Interesting about the Raptor!

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seekerof

for once I agree with Seeker...Emoticons are not a suficient way to show your opinion about this article.

Edit for some feedback on the article:

The F-15C is alot cheaper than the F/A-22 right? the F-15 is no where near the claimed 140mil, I believe an F-15C with the latest avionics go for about 60~80mil tops if my memory serves me.

The article also claimed the F-22 can do a Cobra, no biggie, we all knew that it could, still interesting.

[edit on 29/6/2005 by GrOuNd_ZeRo]

Actually that was an old test, from sometime last year or really early this year I think. I heard about this a couple of months ago.

As far as the cost of an F-15C.
(F-15A/B) $27.9 million [1998$]
(F-15C/D) $29.9 million [1998$]

And from June of 2000
A USAF-commissioned study conducted by Boeing's Phantom Works, St. Louis, Missouri, reported that new manufacturing technologies should enable the Boeing Company to reduce the cost of building F-15 fighters, and many other aircraft, by half.

Originally posted by GrOuNd_ZeRo
The F-15C is alot cheaper than the F/A-22 right? the F-15 is no where near the claimed 140mil, I believe an F-15C with the latest avionics go for about 60~80mil tops if my memory serves me.
[edit on 29/6/2005 by GrOuNd_ZeRo]

I have read in a few places that the projected cost of upgrading the F-15 fleet to the most modern state possable would cost about 90% of what it would cost to just replace them with Raptors.

I'll try to find the link on that one.

I know Korea is paying over $4 billion for like 40 of them. But that's not really a fair example, because they also bought the license to build them as F-15Ks. They're buying the first of them from Boeing, then once their plant is up and running they'll build them there.

Originally posted by Zaphod58
Actually that was an old test, from sometime last year or really early this year I think. I heard about this a couple of months ago.

As far as the cost of an F-15C.
(F-15A/B) $27.9 million [1998$]
(F-15C/D) $29.9 million [1998$]

And from June of 2000
A USAF-commissioned study conducted by Boeing's Phantom Works, St. Louis, Missouri, reported that new manufacturing technologies should enable the Boeing Company to reduce the cost of building F-15 fighters, and many other aircraft, by half.

According to the article the Airforce tested what was essentially 2 raptors against 8 Eagles, maybe they figure 4 F15C/D's at 30M a pop is 120M, or we can have 1 raptor for 130 which can do the same work? I dont know if that how they think, I cant imagine they do but I dont know?

I just didnt quite this part of the story. 100M is just slighty more and then there is the development costs.

"The aircraft are priced at approximately $130 million each, not including the development costs. This is slightly more than a brand-new F-15C, Fergione said."

I guess in time they will become less expensive but maybe not?


[edit on 30-6-2005 by warpboost]

I would say that $130 million is just SLIGHTLY more than a new F-15C. heh I don't know where they got their figures from but they were way off. If American Mad Man is right, THEN the F-15 goes up to $117 million. I don't know if it would go THAT high from $30, but then I'm not sure how much the AESA radar and other things would add to it. With the new ways of building, and other cost cutting measures, I don't think it would go that high, but I could very easily be wrong.

what gets me everytime they seem to test the raptor againest another group of planes the entire battle is over in like 5 min. thats freakin fast. i dont care about how much it cost if you guys argue over that and this plane is able to distory 8 planes that in actual combat have a 100 kills to no lose ratio. to me that tells me something.

Its very impressive, unfortunately we lack data on air combat with the russian equivelent or competitive aircraft.

Its very impressive, unfortunately we lack data on air combat with the russian equivelent or competitive aircraft.

It seems to me, since it's replacing the F-15, tests againist the 15 would be the most important test. If it flogs the airframe it's replacing then it's worth the cost. If we let increase in cost stop us, we would still be flying the F-4 Phantom. Everything I've heard and read tells me it's worth the extra money.

Originally posted by jimragan
It seems to me, since it's replacing the F-15, tests againist the 15 would be the most important test. If it flogs the airframe it's replacing then it's worth the cost.

You nailed it. If the F22 Spanks the F15 to embarrassment levels, then Id say it’s exactly what we need as the F15 has easily proven itself. I saw a History Channel piece with the pilots that flew in those F15's and they said they didn’t have a chance. They also mentioned they put some F16's up there as well and they were splashed in the same fashion.

You know, the article hinted at this as well: They F22 doesn’t actually need to shoot down all of its adversaries; it just needs to scare them from the air. If I was an enemy MiG pilot and I knew there were Raptors in the air, I would be nervous to go up there. The physiological value is huge. If you think for a second the USA hasn’t made sure its potential enemies haven’t caught wind of those results you’re kidding yourself. That’s no accident.

But we all forget one crucial thing here: Enemy fighters will never be the F22’s biggest challenge. SAM’s will be. And I think other nations have all but conceded the F22’s air dominance by focusing more on SAM’s than better planes. Don’t get me wrong, there are some nice planes out there. But nothing even remotely close to the F22 will be in operation for quite some time.

Yup, SAM’s are a threat to our aircraft if we ever need to perform a mission into a modern battlefield with some half decent SAMs, our legacy fighters just woulden't cut it. We will have to rely on our stealth bombers to take out the SAM’s before we can engage in A2A combat. The Raptor can do both of those things it can take out targets the bombers can and it can also shoot down enemy fighters in the process and its probably not going to get shot down doing it.

What makes this exercise more interesting is that all the F-15s were being flown by Raptor pilots, so they'd know what to expect and the capabilities of the F-22s they were up against.

What makes this exercise more interesting is that all the F-15s were being flown by Raptor pilots,

Yup, and they still got their A kicked by one Raptor.

Originally posted by WestPoint23
Yup, and they still got their A kicked by one Raptor.

Actually there were 4 (although two held back in support positions). Just making a little nitpick

There was a 1v4, and a 2v8 engagement. In both of them, the Eagles didn't last long enough to even get close to visual range before they were all dead. The two in support positions were just there, in support of. They never had to do anything but bore holes in the sky. It was the most one sided loss ever for the Eagle.