Yeah only the F-35A’s have internal guns. B’s and C’s rely on the GAU-22 gunpod.
I guess they never did learn from the mistakes of removing the guns from the Phantoms.
4 Likes
I mean there are real constraints but honestly missiles have gotten good enough
Again, that’s what they thought during Vietnam. “The age of dogfighting is over” when in reality it was far from it. But still even with how advanced missiles are now it doesn’t hurt to have a backup in the form of a gun, especially one that doesn’t kill performance and stealth capabilities.
The missiles now are actually really good though. Im just glad the A has a gun
Guns do weigh a good bit too, especially with ammo. And they take up internal space
It’s a shame the B never had an internal gun. Could have been pretty fun having the flight performance and VTOL without the drag of the gunpod.
Oh yeah definitely. But I’d imagine the weight of the internal gun + ammo would still be better than the weight + drag of the gunpod by a bit.
2 Likes
tbf im pretty sure more US players will be in F-22 than F-35