Rafale is not designed as a peak ASF in terms of performance, it loses some perfomance for low altitude agility and penetration at 200 feet. Typhoon is much more of an ASF, but loses out to the Rafale at low altitudes.
you're almost there RandomRadio!!
I am thinking we are perhaps 3 to 4 pages away from Randomradio finally posting "well yes the Rafale doesn't supercruise like the F-22, but the Rafale is still an ASF because it relies on agility and other tactics and advantages to win"
(bonus points he will respond to this exact section promising us I will be wrong and he would never change his incorrect position)
Hint: I even gave you an out with the Chip Berke video! but instead you decided to talk about Block 4 rather than lock onto "hey he says you don't need super speed!! You can win with sensors and avionics!!" The Rafale may not supercruise but it can win with sensors and avionics!!
its not too late!!
But F-22, Typhoon, and Rafale can supercruise at higher altitudes,
What are the altitudes exactly? Hard numbers please.
and the engines can sustain those speeds.
how? what is the data? We have gobs of information on the F-22 and an airshow pamphlet for the Rafale. "sustaining" is not going to happen for the Rafale and the lack of evidence should make that abundently clear. We never get data or numbers, we get descriptions.
"High altitude"
really? how high exactly
"very high!"
"Sustain those speeds"
really for how long?
"goodly long!"
we literally hear more about the CAD software used to design the Rafale than we do this supposed Supercruise capability. everyone and their mother knows the F-22 supercruises its mentioned almost synonymously with the F-22. We never hear such things with Rafale. We have 2 ever-recycled examples one of which is coming on 20 years old, and looks suspiciously like a test flight.
lets compare mentions of Supercruise in some of the obvious places:
USAF F-22 Datasheet mentions: 6
P&W F119 datasheet: 1
Mentions by Dassault on their website: 0
Mentions in 1987 development paper of Rafale by Program Manager: 0
Mentions by Snecma on M88: 0
A search on the official website of France Air and Space force: 0
French Navy Website: 0
supercruise is such a game changing feature they don't bother to mention it at all. Theyre still publishing papers on the F-22's supercruise over 25 years after the First F-22 did it over Edwards in 1999.
The only difference is the F-22's engine is a more modern design with counterrotating turbines.
HAHAHAHA
How so?!
You guys have been discussing this for quite some time, but no one has looked up the data on the bypass ratio of M88?
Of course we are not going to look up data on the Rafale, it would harpoon his entire world view.
Something I have previously said. The Rafale doesn't even match the FA-18, let alone the F-35.
For as smart as Randomradio thinks he is he fell for a very obvious trap. not his fault in a way Dassault fell for it, and Randomradio believes everything France says so no surprise
what we keep hearing is that Rafale has made a tremendous splash, but not only did we not see the Splash, we don't even see the ripples. We see no impact and no evidence of impact.
When the F-22 showed up it completely changed the way the USAF conducted air warfare. The F-15 which had ruled the roost for decades was suddenly 2nd place. That is pretty jarring. from predator to prey nearly overnight. The stories that began to be reported and passed on anecdotally from RedFlags in both Alaska and Nevada where nothing short of spellbinding. When the F-22 uses supercruise to humilate friends and foe alike, we hear about it. When the Rafale "uses supercruise" we get to see it as a wikipedia footnote and no one who operates the Rafale mentions it at all.
it makes no sense. its like saying you found a dollar on the ground and also invented time travel.
If the Rafale could supercruise in a meaningful way, you would have heard about it as a meaningful thing.
Where is the impact of the supercruising "almost an F-22!!" ASF Rafale? What impact did it have on the SU-30MKI or the rest of the Indian Air force? Has anyone seen any reports on that? The Rafale is a dud in that sense. its a good multirole fighter but its not an F-22, its not even a Flanker MKI and if it was suddenly better than the MKI to say that would be a "Shake up" of the IAF would be an understatement.
what we get instead are blathering fanboys trying to take the most scant evidence from the most far flung sources and conjecture that is extremely light on any kind of detail. We have had the details of the ATF programs "Mission 1" for decades. its completely explicit and heavy on actual numbers to include the entire expected mission profile.
