IRIAF | News and Discussions

[VEVAK]

Will we ever though be able to challenge U.S Airpower in case of war, even with large quantities of Su-30's or Su-35 or Iranian equivalent. I'm not saying we shouldn't even have a problem or spend any money on airforce. Airforce is really key element in modern warfare. But in terms of going up against say, 2 b-1 lancers, and 4 F-22's. These 6 fighters with long range firepower alone will destroy dozens of aircraft.

You can't go up against them in a conventional sense! But if it's over your own territory you need an Air Force capable of coming up with unconventional or revised tactics!
For example every fighter Iran builds should be 2 seat fighters & in war time each fighter should have it's own UAV with a back pilot controlling it!

If you have fairly equivalent speed over your own territory backed by your air defense and UCAV's you can come at them from various angel & in numbers! But lacking speed a lot of these options go away because you won't even be able to catch them!

Yes there is no way for Iran to go up against 4 F-22's with even 12 Su-35's!
But 12 Su-35's backed by 12 UCAV's with Air Defense system that sending 6-8 Karrar-4's directly towards them that's a capability you can play around with & you can catch them and go at them from different angle at different altitudes!

 

[PeeD]

Yea because they can afford to keep adding fighters to their stock but a pilot that's just too expensive!
As if the country has no reserve forces & keeps adding fighters to their storage without any thought to who is going to pilot them in case of an emergency!

Russians are replacing their legacy fleet. You might think, Mig-23, Su-15 with thousand of hours are useful as storage fighters. Not so much and even putting their turbojet Su-24 in storage is a good move although these really have the potential to be useful as storage bomb trucks.
In total again: they are just maintaining their fleet size, not significantly expanding it.

Fired how many missiles and from where?
AGAIN!!!!!!!!!!!! I TOLD YOU TO LOOK AT A MAP BEFOR YOU TYPE!

USSR wouldn't of been able to fire it's Oka missiles from one side of Germany to the other side of Germany!
And even if they had managed to somehow magically transported it's Oka missiles in western parts of east Germany they still wouldn't of been able to hit Paris & would of at best been able to go 150km into French territory!

That is NO Game Changer!

You sound confused... why would they not have been able to place Okas in western east Germany??? Again, that asset could take out any forward operating base along the frontline and you seems completely unaware what a 500 combat radius reduction or increased tanker requirement would cause for 80's tactical airpower...

For the Russians in the 80's & 90's in terms of conventional weapons Su-27, Various Russian diesel and nuclear subs, Long range high altitude supersonic bombers, S-300, Kh-55... These were game changers! Weapons that if even one was taken out would of changed calculation on a large scale!

Take the Su-27 out and you are on the right track.

Your the one that claimed that a F-313 will not be detected at that range!

I said it is within technical feasibility and hence can be considered.

Yes it is possible & easily within Iran's capability to do with little adjustment to the existing OWJ engines! Building larger diameter engines is well within Iran's capability to do especially if you don't change the length of the Turbines and compressors!
The hard part would always be increasing lifespan, and reducing fuel consumption! And even in that aspect it would be easier to play around with on a larger diameter engine rather than a smaller diameter engine.

In real application, jet engines are so complex, that modifying something like the diameter means a completely new R&D. engineering etc.
Iran has just proven it's manufacturing capability with the Owj, demonstrating own engineering capability is an at least as difficult task...
No, this is anything than easy, even for something like the J-85.

In terms of Air to Air capability what your claiming is absurd! Any fighter can fly low! That's a tactic you don't limit and build fighters around one tactic! It's absurd!

Your not just limiting speed! Your limiting climb rate, turn rate, maneuverability, speed, BVR capability,...

Too large technical hurdles to take away those limits.

What ever the range is Iran claims it's a Mid range Air to Air missile!

Expect at least AIM-54 performance levels for the F-90 or at least for a evolved variant for the F-313.

IADS can do all the detection it wants the point is there is no way you can target the aircraft unless it can somehow have two way secured communication with the fighter having it's direct coordinates & guide the missile to a range where it can turn on it's active seeker!

Flying low in GE mode limits line of sight limiting your ability to have secured 2 way communication in GE in between mountains in the middle of nowhere

One way frequency will never be secure because you don't know who is broadcasting and who your targeting!

One way coded communication in HF is one way. Mass use of expandable relay drones, SATCOM (in future), etc.

Absolutely WRONG! Their belly are stealth only at level flight! If they show their belly in a high angle turn or climb they will be detected! ALL OF THEM!

Yes, belly RCS is normally larger than frontal, because that's the design objective. However it is just up to the design for what operational regime it is effective. Well possible that the F-313 is designed to deflect RF at the climb angle, well possible that a highly effective skin integral RAM is present at the belly. Basically everything is possible, so just stop your "that is IMPOSSIBLE!", you and me don't know the details to make such statements.

It's not just the Fuselage! It's the wings, Engines, intakes,...

And your making things up! What part of it is Honeycombed & I'll explain to you how!

Is it the skeleton of the nose that's honeycombed? If so you cut it in any shape you want it!
Is it the skin? if that was the case you would need 4-5 flat pieces welded or bolted to each other for the nonsense your saying to make any kind of sense! which it is nonsense! Your making up excuse for a pour job!
There are no 4-5 pieces! It's a single peace mold on the nose and you can cut out the mold for the Airframe in any shape you want with little effect!

Your just making up BS & you just wanna make sense out of something that doesn't make sense using cost as an excuse!

Look. Based on a low level of information you made a final judgment that the facet stealth design of the fuselage is a sign of stupidity. I have the same low information on the F-313 as you, but I defended that detail for producebility/cost as argument for it.
I won't enter a useless discussion whether or not what detail is used or not.
Stay on your opinion that it is just do to poor design. Possible, who knows...

The reason why the F-117 is shaped that way was due to a miss understanding as to what caused it to be stealth!
And once the U.S. got into detail as to why, they stopped building stealth Aircraft in that manner!

No. It was due to low computing power and bad software. It's poor understanding, not miss understanding. with evolved capability they mastered curved stealth.
However what else than better aerodynamic capability does curved stealth has? Has it higher stealth capability than the more discrete facet stealth? Not proven.

Again, your basing your info on the assumption that the Americans are stupid!

An Air to Air missile in a ballistic trajectory will have a longer range at lower altitude! That's FACT! That's common sense!

Now you can claim your radar targeting will be effected due to ground clutter! That is factual! But the range of your missile is not going to be reduced by the numbers your claiming! In fact the opposite is true if your trying to calculate the max range of a missile your range will reduce at higher altitudes!
Also nothing is stopping Russian Fighter from flying low either!

I agree that thinking that is common sense. However common sense and physics are sometimes different, like in this case.

It will have a longer ranger yes. However the kinetic state it has at that edge of envelope will hardy be sufficient to achieve a kill. The AMRAAM that glides to 80km on a ballistic course would have a too low terminal velocity in range of mach 1 to achieve a kill. This means a AAM always has to retain a minimum of kinetic state to be effective. This makes it different to ballistic missiles or bombs.

To retain a mach 2 capability at low level, the AMRAAM can't be at the edge of its envelope like at 12km, where it slowly passes below the required mach 3 velocity. Once at that state, it has not enough energy to do the diving into high-q dense atmosphere and reach the intercept point at 20m. A common misconception is to think that the acceleration caused by gravity would help to retain speed, no, its so small that it is negligible at those speeds.

This here gives a idea about this phenomenon:

There is hence a range penalty to pay if you try to kill (not just reach) a low flying target. I want the F-313 to make max. use of that.

Iran hasn't been without an Air Force! Hell in the 90's the Americans shredded their own F-14's because they didn't want Iran flying it's own F-14's and over the years they have gone to great lengths to prevent Iran from having a real Air Force So NO! Absolutely WRONG!

