GAO: Tactical Aircraft: Changing Conditions Drive Need for New F/A-22 Business Case"

"monkey" wrote in message
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"Tarver Engineering" wrote in message
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"monkey" wrote in message
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"Tarver Engineering" wrote in message
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"BUFDRVR" wrote in message
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Face
it - a non-stealthy combat aircraft is obsolete.

I think you may be over stating that point a bit Walt. There's
still
years
and
years of play for non-stealth (and in the case of the BUFF,
anti-stealth)
aircraft. In fact, the addition of the F/A-22 ensures that.

An F-15 life extension is a near certainty now.

A lot of people will be crying into their beer after an F-15 lifex -
that is just not an effective plan these days. We did that with our
Hornets, and even with centre barrel replacement there are TONS of
serviceability problems.

There aren't enough F-22s to replace the F-15 and the F-35 is sliding
further away. The options are to life extend the F-15, or have the USAF
buy
F/A-18Es. If we wait until the F-15s start falling out of the sky, then
they will all be gounded.

Besides that, the F-18 life extension doubled the usable life of the
F/A-18As.

I agree with the fact that something has to be done...however in my
experience flying military jets "life extension" is a huge misnomer.
Yes, the life of the airframe is "extended." But the fact of the
matter is that our older "life extended" jets have a very low fatigue
tolerance and as such have a very low g limit, as well as severe store
carriage limitations. Yes, the jets are still flying, but you'll find
that a lot of them are useless for anything except ifr training and
cross countries. But hey, what can an air force do-until the new jets
come on line or they get more money, they will have to stick with
flying older aircraft less, and restricting the mission types.

If only the F-22 had been cancelled in '98 ...