@StobieWan Here you are me old china. Should give you some ammo to back up stirring.
The radar on top is the Wedgetail MESA and the one underneath is a CANOE one that was spied been flown underneath a USN P-8.
Royal Air Force [RAF] discussions and updates
- Thread starter neil
- Start date
The radar on top is the Wedgetail MESA and the one underneath is a CANOE one that was spied been flown underneath a USN P-8.
mwahaha....awesome
I have seen posts bemoaning the demise of the Nimrod AEW which really is a case of rose tinted goggles.
Frankly, E7, add to cart, job done strikes me as a sensible decision. SAAB are still pushing their case that an untested combination of air frame and radars (plural, they'd need to combine a pair of their arrays to get it to work) is a low risk offering.
Can Wedgetail do much in terms of ground target tracking or is it specifically air to air in performance ?
I have seen posts bemoaning the demise of the Nimrod AEW which really is a case of rose tinted goggles.
Frankly, E7, add to cart, job done strikes me as a sensible decision. SAAB are still pushing their case that an untested combination of air frame and radars (plural, they'd need to combine a pair of their arrays to get it to work) is a low risk offering.
Can Wedgetail do much in terms of ground target tracking or is it specifically air to air in performance ?
Air and (sea) surface tracking are included in virtually every spec sheet. Some articles include ground target identification, but whether this is by virtue of amalgamating info from other sources, through some innate capability or a combination of sorts OR a misunderstanding by the journo is not clear. For the moment I'm enough in awe of it's current capability and the way that the RAAF is chivvying Boeing along in expanding its potential
oldsig
And Australian business as well if this eventuates.
Britain to buy Wedgetail aircraft in nearly $2 billion deal
"The British buy will be based on the Australian version of the aircraft. The purchase will open up significant export opportunities for Australian suppliers who already have technology installed on Wedgetail aircraft."
Without giving away secrets, does anyone know what Aussie tech is in the Wedgetail?
cheers
rb
Would be like any other contract. I believe it was Bahrain? that had developed an upgraded F-16 that achieved some export success and as such got some royalties out of it.
In regards to the business side of things Australian companies will have a small leg up due to them already supporting an existing fleet leaving room for them to do work quicker and cheaper then other companies possibly. Being for such a small order the cost benefit tends to tip towards getting existing industry experienced to assist in the acquisition then having all new companies and workers do so.
Bahrain is the smallest, poorest (overall: Oman's poorer per head) & weakest of the Gulf Arab states, & can't afford its own versions. It was the UAE which paid for development of an upgraded F-16, the F-16E/F, AKA Block 60, & about 80 of them. But it didn't sell to anyone else, despite attempts.
Bahrain had a dozen standard F-16C/D, without AIM-120 (export blocked) until it bought another 10 in 2000 or so & was allowed AIM-120. It's ordered 16 F-16V, which owes nothing to the F-16E AFAIK.
Bahrain had a dozen standard F-16C/D, without AIM-120 (export blocked) until it bought another 10 in 2000 or so & was allowed AIM-120. It's ordered 16 F-16V, which owes nothing to the F-16E AFAIK.
t68
Well-Known Member
I wonder if it would be worth the RAAF adding to the order now while a small production line is available, as the original order was 4 plus 3 options for a total of 7. Say 4 aircraft gives the RAAF(10) a bit more redundancy that way we could deploy 3 aircraft away from Australia for 24/7 operations if required still leaving enough aircraft for maintenance training requirements at home
And what capabilities are you going to delete from the ADF to pay for these? The ADF, read CoA, are not flush with money to acquire extra kit at the drop of a hat and the Australian govt budget may not be in a position to afford such increases. It already has multi billion dollar defence CAPEX acquisitions for the next 20 - 30 years that have yet to be paid for and economic headwinds are forecast as the global economy changes as it continues along it's course at a macro temporal scale.
When you look at it in the grand scheme of things Australia having 6 AEW&C aircraft (on top of everything else we have or are acquiring/planned) we are already hitting well above our weight. The USAF them selves only have around 40 AEW&C/C&C aircraft and they are over 20 times the size of the RAAF so statistically they should have 120+ or we should only have 2. The RAF is more then double the size and are buying 1 less aircraft. Australia getting any more aircraft then our current 6 would be purely for the benefit of our allies at the expense of other systems that those funds and personnel could go towards. If we need improved training then build a ground based training center, Anything more would be a waste. If we are going to want to milk an existing production line then it should be to assist our allies and friends in acquiring them, We can introduce, provide some training but we should not be buying anymore then we need.
Apologies for this being posted in the RAF thread admins & moderators.
Apologies for this being posted in the RAF thread admins & moderators.
That isn’t really how it works. For example the Australian land and ocean mass is broadly similar to the US - certainly not 1/20th the size. It is inappropriate to scale directly.
Basically the requirement would have been to provide a given amount of surveillance at a given range from a MOB for a given duration. Probably detailed and compared in a few separate vignettes.
The RAAF capability probably gives the ability for 3x Wedgetails, maybe 4 at a pinch to be deployed for a high intensity surge and the ability to maintain an aircraft for training at home, this would let the RAAF provide 1x orbit indefinitely. Alternatively as we have seen on OKRA, 1x aircaft for a long duration but not 24/7 ops.
The US would have similar requirement except with more operating areas/orbits.
Adding one or two more wedgetails would certainly add to our capability (not necessarily to allies depending on Context) however as mentioned above it comes at a cost to some other capability or extra budget to defence is required.
To tie this back to the RAF they have a significantly smaller UK landmass (albeit also with NATO commitments). Ultimately 5 aircraft will give them 1 guaranteed orbit with potentially 2 for a very limited period with small gaps in coverage (e.g during AAR).
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t68
Well-Known Member
As you know the objective for defence is to reach 2% overtime and is not expected to meet that till the mid 2020's, 4 new aircraft amortised over 5/6 years and using the UK budget should give a ball park figure of around 2.85b but that's for 5 aircraft or 500m over 6 years
The ADF budget is expecting to increase from the current 36.4b to around 58.7b in 25/26 or the four aircraft or roughly 5% or another take is Naval shipbuilding is expecting to cost defence between 3.5&4B per year indefinably . Accounting always does my head in, the federal budgets is on tonight and I just heard a 7.1b surplus so who knows what we can afford
So the RAF are forming a Special Forces ground unit - Special Air Force Regiment. Rock apes Mk 2, who aren't fussy on the quality of the crayons they eat and they will slum it in 3.5 star or less hotels.
The islands to the north & the implicit guarantee to Ireland increase the area to be patrolled considerably, but don't affect your basic point, that Australia's on a much bigger scale.
Hard to understand the motivation for this.
Guess it is similar to the Marines & SBS though.
Regards,
Massive
I had friend who went into Iraq with the RAF during Desert Storm to operate laser designators to guide airborne munitions. That is very much covert work.
Youtube posting of March 31?...Was this loaded for 1 April?........
I wonder if you guys read the comments below the video or took note of my wording. It's an April fools windup.
the concerned
Active Member
With this special forces roll with the RAF . Surely you would need to be pretty much special forces trained for CSAR operations.
I spent 6 years in the 80's in RAAF 2AFDS (Airfield Defence Squadron) we were were on the east coast with SASR on the west coast. Balance of forces....my mum always said I was special....