Mirage F.1

[MAD]

Politics and national pride aside.  Here is something for you to contemplate:

Mirage F.1 with avionics from the MiG-23 to include the signature radome of the Flogger.  May as well toss in the engine too.  Clients for this little gem could be any number of third world countries that have a need for speed with the simplicity of maintenance at a really friendly price. 

I did do an F-1 with the intakes and exhaust off a Mig-23 as a PLAAF licenced built a/c based on one of Deinos pictures. They do fit ok, but the radome mmmm may have to be shortened IIRC due to the diameter of the fuselage.

Now that would look good as a profile!
A PLAAF Mirage F1

With the PLAAF picking the Dassault design over other Western design, as a replacement for its MiG-15 and MiG-19's, at a time when PRC and the Soviet Union was at odds with one another, and boarder clashes.
The PRC was said to have preferred the Dassault F1 design over its competitors, due to its – cost-to-performance ratio, rough-field performance and the wiliness to allow for license manufacturing, and the French Governments wiliness not to attach human rights issues to the deal!

M.A.D

[B777LR]

Ok, this was January 2005 - Pollux joined following april,  I joined one year later. 
Didn't see Overscan post of course- not very nice on M53! -
I had heard too of a naval F1, but I thought it was powered by the Atar.

Answer to the question "WTF didn't they navalised the F1 ?" is easy : its simply because the competition was on STRIKE aircrafts (A-4, A-7, Jaguar M, SE...) not multirole fighters.

Vought Crusader just had entered aeronavale service in 1965... but they were the last ever build by Vought! That's the problem.
The F-1 flew in 1967 but Bigand crash delayed IOC by three years.
If the aeronavale chose to wait for the F-1, then fleet defence lays on Etendard IV until 1972 at best.

FSW F-1 sounds cool!

Anything would be better than the Etendard IV / Super Etendard
This would have to be one of the most limited capability aircraft made in the West, during the Cold War (A some what equivalent of the Su-7 ‘Fitter’, in its limited weapons load or fuel equation – except the Su-7 was more rugged and hard hitting and gave good combat service!!).
Man did the French Navy pilots get ripped off or what!
M.A.D

Well, we could develop a fighter version of the Etendard! Not saying it would be a good dogfighter, but it could fit into the same niche as the F-4 (heavy, sluggish fighter-bomber).

[PolluxDeltaSeven]

Hum... The Super Etendard is not such a bad plane. It's just a kind of of A-4 Skyhawk that never get the last updates (F404-like engine, multipurpose radar etc...)
For me, its main problem was its centerline undercarriage: the position of the landing gears doesn't allowed heavy bomb carriage ala Skyhawk. The best I saw on centerline was 2 bombs on a twin bomb rack under an Argentinian plane.
I always thought that the Super Etendard was a mistake. It was sold with the "Etendard IV communality" argument while reality later show that it was a was too difefrent to have the same maintain, and too similar to be economically and technologically attractive!
If the A-4 was probably a worse choice for the Marine (because it cannot carry the Exocet), the A-7 sounds good to me, and Archie's Mirage F1M even better!!

The Super Etendard right now is far away from what it was. For such a light aircraft, it could carry a huge variety of weapons and payload (refueling pods, GBU-12/22, EGBU-12, rockets, bombs, Magic II air-air missiles, Damocles laser designator, Exocet anti-ship heavy missiles, but also recce pod and ASMP nuclear missile).
Actually, its really "raison d'être" are the last four items I quoted. If it is still so important for the French Navy, it's because the Rafale are not here in suffisant numbers, and they are not all fitted with laser designator, Exocet, recce pod and ASMP.

But very soon, the Rafale M will receive Damocles in a full integration mode, Reco-NG pod, ASMP-A, and Exocet in a new block. They already received their air-to-ground 30mm gun and refueling pod (something that wasn't planned before 2015 initially, in order to keep "something" in favour of the Super Etendard). At this moment, the Super Etendard won't be able to justify its own existence, except the fact that all the Rafale and Rafale pilots won't be fully operationnal until several years.

I think that the Super Etendard will finish its life like the old French Mirage F1, or some A-4 from other countries, as a cheap second line fighter, for African conflicts for example.

[Sentinel Chicken]

Politics and national pride aside.  Here is something for you to contemplate:

Mirage F.1 with avionics from the MiG-23 to include the signature radome of the Flogger.  May as well toss in the engine too.  Clients for this little gem could be any number of third world countries that have a need for speed with the simplicity of maintenance at a really friendly price. 

I did do an F-1 with the intakes and exhaust off a Mig-23 as a PLAAF licenced built a/c based on one of Deinos pictures. They do fit ok, but the radome mmmm may have to be shortened IIRC due to the diameter of the fuselage.

Now that would look good as a profile!
A PLAAF Mirage F1

With the PLAAF picking the Dassault design over other Western design, as a replacement for its MiG-15 and MiG-19's, at a time when PRC and the Soviet Union was at odds with one another, and boarder clashes.
The PRC was said to have preferred the Dassault F1 design over its competitors, due to its – cost-to-performance ratio, rough-field performance and the wiliness to allow for license manufacturing, and the French Governments wiliness not to attach human rights issues to the deal!

M.A.D

Not too far off the mark, there was a Shenyang design that was broadly based on the Mirage F1 and powered by a Spey engine: http://airlinebuzz.com/forums/blog.php?b=37

[Archibald]

Ok, this was January 2005 - Pollux joined following april,  I joined one year later. 
Didn't see Overscan post of course- not very nice on M53! -
I had heard too of a naval F1, but I thought it was powered by the Atar.

