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Iran unveils first domestic fighter jet

Maybe because they want to save money and use F 5 design instead of doing from scratch. It can take 10 years by using new design. I guess they just want to test their turbojet engine and avionics and use proven design as platform.
Basically they went ahead with F-5 replica while putting subsystems procured from Russian and home industry.
 
Dont know if its true but 1 F 5 is sacrificed for 1 kosar:lol:
 
Well you got to start somewhere. Iran has tried and produce something, good on them for the effort. few years later, next version will be (and should be) an improvement on the first effort, and improvement after improvement is how you grow.

Good initiative, best of luck for the next moves.
 
I just don't understand the Iranian logic.

Why don't they collaborate with Russia or China or even former aerospace manufacturing countries such as Poland, Romania, Czech Republic, Slovakia etc in the aerospace sector and get their own design?

Iran definitely has scientific talent and has managed to reverse engineer this jet with such tough sanctions; it is no easy job.

This would have allowed them to have a better access to design and therefore expedited a completely new design of aircraft.
 
Why don't they collaborate with Russia or China or even former aerospace manufacturing countries such as Poland, Romania, Czech Republic, Slovakia etc in the aerospace sector and get their own design?

because no one wants to work with iran and get bullied for that.. you gotta think before you post.. as if india did not get bullied to withdraw from iranian oil that may be why you did not include india in your list but european countries like poland and czech
 
The F-5 air superiority:

According to defense analyst and prominent Pentagon fighter mafia (of F-16 fame) member Pierre Sprey, the F-5 was perhaps the most effective U.S. air-to-air fighter in the 1960s and early 1970s based on his published fighter effectiveness criteria.[23][24 ] Sprey defines the key factors of fighter effectiveness in order of importance as 1. Ability to surprise the enemy without being surprised, 2. On a per budget basis, ability to outnumber the enemy via lower unit cost and higher sortie rates and reliability, 3. Ability to outmaneuver the enemy, and 4. Once in position to fire by either surprise or maneuver, ability to attain reliable kills (weapon system effectiveness).[25] As a prominent example of a well implemented light fighter,[26][27] the F-5 is a close match to these criteria in the time frame before Beyond Visual Range missiles became reliable. A small visual and radar cross section size and consequent detection difficulty often conferred the F-5 the advantage of surprise.[28] The F-5 has the smallest planform area of any fighter in common usage.[29] This is a critical practical combat advantage since historically about 80% of air to air kills do occur by surprise.[30] The aircraft is highly cost effective and reliable, allowing superior numbers in the air on a per budget basis. The aircraft also has a high sortie rate, low accident rate, high maneuverability, and is armed with an effective combination of 20mm cannon and heat seeking missiles.

The F-5 earned a reputation for a jet that was hard to discern in the air and when one finally saw it, it was often after a missile or guns kill had already been called.

-- Singapore's former Chief of Air Force and F-5 pilot, Major General Ng Chee Khern.[31]

In 1970, Northrop won the International Fighter Aircraft (IFA) competition to replace the F-5A, with better air-to-air performance against aircraft like the Soviet MiG-21. The resultant aircraft, initially known as F-5A-21, subsequently became the F-5E. It had more powerful (5,000 lbf) General Electric J85-21 engines, and had a lengthened and enlarged fuselage, accommodating more fuel. Its wings were fitted with enlarged leading edge extensions, giving an increased wing area and improved maneuverability. The aircraft's avionics were more sophisticated, crucially including a radar (initially the Emerson Electric AN/APQ-153) (the F-5A and B had no radar). It retained the gun armament of two M39 cannon, one on either side of the nose of the F-5A. Various specific avionics fits could be accommodated at customer request, including an inertial navigation system, TACAN and ECMequipment.[39]

The first F-5E flew on 11 August 1972.[40] A two-seat combat-capable trainer, the F-5F, was offered, first flying on 25 September 1974, at Edwards Air Force Base, with a new nose, that was 3 feet longer, which, unlike the F-5B that did not mount a gun, allowed it to retain a single M39 cannon, albeit with a reduced ammunition capacity.[41] The two-seater was equipped with the Emerson AN/APQ-157 radar, which is a derivative of the AN/APQ-153 radar, with dual control and display systems to accommodate the two-men crew, and the radar has the same range of AN/APQ-153, around 10 nmi. On 6 April 1973, the 425th TFS at Williams Air Force Base, Ariz. received the first F-5E Tiger II.[42]

A reconnaissance version, the RF-5E Tigereye, with a sensor package in the nose displacing the radar and one cannon, was also offered.

