Oh well, that is that then.

 

Better ramp up Rafale production.

 

Problem solved.

 

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L'occasion fournie s'ouvre!  La rafale d'air peut entrer!  Ooo la la!

 

Meanwhile, just imagine how very kick-ass those F-18E+ (or maybe they will be F-18H?) jets would be with 25% uprated F414s!!!

 

The US Naval Air Systems Command's top cost estimator has warned in a new internal briefing obtained by Flight International that the Lockheed Martin F-35B/C variants are getting harder to afford.

[B]Lockheed continues to insist, however, that cost estimates within the programme have not changed since 2007, which it says is supported by its recent contractual performance.[/B]

But the NAVAIR briefing, presented to US Navy officials on 4 January, adds fuel to a series of recent reports that the Department of Defense is taking a more conservative approach to estimating the F-35's overall costs, with potential production unit cuts likely in the fiscal year 2011 budget request scheduled for release in February.

According to NAVAIR's cost department, the F-35's total ownership costs, including development, production and sustainment, has doubled to $704 billion since Lockheed won the contract eight years ago.

Moreover, NAVAIR estimates the total of 680 short take-off and vertical landing F-35Bs and carrier-variant F-35Cs, ordered by the US Marine Corps and USN, respectively, will cost $30,700 to fly each hour. This compares to $18,900 for the Boeing AV-8B Harrier II and Boeing F/A-18A-D, the aircraft types the Joint Strike Fighter will replace.

Although NAVAIR projects the F-35 will fly 12% fewer flight hours than the AV-8B and F/A-18A-D fleets, the agency expects the modern aircraft to cost as much as about 25% more to operate at peak rates, the briefing says.

The unexpected cost increases mean the F-35 "will have a significant impact on naval aviation affordability", the NAVAIR document concludes.

[B]Dan Crowley, Lockheed executive vice-president for the F-35, says the presentation reflects an ongoing dispute between the programme and the Joint Estimating Team (JET). The NAVAIR presentation bases its cost assumptions on the latest JET study.
The programme uses a "bottom-up" approach to estimate costs, while the JET and NAVAIR estimates use a parametric model, Crowley says.[/B]

But the dispute is not a trivial matter. If the DoD decides to submit a budget request based on the JET's higher estimate, Lockheed's orders for production aircraft could decline. Such a reduction sets the stage for the so-called "acquisition death spiral", as fewer orders lead to higher unit production costs, which in turn cause further cuts.

[B]But Crowley says that a production cut next year would not necessarily trigger a death spiral. Under Lockheed's interpretation of recent acquisition reform laws, the company could deliver more aircraft to the government than are put under contract.

The first test of this theory could arrive during negotiations for the fifth annual lot of low rate production. "The government will be monitoring our prices for LRIP-5," Crowley says.
Meanwhile, Lockheed will continue to develop its capacity planning based on the assumption that it will deliver one jet every working day by 2015 or 2016, says Crowley.[/B]

L'occasion fournie s'ouvre!  La rafale d'air peut entrer!  Ooo la la! 

Meanwhile, just imagine how very kick-ass those F-18E+ (or maybe they will be F-18H?) jets would be with 25% uprated F414s!!!

why stop there, you know how the froggy fanboys like airshows and this fa-18 has been sitting on the shelf since the 90's

 

controlled flight at high angles of attack using thrust vectoring modifications to the flight controls, and with actuated forebody strakes. 
Demonstrated capabilities included stable flight at approximately 70 degrees angle of attack (previous maximum was 55 degrees) and rolling at high rates at 65 degrees angle of attack. Controlled rolling would have been nearly impossible above 35 degrees without vectoring.

i dont know, it seems even the french arent too keen on building rafales
they are building a wopping 19 planes 2011-14, thats nearly 5 a year http://www.strategypage.com/CuteSoft_Client/CuteEditor/Images/emcry.gif" alt="" />

Ah, the troll returns... I guess it was too much to hope that we might be rid of this pest.

 

 

Interesting that Boeing claims it can make "improvements" to the F18's stealthiness with external stores through extensive computations using networked computersto model the interactions of the stores with the airframe and specially treated weapons.   Ergo, no modification to the airframe for internal stores ala Silent Eagle.   Of course they don't discuss the cost associated with treating these weapons or the possible maintenance overhead associated with keeping those stores in the proper state.  

 

According to their engineers they are working to further reduce the RCS of the Blk3 Super Hornets without making changes to the external shape (i.e. no chines).  I mean how much can they modify the innards to affect any serious improvements.  Sounds like a lot of marketing noise to me.

Obviously I don't understand what chines are then.  Is there some internal structure in the airframe or is it the alignment of the intakes and other external aspects such as the LEX?  Funny I never noticed the edge alignment of the vertical stabilizers and the intakes before. 

 

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Think of a king cobra.  the chines are the "hoods" flanking the c0ckpit.

 

A "real" chine  is what you see on F-22, JSF, SR-71 where the "hoods" a blended from the nose back and lead into the main wings..

the SR-71 was the first aircraft to use it - they discovered that it dropped the inherent RCS signature by 90%.

I can't see it being a cost effective mod to build in proper chines into either the Shornet or the F-15nn.

The economies of scale would preclude any major body work IMO.  I'm cycnically of the view that its more spin rather than substance as the cost to do it would be significant - and what would be the expected returns.  Boeing have admitted the other week that the stealthy F-15 is never going to be signature competitive against a JSF (contrary to the unfort spam that was foisted upon this forum by a prev member now banned).  The cost therefore to lower the RCS needs to be relative to end cost and systems gain against perceived threats.

Both Shornet and Eagle are already competitive against the Flanker family - irrespective of what some "professional bloggers" seek to claim.  The mods would be better off served if done against conformal packs with internal weapons release etc...  there is only so much you can do to a legacy platform.