Thanks for the informative response. What I am driving at is that, by definition, a LRMPA tends to spend a lot of its time flying around in some pretty grotty weather, in the North Atlantic, in the middle of winter.
The potential RPAS solution will need to be able to cope with cloud depths of 20000ft or greater, hostile weather conditions including turbulence and icing, amongst other things.
We would also have to work out new methods of setting buoys electronically (currently done manually by a crew member), not insurmounatble I guess but adds to the cost.
Finally, on the back of LJ's obvious enthusiasm to spend his RAF career sitting in a tin box playing with his joystick
, MRA4 with a full rack fit could carry in excess of 200 buoys, plus additional buoys boxed up if required. I could do that and carry 9 torpedoes in the Bomb-bay and I haven't even used the 4 wing hard points yet.