Back to the real issue, what to do with BAE.....now you think politicians were frightened of Rupert Murdoch!
The Royal Navy Discussions and Updates
- Thread starter overlander
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kev 99
Member
As a complete outsider looking in, that's the impression that I get, or at the very least not listening to the technical people very much.
The decision was taken in the 1990s, so A320 would have been firmly established. I actually meant that BAe could have found ways to overcharge for & cock-up an A320 conversion. BAe was building A320 wings, so I'm sure it'd have lobbied hard for A320 over B737 as a basis, & for the job, if the MoD had decided to ask for tenders for an airliner-based aircraft.Putting a bomb bay, a few hard points and an inflight refuelling capability is not complex or high risk.....taking the wings off and designing new ones on an old design is!
The original plan was only for 21? So it was logical to go with a commerical design, in the late 80s the very safe option would have been the well established Boeing 737. But the A320 was around and starting to sell.
As BAE has such a seemingly unhealthy role in so many MOD disasters is there a reason why they would have steered the Government away from Airbus?
There is a very sad irony in your post, the Electra entered service in 1958 the DH Comet in 1952....the P3 was based on a younger...but less advance aircraft
Fitting a bomb bay has structural implications. Remember, we're talking about relatively high speed pressurised aircraft. The Nimrod bomb bay was in an unpressurised lower fuselage fairing. Of course, it's doable (see P-8, & Airbus proposals), but it's not trivial.
Nimrod MRA4 was (misleadingly) sold as a much lower risk upgrade than any new development. The initial scope of the changes was less than what was finally done. In hindsight, a new development would probably have been a better choice, but remember the context. You keep assuming perfect knowledge at the time the decision was made. You also forget that there was no modern airliner-based proposal on offer: the MoD would have had to specify that was what it wanted, i.e. a new type. How would that have been sold politically? No RR engine option, either, though RR has a share in IAE.
We can quibble over the Lockheed Electra & Comet. The original Comet was several years ahead of the Electra, but Nimrod was based on the Comet 4, which was pretty much a new aircraft: over 50% heavier than Comet 1, longer, faster, over twice as much thrust, twice the range. That was a touch newer than the Electra.
I think your view on hindsight is very generous, which if tolerated is just not going to breed a high performance organisation. I think this is where the RN has come from and should certainly aspire to be. Too often in these posts I hear people defending pretty poor establishment positions, even in comparisons to other Navies.The decision was taken in the 1990s, so A320 would have been firmly established. I actually meant that BAe could have found ways to overcharge for & cock-up an A320 conversion. BAe was building A320 wings, so I'm sure it'd have lobbied hard for A320 over B737 as a basis, & for the job, if the MoD had decided to ask for tenders for an airliner-based aircraft.
Fitting a bomb bay has structural implications. Remember, we're talking about relatively high speed pressurised aircraft. The Nimrod bomb bay was in an unpressurised lower fuselage fairing. Of course, it's doable (see P-8, & Airbus proposals), but it's not trivial.
Nimrod MRA4 was (misleadingly) sold as a much lower risk upgrade than any new development. The initial scope of the changes was less than what was finally done. In hindsight, a new development would probably have been a better choice, but remember the context. You keep assuming perfect knowledge at the time the decision was made. You also forget that there was no modern airliner-based proposal on offer: the MoD would have had to specify that was what it wanted, i.e. a new type. How would that have been sold politically? No RR engine option, either, though RR has a share in IAE.
We can quibble over the Lockheed Electra & Comet. The original Comet was several years ahead of the Electra, but Nimrod was based on the Comet 4, which was pretty much a new aircraft: over 50% heavier than Comet 1, longer, faster, over twice as much thrust, twice the range. That was a touch newer than the Electra.
While we are quibbling the Electra by a few months became operational after the Comet 4. (Wiki 4/10/58 to Jan 59)
Pure speculation, but I suspect that BAE would rather have had complete control of MR4 than share with Airbus, where its commitment was not as great at the other parties (maybe for justifiable reasons).
I am yet to be convinced fitting refuelling or bomb bay/hard points would have been much work at all. Particularly if a new design and not retrofitted, the export potential would have been there years before the P8.
The fuselage of a modern pressurised airliner is a load bearing structure. If you want to convert part of it into a bomb bay, then the shape of the pressurised section is not cylindrical which causes much greater loads. The Nimrod used an unpressurised lower fuselage to house the bay. The P-8 uses a modified and strengthened bay that's been converted from the aft cargo hold. Other conversions of airliners/cargo aircraft to the maritime patrol role (C-130, C-295, ATR-42, P-95) don't even bother trying to create a bomb bay, carrying the stores externally instead. In short, converting an airliner into a full-fledged MPA is a non-trivial exercise that's certainly not cheap.
I also can't really agree with your point on export potential. The fact is that for most nations, the priority given to MPA aircraft is far below that of 'shiny' stuff like fighters, bombers and even VIP transport aircraft. The Nimrod was available for more than a decade and was a very capable design for its time but still wasn't able to get a single export sale. Its only other competitor in terms of performance (not systems) was the Tu-142 which secured a single export customer. It is only recently that jet-powered designs have begun to be seriously considered by operators.
Exactly - and ironically the Nimrod is an industry lesson in what happens if you make non circular holes in the body of an airliner subject to repeated pressurisation and de-pressurisation. It's not just a case of jacking it up, grabbing a jig saw and hacking a bay sized hole in the belly. And if it were, BAE would still have ballsed it up in this instance.
