No More New Fighter Aircraft Types?

"Scott Ferrin" wrote in message
...

So? Does that mean the USAF is all of a sudden going to want to start
buying a derivative of a derivitive of the LOSER in the LWF
competition instead of a fighter with FAR higher performance (F-15)?

I expect that now that the F-15 option is off the table

It's not.

Now Scott, I doubt your history of being wrong about the F-22 for so many
years qualifies you to make a statements about F-15s. The politics of the
situation have eliminated any reasonable chance of a Super Eagle, which is
why I joke about F/A-18s for USAF. Within the same City are two very
different political situations.

Tarver Engineering wrote:
Emmanuel would have been correct in what he wrote two years ago, but the
bone has lit up.

Two years ago the Bone was well into its 3rd rotation in support of OEF
and was a very in demand weapons system. 7 BW Bones were routinely
dropping large numbers of JDAM's in support of ANACONDA this time last
year and flew 301 of 301 sorties in support of it, quite impressive.

You'd have to go back at least five years for the original statement to
be true. In all fairness, the Bone was in the middle of the block D
upgrades and availability on any platform in the middle of an upgrade
program is usually pretty poor.

Getting the Bone to work is a major setback for any F/A-22.


Hardly, now the FB-22 proposal is a different story, but that has a
shorter range and much smaller weapons load. Add SBD's to the Bone and
you're talking about 96 to almost 200 weapons carried.

Michael Kelly, Bone Maintainer

"Michael Kelly" wrote in message
om...
Tarver Engineering wrote:
Emmanuel would have been correct in what he wrote two years ago, but the
bone has lit up.

Two years ago the Bone was well into its 3rd rotation in support of OEF
and was a very in demand weapons system. 7 BW Bones were routinely
dropping large numbers of JDAM's in support of ANACONDA this time last
year and flew 301 of 301 sorties in support of it, quite impressive.

You'd have to go back at least five years for the original statement to
be true. In all fairness, the Bone was in the middle of the block D
upgrades and availability on any platform in the middle of an upgrade
program is usually pretty poor.

Getting the Bone to work is a major setback for any F/A-22.


Hardly, now the FB-22 proposal is a different story, but that has a
shorter range and much smaller weapons load. Add SBD's to the Bone and
you're talking about 96 to almost 200 weapons carried.

I don't see a need for additional A/G airborn weapons platforms now that we
are not going to cut up the Bones.

Henry J Cobb wrote:
But the Air Force has concluded that they don't need jamming.

No, it hasn't done that at all, Henry. Once again, you write with no actual
knowledge of the situation.

The services did a study (The Airborn Electronic Attack Analysis of
Alternatives) that came back with a whole bunch of options. The Navy
component was pretty clear -- EA-18 was the best option. The Air Force has
a more complex situation and the options ranged from UAVs to widebody jets
to EF-22s to EB-52s or some combination of the above. So they decided that
they needed to look some more to decide if a direct replacement was the
right solution or to pursue something different (like UAVs). AFAIK, they
have not settled on a final solution, but "nothing" is not it. They are
apparently making some moves on fitting B-52s for electronic attack as a
near-term fix.

Two articles that describe the process and the current Air Force situation:

http://www.afa.org/magazine/June2002/0602attack.html

http://www.jedonline.com/default.asp...age=0311j24 &
year=2003&month=11&doct=ec%20monitor&rsno=4#1

Henry, I'm getting really tired of doing your homework for you, BTW. Lack
of knowledge is excusable. But willful ignorance, even when confronted with
information to the contrary, is simply rude.

--
Tom Schoene Replace "invalid" with "net" to e-mail
"Our country, right or wrong. When right, to be kept right, when
wrong to be put right." - Senator Carl Schurz, 1872

On Sat, 17 Apr 2004 17:57:02 -0700, "Tarver Engineering"
wrote:


"Michael Kelly" wrote in message
. com...
Tarver Engineering wrote:
Emmanuel would have been correct in what he wrote two years ago, but the
bone has lit up.

Two years ago the Bone was well into its 3rd rotation in support of OEF
and was a very in demand weapons system. 7 BW Bones were routinely
dropping large numbers of JDAM's in support of ANACONDA this time last
year and flew 301 of 301 sorties in support of it, quite impressive.

You'd have to go back at least five years for the original statement to
be true. In all fairness, the Bone was in the middle of the block D
upgrades and availability on any platform in the middle of an upgrade
program is usually pretty poor.

Getting the Bone to work is a major setback for any F/A-22.


