the A-10 would dominate the field like no one's business simply because it's doing what it's designed for, while the F-16 isn't. This was a definitive "apples and oranges" test and people are complaining because they didn't like the apple pie they got when they made it with oranges.
 
faithful_servant said:
Well said. The F-35 takes essentially a sniper type approach, while the F-15 likes to get get up close and personal. This was an up close and personal test, so it's not truly indicative of what the F-35 can do. Take the F-16 into a tank killing exercise against an A-10 and the A-10 would dominate the field like no one's business simply because it's doing what it's designed for, while the F-16 isn't. This was a definitive "apples and oranges" test and people are complaining because they didn't like the apple pie they got when they made it with oranges.
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Nonsense. The F-35 program has already been outdated, and is a PR and financial disaster. Already, UMAV,s are taking center stage in the world, to the extent that it is hard to train enough "pilots" to keep breast with the world reality.

The F-35 naval version would be a disaster against China, as its limited radius would throw it back to inconsequential distances. Its "dogfighting abilities" are already of no consequence due to the range of smart, and not quite so smart, missile systems.

The benefits of the F-35 program flow to pork-barrel, partisan precipitants, not to any sort of national defense.
 
Seems like a no-brainer to defeat f35s in combat. Just send a bunch of inexpensive drones after them.

Then once the f35s exhaust all their missiles by shooting them down, send in some old 4th generation fighters or non-stealth fighters (Typhoon, Mig-29a, Su-27. . .) to mop them up.
 
Redress said:
Some things to understand: the F-35 is a BVR(beyond visual range) aircraft, the exercise was WVR. Basically, in very artificial circumstances, at a range the F-16 is designed and excels at, with a pilot who is intimately familiar with the F-16, going against an aircraft that is supposed to kill enemy aircraft before they ever get to that range(and is very capable of doing just that), with a pilot who has a ****load fewer hours in that aircraft, the F-16 won. It is certainly an issue, but it is not nearly the issue that many are trying to make this out to be(this happened last month IIRC, and there has been a ton of talk on it). AF-2, the F-35 prototype used for the exercise, lacked stealth coating, mission, sensor and weapon systems that would have afforded off-boresight missile shots.

Now, it is important to note that there was one very real, very significant problem that the exercise found, which was poor kinematics. In other words, it moved like a brick. Not a fatal flaw, and these exercises are to find issues so they can be fixes, but a flaw nonetheless.
Click to expand...

There is a reason there are still guns on fighter aircraft. While it may maneuver like a brick my question to you is this does the f-35 have enough thrust and acceleration to allow it to disengage from an unfavorable engagement? Everything I have seen points to no. That means it is fatally flawed. The F-4 was a brick but it could disengage if need be. It epitomized the zoom and boom style of fighter, where a F-16 is the Turn and Burn icon. The F-15 was a league of its own for its time, with the F-22 taking that spot now. BVR capability is nice to have but most engagements happen at knife range because of the usual ROE requiring VID on potential bandits. BVR is good for unlimited warfare with proper support like AWACS and such. VID range is not the range against a potential opponent the F-35 should be at.
 
PoS said:
Well this kind of reminds me about the F-4 Phantom when they first deployed it for combat. I read that they didnt bother to put in a cannon on the first versions because they felt that dogfighting was an outdated concept and enemy aircraft would be shot out of the sky by the F-4's missiles before they could get close. Then all of a sudden our planes were getting shot down left and right in Vietnam and the top brass realized their mistake and began to teach pilots how to dogfight again as well as putting in an internal gun for the new versions of the Phantom. Its beginning to feel that way all over again.
Click to expand...

Left and right? In dogfights? No.

During the Vietnam War, thousands of U.S. aircraft were lost to antiaircraft artillery (AAA), surface-to-air missiles (SAMs), and fighter interceptors (MiG)s. The great majority of U.S. combat losses in all areas of Southeast Asia were to AAA.

F-4 Phantom II-- --445 total, 382 in combat
-First loss was operational (non-combat), F-4C 64-0674 (45TH TFS, 15th TFW) which ran out of fuel after strike in SVN on 9 June 1965; first combat loss F-4C 64-0685 (45th TFS, 15th TFW) shot down Ta Chan, NW NVN on 20 June 1965. 9 of the losses were parked aircraft struck by rockets.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aircraft_losses_of_the_Vietnam_War
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On the other hand, the other side...who had far fewer air assets:

North Vietnamese aircraft[edit]

MiG-21 №4326, which shot down 13 aircraft during war
Fixed-wing losses[edit]
Claimed by VPAF: 154 MiG aircraft lost through all causes, including 131 in air combat (includes 63 MiG-17s, 8 MiG-19s and 60 MiG-21s)[9]

Claimed by U.S (air-to-air combat only)[10]

Antonov An-2 2
Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-17 100
Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-19 10
Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-21 86
At least two North Vietnamese MiGs were admitted to have been downed by U.S. Navy warships.

