For DU'ers who know this stuff, what are the advantages of the F-35 over the F-22,

[speak easy]

(other than cost)

[RockRaven]

1. Approximately F-13

give or take... I'm not an expert on this kind of math.

[speak easy]

3. ...

[LymphocyteLover]

44. LOL!

[aikoaiko]

2. Bigger bombs that get dropped on people's heads.

But I'm no expert.

[albacore]

4. Forbes article says the F-35 doesn't do what it's supposed to do.

There is more bad shit than good shit on that $100-million-per-copy turkey.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidaxe/2021/02/23/the-us-air-force-just-admitted-the-f-35-stealth-fighter-has-failed/?sh=3fd4d57a1b16&utm_source=ForbesMainTwitter&utm_campaign=socialflowForbesMainTwitter&utm_medium=social

[GP6971]

5. with all the problems

I would say none.

[brush]

33. Yep, it's an absurdly over-priced dud that ironically was supposed to be...

multi-purpose and cheaper than the F-22 that can fly circles around it. It was also supposed to replace the A-10, the close air support aircraft of the Air Force but it doesn't do that well either. Previous fighters of the teen series, fourth generation (F-14, F-15, F-16 and F-18) fighters are also arguable better at fulfilling their role than the failed F-35 fifth generation fighter is.

[MarineCombatEngineer]

40. Huh?

It was also supposed to replace the A-10, the close air support aircraft of the Navy but it doesn't do that well either

The US Navy never operated the A-10 Thunderbolt, it was a USAF close ground support and armor busting attack aircraft that was only operated by the Air Force.

[Klaralven]

41. It's all due to a lot of bad bureaucratic regulation

The Air Force only flies fixed-wing aircraft, so they developed the A-10 for tank-busting. However, they consider that job beneath the proper function of an Air Force fighter pilot, so they don't like it. Instead, they want to bust tanks with a proper jet fighter like the F-16 or F-35 that can attain supersonic speeds.

The Army would probably like the A-10. At least the troops appreciate them. But the Army is forbidden from flying fixed-wing aircraft, so they develop their own very expensive, hard to maintain, and rather more vulnerable attack helicopters. The Army is permitted to fly, but only in a vehicle that is attempting to thrash itself apart.

The Navy can fly aircraft from carriers, but the planes need to not come apart when launched by catapult or when landed with a tailhook and arresting gear. So they are rather stronger and heavier in certain aspects than Air Force planes.

The Marines can fly aircraft as guest on the Navy carriers. However, they would like to have their own planes on their own vessels which don't have flight decks. Therefore, they want one that can take off and land vertically.

Some idiot decided to make the F-35 as a single design in three versions for the Air Force (F-35A), Navy (F-35C) and Marines (F-35B). It isn't good at any of the three jobs, and it is way too expensive. The F-35B is particularly poor, since if you add the weight of stuff to enable V/STOL, you no longer have as much range or payload.

[brush]

48. You're right. That of course should be close air support of the Air Force.

[fierywoman]

6. Are you talking about old fashioned f-stops on a camera lens?

[speak easy]

8. ...

F-22A

[fierywoman]

11. AH! Thanks. Got it.

[TrogL]

7. Well, the F35 started out being an inexpensive high-speed interceptor

Or something like that, then they decided to turn it into the Swiss Army Knife of aircraft. Hence, it does everything badly and weighs a ton more than it should.

[TomSlick]

9. I'm retired Army. I don't know from USAF fast movers.

But here's what I found.

[link:https://militarymachine.com/f-22-raptor-vs-f-35-lightning-ii/|

They both seem bloody expensive to me for something that can be brought down by a lucky shot from a cheap MANPADS.

[speak easy]

13. ty!

[msongs]

10. it's partially made in vermont? nt

[speak easy]

12. Heh!

[sheshe2]

16. And they call Vermont home.

Wonder what the price of housing is there.