Hardly, now the FB-22 proposal is a different story, but that has a
shorter range and much smaller weapons load. Add SBD's to the Bone and
you're talking about 96 to almost 200 weapons carried.

I don't see a need for additional A/G airborn weapons platforms now that we
are not going to cut up the Bones.

Same problem as always- they aren't going to last forever. If ANY
weapon system in the pipeline is an indicator, if we started a clean
sheet replacement for the B-1 it would be decades before we saw
anything in service. Come to think of it though, ISTR the arguement
for the FB-22 as being as a follow on to the Strike Eagle. I've only
heard it mentioned in the same breath as the B-1 once. Even with the
stretch, an FB-22 wouldn't have the range of a B-1 so I don't think
it's an apples/apples comparison. Both Northrop and Lockheed have
kicked around full sized bomber designs in the last four or five years
though. I think things are so much in flux these days that nobody is
sure WHAT they want. You see a supercruising bomber design from
Northrop one day, another from Lockheed a couple years later, then
back to Northrop with a Quiet Supersonic large, long ranged bombing
UCAV. Then toss in things like that Hypersoar that LLNL was doing a
study on and it's anybody's guess as to what we might see. I think
the Air Force figures it has to start *somewhere* though and they know
that at some point the Strike Eagles will have to be replaced and
building an FB-22 along side the F-22 would help them get back some of
those research dollars they invested vs. going with something entirely
new and that's why the FB-22 is even being talked about.

On Sat, 17 Apr 2004 13:56:38 -0700, "Tarver Engineering"
wrote:


"Scott Ferrin" wrote in message
.. .

So? Does that mean the USAF is all of a sudden going to want to start
buying a derivative of a derivitive of the LOSER in the LWF
competition instead of a fighter with FAR higher performance (F-15)?

I expect that now that the F-15 option is off the table

It's not.

Now Scott, I doubt your history of being wrong about the F-22 for so many
years

I think you are confusing yourself here. Exactly what was it I was
wrong about? Feel free to quote anything I've said here on the
newsgroups. If you can't find anything to back your claim then shut
your pie hole.

The politics of the
situation have eliminated any reasonable chance of a Super Eagle, which is
why I joke about F/A-18s for USAF. Within the same City are two very
different political situations.


It depends on what you consider a "Super Eagle". We'll certainly
never see something along the lines of the F-15XX they were kicking
around ten years ago but an F-15E with an AESA and better engines is
easily doable. The production line isn't shutting down anytime soon
(especially if Singapore decides to go with the Eagle) so it's not
like we wouldn't be able to build them. As far as the USAF *ever*
signing up for "Super"Hornets over Eagles that's something I doubt
Vegas would ever accept bets on.

"Scott Ferrin" wrote in message
...
On Sat, 17 Apr 2004 17:57:02 -0700, "Tarver Engineering"
wrote:


"Michael Kelly" wrote in message
. com...
Tarver Engineering wrote:
Emmanuel would have been correct in what he wrote two years ago, but
the
bone has lit up.

Two years ago the Bone was well into its 3rd rotation in support of OEF
and was a very in demand weapons system. 7 BW Bones were routinely
dropping large numbers of JDAM's in support of ANACONDA this time last
year and flew 301 of 301 sorties in support of it, quite impressive.

You'd have to go back at least five years for the original statement to
be true. In all fairness, the Bone was in the middle of the block D
upgrades and availability on any platform in the middle of an upgrade
program is usually pretty poor.

Getting the Bone to work is a major setback for any F/A-22.


Hardly, now the FB-22 proposal is a different story, but that has a
shorter range and much smaller weapons load. Add SBD's to the Bone and
you're talking about 96 to almost 200 weapons carried.

I don't see a need for additional A/G airborn weapons platforms now that
we
are not going to cut up the Bones.

Same problem as always- they aren't going to last forever. If ANY
weapon system in the pipeline is an indicator, if we started a clean
sheet replacement for the B-1 it would be decades before we saw
anything in service.

I don't see another manned bomber being built ever.

Come to think of it though, ISTR the arguement
for the FB-22 as being as a follow on to the Strike Eagle. I've only
heard it mentioned in the same breath as the B-1 once. Even with the
stretch, an FB-22 wouldn't have the range of a B-1 so I don't think
it's an apples/apples comparison.

When the Bone was looking at being scrap there was a possible need for
additional bomber fleet, as the B-52 is old. Now that the bone is looking
at bringing back additional aircraft I don't see spending money on more bomb
truck capability as a sound investment.

Both Northrop and Lockheed have
kicked around full sized bomber designs in the last four or five years
though. I think things are so much in flux these days that nobody is
sure WHAT they want.

