And Finally for F18 amateurs a video of an exchange French navy pilot which is now a F18 instructor at NAS OCEANA.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Z-Geid6Prw

This is surprising from Boeing if we refer to the selection process who will likely select the cheapest that can fulfill the task.

I don’t think they are stupid so there must be some reasons. Perhaps performance has more importance than we thought ? It is quite confusing actually.

That being said SH improvements looks very good.

Quadbike,

Letting the MoD choose without recomandation is taking the risk that a lot of lobby/politics etc come into the game to tell which criteria should be the most important and to offer huge offsets deal etc.

Because of this situation I would not be surprised if there are futher delays. and further drama in the process. But that’s just my own speculation.

I think that forum like this one is exactly the place to speak about rumors and debate. That doesn’t mean we should take them for granted.

The wording is ‘”There are doubts about the performance of the radar,”. It does not say the performance is unsatisfactory. You have mixed up two different things.

I did not say otherwise. I said that the announced/projected performances by Selex were certainly too optimistics. Not that the radar was flawed.

post 240 for instance :
http://forum.keypublishing.com/showthread.php?t=102437&page=8

Yes it seems a bit optimistic. The time to go from 3 contenders to the final choice and starting exclusive negociations is long. I would be surprised if they sign the contract early 2011.

I read that it’s the offset negociation part which is very long in India.

Correio Brasiliense, Auguts 2

Technical report confirms Rafale

Preferred “policy” of President Lula, French airliner wins backing after changes in evaluation criteria of the Ministry of Defence
[…]
It has been over a year and a half since the three finalists – Dassault, Boeing and the American Swedish Saab – calls delivered final offers, or Breath (English best and final Offers), the Air Force Command. Since then, the Copac examined in depth the proposals in relation to the specifications of the fighters, technology transfer, offset (compensatory) and the purchase price and maintenance, among other items. The first report that reached the High Command of the Air Force brought the Swedish Gripen NG as the best option, but had requested a review by the leadership of the FAB to increase the weight of the risks already mentioned in the text. The report said there are doubts as to the performance of radar and operational costs of the engine of Gripen NG – these issues had been virtually discarded in this time of evaluation.

After further technical inquiring they found issues with the radar and other items. Remember that the last version of the report that favored the rafale is signed by Saito himself.

Because of complaints that came to my knowledge I went to check on the ground if there were changes in the report issued by the Navy regarding the use of the Rafale on board the Sampa [Sao Paulo aircraft carrier]. Monday afternoon, friends of MB [Brazilian Navy] and FAB gave me access to the document submitted to Defence Minister and which contains the explanatory memorandum which will be submitted to President Lula.

The signature of the commanders of the two forces certifies that they are original. Some points:

1. From the Sao Paulo, the Rafale can operate with only 40% of its capacity [payload], which could be minimized with a refueling after takeoff;
2. The F/A-18E/F Super Hornet is unable to operate our aircraft carrier. Its dry weight is beyond the capacity of the wiring, Its length is greater than that of elevators and catapults would not be able to launch it;
3. Even the Gripen navy, which exists only in theory, can only function with a capacity of 80%.

The document prepared by the Navy contains verbatim the explanatory memorandum and indicates that the 3 would operate smoothly with the future aircraft carrier class of 50000 tons to be operated by the Navy. This material, prepared by COPAC and reviewed by the High Command of Aeronautics has been valided. What has changed are the weights assigned to each element. A good example: in the original settings, established in 1995, the weight of technology transfer was 9%. In contrast, the weight of price and maintenance costs were 30 and 40%. No wonder the F/A-18E/F was the winners of the process. The generals have pushed the engineers to accept what they had established themselves as a rule! Jobim returned because that does not meet the assumptions of the new END [national defense strategy .. which favors technological independance]

In the new criteria established with the national defense strategy, the technology package is now worth 40%. It is worth noting that the recalculation of the scores have been prepared by COPAC. In the process, ended 75 days ago [!], the Rafale has emerged as the winner because it has scored regularly on all points.[…] Others competitors scored excellent on some points, but showed a weak performance [latimavel?] in others.

The Super Hornet has been heavily penalized by U.S. law, which prohibits the government from establishing compensation with other states. Everything depends only from the manufacturers, who can not afford the purchase of aircraft for the armed forces of Uncle Sam, for example. For its part, the Gripen present higher risks, according COPAC itself . The Swedes could not even show a spreadsheet about the costs of the F-414 because it was copyrighted by the U.S. Navy. Just to give you an idea, the volume of pages about this issue is equivalent to the amount of pages used to describe the risks of the two others competitors.
There are doubts about the performance of the radar, on the sustainability of the cell, on the implementation of the program and also some devastating certainties, like the fact that, with limited interior space and a lower capacity of energy production , the Gripen offers smaller developments than its competitors. Boys, I read it: written by Copac itself! Furthermore, it was rated slightly higher than the Rafale on the issue of technology transfer, but not enough to overcome its weaknesses and achieve trade compensation by france, which guarantees the purchase of 12 KC-390 and the participation of Dassault in the Embraer program.

About the explanatory memorandum, it is a masterpiece from a methodological point of view. Each phrase refers to an attached document, including the explanatory memorandum sent in December by the Air Force Command, which uses color coding to highlight the strengths, weaknesses, and the median for each unit … [Exactly what said Istoe… some leaks were more credible than others ..]

For health reasons, I moved away from the forums. […] I hope I have been helpful to the debate.

Moreover, the Navy will operate 48 aircraft on its two units in the future.

Abracos

Pepe