The F-14 has some brute force methods such as the AIM-54 that make it a kind of threat even today. It can thus even be called unconventional airpower. However to think that the Americans were somehow forced to destroy their F-14 because the threat of the 40 or 60 Iranian F-14 pose goes too far. They did it because the complex F-14 would certainly never again re-enter U.S service and lowering the risk of operational Iranian F-14 as reason to destroy them, not just store them.
The Americans are very sensitive to losses. In the 90's and 2000's, Iranian F-14s would may have been able to kill 100 U.S fighters in the course of a conflict... The question is whether this was part of the true deterrence that saved Iran from an attack or not.
Due to the (in relation) low numbers, I think it had only a very small share in that deterrence mix.

If Iran had purchased only 12 Su-27/Su-30 fighters a year for the past 2 decades it would have been much stronger today than it already is NOT LESS!

What kind of statement is this? Sure, this is the only result possible. The real question is whether there were no more cost effective systems available.

I'd rather have a larger faster fighter capable of firing more capable missiles!
MiG-25 was a steel base Airframe! I'd rather see Iran build an interceptor like that to make up the difference than the F-313 in an Air to Air role

Good that your memory is better than mine here and you reminded me that the Mig-25 and to lesser extend Mig-31 is the example of a steel/low-Ti airframe...
I'm a friend of large, high speed, missile-carrier aircraft. A good counter to conventional airpower. However the aeronautic capabilities required, cost, the large footprint, high maintenance, long take-off, the inefficient operation of it are counters to it.
It would be an incredible feat if a similar counter-airpower capability could be reached with a much more efficient system.

 

[VEVAK]

Russians are replacing their legacy fleet. You might think, Mig-23, Su-15 with thousand of hours are useful as storage fighters. Not so much and even putting their turbojet Su-24 in storage is a good move although these really have the potential to be useful as storage bomb trucks.
In total again: they are just maintaining their fleet size, not significantly expanding it..

Wrong again! As expected!

Russian's are keeping Su-27's, Su-30's, MiG-29's, Tu-22M, Tu-160,... In storage!!!!!!!!!! Wake the hell up! look at the calendar, look at how many they have produced and how many they keep on active duty!

You sound confused... why would they not have been able to place Okas in western east Germany??? Again, that asset could take out any forward operating base along the frontline and you seems completely unaware what a 500 combat radius reduction or increased tanker requirement would cause for 80's tactical airpower.....

You seem to not understand what 80's tactical Air Power was! 80's Air Power was the Tu-160, Tu-22, MiG-31, MiG-29, Su-27, Tornado, Mirage F-1, Mirage 2000, Mirage 4, Mirage 5, Harrier, Avro Vulcun, Handly Victor, F-14, F-15,...

So NO! 500km was NOTHING! How many Oka Missiles was the USSR going to fire & from where to hit what target? Look at a map!

Take the Su-27 out and you are on the right track...

The Su-27 was the main fighter that pushed the U.S. to develop the F-22 & it gave the Russian's Air Supremacy over all of Europe! So NO YOU DON'T have a clue of what your talking about!

Russia would still be Russia with or without the Oka or Iskandar missile but without the Su-27 & it s variants the entire world would look a lot different than it does today! And that is a FACT! SO NO!

In real application, jet engines are so complex, that modifying something like the diameter means a completely new R&D. engineering etc.
Iran has just proven it's manufacturing capability with the Owj, demonstrating own engineering capability is an at least as difficult task...
No, this is anything than easy, even for something like the J-85...

It is FAR easier than you may think! In fact If you can jam pack everything in a small diameter engine putting them in a larger diameter engine would be easier because it will give you more room! The only time it was hard to do this was when cutting was done with far less advanced equipment! Today cutting is fully automated, you have precision cutting, precision measuring equipment,... On top of that you have access to the Russian R-13 & the Chinese variant of that engine on your J-7's

The only reason Iran is NOT doubling the J-85 design is because they know for a FACT they are capable of building something more powerful, with lower fuel consumption & higher lifespan! Also, the main problem would still be not having a platform to put them on!

Iran has already done the hard part and that is to gather & build the tools, facilities & equipment necessary to build various components of a Jet engine & produce or at least gain the know how on how to produce various super alloys and composites!
Cutting out larger specs using computer aided designs that's the easy part!

Expect at least AIM-54 performance levels for the F-90 or at least for a evolved variant for the F-313...

One way coded communication in HF is one way. Mass use of expandable relay drones, SATCOM (in future), etc.
..

Frequency is Frequency it's just a matter of what type of receiver & transponder you have or don't have on your platform! You can send coded messages in any type of frequency coms and then it's just a matter of having a registry with your receiver that uses a code that acts like a password.
That means if they decode your registry they can have you shooting down your own fighters & UAV's and you wouldn't even know it! And knowing that they have the computing power to do that in a short period of time it's absurd!
There is a reason why SAM's & Air to Air missiles have their own Terminal Guidance system & what your suggesting is to build a manned fighter that doesn't have it's own Radar but is capable of firing missiles that have their own radar! And fully reliant on HF signals coming for situational awareness and targeting It's absurd!
WHAT would be the point of having a pilot in there at all?????

Yes, belly RCS is normally larger than frontal, because that's the design objective. However it is just up to the design for what operational regime it is effective. Well possible that the F-313 is designed to deflect RF at the climb angle, well possible that a highly effective skin integral RAM is present at the belly. Basically everything is possible, so just stop your "that is IMPOSSIBLE!", you and me don't know the details to make such statements...

Yes everything is possible!

Look. Based on a low level of information you made a final judgment that the facet stealth design of the fuselage is a sign of stupidity. I have the same low information on the F-313 as you, but I defended that detail for producebility/cost as argument for it.
I won't enter a useless discussion whether or not what detail is used or not.
Stay on your opinion that it is just do to poor design. Possible, who knows.....

GOOD! 1st comes acceptance

No. It was due to low computing power and bad software. It's poor understanding, not miss understanding. with evolved capability they mastered curved stealth.
However what else than better aerodynamic capability does curved stealth has? Has it higher stealth capability than the more discrete facet stealth? Not proven...

Yes during the Have Blue program it was poor understanding of what was causing the waves to deflect

And it was poor understanding at the top levels that the F-117 kept it's shape because from a technical point of view they had already figured out that making it more aerodynamic wouldn't effect it's stealth features and that's why they even offered to make it more aerodynamic but according to them the people at the top refused

I agree that thinking that is common sense. However common sense and physics are sometimes different, like in this case.

It will have a longer ranger yes. However the kinetic state it has at that edge of envelope will hardy be sufficient to achieve a kill. The AMRAAM that glides to 80km on a ballistic course would have a too low terminal velocity in range of mach 1 to achieve a kill. This means a AAM always has to retain a minimum of kinetic state to be effective. This makes it different to ballistic missiles or bombs.

To retain a mach 2 capability at low level, the AMRAAM can't be at the edge of its envelope like at 12km, where it slowly passes below the required mach 3 velocity. Once at that state, it has not enough energy to do the diving into high-q dense atmosphere and reach the intercept point at 20m. A common misconception is to think that the acceleration caused by gravity would help to retain speed, no, its so small that it is negligible at those speeds.

This here gives a idea about this phenomenon:

There is hence a range penalty to pay if you try to kill (not just reach) a low flying target. I want the F-313 to make max. use of that.
..

Either you don't understand this chart or I don't because all I see here is further prof of my point!

The lower you are the lower your range will be! And this chart is not about low flying objects! It's about the max rang of the missile being fired at different altitudes against a low maneuvering high altitude bomber!

