Interesting Article On The Gripen

[Brigadier]

Supposedly the E variant is the best yet.

https://amp.businessinsider.com/swe...IVThWp3rnUpOUp8DoXKT6Avx2as8Frd7JFWlsIEc

Quote
Gripen pilots don't like to show their cards by demonstrating the full power of the jet's jamming in training. But the one time they did, it completely reversed the course of the mock battle in training, Bronk said.

"Several years ago the Gripen pilots got tired of being made fun of by German Typhoon pilots and came to play with their wartime electronic warfare and gave them a [censored] of a hard time," Bronk said. One of the Gripens was "reportedly able to appear on the left wing of a Typhoon without being detected" by using its "extremely respected" jamming ability, Bronk said.

"It would be fair to assume the Gripen is one of the most capable electronic warfighters out there," he said, adding that the Gripens that baffled the Typhoons were of the C/D series, which have much less powerful electronic-warfare capabilities than the E series Gripens that Helgesson described.

 

[FlyPenFly]

I can confirm that in my Saab, the electronics were flaky due to jamming.

 

[Brigadier]

Make fun of it all you want, but that Typhoon would have been dead before he even knew what hit him.

 

[Astro14]

The Gripen is a great airplane in search of a market. Excellent airframe performance. The Volvo-built engine is a derivative of the F404 in the F/A-18 and that's a great engine. I've not flown against their ECM suite, but the Swedish defense industry has great talent and is able to meet the unique service requirements of Sweden.

For example: short takeoff and landing. The SAAB Viggen used canards and a delta wing, along with thrust reverse and huge wheel brakes, to be able to take off and land on short stretches of highway. The fighters could be dispersed among the Swedish countryside, hidden, and ready to fly on short notice, using highways and roads for take off and landing. It was unique. That airplane had no short field equal. There are some great YouTube videos of one landing, backing up, and taking off in less than 1,500'. That's astonishing performance.

At one point, Sweden had 20 times the fighters per capita that the US or Russia had. 20 times as many airplanes per citizen. Their defense strategy was built on excellent fighters in huge numbers being able to repel a Russian invasion or attack.

From the Drakken, through the Viggen, and now the Gripen, Swedish fighters have been built as integrated platforms. Avionics performance is built and designed in with the airframe and powerplant.

A long history of exceptional fighters built for unique service requirements.

Fighter sales are interesting. So many political factors are included in the purchase decision. Now, to be fair, some of those political factors, like system interoperability with treaty (e.g. NATO, EU, ANZUS, ASEA) partners, or strategic partners and allies, are important and legitimate. Some, like an expectation of quid pro quo on other political issues, distort the decision process.

IF fighter sales were purely on performance, you would see a lot more nations with the Gripen.

 

[DeepFriar]

SAAB was always wonderful to work with. Bright people, innovative and not set in their ways. Beholden to no specific approach unlike how our stovepipes can sometimes be. The Ring Laser Gyro effort with the Gripen ran concurrent with the one placing RLG's directly on the gun trunnions of their 155mm self propelled howitzers (talk about a tough shock environment) providing both nortfinding/aiming for indirect fire and fast nav to new firing locations (with the equipment it was possible to stop, emplace and fire the first shot accurately in 30 seconds).. The Gripen was the conceptual outgrowth of the F20 Tigershark program we discussed here earlier. As Astro points out the aircraft would be dispersed and sit cold and dark, cocked and locked with stored heading alignment, until dispatched. On notification they were to be off the ground in 30 seconds. Very successful program. I think we guaranteed them 4,000 hours MTBF (whereas 50 MTBF was the norm pre-RLG) but it may actually be closer to 50,000 hours at component level.

One last thing about that article - the author sets up a false comparison on stealth versus ECM. I can assure you that when the F-22 and especially the F-35 turn those big AESA antennae on you, your airplane is gonna BLEED. I still believe the highest, best use of that *drive shaft" on the lift fan variant is driving a multi-megawatt generator for both electrical and laser weapons. And that's in addition to the regular offensive EW suite. BTW I have no direct knowledge of these things, just open source and speculation, and haven't been cleared in almost 20 years. So take it FWIW.

Cheers

Larry