Our choices were to either go with the existing aircraft with a life extension exercise or buy something of a less capable airframe on the international market.
Right now, we can do all the roles of an MPA using a mix of other platforms - we can revisit the requirement in a few years when hopefully the economy has recovered a bit.
When we do, the top dog would be P8 I guess.
It's a shame the MR4 was such a fiasco tho
Ian
I probably was over trivialising the work in comparision to the rebuild of the Nimrod. I do think an Airbus platform would have had a strong potential to secure orders from the partner nations and through them access to their traditional markets, but agree nothing is guaranteed.
One option may have been just to refurbish the Nimrods. Also it is necessary to have an internal bomb bay? That said an off the shelf A320 is currently c$65m, how much would it cost to modify even at todays prices?
The good think about just being a customer rather than getting involved in the development is we can wait and see, let them iron out the teething problems and then when the budget is there, buy 4-6 and just fit in with someone elses production cycle.Exactly - and ironically the Nimrod is an industry lesson in what happens if you make non circular holes in the body of an airliner subject to repeated pressurisation and de-pressurisation. It's not just a case of jacking it up, grabbing a jig saw and hacking a bay sized hole in the belly. And if it were, BAE would still have ballsed it up in this instance.
Our choices were to either go with the existing aircraft with a life extension exercise or buy something of a less capable airframe on the international market.
Right now, we can do all the roles of an MPA using a mix of other platforms - we can revisit the requirement in a few years when hopefully the economy has recovered a bit.
When we do, the top dog would be P8 I guess.
It's a shame the MR4 was such a fiasco tho
Ian
In an ideal world these aircraft would be under RN control. It would be also good to see any future aircraft being capable of carrying a decent number (6-8) of Storm Shadow or other stand off land attack weapons.
I don't now how serious the potential for India to go with a navalised Typhoon (as suggested has been offered in the piece elsewhere on this site). If they did, surely it would make sense to drop the cats from the QEs and save a lot of money? Maybe a drop in the weapons load with just a ski jump take off but better than where we are now with just Apaches and will be for the next 10 years?
Much of the UK involvement with the F35 was the lift engine which we are not buying anyway and we would benefit from a uniform Typhoon fleet.
Much of the UK involvement with the F35 was the lift engine which we are not buying anyway and we would benefit from a uniform Typhoon fleet.
kev 99
Member
Potential of navalised Typhoon for India, practically nil I would say.
STOBAR is the worst configuration for carrier aircraft, takes up the most deck space and the aircraft have heavily restrictive loads. Seaphoon has been discounted so many times it's practically a running joke and I don't trust the soundbytes coming out of BAE over how easy it would be to develop; if it's that easy they could of fronted the money themselves and flogged it to us already.
STOBAR is the worst configuration for carrier aircraft, takes up the most deck space and the aircraft have heavily restrictive loads. Seaphoon has been discounted so many times it's practically a running joke and I don't trust the soundbytes coming out of BAE over how easy it would be to develop; if it's that easy they could of fronted the money themselves and flogged it to us already.
I agree that STOBAR restricts aircraft to smaller payloads. But I don't see how it takes up more deck space. Are you referring to the area occupied by the ramp? The CATOBAR system uses up just as much on-deck space and also a large amount of below-deck volume.
It's not serious, never has been and never got further than some power point slides and a few design studies. We have way more involvement with the F35 than the "lift engine" which doesn't in fact exist as such.
Uniform Typhoon fleet? The US are probably thanking their stars they don't have a uniform F22 fleet right now...
Ian
kev 99
Member
Pretty much everything I've seen on the subject suggests you need a larger runway.
Not for imaginary aircraft you don't
Sea Typhoon is more on the theoretical I suspect.Ian
FluffyThoughts
Member
Aren't we forgetting one thing: America's deficit? If they pull the f-35, or cut unit-numbers until they become unaffordable - especially as Tony Blair has spent £2-billion tax-payer funds on the platform - then why should SeaPhoon be unreasonable?
How much life is left in the Tranche I's? Could they be re-jigged into FRS-5s; especially the twin-seat ones? Add a few ex-Oz F-18F (around 2022) to act as tankers then the cost will be affordable (in a FRES sort of way), surely...? :dunce
How much life is left in the Tranche I's? Could they be re-jigged into FRS-5s; especially the twin-seat ones? Add a few ex-Oz F-18F (around 2022) to act as tankers then the cost will be affordable (in a FRES sort of way), surely...? :dunce
kev 99
Member
Surely the FRES and affordable have no business being in the same sentence?
F35 is out there, it seems to fly okay and we have a workshare in it. India's fighter competition isn't even close to selection yet and no development work has actually been done on SeaPhoon - India has been invited to fork out for the work, that's about it.
The selection will drag on for a bit yet, so even if SeaPhoon got the nod, it'd be too late for us to have skipped fitting CATOBAR kit. The Indians will take a very long time to arrive at a decision and having done that, there's little to say they won't restart the competition at some later point over some other issue.
Switching to STOBAR at this point would be *galactically* dim.
Ian
FluffyThoughts
Member
Just found this link somewhere else Pentagon Braces for Steep Defense Budget Cuts After Debt Deal - The Daily Beast . The Economist has already cast doubt on Lightning II. Let's hope we've got a few F-4K's in storage for The Queen...! :mad3
SuperHornet production is still open for a few more years yet, but I can't see Lightning II taking the hit - it's too central for the USAF, USMC, USN and a slew of foreign users.
It's a huge, multinational program with excellent export potential. There's stacks of other things that can be cut before this happens.
Ian