Spitfire9Only the contractors of the buying countries will be getting the contracts. As long as a work can be done by a contractor of buying nations, that contractor gets the job.
I suggest subcontracting to OEM’s of friendly countries where they have the know how needed to do the job and you do not. That reduces project cost. If desired the government can spend those saved costs on other projects creating indigenous technological know how.
For example: it would cost $1 billion to develop technology A needed for an element of F-3 design and $1 billion for construction. A foreign company already has technology A and would design and construct that element for $1.25 billion. $750 million is saved which could then be spent locally.
Spitfire9Time.
Its coming way too late.
Yes. But 40 Mk1 are pretty irrelevant to IAF capability. To me what matters is that Mk2 gets it right and is not so late that IAF buys dozens less than expected because it has been forced to buy extra Rafales to maintain numbers.
If Mk2 is years late that will be evidence of little being learned from Mk1 project management failings. The same fate would then await AMCA, I think.
Spitfire9There is little that Japan would need from UK.
Historically, UK’s scope of work was the engine, but the engine is Japanese-developed in this case.
I doubt that Mitsubishi’s know how equals that of BaE Systems. I guess there are a number of areas in which BaE Systems technological know how surpasses Mitsubishi’s.
The reason I suggest BaE Systems as a possible subcontractor is because if no US company is involved, I think the US would be more likely to buy F-3 if BaE Systems rather than EADS were involved.
If you want work, then you must buy.
It is no accident that the UK participation is in F-35B, which the UK was originally planning to buy in 130 units and had the Harrier expertise to bring in.
Agreed that UK had unique design experience in VTOL jets.
The problem with buying work is that it involves one’s government providing funding. Would the USA government be interested in such an arrangement for a project it does not control?
Spitfire9No European partner nation for one simple reason; no one in Europe has the money to buy it with the current ongoing European financial crisis.
Rmember, the work is split among purchasing nations only. No money on the table, no work share.
No chance of a deal on a company-to-company basis? I don’t see how it can be cost effective for the main contractor (Mitsubishi) to re-invent wheels that have already been invented elsewhere. IMO it’s better to get some technology inputs from subcontractors and to target your R&D funds on technologies you particularly want for yourself.
UK participation in F-35 is not dependent on UK ordering F-35. Why could the F-3 project not be the same?
Spitfire9Well one of the properties specified for next/5th gen. fighters
was a significantly lower operational cost than previous gen.Things didn’t pan out too well there for most
That is what was expected of F-35 and export customers will have selected it on that basis. Denmark will have expected an aircraft more capable than its existing F-16 with similar purchase and operating costs.
LM estimates F-35 will cost about 7% more to operate (similar to F-16) and for years said it would cost about $65 million (similar to F-16). Non-LM estimates put operating cost about 100% higher than F-16, I think. Current cost per aircraft is above $100 million, I think. That cost will reduce but the question is: when? If a country needs to replace its F-16 fleet before 2020 it is irrelevant what the unit cost will be for 2025+ deliveries.
Edit: It seems to me that if you want to replace F-16’s with aircraft in the same cost bracket, you have 2 choices from western OEM’s – F-16 or Gripen.
Spitfire9It’s not the technology that Japan’s having a problem with, but the economy of development and production. Let’s be honest, Japanese government debt is at 240% of GDP and they too have to start the austerity soon.
This is why Japan needs a partner nation or two to pool the funding, and only the US, Canada, and Australia have the necessary financial resources to join in the program, co-fund and co-purchases.
Makes sense but it appears from the article that Japan has decided to develop the aircraft on its own if necessary. Strategic move to ensure they get what they want next time? They wanted F-22 this time, not F-35, but could not have it IIRC.
Spitfire9With a project of this magnitude would it not make sense to team up with a US manufacturer (especially if the idea is to build F-22 replacements)? If not a US partner, EADS or BaE Systems. With no government interference from Europe resulting in program delays, capability creep, assembly line duplication etc it might be possible to co-operate with a European major without serious inefficiency penalties.
Spitfire9Bang-for-the-buck is key. No ally will be allowed to show up with a squadron of jets which cannot fly the primary missions, yet comsume valuable real estate and logistics, and require a circus of jammers and tankers, elephants and bearded ladies to perform the mission.
Send them home. Let them fly airshows on sunny Saturdays and Holiday fly-bys for the Royal family.
