indeed this true, growing up i remember regularly reading about crashed mig’s. people blame it on a lot of things, like the faulty indigenous electronics revamps but most retired air force personnel seem to agree it’s a lack of training aircraft. i know little about flying but apparently it’s a risky proposition to…

it’s too far back imo to be the lift fan. pretty sure the lift fan is placed in front of the wings and behind the cockpit. this seems to have the drogue refueling socket in that position instead, leading me to believe it’s the f35A, USAF version.

Can someone tell me what these protuberances are? I imagine they must be some sort of antennae

I understand the nature of a nuclear weapon emits an EMP pulse at the time of detonation, can you have weapons that simply emit the EMP wave?

if a simple ramp leads to tangible benefits for the STOVL f35b why then doesn’t the US Navy retrofit a ramp to the prow end of some of their gator navy flat tops? surely this would be relatively inexpensive and would sacrifice one of the designated helicopter landing spots at best.

well as britain and italy are partners+customers of the f35 program surely it makes sense to test the ramp take off ability of the jets. also, how easy would a retrofit of a ramp be on gator navy ships? surely a small ramp at the very end wouldn’t sacrifice too much space but allow take off benefits to the marines

also can someone tell me the origins of the term ‘Wild weasel’ for a particular mission set such as DEAD?

Tyler, how much do traditional external fuel tanks cost in comparison to conformal fuel tanks?

i feel like someone should paint a HotWheels sticker on the side of the cart just for a little bit of fun

from the outline in the image mentioned above, it looks like a scale model of the b2. i thought northrop who were the main exponents of smooth surface flying wing stealth type designs whilst lockheed were all about the angles?

i think EMALS has been offered to the Indian navy by the US govt as a potential option for India’s upcoming new carrier. If the system is truly beset with so many niggles a decade into development could this just be a way of increasing the user base to get operational data to help sort out bugs? obviously this assumes…

anyone else reminded of these things from swat kats?

I really like this british racing green paint job. I imagine it isn’t very practical in combat anymore but it sure looks great

understood. thank you

thanks, that was a very detailed response. so what you’re saying is that even if you wanted to try there’s no point getting a STOVL aircraft like a harrier or a f-35b and trying it to land it in a traditional arrestor mechanism?

say a jet such as the mig 29k that would operate off of ski jump carriers, suddenly had to take off of a catapult type US flat top. would it be as simple as fitting a tow hook to the front or would the catapult destroy the front undercarriage?

hi Tyler, i’ve heard that the j-31 is what the f-35 could’ve been if it wasn’t compromised by the vtol requirement. hypothetically what would you imagine pierre sprey would have to say about the j-31 then?

oh right. so by bring back weight you mean how much weight they can carry when they land? i’m guessing the heavier the plane is the more momentum.

the royal navy will be operating the type from ski jumps. will the ski jump allow their f35s greater payload capacity at takeoff?

I imagine that what looks like crude duck tape on the plane is actually some special super expensive coating for what I imagine must be openings of some sort, but why is it all over the spine of the plane? I could understand it on the underbelly where weapons bays and such are but up top, kinda makes it look…