The Rafale is so amazing, so impactful with its supercruise, its not being mentioned at all by any of its users, there are no tactics or doctrines that incorporate its use. We hear nothing of Flankers or Mirage 2000s having to completely reimagine how to survive and fight against it. We hear far more conversations about the F-35 in that sense and how it changes the old ways overnight, but lets not talk about that for the moment.
Here is where Dassault and others completely messed up. (Take note Randomradio-- this is your ticket out of your untenable position!) When The F-22 was supercruising and making it famous, Dassault rather than fall for the "trick" that was "you either have it or your dead!" promoted by the USAF, LM, et al was simply to say:
"so what? we don't need supercruise to win in the air."
that is all they needed to say. instead they fell for the trick. Random fell for it too. He dutifully told us you need Supercruise. that is the defining charecteritic. But oops!! Rafale doesn't supercruise like an F-22. It supercruises like everything else including examples he gave us going back to the 1950s.
an F-15 can "Supercruise" in the style of Rafale. in fact Randomradio lists all kinds of aircraft that can do this gimmick of F-22 Supercruise. Guess why the USAF never mentioned SC for the F-15? because they know its basically useless. do they mention supercruise for the F-22?
Yes. every time.
I still have yet to see how as Randomradio plays this "yes everything can supercruise as a novelty even an attack aircraft!" but the Rafale's gimmick is not a gimmick!
I see no difference, I see no evidence, I see nothing other than Random claiming so, that Rafale gimmick fake SC is any different than everyone else Fake Gimmick SC. he just says its different! The Rafale SC is like the F-22!
How? never explained
what are the differences using data? Files never found.
Dassault fell right into the trap of trying to measure up to something they can't possibly measure up to. The only way to make a Rafale compete with the F-22 on its level is to make a completely different aircraft, and this goes for the engine too. How do you make Snecma M88 capable of SC? use a different engine.
please note, that never ever in the history of ever did Boeing every try to convince anyone that the Super Hornet was a supercruiser. that was fools gambit and they promoted their aircraft without it. Something the Eurocanards failed to understand.
Rafale was never designed to fight and win in the air like an F-22, but they fell for the trick that in order to do so, they had to play by the rules of the USAF and F-22 consortium. if gifted to the USAF the Rafale would be classified as basically a sophisticated F-16. Multirole fighter, good avionics, not an ASF, no supercruise, no Stealth at the level of acceptability. "special, just like everyone else"
Why hasn't anyone asked "why?" why would the French AF and Navy demand supercruise for the Rafale? when did the French armed forces of Dassault come to the conclusion that the MCX Program that became Rafale had to have a capability no one asked for?
Where are the studies that were used? where was the research? What specific aspects of the Rafale design and development were used to create sustainable supercruise for something like Mission 1 of the ATF? What is the supercruise profile of the MCX/Rafale? where?
searching the 1987 document we get not just explanations for the design studies, but we have the Program manager "showing his work" and giving us the studies and indicative's that LEAD to those design decisions. thats really helpful stuff. "here is how we built the Rafale, here is the study that lead us to this design feature" There is no such thing mentioned at all any where in France about supercruise at all. or sustained supersonic flight. no requirements, nothing. zero evidence in any phase.
zero acknowledge from the designers or users, no operational impacts. we see no impact, no ripples, no consequences.
Randomradio keeps trying to convince us that a 747 and a concorde are the same thing because they both have 4 engines, carry passengers, and fly high. All those things are true, and the 747 is an impressive feat of engineering, but come on now; not a concorde. really obvious for anyone who is not completely and willfully blinded:
The only difference is the F-22's engine is a more modern design with counterrotating turbines.
the F-22 supercruises because it actually supercruises, and the Rafale "supercruises" because an airshow pamphlets says it does.