[speak easy]

17. $27 an hour :)

[Happy Hoosier]

14. The F-35 has more modern and capable avionics.

The F-22 was built before the major shift in avionics design. The F-35 really does have remarkable avionics capabilities. It is, of course, very expensive and has had its share of teething problems. But I‘ve witnessed it in exercises and its a game changer.

[speak easy]

15. ty!

I've always thought the F-22 was a beautiful aircraft (although the stealth covering does it no favors in photos)

[sir pball]

24. Ehhhhhh sort of

I have friends in the defense industry, and all I know is what they're allowed to tell me - but the 22 was designed with all this in mind, it's not THAT much older. The 35 is a cheaper, less stealth-and-superiority capable airframe that's been sold as the "Gen 5 F-16". If we had properly invested in the 22, and started upgrading it now as it's due, we wouldn't be nearly in this pickle. But the corporations would have made less money.

[Happy Hoosier]

29. With all due respect...

I don’t have friends in the defense industry. I am in the defense industry and have worked on both planes from an avionics perspective.

The F-22 was designed for upgrades, but hasn’t been updated as much as originally planned. It did not have an operational HMD until fairly recently. It was deployed without an AESA radar OR an EGI.

The F-35 cockpit is much more advanced. It just is.

They do have slightly different missions. The F-22 is an air dominance fighter. The F-35 is a multi-role fighter.

[EX500rider]

50. "The F-35 cockpit is much more advanced."

Exactly, F-22 contract was awarded in 1986 while the F-22 contract was 2001....anybody who owned computers between those times know what great advances were made.

[sir pball]

18. Multirole ability, and marketability

The original plan was for the US to have a dedicated force of 22s, which was designed to be (and probably is) the best pure air superiority aircraft on the planet, a cost-is-no-object starfighter filled to the brim with the best tech money can buy and given the sole task of shooting down other aircraft, with a larger force of cheaper 35s to do the airstrikes, air support, mopping up, and all the rest of it. More or less identical to the original roles of the F-15 and F-16; a Bad Ass Mother of a fighter plane (IIRC no F-15 has ever been shot down) with a Zerg rush of cheaper, more versatile jets following up to do the "dirty work".

That said, pure air superiority fighters are a luxury only superpowers can afford; the 35 was marketed as a fighter capable of taking on anything short of a 22 but also just as comfortable in a precision strike, CAS, or SEAD role, and the world did eat it up - there's still something like 3500 orders for the thing.

If you ask me, we shoulda punted the 35 to the Eurofighter consortium or someone, and just started up 22 production again with development of strike and naval variants. But what would I know

[speak easy]

20. Thank you !

[qazplm135]

31. Bonus points for Zerg rush

Lol

[Johnny2X2X]

19. F-35 is more versatile

It can be used for recon and combat. Communications are superior.

My company did some of the avionics for both.

F-22 is the baddest thing in the sky, F-35 was supposed to replace several planes.

[Azathoth]

21. Far as I know, F-22 is unmatched in terms of air superiority. F-35 is a multi-role fighter

F-35 is like owning a Ferrari. F-22 is like owning an F1 racer.

[applegrove]

23. F-35 can see enemy jets coming way before they themselves are seen on

the enemy plane's radar. Basically there would be no point in being in the air if you are going up against the F-35. You would be knocked out of the sky before you know they are there. Less arenas for war are a good thing. That is if Kushner hadn't sold the planes to non NATO countries.