I think I’ve got the message: the only fighter/strike aircraft worth deploying is the F-35. Australia, England, France, Germany, India, Singapore, South Korea, Spain have all ordered or been taking delivery of aircraft that are of no military value to augment or replace their existing aircraft of no military value. Shame. I guess it might have been possible to intervene in Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya if only the F-35 had been available.
Spitfire9This is what Akaer will build on Gripen NG,
and yes, i’m stealing from @signatorys old thread in militaryphotos, as usual.
Most of the fuselage + wings + a few other bits… quite a major chunk of the aircraft. Am I right in thinking that Brazil would be building these for all Gripen E/F aircraft – Swedish, Swiss included? What would the Swiss build?
Spitfire9Ingestion does not mean the engine will fail nor that the aircraft will be lost, do you seriously think this is not all taken into account in design and proven in testing ?
You have said in your own comment “a twin engined aircraft ingesting a bird will possibly (my correction there) loose one engine” so a twin engined may possibly loose an engine, but a singled engined aircraft is doomed ? This is an issue with any aircraft around the world, do you know how common ingestion and bird strikes are around the world ? How many planes actually crash from it occuring ?
Government records tabled in the House of Commons on Monday show that Canadian CF-18 fighter jet engines have “ingested” at least 67 birds since 1988.
Read more: http://www.canada.com/engines+have+ingested+birds+since+1988/7275133/story.html#ixzz29kYqJsE2
It would be useful to know what percentage of engines were damaged to such a degree that they failed/would have failed if they had not been shut down.
Spitfire9Irtusk – e-z read version:
http://www.airforce-magazine.com/MagazineArchive/Pages/2012/October%202012/1012slow.aspx
Madrat – The heat’s gotta go somewhere. Remember what Scotty used to tell Captain Kirk….
Interesting piece of information in there:
Using the government’s own models, he said Lockheed Martin estimates the F-35 will be “about seven percent more expensive to operate than an F-16.”
(Speaker: Lockheed Martin vice president for aeronautics Larry A. Lawson.)
I am astonished. I thought F-35 was widely believed to be more expensive to operate than F-16, F-15 and F-18.
Spitfire9Unlikely IMHO. Despite economic woes I think they are bound for JSF.
According to armedforces.co.uk a lot of Denmark’s army and air force equipment is stored. I presume this is for cost reduction. The same source puts the military budget at $4 billion in 2010. The report I cited from defensenews.com gives the same budget for 2012 and 2013.
One big question to me is this: even if Denmark reduced its requirement to 20 F-35’s/Super Hornets/whatever, how could it cover introduction costs? You can spread aircraft deliveries over a number of years but you can’t spread the delivery of some of the items needed over several years to fit your budget eg you can’t take delivery of a quarter of a simulator each year.
Another important question to me regarding F-35: how could Denmark know what throughlife costs would be? The cost of the aircraft themselves in future years remains unknown, given that a date for full scale production is not fixed; the cost of maintaining F-35 is not predictable since the buyer will not be able to do all the maintenance it would normally do.
All in all, how can Denmark afford any replacement for F-16 without the manufacturer/manufacturer’s country helping with finance to help Denmark get through the early years of high costs?
Spitfire9Another pointer that Denmark may re-appraise its F-16 replacement options.
“The Danish defense budget has been set at $3.98 billion for 2013, down from $4.01 billion in 2012. Finland’s core defense budget will decrease to $3.07 billion in 2013, compared with $3.3 billion in 2012. The cuts in spending are slated to continue, with the annual allocation to the armed forces due to be reduced by $325 million by 2015 compared with the 2011 budget allocation.”
If the budget does not extend to acquiring your preferred F-16 replacement, you have to increase the budget or cut expenditure on other defence items and activities or choose a cheaper F-16 replacement.
Spitfire9BaE predicts Oman Typhoon talks conclusion this year
Contract negotiations with the Omani Ministry of Defence for the supply of 12 Typhoon Tranche 3 aircraft and associated support are expected to be concluded this year.
Source: BaE statement reported in defence-aerospace (last paragraph)
Spitfire9Croatia to buy Gripen fighter jets from Sweden. According to the newspaper Aftonbladet in Swedish.
The article talks of 8-12 aircraft with an offset of 15 billion krone (about $2.25 billion). That is one hell of an offset – should work out at more than 100%.
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