Rafale Thread

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Bluewings12 3/18/2009 7:15:16 PM

cwDeici is a strange character ... The fact is I agree with him about 50% of what he said .

cwDeici , you shouldn 't play the "I can read you" game . As you said , my english is far to be perfect but I can make myself understandable well enough . Surely , I may miss some stuff here and there and I could be sometimes hard to understand but I try . Let me just say that if my english was better , my posts would also be better . Is your French as good or better than my English ?

Unlike you , I will no go personal and not try to talk BS about who you could be . You have an excellent english but you come here like a pseudo referee , which is a bit of a light start regarding the thread at hand . Since it seems that you have so much to say about me , please carry on .

It comes as a surprise to me that I have a very poor wisdom and an average intelligence . I always tried to run my life like a Swiss clock and my IQ is 145 . Before to be in the Forces , people told me to be the Captain in my soccer team , then they asked me if I was ok to take care of a 8 men Commando Team in Lebanon (twice) and now , I drive a 44tons Truck with a load worth 250.000 Euros through Europe . It seems that people tend to trust me ... But of course , they know who I am in real life , unlike you cwDeici .

Back to Rafale .

""The Rafale might have AESA, inbuilt laser designator, this and that and all that SOME DAY... but it DOES NOT and will not properly for some time (even the half-baked solutions may not arrive) or never.

Therefore it is crap.""

I like the "therefore it is crap" . Easy to say , harder to prove . Rafale as it is now is one of the most efficient stiker-fighter operational today , note that I did not say the best . As it is now , the FAF and the MN have an excellent platform and if you would read french and follow some french military sites (like the one from the St Dizier Rafale airbase) , you would see that the Pilots enjoy very much flying the Rafale and they mostly praise the beast . On the other hand , it is true that the Rafale is unfinished (I never said otherwise and I complain enough about it) but France is working slowly on it , note the "slowly" .

DA :

""Not that I agree or disagree, I DON'T KNOW, but how are you quantifying that statement? In other words, what parametric data are you using to make that assertion?""

Quote :

""Sur le Rafale, le concept "HOTAS" a été poussé à un niveau élevé : le pilote dispose sur le manche et sur la poignée de gaz d'un total de 37 commandes qui lui permettent, sans lâcher ni l'un ni l'autre, de commander tout le système d'armes, l'ensemble des capteurs et du pilote automatique.""

h*tp://www.defense.gouv.fr/marine/decouverte/equipements/aeronefs/rafale_m

JP Bergerac :

""HOTAS on Rafale has reached a level never seen before on French acft and we have probably reached the limit, both of room available on the stick & throttle and usability (34 HOTAS switches altogether, with several hundred multiplexed functions!)""

The Viper Blk-52 seems to have a 16 HOTAS , the SH 20 (22 ?) and I could not find anything on the Raptor stick so far . Any help welcome ...

gf :

""Explain to me why hot and cold thermal imaging is more important on a tank with a ballistic kill range effectively less than 1/8th that of a thermal on a combat aircraft where detection range is far more critical.""

The reasons are multiple :

-the waveband is different (3-5 um , 8-12 um , etc)

-the output power is different

-the resolutions are different

-etc

Just to show you that I 'm not coming with empy pockets , here are some good pdf from SAGEM (their main facility is here , in Dijon) :

General IR imaging :

h*tp://www.sagem-ds.com/pdf/en/D717.pdf

2nd generation devices :

h*tp://www.sagem-ds.com/pdf/en/D973.pdf

3rd generation devic

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Bluewings12 3/18/2009 7:50:09 PM

Since I don 't know who read or not the last link I posted , here is something interesting from it :

""The large matrix of the MATIS AP and its NETD of 35mK (at maximum integration time) provide unsurpassed picture quality with no compromise between situational awareness and range. With the continuous zoom, there is no loss of image during the change of field of view, which brings tracking capacity and comfort of use, whereas the three different speeds for zooming enable quick and precise adjustment of field of view. When using the minimum field of view, it has excellent boresight stability and a secondary image stabilization capacity, using gyrometric data from the host system (option). The advanced image processing features an anti-blooming function for missile launching applications.""

Notice the :

-unsurpassed picture quality with no compromise between situational awareness and range

-The advanced image processing features an anti-blooming function for missile launching applications.

Add to this SPECTRA , IR MICA and an advanced LRF and you have a deadly and perfectly stealthy BVR combo .

Cheers .

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HERALD1357 BULL. 3/18/2009 8:32:39 PM

Something else I forgot (not what I mentioned I forgot)... JP and Darth seem to lack knowledge outside their fields and seem to be going out on limbs, JP seems more aware of it (however he too is quite patriotic).

The only people commenting outside their area on the issue of touchscreens would be Softwar and Herald who have never used any of the devices under discussion in the kinds of environments and conditions we are discussing. If you have been in the Military since about the last 5 years, you probably understand why Herald and Softwars assertions were inaccurate. If not then that explains a lot.

-DA

I cut the crap and got to the point, staff sergeant.

Herald

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Bluewings12 3/18/2009 9:01:06 PM

The fact is that you don 't know what the point is , internet addict . The Staff Sargent is correct again .