I'm not a fan of war but my dad was a tween when his father went off to WWII in his forties and went to the front and as a sensitive lad my dad was both powerless and aware. The average age of infantry was 26. My grandfather was artillery. Most soldiers did not have teenage sons but my grandfather went to military college and had a brother who fought in WWI. He went when duty called and was one of the oldest Captains in the Canadian Army. Needless to say my father would watch soldiers train at the airfield near his home. My dad could name the type of plane flying overhead just from the sound including german ones which is what that airfield trained soldiers in. At boarding school during the war he was a football player and a swimmer and put out an edict that nobody was to lay a hand on any jewish kids or he would beat them up (he never had to, the only fight he ever got into was when someone hurt a cat in university). He got a call out-thank you from a canadian jewish elder when my brother was a kid and they were at an event at a different private school. He followed WWII military history for the rest of his life, he especially liked Barbara Tuchman. My granfather never talked about the war to us but military history was one of the ways my dad coped as a kid as well as doing so well at the butterfly stroke they reccomended that he go to the U of T highschool for elite swimming training. He stayed at the private school where he was.

He talked military history to us kids not because war was good but because it was something you had to cope with your whole life afterwards. People cope in different ways. That is where i get it from. Mostly dad talked politics.

[speak easy]

27. ty!

[EX500rider]

25. F-35 Pilot Reviews

"As more F-35 stealth fighters enter service their database of effective tactics and operating techniques is rapidly expanding. One thing the F-35 does extremely well is use automated flight controls that allow the pilot to carry out maneuvers that would require a lot more experience in older (F-15. Su-30) aircraft but are much easier for an F-35 pilot. The more experienced pilots know a lot more useful maneuvers than new pilots but because of the adaptive F-35 flight control software, it is much easier for new pilots to master an unfamiliar maneuver. The best way to explain this is the experience of British carrier pilots who formerly flew Harrier vertical takeoff and landing aircraft and were now using the F-35B (the vertical takeoff and landing version). The British pilots say difficult carrier landings that could be terrifying in a Harrier (which U.S. Marine Corps pilots also used on small carriers) were surprisingly easy with an F-35B. As British pilots began carrying out landings on the new British carrier they were pleasantly surprised. The F-35B flight control automatically adapted to all the rapidly changing wind and carrier movement variables and allowed you to land without a lot of stress. Handling the F-35B, in general, was much easier, and safer, than the Harrier. Hovering, for example, required a lot of continuous effort and attention from a Harrier pilot. In the F-35B the pilot could fly the aircraft to a position and hover and the aircraft would remain where it was flown to without additional effort by the pilots no matter how much the weather changed.

All this ease of flying enables F-35 pilots to concentrate on something that does still require a lot of decision making by the pilot; stealth management and threat management. The stealth characteristics of the F-35 make it more difficult for radar to detect it. How the pilots fly in a combat zone can improve the effectiveness of stealth. That is done by learning to manage the flood of “threat management” data that F-35 pilots have access to. By being able to concentrate on stealth and threat management F-35 pilots achieve what has been the key element in air combat since 1914; getting in the first shot. From 2014 into the 1940s the key to success in air-to-air combat was knowing how to fly into a position where you would see the enemy first and carry out a surprise attack. The earliest of these tricks was the World War I tactics of trying to have the sun behind you to make it more difficult for the enemy to see you coming. Another tactic was trying to get higher and out of sight (for as long as possible) until you could dive on the enemy aircraft in a high speed and unexpected attack. In effect, “stealth” and the resulting surprise was always the key to victory. The F-35 was designed with that in mind. The radar stealth and maneuverability isn’t as good as the F-22, but the F-35 “situational awareness” is much better. Pilots who have flown the F-22 and F-35 always note that and point out that, in the hands of an experienced pilot, it makes the F-35 a more effective aircraft than the older and more expensive F-22.

The F-35 was designed to have “affordable stealth” and much more effective sensors and electronics. The F-35 stealth is much less expensive than that in the F-22 and initial Israeli combat experience over Lebanon and Syria indicates that the stealth and internal electronic countermeasures more than make up to for that. The passive sensors and “sensor fusion” software of the F-35 also appear to be working as advertised. In the cockpit, the pilot has one large (20 inch diagonal) LCD showing all needed aircraft data with more showing on the pilots JHMDS helmet visor. That is all very well, but as with the very capable F-22, it wasn’t performance that limited procurement but excessive cost.

