JackonickoThe reported Leonardo involvement is by the bit that used to be Selex, and before that GEC Marconi and is based in Edinburgh. This isn’t ‘Italian involvement’.
JackonickoI wouldn’t assume anything about intake configuration from what is a cheaply built model, designed to backdrop Gavin Williamson’s announcement of the new Combat Air strategy, and to be an LO platform of the right kind of size to be broadly representative of what the company is looking at.
It is not a mock up. The business case hasn’t even been made, and Team Tempest is still looking at potential partnerships. The final configuration is far from being finalised, and the definitive aircraft could still look quite different.
Charles Woodburn, the chief executive of BAE Systems, said that: “The important thing about the new concept is that it will illustrate a direction of travel.”
Williamson said that: “It shows our allies that we are open to working together to protect the skies in an increasingly threatening future – and this concept model is just a glimpse into what the future could look like.”
And the series of plan views of other possible concept designs shown to journalists at Warton included two aircraft which clearly had engine/intake configurations that were very far from ‘straight through.’
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One of the configurations……
JackonickoOne week before Farnborough BAE Systems briefed a group of journalists on future concepts. It was clear that a number of configurations are still under consideration to meet the manned/optionally manned platform that will be developed to meet this requirement. One looked more like an F-35, another more like a YF-23, one like something from Star Wars and one was a much smaller ‘arrowhead planform’. The latter two were admitted to be ‘less likely’.
I don’t think that this mock-up is necessarily going to be representative of the final aircraft, and nor does that matter. The airframe is the easy bit, and I suspect that the £2 Bn announced will be spent on the clever stuff – some of which is already under development, and much of which one can expect to see first used on the Typhoon – certainly including the Striker II helmet, probably including the radar, perhaps including wide area displays, wearable cockpit technology, and a new DASS, as well as haptic gesture recognition, eye tracking and other clever technologies.
And we shouldn’t forget that the answer to this won’t simply be an aircraft, but rather a system of systems that includes a manned/optionally manned platform and a number of other unmanned platforms and weapons.
Though Airbus came up with a concept configuration some time ago, that really is the easy bit, and does not indicate that Airbus and Dassault necessarily have any technological lead. Indeed I suspect that BAE Systems and its partners may be further ahead in certain respects, though naturally not all. There may well be some cross fertilisation between this programme and the TAI TFX and the Japanese ATD-X.
JackonickoThanks EC 5/25.
Wonder why one C was used?
JackonickoDetails of units, etc. (and even serials/codes) for most of the aircraft involved in the Syrian attacks seem to be known.
Does anyone know which Rafales and Mirages were involved, or what unit the pilots were from?
And what was the breakdown between single- and two-seaters?
JackonickoBager,
Your figures seem suspect. The Victor carrying a smaller bombload than the Vulcan? The Victor demonstrated a drop of 35 1,000 lb bombs, the Vulcan could manage ‘only’ 21. Half the range of a Vulcan? I think not.
JackonickoWhile UAVs have a part to play in the ASW and MPA game, their reliance on datalinks, the requirement for bandwidth, and the vulnerability of those datalinks leads me to conclude that unmanned platforms don’t represent the main answer. The US Navy seems to have come to the same conclusion.
JackonickoThe problem with converted modern airliners is that they are optimised to operate at high altitude, flying in straight lines, and not to ‘yank and bank’ at low level, where the ASW game has traditionally been played out.
To compensate for this, the P-8 is designed to conduct wide area search using a Multistatic Active Coherent (MAC) sonics system, and to engage its targets from cruise altitude using weapons with high altitude wing kits (HAWK).
Neither the US version of MAC nor HAWK are operational, however, and development of both is lagging way behind the originally planned timescale. The scope of US investment in P-8 leads me to believe that they will be made to work, regardless of the cost. But it may not be easy. And doing the job from low level may be better, anyway.
And there are plenty of options that do operate at low level, and that use proven multistatic systems.
For the Franco-German requirement I would rule out solutions based on aircraft like the C295, Dash 8 and ATR, since these lack range/endurance and take too long to get to distant patrol areas. I’d also reluctantly rule out the excellent P-1 – Japan is simply too untried a provider of military aircraft to export customers. The Franco-German requirement is also too small to allow a clean sheet of paper design.
