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Northrop Update on E-2D Advanced Hawkeye
(Source: Northrop Grumman Corp.; issued July 17, 2006)
BETHPAGE, N.Y. — Northrop Grumman Corporation has mated the major subassemblies of the first E-2D Advanced Hawkeye test aircraft at its St. Augustine, Fla., manufacturing center into a single fuselage structure, taking the E-2D program another milestone closer to the scheduled first flight in the summer of 2007.
The E-2D Advanced Hawkeye will be the U.S. Navy’s new airborne early warning and battle management system and a key node in the service’s architecture for 21st century operations: Sea Power 21.
“If you read the U.S. Navy’s 2006 program guide, many of the technological improvements being incorporated in the Hawkeye represent leading-edge improvements in U.S. forces, not just in the Navy’s theater air and missile defense programs,” said Tim Farrell, vice president of Airborne Early Warning Programs for Northrop Grumman’s Integrated Systems sector. “In about a year’s time, our customer community will first experience the on-delivery power and the open-ended potential of our new radar and the rest of the E-2D system as a network-centric warfare enabler.
“Until then, we take pride in the E-2D platform as it begins to take shape through the new manufacturing process that we have applied to this program.”
Northrop Grumman is building two E-2D test aircraft. The second will be completed and flying about four months after the first. The E-2Ds reflect new manufacturing techniques to build the structure that underlies the familiar Hawkeye family look.
When Northrop Grumman was awarded the system development and demonstration contract for the Advanced Hawkeye in 2003, the company chose to change its manufacturing approach. Engineers created a virtual design environment that integrated the engineering team in Bethpage with the manufacturing team in St. Augustine. They then began to re-engineer the structure, beginning with single detail parts.
In previous Hawkeye platforms, individual sheet-metal components were the basis for all structural assemblies. For the E-2D, a number of substructures were re-designed as machined components, eliminating significant numbers of detail parts and improving the production process.
“We looked at the E-2D program as the opportunity to take what we believe to be the most advanced and dependable airborne early warning and battle management aircraft in the world and not only make it more advanced, but also make it easier to build and maintain,” said Farrell. “I believe the E-2D Hawkeye team has accomplished that.”
Lockheed Martin Naval Electronics & Surveillance Systems, Syracuse, N.Y., serves as the principal radar-system supplier and is teamed with Northrop Grumman Electronic Systems, Baltimore, and Raytheon Company’s Space & Airborne Systems, El Segundo, Calif. BAE Systems, Greenlawn, N.Y., is responsible for the identification friend-or-foe system. L-3 Communications Randtron Antenna Systems, Menlo Park, Calif., is developing the ultra high-frequency electronically scanned array antenna. Northrop Grumman’s Navigation Systems division, Woodland Hills, Calif., part of the company’s Electronic Systems sector, will provide the new, integrated tactical cockpit for the E-2D.
By: orko_8 - 30th July 2006 at 13:49
U.S. Tomcat fighter makes last carrier flight
The U.S. Navy’s F-14 Tomcat, built to protect the fleet from Soviet bombers, took its last flight off an aircraft carrier Friday, closing one of the final chapters in its 32-year history.The retirement of the Tomcat, made famous in the movie “Top Gun,” clears the way for the Navy to start using new military aircraft that supporters say can meet post-Cold War requirements more affordably.
But for Tomcat pilots and aircraft enthusiasts, the end of the F-14 does not just mark an end of an aviation era — it signals a trend in U.S. government weapons spending that favors cost-cutting over performance.
By: BuffPuff - 30th July 2006 at 13:41
The E2D – new build or E2C rebuilds?
By: d'clacy - 30th July 2006 at 12:45
I read somewhere last year that Boing were working on a future version of the F18, to be ready for production about 2010, with the intention of getting orders that would otherwise go to the F35. Is anybody familiar with this project? It was either going to have stealth characteristics or be super-cruise capable. I forget which.
By: US Agent - 28th July 2006 at 20:49
Navy Gets New High-Tech Choppers
David Axe | July 28, 2006
link
The Navy has received the first four of around 250 advanced helicopters worth $2.5 billion that will replace hundreds of Reagan-era aircraft and change the way it fights on, above and under the sea. Multi-role Helicopter Squadron 41, based at Naval Air Station North Island near San Diego, Calif., accepted four Lockheed Martin and Sikorsky MH-60R Seahawks in January.
HSM-41 is the West Coast training squadron for the Navy’s light helicopter community. It feeds fully-trained aviators into co-located fleet squadrons that deploy one- or two-aircraft detachments aboard frigates, destroyers and cruisers. With the new helicopter, the squadron is also responsible for writing the training curriculum that will be used throughout the MH-60R’s projected 25-year service life.
The squadron will begin training the first fleet pilots on the new aircraft in October.
“We know what the fleet wants at the end … and we work backwards from that,” says HSM-41 skipper Comm. J.C. Shaub, 46. He adds that the MH-60R crews will train to destroy submarines and surface ships, to transport people and supplies and conduct surveillance using radar and passive and infrared sensors.
The so-called “Romeo” is a development of the venerable Sikorsky SH-60B Seahawk (called “Bravos” by their crews), itself a derivative of the Army’s UH-60A Blackhawk transport from the same company. The Bravo was designed to fly from warships on the open sea, searching out and destroying Soviet nuclear submarines using sonar buoys, a towed magnetic sensor and torpedoes. With the end of the Cold War, the Bravo force evolved, adopting new weapons and sensors to fight small boats on the surface and quiet diesel submarines in shallow coastal waters. By the late 1990s, steadily proliferating threats and an increasingly overloaded airframe meant that it was time for a replacement.
Enter the Romeo, which will replace not only the SH-60B but also the similar SH-60F as part of a plan to neck down the Navy’s helicopter inventory from seven types to just two.
“It does everything the Bravo does … but does it with more fidelity and better armament,” HSM-41 skipper Comm. J.C. Shaub says of the Romeo.
The MH-60R looks a lot like its predecessor — and the first four are in fact rebuilds of surplus Bravos — but inside it’s a completely new aircraft. A dipping sonar improves its ability to detect submarines. A modular cockpit based on digital displays means better situational awareness for a smaller crew. The Romeo is designed to switch between missions while in-flight and, in a pinch, to offload sensors and equipment so it can carry humanitarian supplies or evacuees. It can carry more weapons and has even been tested as an air-to-air fighter against low-flying small aircraft, according to HSM-41 executive officer Comm. Dennis Walsh, 42.
“These are exciting times,” Walsh says.
Currently HSM-41 flies 10 Bravos in addition to the four Romeos. It will replace the older aircraft with 11 more Romeos by 2010, leaving the East Coast training squadron to soldier on with Bravos until the Navy transitions to an all-Romeo force sometime after 2012.
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July 17, 2006 at 9:30 pm