While I'm all for a better Hürjet and agree with all of you, just thinking out loud:
The benchmark F-16 is not a state-of-the-art design anymore. It was designed in 1970s, and depending on the mission profile, it could be surpassed by newer designs like Lavi or other canard designs with less brute-strength. Current F-16 is very capable, but due to additional equipment it's not a lean machine anymore.
Hürjet is a double-seat trainer aircraft, due to conventional design it will not be efficient aerodynamically and its battlefield survivability will not be good because it lacks stealth design.
Helmet mounted cueing, all aspect missiles, precision guided small bombs will makeinstantenous sustained turn rates and heavy loads less important.
If there was no time-pressure, leaving Hürjet as it is with a cheaper & small engine and developing it could be better now. In parallel, a different and more efficient airframe could be developed. However there is TFX/MMU now, so all resources for a new fighter should go into MMU. Again however, due to advanced needs of MMU we could have used an interim design between MMU and Hürjet, to accumulate more experience. There is no resource or time for that now. This lack of experience makes MMU programme too risky, but we must succeed.
Turkey should have developed a F-16 variant like F-16XL or F-2 of Japan in the 1990s.
The benchmark F-16 is not a state-of-the-art design anymore. It was designed in 1970s, and depending on the mission profile, it could be surpassed by newer designs like Lavi or other canard designs with less brute-strength. Current F-16 is very capable, but due to additional equipment it's not a lean machine anymore.
Hürjet is a double-seat trainer aircraft, due to conventional design it will not be efficient aerodynamically and its battlefield survivability will not be good because it lacks stealth design.
Helmet mounted cueing, all aspect missiles, precision guided small bombs will make
If there was no time-pressure, leaving Hürjet as it is with a cheaper & small engine and developing it could be better now. In parallel, a different and more efficient airframe could be developed. However there is TFX/MMU now, so all resources for a new fighter should go into MMU. Again however, due to advanced needs of MMU we could have used an interim design between MMU and Hürjet, to accumulate more experience. There is no resource or time for that now. This lack of experience makes MMU programme too risky, but we must succeed.
Turkey should have developed a F-16 variant like F-16XL or F-2 of Japan in the 1990s.
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