What the F-35 flight management software and situational awareness demonstrate is that the usual measures of a superior fighter aircraft (speed, maneuverability) no longer matter as much. An F-35 is more likely to see the other aircraft first, fire first and be more aware of the changing battle situation than enemy pilots in, on paper, faster and more maneuverable aircraft.
Even when the F-35 is hit and damaged the flight control software senses the damage and automatically flies differently to compensate for the damage. That takes a lot of stress off the pilot who can concentrate on threat and stealth management to complete the mission and get the aircraft back to base. Another important aspect of the F-35 is that its flight control and threat management software is built to be constantly updated by pilot experience. As more pilots fly the F-35 and experiment with different techniques, its software is updated to become more capable. Those updates require more attention to post-change testing. That’s because there are so many interconnections within the flight control software. Those have to be tested to prevent unexpected results when the pilot is most vulnerable to that sort of thing."

https://www.strategypage.com/htmw/htairfo/articles/20190429.aspx

[speak easy]

28. ty - excellent reference.

[lastlib]

26. Profits to the contractor(s)?

F-35 can drop more $$$ into the contractors' pockets than any other aircraft, and do it more efficiently, ie, with less risk of congressional oversight.

My hunch.

[jmowreader]

30. One big advantage is adaptability

There are three versions of the F-35 all using the same airframe molds: the A model for the Air Force, the B model for the Marines and the C model for the Navy. The B model has the short takeoff/vertical landing capability the Harrier did, but unlike the Harrier it doesn't HAVE to land vertically. (If you try performing a rolling landing in a Harrier you will destroy the landing gear in the process. The F-35B will perform rolling landings without risk.) It's also a hell of a lot easier to fly than the Harrier is. The C model is equipped with the fittings for catapult launches and arrested landings.

There's also better situational awareness. The famous $400,000 F-35 driver's helmet works with the cameras and sensors embedded in the airframe to effectively turn the plane transparent. If an F-22 pilot wishes to look at what's behind her to either left or right and below the canopy beltline, she will have a hard time doing that because the wing is in the way. The F-35 pilot can look at the feed from the camera pointing the direction she wants to inspect.

Because most of the airplane is the same from version to version, it's easier to get parts for it.

The major advantage of the F-22 is the extra engine it has.

[speak easy]

32. Thank you.

[Kaleva]

49. +1

[hunter]

34. It's the 21st century. Manned fighter aircraft are useless in any serious war.

Wealthy nations can batter the hell out of poor nations and still lose.

The modern world economy is so damned brittle that everything falls apart if wealthy nations fight.

The F-35 is a despicable waste of money and engineering talent.

[speak easy]

36. Syria was not a serious war?

[hunter]

38. What happened in Syria? Did we "win?"

The pre-war population of the Syrian Arab Republic was estimated at 22 million (2017), including permanent residents. Of that number, the United Nations (UN) identified 13.5 million (2016) as displaced persons, requiring humanitarian assistance. Of these, since the start of the Syrian Civil War in 2011 more than six million (2016) were internally displaced, and around five million (2016) had crossed into other countries, with most seeking asylum or placed in Syrian refugee camps established in Turkey (3,614,108), Lebanon (929,624), Jordan (662,010), Egypt (131,433), and other countries.

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

[speak easy]

39. Russian (air) intervention turned the tide win favor of Assad.

[hunter]

42. As if all those refugees care.

The initial political instability started with global warming and religion.

Those same issues are threatening to break up the U.S.A..

Fighter jets don't solve that problem.

Reducing socioeconomic inequalities ought to be our first order of business or we could very well end up like Syria.

[onethatcares]

35. I have an idea

we take this drawing below and write press releases about how much better this plane is at every aspect of warfare on land, sea, air and in space. We throw big wads of tax payer dollars at it and tell our enemies they better watch out or we'll be knocking on their doors in short order.