Here is a hint! Your Aircraft is on the 0 axis not the other way around!
It's showing the various ranges of an AiM-120 when it's going head on vs when it's chasing at different altitudes! (It's further prof that speed is life for someone how understands the chart)
Also, it further evidence that you don't waist BVR missiles by putting them on low altitude subsonic fighters!

So you got that the other way around buddy! And achieving both velocity & altitude are a major factor especially on heavier missiles!

Also, the AIM-120 has explosives onboard! And it doesn't actually need to hit you to get a kill especially on such a weak Airframe!

The F-14 has some brute force methods such as the AIM-54 that make it a kind of threat even today. It can thus even be called unconventional airpower. However to think that the Americans were somehow forced to destroy their F-14 because the threat of the 40 or 60 Iranian F-14 pose goes too far. They did it because the complex F-14 would certainly never again re-enter U.S service and lowering the risk of operational Iranian F-14 as reason to destroy them, not just store them.
The Americans are very sensitive to losses. In the 90's and 2000's, Iranian F-14s would may have been able to kill 100 U.S fighters in the course of a conflict... The question is whether this was part of the true deterrence that saved Iran from an attack or not.
Due to the (in relation) low numbers, I think it had only a very small share in that deterrence mix..

Clearly you don't comprehend the value of an Air Force! Even Iranian IRGC officers on the ground in Syria understood that even against a rag tag group of terrorist the Syrian Air Force was not sufficient & that they would also need air cover to protect their forces from the Israeli's, U.S.,... to be able to send forces in and move forces around in Syria!

And if all the U.S. did was shred a few F-14's I would say maybe! But that's not all they did! On top of the Sanctions they even went to the extent of buying the MiG-29's Iran ordered from Russia! Those are extreme masseurs! And it's extreme enough to say that this is a country that would also go to the extreme of covertly trying to prevent Iran from building a capable fighter of it's own!

What kind of statement is this? Sure, this is the only result possible. The real question is whether there were no more cost effective systems available..

MY GOD! Increasing your military budget and spending ~$1.5 Billion a year on your Air Force wouldn't of had any major effect on Iran's economy or military! That is the minimum a country the size of Iran should be spending on yearly fighter accusation! Iran's Air Force has had 30 years of neglect!
And yes I would prefer that Iran spends that money at home so they can create high tech jobs and advance the countries technological capabilities!

You can debate all you want on whether it should be domestic or imported but spending that money on fighter accusation shouldn't be a matter of debate!

Iranian Oil, Natural Gas, Mining, various services,..... these are all government owned and controlled + the taxes they get & if the money is NOT being spent to protect Iranian Air Space then one must wonder where the money is going!

Good that your memory is better than mine here and you reminded me that the Mig-25 and to lesser extend Mig-31 is the example of a steel/low-Ti airframe...
I'm a friend of large, high speed, missile-carrier aircraft. A good counter to conventional airpower. However the aeronautic capabilities required, cost, the large footprint, high maintenance, long take-off, the inefficient operation of it are counters to it.
It would be an incredible feat if a similar counter-airpower capability could be reached with a much more efficient system.

MiG-25 was a steel based fighter but it paid dearly in terms of combat radius limiting it to only 300km!

But today if Iran builds a fighter that size using stainless steel + composites + Ti using an upgraded reverse engineered AWG-9 + an internal weapons bay you could have a capable fighter with an upgraded Fakour-90 & you can also reduce it's RCS using simple known methods + you'll have room to add air refueling pod & the fighter will be big enough to be used in various missions like tanker role, supersonic bomber, interceptor, high altitude recon,...!

If you can get the power plant to put out that much thrust & an Airframe design capable of Mach 3 then you'll have something the U.S. will have trouble with if deployed in numbers & if you can achieve 7 G's that's more than sufficient!

I wouldn't focus on the length of the Runway instead I would focus on building a large number of robotic or semi autonomous construction equipment capable of cleaning & repairing the runway quickly
Your fighters should be in the Air before enemy missiles reach and your robots should be able to fix the runway before you land!

 

[PeeD]

Wrong again! As expected!

Russian's are keeping Su-27's, Su-30's, MiG-29's, Tu-22M, Tu-160,... In storage!!!!!!!!!! Wake the hell up! look at the calendar, look at how many they have produced and how many they keep on active duty!

Yes they do because they have no money. They keep their production lines alive by small lot's and dream about having enough spare money to activate those stored fighters which they were forced to put into storage during the dark 90's. They will probably never reach pre-90 numbers of airpower ever again.

You seem to not understand what 80's tactical Air Power was! 80's Air Power was the Tu-160, Tu-22, MiG-31, MiG-29, Su-27, Tornado, Mirage F-1, Mirage 2000, Mirage 4, Mirage 5, Harrier, Avro Vulcun, Handly Victor, F-14, F-15,...

So NO! 500km was NOTHING! How many Oka Missiles was the USSR going to fire & from where to hit what target? Look at a map!

500km radius reduction would have degraded much of the capability of most of your listed airpower assets. Mentioning a incredible machine such as the Tu-160 among them is a shame.

The Su-27 was the main fighter that pushed the U.S. to develop the F-22 & it gave the Russian's Air Supremacy over all of Europe! So NO YOU DON'T have a clue of what your talking about!

Russia would still be Russia with or without the Oka or Iskandar missile but without the Su-27 & it s variants the entire world would look a lot different than it does today! And that is a FACT! SO NO!

Tell me what combat radius you expect from the Su-27, that you want it to fight over all Europe? It was a great machine but purely tactical.

It is FAR easier than you may think! In fact If you can jam pack everything in a small diameter engine putting them in a larger diameter engine would be easier because it will give you more room! The only time it was hard to do this was when cutting was done with far less advanced equipment! Today cutting is fully automated, you have precision cutting, precision measuring equipment,... On top of that you have access to the Russian R-13 & the Chinese variant of that engine on your J-7's

The only reason Iran is NOT doubling the J-85 design is because they know for a FACT they are capable of building something more powerful, with lower fuel consumption & higher lifespan! Also, the main problem would still be not having a platform to put them on!

Iran has already done the hard part and that is to gather & build the tools, facilities & equipment necessary to build various components of a Jet engine & produce or at least gain the know how on how to produce various super alloys and composites!
Cutting out larger specs using computer aided designs that's the easy part!

Manufacturing is not the game stopper, changing the design is, mastering engine design is. What kind of chain reaction on ALL design parameters would you expect by changing the dia. ? New blades --> new disks --> new bearings --> new shafts... basically a complete new design.
Iran is at the coping stage in this highest of all engineering discipline, mastering such a redesign has not been proven yet.

Frequency is Frequency it's just a matter of what type of receiver & transponder you have or don't have on your platform! You can send coded messages in any type of frequency coms and then it's just a matter of having a registry with your receiver that uses a code that acts like a password.
That means if they decode your registry they can have you shooting down your own fighters & UAV's and you wouldn't even know it! And knowing that they have the computing power to do that in a short period of time it's absurd!

This is a basic problem. If you think there is no way to avoid Americans hack into coms, then it applies to nearly every field.

There is a reason why SAM's & Air to Air missiles have their own Terminal Guidance system & what your suggesting is to build a manned fighter that doesn't have it's own Radar but is capable of firing missiles that have their own radar! And fully reliant on HF signals coming for situational awareness and targeting It's absurd!
WHAT would be the point of having a pilot in there at all?????

I already answered on why manned is needed at this time. Troposcattering HF is one way, I listed others. SAMs use missile sensors for many other reasons, even some rather recent systems like the KS-1 use command guidance...

The lower you are the lower your range will be! And this chart is not about low flying objects! It's about the max rang of the missile being fired at different altitudes against a low maneuvering high altitude bomber!

The reason for lower range is aerodynamic friction, this is what I try to say! So it applied also to the low flying F-313 as I tried to explain in detail. The misconception of many is that range of a high altitude shot will be higher against a low flying target than a high flying, it's the opposite.

