Nimrod Contract
 

Signed for 12 aircraft, apparently...

NIMROD "Maritime Revamped Aircraft"
 

Seems someone is guilty of leg-pulling at the expense of the 'Beeb', who now refer to the Nimrod MRA4 as a "maritime revamped aircraft". :E

But then again, perhaps they're not that far off the mark! :ok:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/...st/5186680.stm

I wonder if the wings will fit this time?

check out the picture on http://www.mod.uk/DefenceInternet/De...lNewNimrod.htm. The MR2s seem to have had some modification work. :\

S_H

Nimrod R1 methinks.
Funny angle, but you'd expect messrs MOD & Co to get it right :ugh:

Yes, but not interchangeable, so don't do two of them in the same hangar. :cool:

Any chance of the them inceasing the order later on? I am guessing the development costs are included in this order, so should bring the cost down.

Oh good two Nimrod threads

Isn't it just mindblowing that the MOD, for God's sake, can't get the caption right?

Nimrod R1s.

Yep!
It's the same old picture they have used for all their press releases - probably the only one they have
If they were to contact the photo section at ISK they could get some really nice MR2 ones - in bare metal and shiney - even sepia, B&W and colour - Hemp, or Sea Grey (actually duck egg blue) the MR4A colour, which is very smart - 2 'blue bombers' on the ISK line at present.
Probably even get a photo of the one that was sprayed turd brown due to an incorrect 1 digit section and reference No from some knob at MOD - this was spotted by a 'sharp' stacker who advised them of the colour - "Wind your neck in and just issue the paint" came the reply - so they did!
This jet was aptly nicknamed "Elsan Airways", and, at the time, was wisely delivered to 4th Division South at St Mawgan:ok:

Buoy,

Any chance of some pictures? the blue sounds rather fetching.

Is Elsan Airways a fully owned subsidiary of Mushroom Airways?

Edit: speeelnig adn rwong kyes

Its true though isn't it?

FJJP and Buoy15 -

Yes it is annoying isn't it? But sometimes aircrew make the same mistake! During GW1, whilst on a certain 4th division south MR2 Sqn deployed to Akrotiri, myself and some other crew members were making our way out to the jet in a minibus. It was about 4.30am and pitch dark, and we were all still half asleep, there were shedloads of aircraft on the pan, we saw a Nimrod and headed for it. Arriving at the Jet, it was in complete darkness- wheres the f**kin' groundcrew we said, never mind lets get on board. Lugging our kit up the steps we found the door locked. Suddenly the penny dropped, we looked at the tail and noticed the lack of a MAD boom (51 Sqn were also there). We hurridly got back into the minibus and drove to the correct pan, glad that it was too dark for anyone else to notice our faux pas, and resolving not to mention a word to anyone (until this day)!.

Sorry for the thread creep!
MO

It's not "blue", it's officially "Camouflage Grey". BS631, originally known as "Barley Grey" in the days of the Phantom Force.....

Here's one I took yesterday....

http://fileanchor.com/45738-r.jpg

A Bit Pricey Surely?
 

Nearly £92m per airframe to keep 1000 jobs going? Why not give each of the 1000 workers a cheque for £1.1m and tell them to sort the rest of their own lives out?:confused:

Good idea:-

Here's your cheque - now can you go and do a SAR mission just west of Shannon for me please? Oh, and later on I'd like you to be available to circle over the capital, just in case we have a national emergency....

Is that a retractable EOSDS sticking out of your bottom?

:}

So what you're saying is there are absolutely no other options that could do these taskings? A Nimrod is the World's only SAR aircraft, it's also the World's sole aircraft that can act as an airborne comms middleman, it's the only fixed wing ASW plane in the market, it's the only recce asset in the Western World, etc. etc.

An alternative view from those outside your MATZ would be that our Scottish MPs sitting in London daren't can the Nimrod force for fear of a Jockanese backlash and even in these days of financial squeeze have been railroaded into pouring more money into an ageing platform.

My exasperation is not aimed at your force per se but at our procurement process, which invariably has such rigid government conditions imposed on it that a single result is the only outcome, eg. pick any helicopter you want provided it's made in Yeovil, let competition decide the best replacement for the Hawk trainer - provided it's called a Hawk, those american carriers are awesome - bet if we cobbled together a consortium of has-been shipbuilders and asked them to replicate it would be just as good rather than buy off-the-shelf, etc. etc. :ugh:

Have you not noticed that across all these threads :ugh: is the most commonly used smily?

All valid points.

It seems to me that it would have been futile to can it at this stage.

The decision to continue was made 3 or 4 years ago, on the back of possibly the most stupid contract ever agreed by BAE. Note that no more contracts of that ilk will ever be signed again. Desperate times for BAE equalled low, low prices.

I think the major flaw was believing hand-made fuselages (before CAD/CAM etc.) would fit onto wings made by robots!

Good news is the mission system is supposed to be excellent - but then that was made by Boeing!:ugh: :ugh: :ugh: :ugh: (lesson learnt!)

I couldnt agree more. To try and justify this folly with as feeble an excuse as a SAR task to the west of Shannon and with being able to circle London is silly...

Why won't anyone admit that this aircraft is a complete and utter waste of time and money. We don't need it, we don't want it and the whole idea should be scrapped now before we waste anymore of my money on it.:ugh: :ugh: :ugh: :ugh:

Vecvechookatack - I did have tongue in cheek there!

All I'm saying is it would be further folly to dump a system that is near complete.

Uk procurement policy is flawed...always has been.

What is the alternative?

Rely totally on other countries' "export" variants? Thats' fielding a second team. Look at the JSF, will we ever get access to source codes, so that our industry can tinker with them? Will Congress let us?

The price of retaining an indigenous capability in defence is suffering our now routine procurement funk ups.

Is it all worth it, I ask myself.