People's Republic of China aircraft[edit]
Fixed-wing losses[edit]
MiG-17 Fresco 1 thought to be shot down[11]
Click to expand...
 
PirateMk1 said:
There is a reason there are still guns on fighter aircraft. While it may maneuver like a brick my question to you is this does the f-35 have enough thrust and acceleration to allow it to disengage from an unfavorable engagement? Everything I have seen points to no. That means it is fatally flawed. The F-4 was a brick but it could disengage if need be. It epitomized the zoom and boom style of fighter, where a F-16 is the Turn and Burn icon. The F-15 was a league of its own for its time, with the F-22 taking that spot now. BVR capability is nice to have but most engagements happen at knife range because of the usual ROE requiring VID on potential bandits. BVR is good for unlimited warfare with proper support like AWACS and such. VID range is not the range against a potential opponent the F-35 should be at.
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The F-35 engines look to produce significantly more thrust than the similar weight f-18E. Any battle outside of ambush will have EW air assets, making VID a nonissue(plus other stuff we can't get into).

To be blunt, I am not entirely sold on the F-35, but, and this is the important part, the exercise talked about in the OP is not why. That is a nonissue.
 
Mycroft said:
Left and right? In dogfights? No.

On the other hand, the other side...who had far fewer air assets:
Click to expand...

Thats not what it says on this wikipedia entry:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mikoyan-Gurevich_MiG-21

The U.S Air Force and the U.S. Navy continued to lay down great expectations on the F4 Phantom, assuming that the massive firepower, the best available on-board radar, the highest speed and acceleration properties, coupled with new tactics would provide Phantoms with an advantage over the MiGs. But in confrontations with the lighter MiG-21, F-4s began to suffer losses. From May to December 1966, the U.S. air forces lost 47 aircraft, destroying only 12 NVAF fighters in return. From April 1965 to November 1968, over 268 air battles occurred over the skies of North Vietnam. North Vietnam claimed 244 downed U.S. aircraft, while admitting to the loss of 85 MiGs.[41]

After a million sorties and nearly 1,000 US aircraft losses, Operation Rolling Thunder came to an end on 1 November 1968.[42] A poor air-to-air combat loss-exchange ratios against the smaller, more agile enemy MiGs during the early part of the Vietnam War eventually led the USN to create their Navy Fighter Weapons School, also known as "TOPGUN" at Naval Air Station Miramar, California on 3 March 1969.
Click to expand...
 
Redress said:
Some things to understand: the F-35 is a BVR(beyond visual range) aircraft, the exercise was WVR. Basically, in very artificial circumstances, at a range the F-16 is designed and excels at, with a pilot who is intimately familiar with the F-16, going against an aircraft that is supposed to kill enemy aircraft before they ever get to that range(and is very capable of doing just that), with a pilot who has a ****load fewer hours in that aircraft, the F-16 won. It is certainly an issue, but it is not nearly the issue that many are trying to make this out to be(this happened last month IIRC, and there has been a ton of talk on it). AF-2, the F-35 prototype used for the exercise, lacked stealth coating, mission, sensor and weapon systems that would have afforded off-boresight missile shots.

Now, it is important to note that there was one very real, very significant problem that the exercise found, which was poor kinematics. In other words, it moved like a brick. Not a fatal flaw, and these exercises are to find issues so they can be fixes, but a flaw nonetheless.
Click to expand...

1. The F35 is supposed to be an air dominance platform. Then we tried to load it up with everything else under the sun (OH, It will also be a bomber, and it will do EW, and it can be its own intelligence analyst. I'm surprised no one has proposed making it a troop carrier), and - astonishingly - it's ability to perform that mission degraded.