X-45 UCAV.

You see a supercruising bomber design from
Northrop one day, another from Lockheed a couple years later, then
back to Northrop with a Quiet Supersonic large, long ranged bombing
UCAV. Then toss in things like that Hypersoar that LLNL was doing a
study on and it's anybody's guess as to what we might see. I think
the Air Force figures it has to start *somewhere* though and they know
that at some point the Strike Eagles will have to be replaced and
building an FB-22 along side the F-22 would help them get back some of
those research dollars they invested vs. going with something entirely
new and that's why the FB-22 is even being talked about.

I don't see replacing Stike Eagles as a plan at all, as they were an interm
solution while the Bone sucked. Same as the C-130J was designed to manage
risk in case the C-17 program failed to fix their problems.

"Scott Ferrin" wrote in message
...
On Sat, 17 Apr 2004 13:56:38 -0700, "Tarver Engineering"
wrote:


"Scott Ferrin" wrote in message
.. .

So? Does that mean the USAF is all of a sudden going to want to
start
buying a derivative of a derivitive of the LOSER in the LWF
competition instead of a fighter with FAR higher performance (F-15)?

I expect that now that the F-15 option is off the table

It's not.

Now Scott, I doubt your history of being wrong about the F-22 for so many
years

I think you are confusing yourself here.

Any such "thought" would be projection.

Same problem as always- they aren't going to last forever. If ANY
weapon system in the pipeline is an indicator, if we started a clean
sheet replacement for the B-1 it would be decades before we saw
anything in service.

I don't see another manned bomber being built ever.

I thought that for a while but I think in the end the comlink to the
UCAVs are never going to be bulletproof and if you make them
completely autonomous you lose too much utility. Not to mention the
likelihood of them ever building a stealthy UCAV big enough to carry a
30k bomb is pretty much zero. "That thing is going to cost HOW much
and it won't even have a man in it???"







Come to think of it though, ISTR the arguement
for the FB-22 as being as a follow on to the Strike Eagle. I've only
heard it mentioned in the same breath as the B-1 once. Even with the
stretch, an FB-22 wouldn't have the range of a B-1 so I don't think
it's an apples/apples comparison.

When the Bone was looking at being scrap there was a possible need for
additional bomber fleet, as the B-52 is old. Now that the bone is looking
at bringing back additional aircraft I don't see spending money on more bomb
truck capability as a sound investment.

This is were we start to see some pork. The USAF doesn't want to
bring many (if any) back out of the boneyard. They feel like using
the funds it would take to bring them back out to upgrade the
*existing* fleet would be a better use of $$$. The politicians are
doing their best to force them to though. We'll have to see how it
pans out. As far as the age thing goes there was a study done in 1999
by the USAF

http://www.xmission.com/~sferrin/Bom...map%201999.pdf

and in it they determined the B-1 will actually crap out structurally
before the B-52. This was done *before* the USAF got all hot about
using the B-1 as an on-call bomb truck so the numbers would be even
more skewed.






Both Northrop and Lockheed have
kicked around full sized bomber designs in the last four or five years
though. I think things are so much in flux these days that nobody is
sure WHAT they want.

X-45 UCAV.


or X-47? At *best* the X-45C could give you F-117-like ability
provided all it has to do is move the bomb from point A to point B.
If you have to self designate the target forget it. If your link is
jammed forget it. The X-45 in any way shape or form is in NO way a
long-range bomb truck.



You see a supercruising bomber design from
Northrop one day, another from Lockheed a couple years later, then
back to Northrop with a Quiet Supersonic large, long ranged bombing
UCAV. Then toss in things like that Hypersoar that LLNL was doing a
study on and it's anybody's guess as to what we might see. I think
the Air Force figures it has to start *somewhere* though and they know
that at some point the Strike Eagles will have to be replaced and
building an FB-22 along side the F-22 would help them get back some of
those research dollars they invested vs. going with something entirely
new and that's why the FB-22 is even being talked about.

I don't see replacing Stike Eagles as a plan at all, as they were an interm
solution while the Bone sucked.

The USAF doesn't share that opinion. As for the Stirke Eagle being an
interim solution to the B-1's troubles you might want to do a little
reading on the subject. Check the dates of the F-15E/F-16XL flyoffs
to those of the B-1. The B-1 was still strictly nuclear when the
majority of the F-15Es were already bought and in service. The two
programs have nothing to do with each other.




Same as the C-130J was designed to manage
risk in case the C-17 program failed to fix their problems.

Not even close.