And if all the U.S. did was shred a few F-14's I would say maybe! But that's not all they did! On top of the Sanctions they even went to the extent of buying the MiG-29's Iran ordered from Russia! Those are extreme masseurs! And it's extreme enough to say that this is a country that would also go to the extreme of covertly trying to prevent Iran from building a capable fighter of it's own!

The reason was that those Mig-29 were nuke-wired from which Iran could have learned something about operating nukes. They were also offered at such low prices that it was no issue for the U.S to buy them.

Airpower is dangerous, any weapon system is dangerous. However being dangerous at Iraq 1991 level is not the same as 2017 Iran with it's BM arsenal.

Clearly you don't comprehend the value of an Air Force! Even Iranian IRGC officers on the ground in Syria understood that even against a rag tag group of terrorist the Syrian Air Force was not sufficient & that they would also need air cover to protect their forces from the Israeli's, U.S.,... to be able to send forces in and move forces around in Syria!

Quite costly to operate supersonic interdictors against rag tag groups... Timing is not right, otherwise Irans drone capability would have had the same capability as Russian airpower, only at much lower price.

MY GOD! Increasing your military budget and spending ~$1.5 Billion a year on your Air Force wouldn't of had any major effect on Iran's economy or military! That is the minimum a country the size of Iran should be spending on yearly fighter accusation! Iran's Air Force has had 30 years of neglect!
And yes I would prefer that Iran spends that money at home so they can create high tech jobs and advance the countries technological capabilities!

You can debate all you want on whether it should be domestic or imported but spending that money on fighter accusation shouldn't be a matter of debate!

Iranian Oil, Natural Gas, Mining, various services,..... these are all government owned and controlled + the taxes they get & if the money is NOT being spent to protect Iranian Air Space then one must wonder where the money is going!

I favor skipping this soon obsolete path and go directly for UCAV's. We need to be progressive if we want to come closer to the level of our adversaries. If it means, giving your 1,4 billion to the IRGC-ASF drone program instead of the IRIAF, so be it.

MiG-25 was a steel based fighter but it paid dearly in terms of combat radius limiting it to only 300km!

300km is a U.S number for staying on afterburner at mach 2,8 all the time. But yes the 60's grade steel alloys and the somewhat fuel thirsty turbojets were the main reasons for the relative short range. The Mig-31 uses just somewhat less steel but achieves much higher range due to the better 70's alloys and new turbofans.
Would Iran go for a heavy fighter, it would certainly have those 70's alloys equivalent by now 2017. If it would have 90's state of the art alloys, it may could skip the use of Ti.

But today if Iran builds a fighter that size using stainless steel + composites + Ti using an upgraded reverse engineered AWG-9 + an internal weapons bay you could have a capable fighter with an upgraded Fakour-90 & you can also reduce it's RCS using simple known methods + you'll have room to add air refueling pod & the fighter will be big enough to be used in various missions like tanker role, supersonic bomber, interceptor, high altitude recon,...!

If you can get the power plant to put out that much thrust & an Airframe design capable of Mach 3 then you'll have something the U.S. will have trouble with if deployed in numbers & if you can achieve 7 G's that's more than sufficient!

I would like that too. Its the technological risk and the end cost of the system that creates doubts about its bucks for bang ratio.
This all would require high aeronautic capabilities and the engine question would still e open for debate. Less risk, less system cost, lower physical parameter levels, this are all arguments and the F-313 could be the answer to it.

I wouldn't focus on the length of the Runway instead I would focus on building a large number of robotic or semi autonomous construction equipment capable of cleaning & repairing the runway quickly
Your fighters should be in the Air before enemy missiles reach and your robots should be able to fix the runway before you land!

I would go for underground mountain basing or even a underground runway...

But if you want a sober answer: I want a aircraft rugged enough to operate from our dried salt lakes, with lowest to no preparation, with one fuel truck and 3-4 other vehicles of the mobile caravan. Small footprint.
I want a aircraft far away from physical edges to have minimal maintenance interval, better operate the first 100 hours with next to no maintenance.

 

[AmirPatriot]

If it means, giving your 1,4 billion to the IRGC-ASF drone program instead of the IRIAF, so be it.

Then you might as well disband the IRIAF.

I want a aircraft rugged enough to operate from our dried salt lakes, with lowest to no preparation, with one fuel truck and 3-4 other vehicles of the mobile caravan. Small footprint.
I want a aircraft far away from physical edges to have minimal maintenance interval, better operate the first 100 hours with next to no maintenance.

This aircraft should also carry an AESA radar, 2 enormous LRAAMs, have special stealthy materials like RAS or RAM, liberal use of carbon fibre, 2 turbofan engines, and an advanced FBW system. Oh, and it should cost less than $8 million.

So you want an impossible aircraft.

I don't know anymore the context. Bleeding energy is a way to bring down the G capability of the AAM, be it by flying in opposite direction or flying in dense air layers or forcing it to maneuver to bring it into intercept position. All counts and at the time it reaches you, a 5 g turn could be sufficient to evade it.

Possible, but I'm fairly sure in most situations the objective is to make the missile fall out of range rather than anything else.

Though I don't know why we're debating this since it's not relevant to the discussion.

No issue if designed correctly.

So how would you design it? Surely a 2000 lb bomb is going to block the bay. Unless you put it on the other pylon, attached more to the side of the fuselage than underneath it.

 

[Zathura]

https://twitter.com/x/status/912045897613299713

https://twitter.com/x/status/912052734513352704

 

[raptor22]

 

[PeeD]

Then you might as well disband the IRIAF.

The fittest survives and Irans security has no room for sentimental feelings.

This aircraft should also carry an AESA radar, 2 enormous LRAAMs, have special stealthy materials like RAS or RAM, liberal use of carbon fibre, 2 turbofan engines, and an advanced FBW system. Oh, and it should cost less than $8 million.

So you want an impossible aircraft.

You are repeating yourself. Good I have understood that this is your opinion.

Possible, but I'm fairly sure in most situations the objective is to make the missile fall out of range rather than anything else.

Though I don't know why we're debating this since it's not relevant to the discussion.

The relevance comes from the concept of flying low and subsonic to survive long range BVR shots, instead of flying high and fast and pull high Gs.

Bleeding the energy of the AAM is the main method for both concepts.

So how would you design it? Surely a 2000 lb bomb is going to block the bay. Unless you put it on the other pylon, attached more to the side of the fuselage than underneath it.

Yes more to the side, at the edge of the fuselage. I already pointed that out in the f-15 illustration.

 

[AmirPatriot]

View attachment 427553

Huh. I didn't know the F-4 had buddy refuelling capabilities.

 

[raptor22]

Huh. I didn't know the F-4 had buddy refuelling capabilities.

well it's dated back to 80s (1367) and for the first time for f4,

And happened because of this:

 

[raptor22]

Iran military jet F4 Phantom filmed tailing the USA's F18 over Persian gulf:

 

[VEVAK]

Yes they do because they have no money. They keep their production lines alive by small lot's and dream about having enough spare money to activate those stored fighters which they were forced to put into storage during the dark 90's. They will probably never reach pre-90 numbers of airpower ever again.
.

You keep your production lines active & you constantly add to your reserves all based on your threat assessment!

Russians figured out a long time ago that it's far more important to continue to produce a verity of advanced weapons than it is to keep a large "active" military!
That's why they have far more reserves than active military!
That's why they are constantly adding to their storage!

There is absolutely NO logical reason why the Russian would or should pay full time paychecks + benefits to 3 Million people! If the average cost of each Solders comes out to $10,000 USD a year that's Salary, Healthcare, housing & other benefits combined that would be $30 billion USD a year which would take up ~45% of the Russian Military budget!