2. Unless we are in no-kidding WWIII where there are no ROE's, all engagement is done within visual range.


the situation is significantly changed from Vietnam where visual confirmation of target was required
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Talked to a Marine fighter pilot this morning on this exact question, and this is not correct (again, unless A: you are being actively engaged at BVR or B: it is a WWIII-No-ROE-Just-Kill-Everything scenario).
 
cpwill said:
1. The F35 is supposed to be an air dominance platform.
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Actually, with respect, it was designed from the beginning as a fighter bomber to compete in the JST (Joint Strike Fighter) program.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joint_Strike_Fighter_program

It was supposed to replace the F-16 for the Air Force, the F/A-18 for the Navy and the Harrier for the Marines. All of those are fighter bombers. The F-16 and the F/A-18 were actually created as lightweight fighters to supplement F-15's and F-14's way back when. They were supposed to be cheap fighter bombers to do the grunt work while the Eagles and Tomcats were supposed to keep the skies clear of enemy fighters (or, in the F-14's case, shoot down enemy bombers/missiles at extreme range with it's Phoenix missiles). Also, the F-14 was too large to fit on America's smaller carriers at that time, which was another mission for the F/A-18 (which had originally lost the Air Force competition with the F-16 - when it was called the F-17. But they re-did it, called it the F/A-18 and sold it to the Navy/Marines).

So, from the beginning, the F-35 was supposed to replace these 'lightweight' fighter-bombers. And a fighter-bomber is another word for 'compromise' as it does neither mission exceptionally well. The F-16 was no match for the F-15 in air combat just as the F-35 is no match for the F-22 in air combat.

I compare the F-35 to the F-111 Aardvark from the 60's. At the time, it was designed to do a TON of things for most of the services. But it ended up fat, overweight and pricey and doing few things well - so it was purchased as just a bomber (and a very good bomber for it's size - basically the F-15 Strike Eagle's forerunner).

Unfortunately, because they decided to make the F-35 (or the Boeing X-32 if it had won the JSF competition) stealthy, that automatically rocketed it's price to the Moon. And it is pretty silly to make a fighter-bomber stealthy unless you can make it fairly cheaply.
Now, the F-35 makes some sense for the Navy as it does not have a big brother to clear the skies for it. But making the F-35 stealthy makes little sense for the Air Force or Marines.
First, the F-22 will clear the skies for the Air Force, so it is highly unlikely the F-35 is going to have to use it's stealthiness that often. Plus, most of the targets America looks like it will be taking on in the near (at least) future do not even possess radar guided missiles (ISIL certainly doesn't - or if so, VERY few). And radar guided missiles are just about the only thing (outside of some advanced radar-guided AA gun platforms like the ZSU-23-4) that stealth is for as stealthiness is near useless again heat seeking missiles and most AA guns...especially those that can actually visually see the target.
And stealth is TOTALLY useless against ground pounding missions - the type that most Marine F-35's will probably be called upon to do - as the enemy can clearly see the plane as it attacks.
Plus Stealth technology is still very expensive and difficult to maintain/service.
Stealth makes sense for recon, deep/pinpoint strike and air superiority. But not much sense (considering the cost and maintenance drawbacks) for typical fighter-bomber missions when air superiority has already been gained.

Imo, that is why the F-35 has skyrocketed in price - it is trying to be too many things and it is stealthy.

I think they should buy a few F-35C's for the Navy to supplement the F/A-18E/F/G's (though that is not my first choice) for air superiority missions and/or strikes at high value targets (except for the fact it has only one engine and the Navy FAR prefer twin engines for added safety margins when flying over oceans far from bases). And also the F-35B's makes sense for the Marines since there is no other V/STOL replacement for the Harrier out there (to my knowledge). But for the Air Force, it makes little sense as it is FAR too expensive. I say dump the F-35A for the Air Force and just upgrade the F-16 some more and buy more of those (though, again, not my first choice)...as I think they are generally excellent for the job, even today. Sending F-35's to blow up ISIS targets is ridiculous overkill (financially). And highly dangerous as one could easily get shot down on a low level mission and they could grab the plane wreckage and sell the tech to the highest bidder. Other then the F-117 shot down over what used to be Yugoslavia, I do not believe another American stealth, manned, combat aircraft has been shot down. And the F-117 was older stealth technology anyway.
 
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Ganesh said:
Nonsense. The F-35 program has already been outdated, and is a PR and financial disaster. Already, UMAV,s are taking center stage in the world, to the extent that it is hard to train enough "pilots" to keep breast with the world reality.

The F-35 naval version would be a disaster against China, as its limited radius would throw it back to inconsequential distances. Its "dogfighting abilities" are already of no consequence due to the range of smart, and not quite so smart, missile systems.

