Pentagon to test F-35 against A-10 in 'common sense' war scenario showdown

[EX500rider]

62. "They already tested it against the F-16 and the F-16 won."

F-35's internal weapons capability is equal to that of a F-16 loaded wall to wall. Once stealth is no longer a primary issue, a F-35 can carry about three times (18,000lbs) the stores load of that of an F-16.

F-16, even with the conformal fuel tank, will need external fuel tanks to achieve the maximum range. F-35 will achieve its maximum range on internal fuel alone, and for a slight range penalty, be loaded up with 18,000lb of nothing but weapons. With F-16, there is a trade off between range and fuel.

F-35 also will out-accelerate any fighter in the US inventory, except for the F-22 and a clean F-16 Block 50. F-35 is designed for the transonic regime while practically every other fighter designed (except for F-22) is designed for operating at subsonic speeds. They only visit the supersonic performance range and only briefly.

F-35 does away with stealth coatings like on the F-22, B-2 and F-117. The stealth coating is instead baked directly into the skin of the aircraft in a stealth mat. There has been extensive durability studies of the F-35's skin to see how ordinary wear and tear and damage would do to the stealth signature, and to see how long the skin can last. Lockheed Martin, to make a point of how durable the skin is to wear and tear, actually has a piece of the stealth mat used as a floor mat at one of their labs and they occasionally pull it up and conduct tests to see how it fares. It can be argued that the F-22, B-2 and F-117 stealth coatings represent the first generation of stealth coatings. F-35's approach to stealth coatings represent the second generation of stealth coatings.

The biggest change with F-35's maintenance model is the switch from 'maintenance per schedule' to 'maintenance on demand'. The aircraft has a built in maintenance tracking system that can flag maintainers to fix problems as required while the jet is returning from a mission (say, as the aircraft is landing, the computer will uplink to the maintainer's computer systems and tell them that the F-35 returning right now is expected to require a oil change when it lands). ALIS will also capture data on the entire F-35 fleet and allows for pre-positioning of spare parts where they are needed and when using just-in-time logistics.

All the above from a very long thread about the F-22/F-35/F-16/A-10 on Airliners.net

http://www.airliners.net/aviation-forums/military/read.main/146799/