new radar for GR4's

i cam across this and wondered what you guys thought.

www.qinetiq.com...

It would appear the tornados might be getting an AESA radar upgrade in the near future.

do hope so I also hread that they are looking at giving the tornado the EJ200 engines. Sorry no source

Paperplane_uk,

>>
I came across this and wondered what you guys thought.
>>

Utter waste of money and time.

The Tornado /retracts/ wing area to maintain cruise Mach point and so ends up with 150-200lb wingloading by the time it reaches medium altitude.

If it doesn't have 'adjustments' made to the centerline pylons, it cannot carry the three JDAM which are it's sole superiority over an F-16 with the APG-68V(9) and without winged/boosted IAM of /some/ kind, the ability to do longrange SAR mapping is kinda pointless.

The old TI GMR/TFR combination is dated. So too is the ENTIRE mission concept behind which the Tornado was created. We don't go in lolo anymore. And when we do, at night, the squint lines and LOS inhibits most of the functionality of the long range patch mapping modes anyway.

I would DITCH the Fin, as fast as possible, getting the retirement costs out of the way now, so as to be able to look at whatever combination of:

1. Big Wing Flubber + Rafale M/N

2. Big Wing Flubber + CORAX

3. Flubber + F-35C

4. F-35C + Flubber (reduced buy, ADF only) + CORAX/A-45

Combination I could afford to gain a real ability to hostage a 700-900nm radius with a weapons system that /started out/ as being compatible with longrange munitions. If you can't repackage ARTS into an XTRA type (conformal array) system for the next gen UCAV, it's worth little more than a COTS comparitive source for 'how the real world does things' on AMSAR which is developmental for Flubber 'some day' anyway.

i.e. ARTS stands to as a potential cost-cap pricing control alternative and/or (depending on who owns what) a means to secure AMSAR from the French. But it is not worth the effort to stuff it into an aging platform that was never _physically_ compatible with the medium altitude standoff role now seen as "Heck, maybe the Amis /were/ right..." standard.

Tornado is a pocket-111. Since the 111 is long gone _for cause_ (14,000ft ceiling with full weapons/fuel load) you might think about whether you want to play the 'five types for one AF' game with a state economy the size of California bankrolling your warchest.


KPl.

Paperplane


i have long since come to the conclusion that CH doesn`t like anything that flies.period.

as he has nothing good to say about any aircraft past , present or future.

Harlequin, I too have noticed this. I guess he must have a fear of flying. Or just a fear of planes in general. Nah, I'm just being silly. But yes, does have some kind of contempt for aircraft.

Do you guy's even read his posts? What a waste of time...

Tornado is a pocket-111

that quote says it all.

The Panavia Tornado is the class leader in low level bomb trucks - the F-15E is the US aircraft in the same class.

Not the aardvark

The aircraft in the same class as the F-111 would have been the TSR2 - yet that was cancelled in favour of the F-111K , which itself was cancelled.

And the TSR2 was better.

[edit on 3/3/06 by Harlequin]

ch1466 misses the obvious points, not least that RAF doesn't even use JDAM and that the RAF already has Tornados but not F-16s.

I don't think anyone can understand everything he says anyway, I'm sure it's deliberate to confuse people so they are bamboozeled enough to think he sounds like he knows exactly what he is on about when in actual fact it's probably just nonsensical fantasy that he makes up as he goes along. He probably gets some sort of kick out of talking gibberish or something but it really doesn't contribute much if no-one can understand what on earth he is on about half the time.

We have a word for people like that it starts with W and ends in R.

gentleman and ladies - CH1466 does have alot of good tech info BUT , there is also a heck of alot of bias and opinion mixed up in it - which is why people stop reading


words like `flubber` don`t bode well for a proffesional opinion.

Yes I agree, he does have some good information. However his pigeon talk combined with heavy use of acronyms and obvious bias/opinion make it hard for your average reader who is not versed well in military know how to understand WTF he is trying to say, and to distinguish between fact and opinion.

But can we get back to discussing the actual topic instead of another members post?

In a world where the airframe is increasingly just a delivery platform, the weapons sensors like AESA are ever more important. Thus the Tornado can be made relevant even in the 2020+ context. The Tornado, despite it's limitations, has major advantages over systems like F-16 in terms of load and low level ride, although it lacks the air-air swing. But a Tornado with AESA would certainly be better than an F-16 without as a bombtruck. IMO.

Have alway thought that the Tornado F3 would make a better strike plane, longer range due to the increased full load.

I'm sure taking the ground attack bit off the GR4 and "glueing" them on to the F3 would make for a interesting project.

If the GR4 / 5 will be around 2020, I wonder what the plane will evolve into over the next 14years.

RAB

I may be getting cynical with age but I tend to think they will just evolve into very old GR.4's