Wednesday, July 13, 2016

Stealth Saga #49

RQ-170:



Neuron:

The French have completed the first round of naval testing of the Neuron UCAV.

Taranis:

High levels of assurance for the decision making will be necessary for automated capabilities on UCAVs.

FCAS:

At least two variants for the FCAS will be delivered, one to each partner country.

Increasingly, the FCAS is looking to be a stealthy drone.

MQ-25:

Surrogate tests are being run for the MQ-25's refueling pod.

PAK-FA:

India has restarted the negotiations with Russia for the PAK-FA derivative. 

Supposedly, going forward, India and Russia will each invest $4 billion in the FGFA PAK-FA derivative.

J-20:

Two more J-20s have joined the flight line this month.  This appears to be part of the LRIP for the J-20.  Side note is the new J-31 is supposedly bigger.

J-31:

Rumors are the new J-31 prototype is larger than the original.

H-20:

Supposedly, China's stealth bomber, the so-called H-20, is using data stolen from the US B-2 program.

Tornado Replacement:

The stealthy Tornado replacement is likely to be a drone herder.

Sixth Generation Fighters:

Russia claims it is testing 6th generation fighter tech on the PAK-FA.  Supposedly, these components are EW systems.  Or they might be high powered microwave weapons.

Russia also claims its 6th gen fighter will fly at Mach 4 to 5, have an EM gun (railgun), be able to fly to the edge of space and control drone swarms.   THey are missing the critical sparkles and rainbow coming out of the afterburner.

F-22:

The F-22 pilot with the most flight time has taken his last flight.

F-35:




How F-35 pilots clobber their A-4 opponents in wargames.

The F-35 is gaining momentum with buyers, but its dominance is far from certain or even likely.

The US Navy is fully committed to the F-35C.

The F-35C will be aboard the Washington for sea trials next month (August, 2016).

F-35Bs will participate in Red Flag for the first time.

F-35Bs have completed ski jump land trials.

Airbus is being tapped to provide cyber protection tech for the F-35.


GE hopes to steal some of that engine production in the future and the USAF is open to the idea.

 Rolls Royce has a piece of the engine action, too.

Lockheed is working to cut costs for the F-35.

There's no system in place to strip Canadian firms of their work share of the F-35, at least not a standard system.

The JPO is at odds with the US Air Force over the ejection seat replacement.

The RAF is hinting it wants a mixed fleet of F-35s (As & Bs).

The Brits & USMC may pool weapons for the F-35B.

Israeli industry is waiting on the MOD to decide on what weapons will be selected for their F-35s.

The F-35 may be deployed to the Middle East, too.

META:

WiB says not to sweat the new Russian radar that can supposedly detect stealth aircraft.

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