Answer to the question "WTF didn't they navalised the F1 ?" is easy : its simply because the competition was on STRIKE aircrafts (A-4, A-7, Jaguar M, SE...) not multirole fighters.

Vought Crusader just had entered aeronavale service in 1965... but they were the last ever build by Vought! That's the problem.
The F-1 flew in 1967 but Bigand crash delayed IOC by three years.
If the aeronavale chose to wait for the F-1, then fleet defence lays on Etendard IV until 1972 at best.

FSW F-1 sounds cool!

Anything would be better than the Etendard IV / Super Etendard
This would have to be one of the most limited capability aircraft made in the West, during the Cold War (A some what equivalent of the Su-7 'Fitter', in its limited weapons load or fuel equation – except the Su-7 was more rugged and hard hitting and gave good combat service!!).
Man did the French Navy pilots get ripped off or what!
M.A.D

Well, we could develop a fighter version of the Etendard! Not saying it would be a good dogfighter, but it could fit into the same niche as the F-4 (heavy, sluggish fighter-bomber).

Somewhere on this forum I've drawn a Mirage-Etendard hybrid.

The Etendard II/ IV/VI and the Mirage I/II/III-01 all appeared in 1955-1956
( Dassault was rather busy at the time, there was also the Super-Mystere B 1 / 2 /4!)

And they were all Mystere IV derivatives.

Etendard and Mirage bodies are basically Mystere IV fuselage with side-mounted intakes.

So both had a common "core" (and a similar engine, a non-afterburning Atar-101 giving 4500 kgp of thrust ) 
but
the Mirage had delta wing while the Etendard kept Mystere' swept wings (a bit scaled up maybe).

Next difference : Mirage III-01 received shock cones in its air intakes and afterburner. Speed rose from mach 1.3 to mach 2.2

The Etendard IV never receive these goodies so its speed stayed mach 1.2

But Mirage intakes and rear fuselage would fit nicely onto an Etendard !

Give Etendard IV Mirage III intakes and afterburner.
Give Super Etendard Mirage F1 intakes and afterburner.

[gunfighter]

Well, the Mirage F1 is not my favourite plane (REALLY NOT), but I know that it was a very unlucky aircraft, born in a moment when its great contender, the F16, was being marketed. I think that, in the case the Falcon had faced any problem (just as the actual situation on the JSF), the F1 could have enjoyed a greater success. Imagine the F1 winning the Century Contract, thus operating with all the european air forces that bought the F16: denmark, belgium, holland, and norway, even portugal.
Other operators that come to my mind are Turkey, Israel, Iran, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, Singapore, South Korea, Argentina, India, Taiwan, Brazil, Mexico, and even the US...
With the years, the basic type could be improved with AMRAAMS and mavericks (these would look nice in a RNZAF bird), CFTs, new radars and so...

[Jschmus]

I always thought the F1 would look good in US colors, either as a front-line bird or as an aggressor.

[dy031101]

Mirage F1.M53 upgraded with Kopyo radar as well as R-73 and R-77...... um...... 

[PanzerWulff]

Thats funny I'm actually working on an israeli F.1,I will be marking it as what the IAF might have done to suppliment and replace their A-4's anf Kifir's if the F-16 was not available
"Panzer"

[Ian the Kiwi Herder]

Ahhh Mirage F1's one of my FAVOURITE subjects.

I have two of the Italeri re-releases in the stash. One will be real world, one not  - Not going to elaborate on that just now, but ones that were VERY close to being built - and still may be sometime -

USAFE Aggressor: (complimenting the F-5's at Alconbury in the 1980's),
JASDF: in the RF-4 style tactical camo
Dutch AF: Wraparound 'standard' pattern but in two greys and (much) reduced size roundels
Danish AF: Patchy overall OD
RNZAF: either Euro 1 type wraparound or the later overall Olive Green

Luv that aircraft.

Ian

[gunfighter]

One of the options I was thinking of was an advanced F1, similar to the development done with the Desert Falcon for the UAEF. Put M53 engine, CFTs, IRST, canards, wingtip AMRAAMs and underwing Paveways III or IV, even SDBs...then add digital camo or something alike. Who could pay for that? any arab country, Japan, even Switzerland...

[Shasper]

I'd bet my left toe if Israel & France hadn't had their falling out, F1s would have replaced the earlier MIII/5s the IDAF had in service.

Shas

[GTX]

Well, the Mirage F1 is not my favourite plane (REALLY NOT), but I know that it was a very unlucky aircraft, born in a moment when its great contender, the F16, was being marketed. I think that, in the case the Falcon had faced any problem (just as the actual situation on the JSF), the F1 could have enjoyed a greater success. Imagine the F1 winning the Century Contract, thus operating with all the european air forces that bought the F16: denmark, belgium, holland, and norway, even portugal.
Other operators that come to my mind are Turkey, Israel, Iran, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, Singapore, South Korea, Argentina, India, Taiwan, Brazil, Mexico, and even the US...
With the years, the basic type could be improved with AMRAAMS and mavericks (these would look nice in a RNZAF bird), CFTs, new radars and so...

Well Australia for one did come under strong consideration in the early'70s - Dassault even offered a full production license which included the rights to produce components for every F1 sold worldwide even if the RAAF didn't select it!

Regards,

Greg

[gunfighter]

Do you think there could be any of these at topgunski? maybe ex-iraqi aircraft exchanged for mig-29s?

[GTX]

Do you think there could be any of these at topgunski? maybe ex-iraqi aircraft exchanged for mig-29s?

Alternatively, maybe a few from South Africa after the program to re-engine one with a RD-33.

Regards,

Greg