So you see the best way of cutting a countries budget is not by cutting weapons production! To keep your strength the best way is to reduce active personal & you make up for it by continued R&D and production of new weapons and by keeping a large military reserve & large stocks of weapons in storage to go with it!

And what you call the dark 90's is mainly due to bad leadership & bad management!

500km radius reduction would have degraded much of the capability of most of your listed airpower assets. Mentioning a incredible machine such as the Tu-160 among them is a shame.
.

Absurd!!!!! Show me! Fired how many missiles? Fired from where? and at what site?

Yes the Oka missile is a good quick reaction missile to have but it is not a game changer! It is NOT a weapon system that could change the tides of war!

Tell me what combat radius you expect from the Su-27, that you want it to fight over all Europe? It was a great machine but purely tactical..

If you want to truly understand it's value all you have to do is look at what only ~70 Iranian F-14's with limited weapons & spare parts were able to accomplish in the Iran Iraq war & multiply that by 100!

If Iran didn't have it's F-14's Iraqi forces inside Iranian territory would of had air cover & equipped with 5x the armored unites they would have been able to continue advancing into Iranian territory!

If Iran didn't have F-14's Iran wouldn't of been able to escort it's F-4's towards Iraqi Airbases in operation like kaman99

If Iran didn't have F-14's Iran's Morvarid operations where we took out 80% of the Iraqi Navy would have never happened!

The most valuable asset Iran had in the Iran Iraq war where it's F-14 & that's why the U.S. tried fool a few Iranian leaders to replace it's F-14's with F-16!

Your comments is just further prof that you clearly don't comprehend the value of an Air Force!

Sadly Iranian IRGC officers never understood that the only reason they were able stop Iraqi Armored unites & push them back using limited Infantry Support weapons was because the Iraqi's that called in Air support never got it & they never got it directly because of Iranian F-14's & IRGC officers never understood this because these battles were going on in the sky's 100's of km away and many times the battle was won by F-14's without even an engagement! Iranian F-14 would lock-on Iraqi fighters as they took off an they would just land their aircraft or as soon as an F-14 was spotted they would run and land the aircraft!

So yes the Su-27 was a massive game changer & that's why the Americans built the F-22

Manufacturing is not the game stopper, changing the design is, mastering engine design is. What kind of chain reaction on ALL design parameters would you expect by changing the dia. ? New blades --> new disks --> new bearings --> new shafts... basically a complete new design.
Iran is at the coping stage in this highest of all engineering discipline, mastering such a redesign has not been proven yet.
.

Again it's not a question of can't! Don't you see! Every fighter project that they have persuade has either been a single engine fighter or a light twin engine (OWJ/J85) fighter so this is not a question of CAN'T this is a conscious decision for building a low cost Airframe with a low maintenance & low fuel consumption!
Which makes it a conscious mistake & has nothing to do with can or can't!

This is a basic problem. If you think there is no way to avoid Americans hack into coms, then it applies to nearly every field.
.

Yes it does! When Iran can hack into US coms do you think they equipped with far more computing power can't hack into ours? Coms are not secure & any manned fighter that's "fully reliant" on ground coms will NEVER be successful hell they'll be more of a security risk than an asset!
And having ground or Air systems constantly emitting any type of radio wave or frequency will make them an easy target

I have NO problem with completely cutting out the Radar system of a stealth fighter as long as it's replaced with "multiple" high powered IRST & optical systems! But what I do have a problem with is sacrificing speed, maneuverability, turn rate, clime rate,... for NO GOOD reason!

And ANY fighter can fly at low altitude & unless your hidden directly behind a specific terrain 50 meters vs 20 meters against a fighter flying above 10,000 meters isn't going to make a difference!

Clearly no human can operate a fighter at low altitudes for long distances without computer assistance

The reason for lower range is aerodynamic friction, this is what I try to say! So it applied also to the low flying F-313 as I tried to explain in detail. The misconception of many is that range of a high altitude shot will be higher against a low flying target than a high flying, it's the opposite.
.

You were trying to show that chart as some kind of proof & it was exactly the opposite! And your wrong!
Modern AiM-120 have been upgraded to take different trajectories depending on the altitude of the target! and they have been specifically adjusted to after low altitude fighters! So NO!
The chart you showed was showing the range of the missile when the Aircraft was at lower altitude & if anything that goes against the F-313 mission profile!
Meaning for a BVR capability or at ranges above 15km (Distance) the fighter that's lower in altitude will be at a disadvantage all the way up to the fighters service ceiling of 20,000 meters!

This is why the American are trained to take the high altitude because it does make a difference a whole lot of difference! The range of your missile fired at 20,000 ft would be about half of what it could be at 40,000ft
This has nothing to do with what type of Missile you have this is physics and the rules are the same for everyone!

The idea that your going to sneak up on a high altitude supersonic fighter and some how climb undetected with limited thrust & climb ratio with a subsonic aircraft to reach an altitude so your missile can reach him before his missile can reach you is beyond absurd and nothing but a childish delusion!

And your also wrong about low altitude targets because modern AiM-120 choose the best trajectory depending on the altitude of the target vs your altitude so against low altitude targets they can take what is called a LOFT Trajectory like the AiM-54 & in this mode the lower you are the higher their range will be it's just physics

Yes if an AIM-120 had to do most of it's flying at low altitude to reach a low altitude fighter then yes it's range would be reduced but that's not how it works! So WRONG!

The reason was that those Mig-29 were nuke-wired from which Iran could have learned something about operating nukes. They were also offered at such low prices that it was no issue for the U.S to buy them.
.

LOL! That's just absurd! Iran had Iraqi MiG-29's in 1991 during the 1st US Iraq war! So no! It had nothing to do with trying to get a new technology related to a nuclear weapons program!

Iran tried to renew it's fighter fleet & the U.S. prevented it! U.S. has been working overtime in trying to prevent Iran from having an Air Force or Building one!

And creating the tech to protect against EMP's can be done with high power electricity & a little ingenuity you really don't need to buy a fighter for that!

Airpower is dangerous, any weapon system is dangerous. However being dangerous at Iraq 1991 level is not the same as 2017 Iran with it's BM arsenal.
.

You talk as if Ballistic Missiles are some kind of new invention! They are NOT! Russians didn't stop building fighter jets and bombers just because they built an accurate BM! That's absurd!

Ballistic Missiles can't protect your troops on the ground & your infrastructure from areal bombardment! They can't provide air cover for your ground troops, They can't escort your transport Aircraft or your airborne command and control & AWACS, They can't provide cover for your helicopters, ships, armored division... from high altitude threats, BM can't take out harden targets!

Also targeting Aircrafts at long distances is next to impossible! That's why countries have Airborne command & control that's why a US president gets Airborne in Air Force 1 when there is a threat.....

And if anything fighters are far more valuable in a modern war than they were in the 90's

Quite costly to operate supersonic interdictors against rag tag groups... Timing is not right, otherwise Irans drone capability would have had the same capability as Russian airpower, only at much lower price.
.

That's DELUSIONAL!

1. The idea that Israel would of just sat back and looked as Iran moved in MALE UCAV is absurd
2. Pro Assad and Iranian backed forces would have been bombed if they didn't have the Russian Air Force and Air Defense to give them cover!

3. Without Russian heavy ground penetrating ordnance to hit and take out underground tunnel thing would have look a lot differently in Syria!

4. Without Russian carpet bombing things would have looked a lot different


Iranian UAV can carry what at max of 8 PGM each with 20kg warhead! That means if in a building all they have to do is go into the basement and nothing would happen to them! & they wouldn't of been able to touch underground tunnels!

A Shahed-129 fly's at under 200kph that's about twice as fast as a car and you need a large airfield to deploy them so if your troops get in trouble if deployed at a base within 200km it could be an hour or more to get to them where a fighter would get there in less than 15 minutes!

