"Why the F-5 Tiger was the perfect plane to simulate ..." Topic

…Soviet "Bandits" in adversary missions.

"Developed as an advanced version of the F-5 fighter, the Northrop F-5E was selected to be the International Fighter Aircraft to follow the F-5A, and over 950 Tiger II were delivered to a wide variety of countries around the world. Moreover the F-5E demonstrated to be the perfect fighter to provide Dissimilar Air Combat Training (DACT), that's why U.S. Navy and Marines still use it as adversary in mock air-to-air engagements.
U.S. Naval Aviation is the main Tiger II operator among the U.S. Armed Forces and it flies the N variant, a type of F-5E previously operated by the Swiss Air Force.

As pointed out by Chad Mingo, a pilot from Fighter Composite Squadron 13 (VFC-13) Saints (that with the VFC-111 Sundowners and with the VMFT-401, is one of the last three U.S. units to fly the F-5), in Rick Llinares book "Strike Beyond Top Gun", the key advantage of the F-5 is to be relatively inexpensive to fly.

Nevertheless according to Mingo there are several differences between the E and N models: "The N model is a little heavier than the E and has several improvements, including RWR gear (radar warning receiver) and enhanced radars, as well as antiskid systems, which provide enhanced handling on wet runways…"
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Amicalement
Armand

It's also a really pretty bird.

Doug

Especially pretty when painted black too.

I still call it a 'MiG-28'

But yeah, I like the lines of the Tiger II. It's too bad the F-20 Tigershark never went into production. That aircraft would still be serving in air forces today if it did.

Tigershark was a great little jet. It would've been successful if the USA had adopted a few squadrons for Aggressor duties and the F-16 had been kept under export restrictions.

The worst thing is the way US fighter development has gone, there is no light weight fighter left to sell to smaller countries (F-16 is now middle of the road).

And in the future it's only the F-35 and nothing else.

Nowonder the Swedes are optimistic with their JAS-39 Gripen.

The F-5 is a cool little jet.

We have a black one (single, most of the time) fly overhead daily.

Not sure where it goes, or why, but it is on a very regular schedule.

I'm not a fan of the black "camo" scheme, but it does make it easier to spot.

Mako, I'd guess that it's a private aggressor bird. There are quite a few of those, especially out of Lakeland.

No, it flies out of Beale every day.

You can see them on the tarmac, with a satellite search.

Every once in a while there are a pair, flying together, but that's probably less than 5% of the time.

Flies south in the morning, and north in the afternoon, evening, daily.

Probably some kind of test bird (though I'm probably stating the obvious).