I 'm not taking side with DA , I 'm just correcting Poseur3 .

Cheers .

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Bluewings12 3/18/2009 9:38:20 PM

To be honest , the SP posters are simply not up to date with what the French are doing . It is very clear to me and it must be even clearer to JP Bergerac .

Anyone here knows that France and Switzerland are both working on the OSF-NG ? Do you know that SwissOptic is heavily involved too ? Do you also know that the UAE could share the founding ?

The OSF-NG will probably be available by 2012 and implemented on every Rafale F3 . If it 's the case , the AdA will not only be able to do what she does now ~stealthy firing at 40km with an excellent PK~ but increase that range to 60km .

As far as I know , no current Fighter as such capability , not even the latest F-XXs (they don 't even have the missile yet) .

Cheers .

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DarthAmerica 3/18/2009 10:36:37 PM

-DA

I cut the crap and got to the point, staff sergeant.

Herald

YOU DIDN'T HAVE A POINT, CIVILIAN. You were wrong as is evident by the facts and the text typed by YOU. BTW, I'm proud to be an NCO so don't think at all your calling me Staff Sergeant in any way bothers me. I've been commissioned before, held Company/Troop Command, all Staff Positions and to this day the U.S. Army officer recruiters are hounding me to go back to the "Dark Side". But of all of that, the best job I ever had was when reenlisted, took a leave of absence from my civilian employer, resigned my commission volunteered to go to Iraq as an infantry squad leader. You should try it yourself. It would be a humbling experience. It's ashame you can't shed your ego long enough to learn things from people WHO DO what you read on google.

-DA

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breaka 3/18/2009 11:52:01 PM

I agree that the 'Touchscreens don't work at 8Gs' is pretty irrelevant. If I am pulling 8G's, it is either to kill or survive (be it defending against a bandit, SAM, or to not hit the ground). At that point, I don't want to be looking in the cockpit at all, and raising an arm to do anything becomes much more difficult. HOTAS is key here, and it is a time when having a HMS displaying critical data while padlocked to the threat is key (as long as it doesn't weigh too much to be useful under G).

That being said, while there are some definite possiblities I could see for touch screen usefulness, I think there are also many near equivalent ways to work around with push buttons and HOTAS. The big thing the touch screens did for the Rafale was give more screen space to a pretty compact cockpit. To look at the effect, take a look at the F-16 Blk 60 or F-16IN cockpit. The 5x7 inch displays are nice, but if the bevel around it for push buttons could be reduced by .5 inch on all sides, you would go from 35 sq in of real estate to 48. For the EF guys, they have a good amount of screen size already, so their money was probably better spent on developing the helmet and DVI. If one is looking for a primarily A-A fighter, these are better selling points.

Bottom line for me on this one is - how much did this cost compared to the benefit, and what upgrades did they not fund in order to get the capability?

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breaka 3/19/2009 12:00:13 AM

Bottom line for me on this one is - how much did this cost compared to the benefit, and what upgrades did they not fund in order to get the capability?

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gf0012-aust 3/19/2009 2:51:08 AM

gf :

The reasons are multiple :

-the waveband is different (3-5 um , 8-12 um , etc)

-the output power is different

-the resolutions are different

-etc

Just to show you that I 'm not coming with empy pockets , here are some good pdf from SAGEM (their main facility is here , in Dijon) :

General IR imaging :

h*tp://www.sagem-ds.com/pdf/en/D717.pdf

2nd generation devices :

h*tp://www.sagem-ds.com/pdf/en/D973.pdf

3rd generation devices (obviously the most important):

h*tp://www.sagem-ds.com/pdf/en/D1236.pdf

They even give you the unofficial aquisition range , do you feel better gf ?

To respond to your question , you need a different waveband , different optics as well as a different technology to detect and track a Tank at 6km or a airplane at 40km . We are talking green apples and red apples , same root but different tech .

The first OSF two-band (3-5µm et 8-12µm , Rafale F1s and few F2s) has been quoted with an enormous 100km range (check it , even on Wiki) . The gimble angle can be changed depends on the mission , detection (wide angle) or tracking (small angle) . During Search&Track , the OSF can spot hot "blobs" at 100km and start to track them straigh away . Why the F-22 does not have this hugely desirable capability ?

The OSF-NG is already in testing , all we need to know is will the French DGA buy it ?
.

It's a pr1ck of a thing to do, but I deliberately threw you a curve. SAGEM have got nothing to do with the technology under discussion - I threw it in to see if you would come back with references from SAGEM to try and support your claims. Guess what - they don't.

Hot and Cold Imaging has got nothing to do with selected wavelength issues and nothing to do with what SAGEM are doing.

BTW, the Swedes are the best on the european continent and in the bulk of their developments are the world leaders when it comes to long range non atmospheric imaging research and development - not the Swiss. You still haven't answered on what Hot and Cold imaging is - and the citations given have got nothing to do with the technology development.

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Bluewings12 3/19/2009 2:52:39 PM

Hot and cold imaging in IR sights is only a change in brightness , like the "negative" film of a camera . That 's it .

Unless you wanna speak about active and passive IR .

Cheers .

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