Originally Posted by Ndegi
Having seen the Spartan perform at two Avalons, it looks a great and very capable aircraft. Pity about the sour grapes culture from the CASA manufacturers trying to undermine the RAAF decision.
I personally flew the IPTN (Indonesian) version of the CASA 235 with their chief test pilot when it came out years ago (my background was all varieties of C130 including the J, except the "A" - I'm not quite that old! - plus the Caribou). The CN235 or variant thereof was the alternate choice to the G222 at the time (which itself has now morphed into the C27J). I was asked to privately voice my personal opinions to the then OC of the transport wing who not too long ago finished his illustrious rise to Chief of Defence Force and has just gone into a civilian role with Airservices I believe.
I didn't like the CASA for a couple of reasons. One was that it seemed physically hard work to fly at low level (harder than both the Herc and the Caribou, believe it or not) which I think was a flight control issue. Also not being able to take a standard pallet, though it sounds minor, is actually a pretty big deal logistically. And another issue was that it was a very tight squeeze for certain common Aus military vehicles.
On top of that, the C130J has already absorbed many of the growing pains of the "J" systems, which were pretty immature and needed lots of work when they first came out.
Of course, it all means nothing if the manufacturer doesn't support it properly.
Originally Posted by Rudder
The yanks reject it and we buy them from them!
It's not quite that simple. Whether the US military accepts or rejects a new toy isn't always a reflection on the hardware itself. They sometimes do stupid things. We sometimes do stupid things. Stupid things are something you get used to dealing with in the military.