So what’s left?
Saab’s latest G6000-based Swordfish strikes me as being a possible solution, or as being a useful model. Carrying the same crew as a P-8, and with much the same range and endurance capability, the Swordfish can engage targets at low level. It lacks some of the payload capability of the P-8, but carries more sonobuoys, and is a surprisingly good alternative to a P-8 class MPA/ASW aircraft.
I’m surprised that no-one’s mentioned it on this thread!
JackonickoEagle1.
There isn’t a big overlap, but overlap there is. Rafale gives heavy stand off precision weapons capabilities not matched by the other two aircraft for political or programmatic reasons. F-15QA gives unmatched payload/range. Typhoon brings more weapons options to the table, together with better intercept and BVR capabilities. Not sufficient overlap for a cost-driven Western air force to ever sensibly procure all three types, but another good reason for Qatar, which really does not have to worry too much about cold hard cash.
JackonickoI always thought that Typhoon was the wrong aircraft for Austria, and that Gripen C seemed a better fit.
However, if one takes Gruber’s statements at face value, and in particular his melodramatic statement that he wants to make sure that his “pilots are not sentenced to death, when in the future (they) may be meeting a defecting, renegade Su-27 and its pursuers…” then it follows that Austria needs a better capability than the very stripped down Tranche 1 Typhoon that they have. They need a proper DASS, they need proper radar and missile warning systems, they need a proper long range BVR missile capability.
A Gripen C is not, with the best will in the world, going to provide sufficient overmatch to deal with a horde of Su-35s, whereas by upgrading the Tranche 1 Typhoons to the latest RAF standards, then a small degree of superiority would be assured. Add Meteor and the job’s done.
JackonickoI’m surprised that people are so surprised, Sintra.
Major news sources judge Qatari Typhoon deal surprising – Aerospace Analysis & Insight was expecting it all along!
The announcement that the UK and Qatar had signed a Statement of Intent today outlining a proposed Qatari purchase of 24 Typhoon aircraft was greeted by most news sources as being surprising and unexpected.
Bloomberg called the deal a ‘surprise win for the Typhoon fighter jet’, while analyst Celine Fornaro at UBS judged that “The market was not expecting a Qatar order for Eurofighter.”
Even some of the most knowledgeable and widely respected specialist journalists seemed surprised by the development – including two of the five aerospace journalists whose work I personally respect and admire most.
Writing in Jane’s Gareth Jennings said that: “Qatar’s decision to replace its one current fighter type with three new different types is curious,” while Aviation Week’s Tony Osborne called the signing of the deal “a surprise move.”
Only the dedicated Middle Eastern focused specialist magazines have been predicting a three-way split Qatari fighter force (procuring 24 examples each of the Rafale, F-15QA and Typhoon), and Arabian Aerospace was doing so since before the Emirate ordered 24 Rafales in March 2016. (But perhaps it’s a bit more easy for a specialist magazine with a much narrower focus and a more relaxed deadline to predict such things?)
Splitting a 72-aircraft order three ways would seem like insanity to most Western air forces – since to do so will inevitably impose higher costs and reduce any ‘economies of scale’, while also requiring more infrastructure and more complex logistics. But if costs are not a concern, it makes much better sense.
The three types have complementary and slightly overlapping capabilities, meaning that Qatar’s multi-type fleet will be more capable than a single-type fleet would have been, while also giving Qatar relationships and leverage with three suppliers, rather than just one.
Qatar’s fighter pilots will be able to train and exercise with the Armée de l’Air’s Rafale squadrons, the USAF, and the Eurofighter partner air forces, and will be able to pick up techniques, tactics and doctrine from all of their new allies.
JackonickoSweden is not interested in selling fighters to this region, but AEW&C and ASW/MPA aircraft must be a real possibility.
JackonickoThere were lots of Canberras with non-standard nose radomes – like VN828 and WG789, for example. It does look like something I’ve seen on a Canberra.
JackonickoCan’t see anything there, Deino. I guess I have to wait for registration to be confirmed….
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