I favor skipping this soon obsolete path and go directly for UCAV's. We need to be progressive if we want to come closer to the level of our adversaries. If it means, giving your 1,4 billion to the IRGC-ASF drone program instead of the IRIAF, so be it.
.

You can not pick one system over another! Iran can't choose between fighters, UCAV's & Missiles! They are all a necessity!

I agree that it may be best to have the IRGC spear head R&D in an advanced supersonic fighter program & maybe if they had done so we would of had at least a 4.5 generation fighter by now! But you can not replace UCAV with fighters it's just not possible because Coms will never be secure!

Iran needs fighters for escort missions, interception, heavy high altitude bombing, heavy ordinance PGM bombings,.....

Spending $2 Billion a year on Aircraft acquisition (~$1.5B on fighter & $500m heavy Aircrafts) wouldn't break or make Iran!
To consciously not spend that money is irresponsible & reckless!

UAV's are also a necessity & there should be a minimum limit of $500 million USD a year for UAV & UCAV acquisition

That 250 $1Million USD Jet powered UCAV + 250 $500K MALI UAV's like the Shahed-129 a year & that leaves $100M for other UAV's & $25M for R&D

300km is a U.S number for staying on afterburner at mach 2,8 all the time. But yes the 60's grade steel alloys and the somewhat fuel thirsty turbojets were the main reasons for the relative short range. The Mig-31 uses just somewhat less steel but achieves much higher range due to the better 70's alloys and new turbofans.
Would Iran go for a heavy fighter, it would certainly have those 70's alloys equivalent by now 2017. If it would have 90's state of the art alloys, it may could skip the use of Ti.
.

Why would Iran skip Ti when they have already started mining for it? And they have already started magnesium alloy production which is more rare and expensive than Ti! It's absurd! Are you afraid of sanctions?

U.S. banned the sale of Civilian Aircraft to Iran again so Iran needs to start getting ready!

I would like that too. Its the technological risk and the end cost of the system that creates doubts about its bucks for bang ratio.
This all would require high aeronautic capabilities and the engine question would still e open for debate. Less risk, less system cost, lower physical parameter levels, this are all arguments and the F-313 could be the answer to it.

I would go for underground mountain basing or even a underground runway...

But if you want a sober answer: I want a aircraft rugged enough to operate from our dried salt lakes, with lowest to no preparation, with one fuel truck and 3-4 other vehicles of the mobile caravan. Small footprint.
I want a aircraft far away from physical edges to have minimal maintenance interval, better operate the first 100 hours with next to no maintenance.

When calculating bang for your buck you need to look at it in the long run and take into account all the aircrafts capabilities! Which means an Aircraft initial purchasing price becomes less relevant!

Having a Ti industry & mining and producing other super alloys is not the burden of a real fighter program it is the positive outcome of having a fighter program which will eventually allow Iran to expand the quantity, variety & quality of other Iranian products! Ti is NOT a rare earth alloy!

 

[Stryker1982]

It would be ridiculous to suggest an airforce is a burden rather than an asset. Iran proved this in the war. The absolute necessity for a modern airforce especially now more than ever, with better guidance, precisions and payloads and all kinds of weapons system available. And russia has proven this in Syria as well. Without russian airforce assad wouldn't win this war, they single handily won the war, but softening defence so much for easy capitulation. and people are still arguing about if we need a robust airforce or not. I really don't get it.

You keep your production lines active & you constantly add to your reserves all based on your threat assessment!

Russians figured out a long time ago that it's far more important to continue to produce a verity of advanced weapons than it is to keep a large "active" military!
That's why they have far more reserves than active military!
That's why they are constantly adding to their storage!

There is absolutely NO logical reason why the Russian would or should pay full time paychecks + benefits to 3 Million people! If the average cost of each Solders comes out to $10,000 USD a year that's Salary, Healthcare, housing & other benefits combined that would be $30 billion USD a year which would take up ~45% of the Russian Military budget!

So you see the best way of cutting a countries budget is not by cutting weapons production! To keep your strength the best way is to reduce active personal & you make up for it by continued R&D and production of new weapons and by keeping a large military reserve & large stocks of weapons in storage to go with it!

And what you call the dark 90's is mainly due to bad leadership & bad management!



Absurd!!!!! Show me! Fired how many missiles? Fired from where? and at what site?

Yes the Oka missile is a good quick reaction missile to have but it is not a game changer! It is NOT a weapon system that could change the tides of war!



If you want to truly understand it's value all you have to do is look at what only ~70 Iranian F-14's with limited weapons & spare parts were able to accomplish in the Iran Iraq war & multiply that by 100!

If Iran didn't have it's F-14's Iraqi forces inside Iranian territory would of had air cover & equipped with 5x the armored unites they would have been able to continue advancing into Iranian territory!

If Iran didn't have F-14's Iran wouldn't of been able to escort it's F-4's towards Iraqi Airbases in operation like kaman99

If Iran didn't have F-14's Iran's Morvarid operations where we took out 80% of the Iraqi Navy would have never happened!

The most valuable asset Iran had in the Iran Iraq war where it's F-14 & that's why the U.S. tried fool a few Iranian leaders to replace it's F-14's with F-16!

Your comments is just further prof that you clearly don't comprehend the value of an Air Force!

Sadly Iranian IRGC officers never understood that the only reason they were able stop Iraqi Armored unites & push them back using limited Infantry Support weapons was because the Iraqi's that called in Air support never got it & they never got it directly because of Iranian F-14's & IRGC officers never understood this because these battles were going on in the sky's 100's of km away and many times the battle was won by F-14's without even an engagement! Iranian F-14 would lock-on Iraqi fighters as they took off an they would just land their aircraft or as soon as an F-14 was spotted they would run and land the aircraft!

So yes the Su-27 was a massive game changer & that's why the Americans built the F-22



Again it's not a question of can't! Don't you see! Every fighter project that they have persuade has either been a single engine fighter or a light twin engine (OWJ/J85) fighter so this is not a question of CAN'T this is a conscious decision for building a low cost Airframe with a low maintenance & low fuel consumption!
Which makes it a conscious mistake & has nothing to do with can or can't!



Yes it does! When Iran can hack into US coms do you think they equipped with far more computing power can't hack into ours? Coms are not secure & any manned fighter that's "fully reliant" on ground coms will NEVER be successful hell they'll be more of a security risk than an asset!
And having ground or Air systems constantly emitting any type of radio wave or frequency will make them an easy target

I have NO problem with completely cutting out the Radar system of a stealth fighter as long as it's replaced with "multiple" high powered IRST & optical systems! But what I do have a problem with is sacrificing speed, maneuverability, turn rate, clime rate,... for NO GOOD reason!

And ANY fighter can fly at low altitude & unless your hidden directly behind a specific terrain 50 meters vs 20 meters against a fighter flying above 10,000 meters isn't going to make a difference!

Clearly no human can operate a fighter at low altitudes for long distances without computer assistance



You were trying to show that chart as some kind of proof & it was exactly the opposite! And your wrong!
Modern AiM-120 have been upgraded to take different trajectories depending on the altitude of the target! and they have been specifically adjusted to after low altitude fighters! So NO!
The chart you showed was showing the range of the missile when the Aircraft was at lower altitude & if anything that goes against the F-313 mission profile!
Meaning for a BVR capability or at ranges above 15km (Distance) the fighter that's lower in altitude will be at a disadvantage all the way up to the fighters service ceiling of 20,000 meters!

This is why the American are trained to take the high altitude because it does make a difference a whole lot of difference! The range of your missile fired at 20,000 ft would be about half of what it could be at 40,000ft
This has nothing to do with what type of Missile you have this is physics and the rules are the same for everyone!