Ladies and gents and anyone else concerned let me present to you the F-98 invisible.
















quite the airframe and weapon launching platform.

Dontcha think???

[speak easy]

37. Flawless :)

[Tommymac]

43. Maybe it is a little bit better ... but DO WE REALLY NEED IT?

It was designed to fight a War that will NEVER happen.

It is like building battleships in the 1930's - weapons' designed to fight the LAST war, not the next one.

A true waste of money in order to continue to prop up the bloated Military Aerospace complex.

My opinion and I'm sticking with it.

[onethatcares]

46. I have another idea

we take the billions or trillions of tax dollars we spend to develop the F-98 invisible and hire citizens to work on the F-98 invisible.

It serves many purposes including keeping earmarks in districts, providing jobs and paychecks and a great sense of patriotism from knowing no other country will be able to counter it.

Citizens will need to sign NDAs concerning their work on the F-98 invisible but that should not be a problem.

[EX500rider]

51. "It was designed to fight a War that will NEVER happen."

Yes and WWI was "the War to end all Wars", right?

You can't say a war with China or Russia "will NEVER happen" especially with China throwing their weight around and being aggressive and stealing territory in the South China Sea. And if it does we owe to to our service men and women not to start a war again flying obsolete planes like in WWII with the Brewster F2A Buffalo which the Zeros swatted out of the sky.

[Tommymac]

55. Never said War will not happen...just that we will NOT fight the last war over again.

China has cheap missiles that can keep our carriers out of range of their land targets.

They have NOTHING that can technically match our existing planes now. We would dominate the air except for those carrier killer missiles.

Russia is a strategic nuclear enemy - nothing we have could win a tactical non-nuclear ground war in Western Eurasia.

We just don't need a high tech bank breaking weapons' system 'because'.

We need to spend that money on the Men and Women who serve, on lower tech littoral weapons not strategic blue ocean weapons systems designed for the 1980's, or the 1940's for that matter.

[Happy Hoosier]

56. Your opinion, of course, but consider....

The F-35 is actually pretty well suited for targeted strikes in defended areas because the majority of the time, the opponent will not even know it's there until too late. And even when they catch glimpses of it, it is difficult to establish and maintain a lock on it.

So I'd argue it's better suited to the kind of limited engagements we are more likely to see as opposed to a full-on war.

I won't necessarily disagree on the cost. Although we, as the public, do benefit from military technology development, I would rather see that kind of development come out of NASA. I say that as someone who has worked as a D0D R&D engineer my whole career. I'd much rather be working a Mars mission. But there is way less money in it and a lot fewer jobs.

[FSogol]

45. All the responses are wrong, the correct answer is the F-35 pours contractor money into each state

so, congress is less likely to cut funding. It$ a $$$ win-win $$$ for everyone! $$$$

[EX500rider]

52. F-22 production wasn't exactly limited to one State either. nt

[hunter]

53. John Maynard Keynes -- paying people to dig holes so other people can fill them up.

The F-35 is a big hole.

We could have done better building high speed internet and modern sewage treatment infrastructure for all.

There are many places in the U.S.A. that don't have either yet.

[turbinetree]

54. Its all about the avionics / radar and how the stealth's capabilities the F-35 and F-22

the big difference I would say is in the helmets and the management of the aircraft software awareness and the F-35’s electro-optical targeting system (EOTS), which is NOT on the F-22, the other planes have to have POD EOTS attached to the underside of the aircraft for the acquisition of targets and such and that hampers the cross section of being detected more readily

[Happy Hoosier]

57. This is correct.

I appreciate someone looking at this honestly, instead of just uniformed trashing.

We can argue about whether the F-35 is WORTH what we pay, but it is the most advanced jet in the world today and will be for some time to come.

[turbinetree]

58. Yepper spot on................

your welcome, that helmet is one of the game changers in the data management