To my knowledge Gripen use Power PC processors, does for example F-22 use any more capable processors? Obviously JSF will use a newer more capable processor, but the Gripen AESA will of course also use new processors too.
COTS Proscessors are used in the F22A, and will be for the F35, but AFAIK the signal prosesor itself is something better (considering the staggering ammount of information it has to deal with every second you could see why). However prosessing technolagy is moveing at an incredible rate, and even COTS stuff in 8 years will be better than what the military use now, so who knows. Anywy the punch is in the riduculously complicated software.
Erieyes AESA total radar coverage is bigger than any fighter radar I've heard about. That can be processed and sent directly into the Gripen cockpit via datalink and be used for guiding a missile to it's target. The difference in processing with the Gripen AESA don't seem big and is basically to cut the middleman. Of course the space available in a fighter is smaller than in a passenger plane, but electronics has been improved in capability since 1997. Saab Microwave certainly knows what it takes to develop a fighter AESA. I won't say it will be a walk in the park, but it certainly isn't impossible to create a competitive radar.
I understand the sweeds were at the forefront of the AEW&C, Fighter, Missile system, IIRC the first to achieve passive AMRAAM launch operationally, so i'm not doubting the sweeds ingenuity or capability. Erieye itself is a very capable system and would have given the sweeds ample knowlage in in area's like beam controll, scan rates and discrimination.They would have much more experiance and better array hardware than the russians who are just getting a testbed into the air. However building a fighter sized system is annother story, thats why it'll be 15 years between AEW&C and Fighter. The miniturization, cooling constraints and ruggerdization of the hardware are huge challanges, however considering the COTS components and non US development of this hardware, building the array wont be the problem, which is what i've said a few times. Considering Saab microvawe's ERIEYE experiance and the availability of Hardware i have no doubt the sweeds (or the rest of the europeans) will be able to build a decent AESA radar with better capabilities than a US 2nd gen system, with better weight and efficiency and probably better track and detection radii becasue of better proscessors i.e. instentanious scan rates, simultainious air and surface scan, scan while track and LPI. Which isnt bad for your first operational fighter radar. However achieventing the advanced capabilities of the AN/APG 81, for all the reasons i have stated above, is something I really, really doubt. It is a hugely sophistocated system, achieveng extreemly good detection and track radii compared to power output becasue of the discriminatory capabilities of the proscessors and software, allowing an AESA based datalink system, providning an extreemley potent and versitile electronic warfare capability with effects in the 150km+ range bracket, possibly a very sensitive ELINT system when not transmitting, in addition to the stuff they dont know about. Now will the europeans make up all of this ground (considering they're still only useing a testbed and the APG 79 is operational) and produce a system of THAT calibur? Anythings possible i guess, but i really, really doubt it.
Anyway, the threat aircraft are all russian and the EU's done much more comprehensive work on AESA's than them. The ZHUK-AE is a long long way behind Captor-E/CAESAR as an example.
And don't believe they will just try to make a copy of the american AESA's, there will certainly be some new development. Saab Microwave has already revealed that they will use a movable array for Gripens AESA, similar to the one of mechanical radars. That way the antenna can be folded away for lower RCS when being radar silent, it will also make it possible to "look over the shoulder". Another advantage should be to be able to look at a target with the outher edge of the radar beam which supposedly gives a good view whith less risk of being discovered. Like looking through the corner of your eyes.
I didnt mean Saab would copy the US systems specifically but emulate their capabilities.
As far as the mechanically scanned AESA (oxymoron), its been looked at before. While it is advantagoues for several reasons which you have sighted, there is a reason why no one else is looking at this technique. MAESA sacrifices one of AESA's big advantages, reliability. By the nature of AESA it has much, much better mean time between failure rates than an MSA, becasue fo the huge redundency in the system. If a few T/R modules break you would probably not even notice capability wise, and they could be replaced during routine maininance cycles. If anything breaks in an MSA then the whole system goes down, drastically reducing reliability.
swerve said:
Not what I've claimed. What I have been arguing against is your claim that what Europe (specifically, in this case, Saab-Ericsson & Selex in cooperation) can do, by the time the Gripen gets an AESA radar, is to match the APG63(v)2 ("Even if the Sweeds do get a decent system in grippen block 2/super grippen, i have no doubt it will be as capable as something like the APG 63 (V)2 but to achieve something like the APG 63(v)3, they would have to effectively leapforg several steps in the technologies evoloution, i.e. most likely not gonna happen.").
