Because of volume, aerodynamics, power and cooling issues.
Pods are much more practical and you just take them off to have your thoroughbred fighter back, once you don’t need them anymore.
Volume is not an issue if the plane has been designed from the ground up for the purpose. The wingtips are also quite large, here they are compared to the pod:
Power is the same as with volume, not an issue if it’s designed for it. Cooling; i don’t know exactly what you mean, but they did add extra cooling intakes on the E compared to the C.
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Could also assume that the extra EW pod would be optimized for a specific frequency or wavelength for jamming purposes (Lo, Med or Hi Freq), in the case of a dedicated EW Gripen platform within the airspace, though, I would assume that the integrated EW suite would do just fine on the 39E/F + with the network warfare centric space and datalinking between each other.
Something like this with the EA-18
has it been reported yet?
I don’t think it needs to be. There is a 300 kg discrepancy between the true empty mass in game and the basic mass empty (BME) in the brochure. The BME usually includes stuff like engine oil, unusable fuel, hydraulic oil, etc. which is not included in the empty mass in game. That likely closes the gap up quite a bit. Plus BME is usually rounded to a nice round number for proportional purposes. So the report which nerfed it to 7,700 kg is probably already close enough.
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The recent change was made based on that brochure so i think it’s intended.
The Gripen E had its practical “max fuel” weight reported and it was then increased to 7,700kg. Any other report will likely get denied because “empty weight” doesn’t mean the same thing for all countries while it is much more practical to measure plane’s weight with 100% fuel or even 50% fuel and etc.
From a practical standpoint, I can’t see the E not being able to have that built-in when the Gripen E had internal AESA jammers that also utilized GaN while for the longest of time the Growler did not have any AESA jammers let alone jammers utilizing GaN. AESA provides more power and GaN provides more power on top of that as well.
Not sure what are you trying to argue here…are you saying that SAAB designed pod, whose contents otherwise fit into GripenE’s airframe?
SAAB is a big seller of other aircraft components (BOZ, BOL, and generally countermeasure suites). It’d make sense to take a component and put it in pod form for them to sell. To buy an entire plane is sometimes excessive.
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Yes, pod is for older platforms with less built in EW capabilities.
I mean, to an extent, yes. they spread the parts out and use several smaller transmitters to accomplish the same function as one cohesive larger one. Using AESA you can not only direct beams but also constructively and destructively interfere them to change the resulting frequency and at what strength it arrives at the target. Sort of how small in-ear headphones can create base notes with a treble emitter. That way the multiple smal emitters can effectively function as one larger one.
Edit:
Adding the pod to the E most likely just increases the number of EW functions one plane can perform at once. Additionally the Gripen E can also connect to other Gripen E and function as one larger interconnected system for even stronger results, which is especially good since all Gripen E’s have the same EW functionality instead of just a single dedicated aircraft
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And also add in that jammer pods likely have less vertical coverage to the rear which is probably important if you want to be running away and going low against missiles compared to internal transmitters.
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“What one of us see, all of us know.”
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AN/ALQ-249’s RAT is estimated to generate about as much electrical power as one F414 on the Growler.
You can’t really power it from the plane’s electrical system and then you need means to cool all that.
Required power is due the S300’s tracking radar that has about 300+kW peak power, eg.
It’s a tough nut to crack and jammers that the plane can power on its own won’t cut it.
And ofc, you can put 4-5 of those pods on the plane and wreck havoc among the enemy IADS.
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SAAB also worked with General Atomics Aeronautical Systems IIRC to slap on GlobalEye derivative on an MQ-9B, called the LoyalEye
I torqued some connectors on this!
So, there’s 13 slots depicted in gripen-e’s loadouts. Only 8 of those 13 slots are manipulable. Why can’t we just spread the slots out by two more spaces, to actually give proper loadout ability to gripen-e’s belly?
(atp i’m just seething)
Is Gripen. Devs don’t care.
the same reason why sweden for unknown reason has smokeless sidewinders.
But realistically what mixed loadouts would you even take that you can’t do on wings