The idea that your going to sneak up on a high altitude supersonic fighter and some how climb undetected with limited thrust & climb ratio with a subsonic aircraft to reach an altitude so your missile can reach him before his missile can reach you is beyond absurd and nothing but a childish delusion!

And your also wrong about low altitude targets because modern AiM-120 choose the best trajectory depending on the altitude of the target vs your altitude so against low altitude targets they can take what is called a LOFT Trajectory like the AiM-54 & in this mode the lower you are the higher their range will be it's just physics

Yes if an AIM-120 had to do most of it's flying at low altitude to reach a low altitude fighter then yes it's range would be reduced but that's not how it works! So WRONG!



LOL! That's just absurd! Iran had Iraqi MiG-29's in 1991 during the 1st US Iraq war! So no! It had nothing to do with trying to get a new technology related to a nuclear weapons program!

Iran tried to renew it's fighter fleet & the U.S. prevented it! U.S. has been working overtime in trying to prevent Iran from having an Air Force or Building one!

And creating the tech to protect against EMP's can be done with high power electricity & a little ingenuity you really don't need to buy a fighter for that!



You talk as if Ballistic Missiles are some kind of new invention! They are NOT! Russians didn't stop building fighter jets and bombers just because they built an accurate BM! That's absurd!

Ballistic Missiles can't protect your troops on the ground & your infrastructure from areal bombardment! They can't provide air cover for your ground troops, They can't escort your transport Aircraft or your airborne command and control & AWACS, They can't provide cover for your helicopters, ships, armored division... from high altitude threats, BM can't take out harden targets!

Also targeting Aircrafts at long distances is next to impossible! That's why countries have Airborne command & control that's why a US president gets Airborne in Air Force 1 when there is a threat.....

And if anything fighters are far more valuable in a modern war than they were in the 90's




That's DELUSIONAL!

1. The idea that Israel would of just sat back and looked as Iran moved in MALE UCAV is absurd
2. Pro Assad and Iranian backed forces would have been bombed if they didn't have the Russian Air Force and Air Defense to give them cover!

3. Without Russian heavy ground penetrating ordnance to hit and take out underground tunnel thing would have look a lot differently in Syria!

4. Without Russian carpet bombing things would have looked a lot different


Iranian UAV can carry what at max of 8 PGM each with 20kg warhead! That means if in a building all they have to do is go into the basement and nothing would happen to them! & they wouldn't of been able to touch underground tunnels!

A Shahed-129 fly's at under 200kph that's about twice as fast as a car and you need a large airfield to deploy them so if your troops get in trouble if deployed at a base within 200km it could be an hour or more to get to them where a fighter would get there in less than 15 minutes!




You can not pick one system over another! Iran can't choose between fighters, UCAV's & Missiles! They are all a necessity!

I agree that it may be best to have the IRGC spear head R&D in an advanced supersonic fighter program & maybe if they had done so we would of had at least a 4.5 generation fighter by now! But you can not replace UCAV with fighters it's just not possible because Coms will never be secure!

Iran needs fighters for escort missions, interception, heavy high altitude bombing, heavy ordinance PGM bombings,.....

Spending $2 Billion a year on Aircraft acquisition (~$1.5B on fighter & $500m heavy Aircrafts) wouldn't break or make Iran!
To consciously not spend that money is irresponsible & reckless!

UAV's are also a necessity & there should be a minimum limit of $500 million USD a year for UAV & UCAV acquisition

That 250 $1Million USD Jet powered UCAV + 250 $500K MALI UAV's like the Shahed-129 a year & that leaves $100M for other UAV's & $25M for R&D



Why would Iran skip Ti when they have already started mining for it? And they have already started magnesium alloy production which is more rare and expensive than Ti! It's absurd! Are you afraid of sanctions?

U.S. banned the sale of Civilian Aircraft to Iran again so Iran needs to start getting ready!




When calculating bang for your buck you need to look at it in the long run and take into account all the aircrafts capabilities! Which means an Aircraft initial purchasing price becomes less relevant!

Having a Ti industry & mining and producing other super alloys is not the burden of a real fighter program it is the positive outcome of having a fighter program which will eventually allow Iran to expand the quantity, variety & quality of other Iranian products! Ti is NOT a rare earth alloy!

Wait do we have the ability to produce the titanium alloys necessary for aircraft production? In terms of material engineering and mining, how are we doing here?

Wrong again! As expected!


But today if Iran builds a fighter that size using stainless steel + composites + Ti using an upgraded reverse engineered AWG-9 + an internal weapons bay you could have a capable fighter with an upgraded Fakour-90 & you can also reduce it's RCS using simple known methods + you'll have room to add air refueling pod & the fighter will be big enough to be used in various missions like tanker role, supersonic bomber, interceptor, high altitude recon,...!

Well within Iran abilities if a project like this is taken seriously and funded seriously.

 

[VEVAK]

It would be ridiculous to suggest an airforce is a burden rather than an asset. Iran proved this in the war. The absolute necessity for a modern airforce especially now more than ever, with better guidance, precisions and payloads and all kinds of weapons system available. And russia has proven this in Syria as well. Without russian airforce assad wouldn't win this war, they single handily won the war, but softening defence so much for easy capitulation. and people are still arguing about if we need a robust airforce or not. I really don't get it.




Wait do we have the ability to produce the titanium alloys necessary for aircraft production? In terms of material engineering and mining, how are we doing here?



Well within Iran abilities if a project like this is taken seriously and funded seriously.

If you can produce magnesium alloy, aluminum alloy & you understand how to enrich uranium then clearly you have the technological capability to produce various types of Ti alloy!
So the Know how is there

Titanium is one of the top 10 most abundant metals on earth and it's widely distributed so yes Iran has Titanium!

So it's a matter of choosing to do so and investing in building the tools & facilities required & these are tool Iran would have to build it's self because no one would sell them to Iran or invest in Iranian Ti industry due to sanctions!

If the IRGC was behind the fighter program they would of started Ti industry, produce Ti alloy and produced various Ti made products & sold them on top of the fighter! Where as IRIAF isn't allowed to participate in Iran's Economy!
and this is another aspect that makes the IRGC better suited for developing a more capable fighter!

BUT again sadly many IRGC high ranking officials don't comprehend the value of a fighter!

Iran will clearly be facing new security challenges

Iran's Kurdish region is most definitely not this big! So what is Iran going to do about it?

Fight them off with handful of outdated M-60's?

This is how reckless Iran's government has been! Where is the money going? These Tanks should be in storage used in a worst case scenario only!

 

[PeeD]

You keep your production lines active & you constantly add to your reserves all based on your threat assessment!

Russians figured out a long time ago that it's far more important to continue to produce a verity of advanced weapons than it is to keep a large "active" military!
That's why they have far more reserves than active military!
That's why they are constantly adding to their storage!

There is absolutely NO logical reason why the Russian would or should pay full time paychecks + benefits to 3 Million people! If the average cost of each Solders comes out to $10,000 USD a year that's Salary, Healthcare, housing & other benefits combined that would be $30 billion USD a year which would take up ~45% of the Russian Military budget!

So you see the best way of cutting a countries budget is not by cutting weapons production! To keep your strength the best way is to reduce active personal & you make up for it by continued R&D and production of new weapons and by keeping a large military reserve & large stocks of weapons in storage to go with it!

We will see what happens with Su-57 production numbers. As a game changer it should be put into production at a relative high rate. I already told you that it would be the dream of Russians to have 800 Mig-29 in service like 1989, but they don't have the economy for that anymore.
Its nonsense that their storage concept is the reason for the small fleet.

Absurd!!!!! Show me! Fired how many missiles? Fired from where? and at what site?

Yes the Oka missile is a good quick reaction missile to have but it is not a game changer! It is NOT a weapon system that could change the tides of war!