The benefits of the F-35 program flow to pork-barrel, partisan precipitants, not to any sort of national defense.
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I made no comments whatsoever about the quality of the F-35, my focus was on the crappy test. Maybe you should slow down and read what you're replying to without trying to read my mind (which, based on your reply, would make you telepathically illiterate).
 
PoS said:
https://medium.com/war-is-boring/test-pilot-admits-the-f-35-can-t-dogfight-cdb9d11a875



Ouch. This is the world's most expensive weapons system and cant even beat a 70's era fighter? This thing needs to get canceled. :doh
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Here is an even bigger question to me... why was the F-35 trying to dogfight in the first place?

It is a Stealth Fighter, is it not? It should be trying to use that Stealth to it's maximum advantage, then pop off a missile at the last minute to give as little warning as possible. And if detected, try to vanish again.

Not to mention that the F-16 was originally designed as an Air Superiority Fighter, and the F-35 is a Multi-Role Fighter. So in reality, this is not really much of a surprise at all.

In this kind of engagement, you are playing against the weaknesses of the F-35, and into the strengths of the F-16.
 
Oozlefinch said:
Here is an even bigger question to me... why was the F-35 trying to dogfight in the first place?

It is a Stealth Fighter, is it not? It should be trying to use that Stealth to it's maximum advantage, then pop off a missile at the last minute to give as little warning as possible. And if detected, try to vanish again.

Not to mention that the F-16 was originally designed as an Air Superiority Fighter, and the F-35 is a Multi-Role Fighter. So in reality, this is not really much of a surprise at all.

In this kind of engagement, you are playing against the weaknesses of the F-35, and into the strengths of the F-16.
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There is an answer to your question: it gives a good look at how the plane handles in high stress engagements. There are a number of areas that they are looking for ways to improve the F-35, starting with the powerplant. Testing is inherently a good thing, as long as you do not misconstrue what the test means(which is my problem with people's reactions to this).
 
Redress said:
There is an answer to your question: it gives a good look at how the plane handles in high stress engagements. There are a number of areas that they are looking for ways to improve the F-35, starting with the powerplant. Testing is inherently a good thing, as long as you do not misconstrue what the test means(which is my problem with people's reactions to this).
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Exactly.

Any time you place "multi-role" against "speciaty", the specialty aircraft is going to have an advantage. Even when there is a generational difference, the specialization will often times eliminate many of those advantages. Far to many people simply hate the F-35, and will take anything they can to try and belittle it simply because of their hatred for it (MIC, money better to welfare, etc).

Hell, if somebody wants to see how useless a stealth fighter can be in a dogfight, why not put an F-117 against an F-16?
 
Oozlefinch said:
Exactly.

Any time you place "multi-role" against "speciaty", the specialty aircraft is going to have an advantage. Even when there is a generational difference, the specialization will often times eliminate many of those advantages. Far to many people simply hate the F-35, and will take anything they can to try and belittle it simply because of their hatred for it (MIC, money better to welfare, etc).

Hell, if somebody wants to see how useless a stealth fighter can be in a dogfight, why not put an F-117 against an F-16?
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I am not convinced that when the F-35 is done and ready it won't take the F-16 in anything but a gun fight. The 35 should bleed speed better and anything in the forward arc when it is fully kitted with an avionics package(it did not have any of the weapons systems avionics installed for this test) should be a kill. ASQ-239 should also be vastly superior to anything the F-16 carries(which from what I understand sucks without having a pod ALQ).
 
Redress said:
I am not convinced that when the F-35 is done and ready it won't take the F-16 in anything but a gun fight. The 35 should bleed speed better and anything in the forward arc when it is fully kitted with an avionics package(it did not have any of the weapons systems avionics installed for this test) should be a kill. ASQ-239 should also be vastly superior to anything the F-16 carries(which from what I understand sucks without having a pod ALQ).
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My concern is the opposition that it is supposed to match up against. The MIG 29 series and the SU 27-33-35 series and the newer Russian stuff aren't jokes, their designers weren't swilling the vodka when they made these machines which are very good and have some good properties and they were doing all aspect vectored thrust off bore sight capable missiles with helmet sights longer than we have by quite a bit. Their thermal detection gear is very good. I understand that the radar and electronic kit the F-35 is supposed to have is cutting edge stuff, but is it far enough advanced to give this airframe a significant advantage over its advisories. I wonder.
 
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