Then you have missed the point of the conversation and the point i was making. This discussion on radars started when Ryttare claimed that the Grippen's avionics package would not be all that different the F35's and sighted the fact that it would be equiped with an AESA radar. The point i have been making is that just because you have an active array doesent mean you have something as capable as the AN/APG 77/79/81, i.e. some AESA's are more equal than others. That is the WHOLE point of this discussion, and it is exactly what i said in the quote you have written above. There is a put load more that goes into a 3rd gen or equivelant system than T/R modules and a cooling system.
You have in effect selectively quoted/selectively read both the quote outlined above and most of what i have said in this thread. I never said CAESAR/ whatever Grippens radar will be called will be exactly as capable as a specific US system called APG 63(v)2, to extrapolte that from what i have said really misses/aviods the crux of the argument. What i said was while i have no doubt (no problem) with the sweeds achieveing something ascapable as system A (maybe more capable, sure),
but achieveing the capabilities of system B is very unlikely for all of the reasons i have stated above (there's the point of the argument). APG 63(v)2 was just an example of a 2nd gen US system, and you have in effect only responded to 14 words and ignored the rest of the statement and rest of the discussion, which distorts their meaning.
I have not made any claims that the first operational AESA fighter radar produced by the EU (BTW, there are quite a few EU-made AESA radars operational already, including airborne, e.g. those bought by the USCG for their patrol aircraft, so we're not discussing the first operational AESA radar) will match or surpass any current or future US AESA fighter radar, because I'm not privy to the information necessary. But I am confident that your claim is false.
Considering what i have actually been saying the whole time, which is; I seriously doubt any EU 1st gen systems will be as capable as US 3rd gen systems, and therefore just because Grippen has an AESA does not mean it will have as capable a radar as the F35, THAT is my contention sir. By disputing it, as you have done continually, you are therefore, taking the opposite view that such a system will be as capable. Hence my response.
And as far as operational AESA's its quite clear i was talking about fighter sized radar's which is obvious the reference to 3rd gen. Should we discuss the US's PESA radar capability in fighters becasue of SPY-1D??? Sure they have some experiance, but you wouldnt say they could make an Ibris, significantly faster, with much less rescources and money would you?
It's a matter of public record that the major European countries opted not to field radars of the technical level of the APG63(v)2, since they considered the ratio of cost to performance to be unacceptable. The hardware was too expensive, too heavy, & too hard to cool. Since the USA fielded so few APG63(v)2s, I suspect that view may also have had its adherents in the USA.
Thats fine mate, considering the europeans will field these systems a decade later i have no doubt they will be significantly more efficient considering the improvement in array hardware alone. But again this is completely beside the point.
France went a different way from other European countries, opting for PESA as an interim radar until AESA hardware was more developed, the UK & its Eurofighter partners developing an outstanding mechanically-scanned radar to fill the same slot. But everyone continued to develop the software & hardware for AESA, with the co-operative programmes Scorpion mentions & separate national & company programmes, aiming at being ready to exploit the technology when the price/performance ratio of the hardware reached an acceptable level, which it now, clearly, has.
I have no doubt the various EU R&D programmes have made significant progress. Considering russian and chinese progress, CAESAR should be the most capable, non US system, in the market for some time. But, and APG 79 it does not make.
European countries have not spent anything near as much as the USA, & the greater US spending is likely to be reflected in a US advantage. But they are not stuck in the 1990s, as you seem to believe. Maybe not where the USA is, but nor are they three generations behind.
Look, my whole contention was not that EU AESA tech is back in the 90's, and if you read what i wrote thats not what i have in fact claimed (i refered to Eu's radar as 1st gen, becasue it techically is EU's first gen). But i have had conversations with several Europeans (this included) where they stated that CAESAR/Saab's AESA will recitfy any radar deficiency they have vs US platforms, becasue they are AESA's. Well sir, that is clearly not the case.
@scorpion...
Sorry for not replying to your posts but i think everything is covered above.