I already showed you whats necessary. Now the Soviets were a nuclear power so a conventional attack was secondary, but once they got that capability with the Oka (and like before it), the conventional scenario changed. Negating 80% of enemy airpower would be game changing wouldn't it?

If you want to truly understand it's value all you have to do is look at what only ~70 Iranian F-14's with limited weapons & spare parts were able to accomplish in the Iran Iraq war & multiply that by 100!

If Iran didn't have it's F-14's Iraqi forces inside Iranian territory would of had air cover & equipped with 5x the armored unites they would have been able to continue advancing into Iranian territory!

The F-14 was the single most potent Iranian weapon system in that period, so yes it was immensely important. In 2017 not anymore, so no need to talk about the F-14 as airpower example.

Sadly Iranian IRGC officers never understood that the only reason they were able stop Iraqi Armored unites & push them back using limited Infantry Support weapons was because the Iraqi's that called in Air support never got it

Typical western nonsense. Just a few day ago in a TV show, the commander of the IRGC said how important air superiority inside Iran was for them...

Again it's not a question of can't! Don't you see! Every fighter project that they have persuade has either been a single engine fighter or a light twin engine (OWJ/J85) fighter so this is not a question of CAN'T this is a conscious decision for building a low cost Airframe with a low maintenance & low fuel consumption!
Which makes it a conscious mistake & has nothing to do with can or can't!

Seems like you want to push me to say Iran can't produce useful jet engines?
The J85 is a veeery low tech. engine, originally made for large cruise missile. This was the reason why Iran went for it and designs that use it! You have no slight idea.

Yes it does! When Iran can hack into US coms do you think they equipped with far more computing power can't hack into ours? Coms are not secure & any manned fighter that's "fully reliant" on ground coms will NEVER be successful hell they'll be more of a security risk than an asset!
And having ground or Air systems constantly emitting any type of radio wave or frequency will make them an easy target

I have NO problem with completely cutting out the Radar system of a stealth fighter as long as it's replaced with "multiple" high powered IRST & optical systems! But what I do have a problem with is sacrificing speed, maneuverability, turn rate, clime rate,... for NO GOOD reason!

Ok mate. So communication is useless/fragile. Guess even Farsi voice communication with a farsi code-word is. Good, it is a interesting topic and you can open a thread about it. But if you want to criticize the F-313 with that argument, we can continue the talk forever.

Clearly no human can operate a fighter at low altitudes for long distances without computer assistance

Why you bring up such arguments which I have answered already?

You were trying to show that chart as some kind of proof & it was exactly the opposite! And your wrong!
Modern AiM-120 have been upgraded to take different trajectories depending on the altitude of the target! and they have been specifically adjusted to after low altitude fighters! So NO!
The chart you showed was showing the range of the missile when the Aircraft was at lower altitude & if anything that goes against the F-313 mission profile!
Meaning for a BVR capability or at ranges above 15km (Distance) the fighter that's lower in altitude will be at a disadvantage all the way up to the fighters service ceiling of 20,000 meters!

This is why the American are trained to take the high altitude because it does make a difference a whole lot of difference! The range of your missile fired at 20,000 ft would be about half of what it could be at 40,000ft
This has nothing to do with what type of Missile you have this is physics and the rules are the same for everyone!

The idea that your going to sneak up on a high altitude supersonic fighter and some how climb undetected with limited thrust & climb ratio with a subsonic aircraft to reach an altitude so your missile can reach him before his missile can reach you is beyond absurd and nothing but a childish delusion!

And your also wrong about low altitude targets because modern AiM-120 choose the best trajectory depending on the altitude of the target vs your altitude so against low altitude targets they can take what is called a LOFT Trajectory like the AiM-54 & in this mode the lower you are the higher their range will be it's just physics

Yes if an AIM-120 had to do most of it's flying at low altitude to reach a low altitude fighter then yes it's range would be reduced but that's not how it works! So WRONG!

You don't understand. Dynamic pressure is the main kinetic energy killer. At 40k feet altitude you have low dynamic pressure compared to sea level. So the dive maneuver will bleed energy from the AIM-120. This is one a several means to reduce the range.

LOL! That's just absurd! Iran had Iraqi MiG-29's in 1991 during the 1st US Iraq war! So no! It had nothing to do with trying to get a new technology related to a nuclear weapons program!

Iran tried to renew it's fighter fleet & the U.S. prevented it! U.S. has been working overtime in trying to prevent Iran from having an Air Force or Building one!

And creating the tech to protect against EMP's can be done with high power electricity & a little ingenuity you really don't need to buy a fighter for that!

Nuke wiring is something much can be learned from, so if you don't understand it, so be it. Americans feared that. They also feared the Mig-29 to a lower extend. But this is no proof that their goal is to avoid Iranian airpower and we should go that path. By now they would probably want a Saeghe like airpower program in Iran, for it to waste it's resources.

You talk as if Ballistic Missiles are some kind of new invention! They are NOT!

Almost 30 years younger than manned airpower...

They are NOT! Russians didn't stop building fighter jets and bombers just because they built an accurate BM! That's absurd!

Ballistic Missiles can't protect your troops on the ground & your infrastructure from areal bombardment! They can't provide air cover for your ground troops, They can't escort your transport Aircraft or your airborne command and control & AWACS, They can't provide cover for your helicopters, ships, armored division... from high altitude threats, BM can't take out harden targets!

Also targeting Aircrafts at long distances is next to impossible! That's why countries have Airborne command & control that's why a US president gets Airborne in Air Force 1 when there is a threat.....

And if anything fighters are far more valuable in a modern war than they were in the 90's

I neither said BMs are everything nor the rest of nonsense you imply. However their effectiveness was the reason why Iran first concentrated on them.

That's DELUSIONAL!

1. The idea that Israel would of just sat back and looked as Iran moved in MALE UCAV is absurd
2. Pro Assad and Iranian backed forces would have been bombed if they didn't have the Russian Air Force and Air Defense to give them cover!

3. Without Russian heavy ground penetrating ordnance to hit and take out underground tunnel thing would have look a lot differently in Syria!

4. Without Russian carpet bombing things would have looked a lot different


Iranian UAV can carry what at max of 8 PGM each with 20kg warhead! That means if in a building all they have to do is go into the basement and nothing would happen to them! & they wouldn't of been able to touch underground tunnels!

A Shahed-129 fly's at under 200kph that's about twice as fast as a car and you need a large airfield to deploy them so if your troops get in trouble if deployed at a base within 200km it could be an hour or more to get to them where a fighter would get there in less than 15 minutes!

You have a very narrow and limited view...
- S2A assets could take care for the Israeli scenario and protect.
- Any special penetration warhead from BMs would be more potent against the quite few underground targets...
- The higher loitering time and the lower costs would make up for the low speed of S-129. In turn the high loitering capability would provide this unmanned airpower with something Russian conventional airpower could never deliver in Syria to the full possible extend --> continuous wide area CAS.
Heck with that hypothetical unmanned airpower force structure, the war would have already been won without Russians...

You can not pick one system over another! Iran can't choose between fighters, UCAV's & Missiles! They are all a necessity!

The recipe for failure... No, get serious. Only the most cost effective assets will be pursued. No cool 5th gen. program for you if it there are better, more cost effective systems. You can protest and show then South Koreans, Turks, Indians etc., telling "but they have done it too..."

Why would Iran skip Ti when they have already started mining for it? And they have already started magnesium alloy production which is more rare and expensive than Ti! It's absurd! Are you afraid of sanctions?

U.S. banned the sale of Civilian Aircraft to Iran again so Iran needs to start getting ready!

I don't say it should skip it. It started with you saying it is a must and the lack of it somehow shows bad decision making. I said: Not necessary, there could be other reasons.