The F-5E eventually received the official name Tiger II; 792 F-5Es, 146 F-5Fs and 12 RF-5Es were eventually built by Northrop.[38] More were built under license overseas: 91 F-5Es and -Fs in Switzerland,[43]68 by Korean Air in South Korea,[44] and 308 in Taiwan.[45]

The F-5E proved to be a successful combat aircraft for U.S. allies, but had no combat service with the U.S. Air Force (though the F-5A with modifications referred to as F-5C was flown by the U.S. in Vietnam[46]). The F-5E evolved into the single-engine F-5G, which was rebranded the F-20 Tigershark. It lost out on export sales to the F-16 in the 1980s.

The F-5E served with the U.S. Air Force from 1975 until 1990, in the 64th Aggressor Squadron and 65th Aggressor Squadron at Nellis Air Force Base in Nevada, and with the 527th Aggressor Squadron at RAF Alconbury in the UK and the 26th Aggressor Squadron at Clark Air Force Base in the Philippines. The U.S. Marines purchased used F-5s from the Air Force in 1989 to replace their F-21s, which served with VMFT-401 at Marine Corps Air Station Yuma. The U.S. Navy used the F-5E extensively at the Naval Fighter Weapons School (TOPGUN) when it was located at NAS Miramar, California. When TOPGUN relocated to become part of the Naval Strike and Air Warfare Center at NAS Fallon, Nevada, the command divested itself of the F-5, choosing to rely on VC-13 (redesignated VFC-13 and which already used F-5s) to employ their F-5s as adversary aircraft. Former adversary squadrons such as VF-43 at NAS Oceana, VF-45 at NAS Key West, VF-126 at NAS Miramar, and VFA-127 at NAS Lemoore have also operated the F-5 along with other aircraft types in support of Dissimilar Air Combat Training (DACT).

The U.S. Navy F-5 fleet continues to be modernized with 36 low-hour F-5E/Fs purchased from Switzerland in 2006. These were updated as F-5N/Fs with modernized avionics and other improved systems. Currently, the only U.S. Navy and U.S. Marine Corps units flying the F-5 are VFC-13 at NAS Fallon, Nevada, VFC-111 at NAS Key West, Florida, and VMFT-401 at MCAS Yuma, Arizona.[6] Currently, VFC-111 operates 18 Northrop F-5N/F Tiger IIs. 17 of these are single-seater F-5Ns and the last is a twin-seater F-5F "FrankenTiger", the product of grafting the older front-half fuselage of an F-5F into the back-half fuselage of a newer low-hours F-5E acquired from the Swiss Air Force. A total of three "FrankenTigers" were made.[70]

According to the FAA, there are 18 privately owned F-5s in the U.S., including Canadair CF-5Ds.[71][72]

Iran

After the Iranian revolution in 1979, the new Islamic Republic of Iran Air Force (IRIAF) was partially successful at keeping Western fighters in service during the Iran–Iraq War in the 1980s and the simple F-5 had a good service readiness until late in the war. Initially Iran took spare parts from foreign sources; later it was able to have its new aircraft industry keep the aircraft flying.[85]


Iranian F-5 during the Iran–Iraq War

IRIAF F-5s were heavily involved, flying air-to-air and air-to-ground sorties. Iranian F-5s took part in air combats with Iraqi Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-21, Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-23, Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-25, Su-20/22, Mirage F-1 and Super Etendards. The exact combat record is not known with many differing claims from Iraqi, Iranian, Western, and Russian sources. Many of the IRIAF's confirmed air-to-air kills were attributed to the Revolutionary Guards for political reasons.[citation needed] There are reports that an IRIAF F-5E, piloted by Major Yadollah Javadpour, shot down a MiG-25 on 6 August 1983.[86][87] Russian sources state that the first confirmed kill of a MiG-25 occurred in 1985.[88]

During the first years of service, Iranian F-5 fighter aircraft had the advantage in missile technology, using advanced versions of the IR seeking Sidewinder, later lost with deliveries of new missiles and fighters to Iraq.[89]
 
My opinion for iran would be to reverse engineer the f14s even if they are able to replecate half of the airframe capabilities (minus the variable wing) with its engine the capabilities of such a plane would be nearer to jets like f15,su27...
Also the Iranians have already upgraded the tomcat avionics with better ones ..
Also the Iranians could potentially use the mig29s and reverse engineer it into a single engine multirole fighter aka mig33 (with potential help from china) ...

Rather than wasting their their resources on useless projects eg qaher313, and this upgraded f5 .. Concentrating their resources on two projects would be much better.
 
Congratulation Iran on your first home built jet. Many countries don't have the privilege to built their own jet engines and air frames but Iran did it. This is a big achievement.
 

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