F-35 Gun Tests
- Thread starter Kevin J.
- Start date
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Apparently it's been long enough for the Marine Corps to forget how inaccurate the SUU-16 and SUU-23 gun were for the USAF F-4C and F-4D Phantoms, and the not much better performance of the Mk 4 Mod 0 pods on the Navy and Marine F-4s.
cmort666
Member
The F-35, a Brewster Buffalo for the modern age...
Pretty impressive, but how about a million rounds per minute?
[ame="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wKlnMwuCZso"]Metal Storm[/ame]
[ame="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wKlnMwuCZso"]Metal Storm[/ame]
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But all you got to penetrate are tents these days......
Good enough !!
Chuck
The problem is that you have to hit the tent.
Gun pods are notoriously inaccurate - both in terms of vibrating while the gun is firing and in terms of not staying aligned with the gun sight.
Both problems meant the gun pods on the F-4 were never much use for air to air.
In the mud mover role there is a potential advantage to having the rounds being dispersed to cover a wider area, but in close air support that can be very, very bad in the enemy trips re tucked in tight to the friendly troops. I much prefer the pilot have full control of where the ordinance is going.
ChuckS1
US Veteran
Same system worked great on the A-10. Your F-4 is ancient technology compared what is available now.
Actually, that might explain the logic behind it.
Unfortunately, there's a lot more to it than that.
The A-10 is a lot slower and more maneuverable and it's also an excellent gun platform.
The F-35B isn't.
The USAF is putting an internal gun in its version of the F-35 and there's a reason for that. The USMC doesn't have that option due to the VTOL requirement and I suspect in the end they're going to wish they'd just skipped the whole program. Not that anyone can admit that now as doing so would be a career ending statement.
The USMC was wise in that regard when they retained the A-4 in preference to the larger and more complex A-7. The A-7 was a fine aircraft, it just didn't fit as well with the USMC's role and operation environment and I don't think the F-35B is going to fit in any better.
You can argue the need for a 5th generation strike fighter for the USAF and the USN given the force projection roles that might take those aircraft into high threat areas, but USMC aviators shine in the air to ground role and we're just not going to find ourselves in a position with troops on the ground and a lack of at least local air superiority. A complex aircraft like the F-35B isn't going to be the optimum choice for deployment in a forward area and the advantages it offers in some areas are not worth the trade offs in others.
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