JSF - if we lose it to save £9bn, we'll be using Typhoon...
 

SO, as the title says - MoD are considering sacking off JSF, cause it'll cost £9bn and we havn't paid for it yet, hence solving our £1.5bn defense budget hole - I believe there is another thread on this very forum discussing it. However, what I would like to put out there, is would we actually gain from using Typhoons instead of JFS from the carriers.

They can carry more ordenance, their more manouverable, and they'll force the Govt to install a proper CATOBAR system, meaning we can get a decent AEW frame on it, and we're buying the d*mn things anyway, so may as well make use of them.

On the other hand, we lose out on the stealth, which, if we ever got into a real high intensity conflict, seems to me to be an excellent thing to have on our side. Plus the F35 has more current avionics (?)

So what do people think is the best answer...?

Hmmm
 

Can I just check if I have understood what you are asking. You seem to be saying would we be better off if we pull out of JSF (which is under development) and design a whole new aircraft from scratch, but based around the existing Typhoon. As naval aircraft are very different from land based types, we would have no idea of it's weapon carrying ability or weight, or it's manoeuvrability in naval form. What percentage of the new Typhoon do you see as using the same parts as the existing Typhoon, and do you see Britain going alone in it's production?
I'm only asking as I'm curious as to your own thoughts. If I were being troublesome I'd probably ask which service you feel should fly it from carriers:E

.
 

Lovely idea,... 'ceptin how as Typhoon was never designed to land on no carrier.... so it would have to be adapted... which is another way of saying redesigned... which would take 10 years and involve a whole load of expensive imponderables....

Then you'd have to fit CATOBAR to the carriers... more delays... more money

Total bill?... quick guess...

£9 billion.... kerrching!

Technicalities aside, you'd never hear the end of the tin foil hat brigade in the RN calling it a scam by those nasty people in the RAF to get rid of the WAFU.

Like they need an excuse to bleat their paranoia.:ugh:

Speaking as a light blue uniformed person, any navalised Typhoon should be definitely flown by dark blue FAA types, as we much prefer our runways to stay still, attached to land and close to home!

If binning 66 JSFs saves £9 Bn, they're costing £136 Bn each, unit programme cost. That's some affordable fighter!

But if we want to really save money, and fund all the other priorities, then bin them, and bin the flipping carriers too.

Well for a start, why not claw some of it back from RBS who want to spend £1bn of govt bailout money on staff performance bonuses? If they've got that much spare money now to spend on bonuses, surely we gave them too much?

Unbelievable that the UK is throwing hundreds of billions of pounds at banks while the armed forces are reduced to squabbling over pocket change.

barnstormer.... much as I admire that admirable cynicism ;) BAe have already carried out conversions and tests on a EF, and have found out that it works. Plus, the carriers are currently in building, so don't require any expensive retrofitting - their already designed to bolt a cat and trap on anyway, if need be.

Plus, i'm advocate dark blue pilots, although cross training would be possible obviously.

and we can't bin the carriers because at the end of the day, any true strike carrier is an exceptionally useful asset.


I think a better question would be, which would give us the greatest capability? JSF or EF?

A cynic might suggest that the total bill and unit cost is a variable depending on whether you want it to be affordable or unaffordable.

If you really want something then you will move all the bolt-on items on to someone elses budget - ground equipment if is can be used for something else - works services for sqns etc etc.

If you want to prove it unaffordable then you include the flying clothing, kettle, carpets, curtains and fittings.

What would you really get for your £9bn? 66 jets or 66 jets and . . .

Sweet Jesus, not this again!!!:ugh:

Unless you work for BAeS YD, go and take a VERY large reality pill and think about what you've just written!

Regards,
MM

Any Typhoon can land on any carrier...........






...........but only once.

I like the Idea of a Navalised Typhoon. This will also open up doors for other AEW aircraft, such as the E-2 Hawk eye :ok:

But, the Crew should be FAA Dark Blue Suiters........ Keeping Fixed Wing Flying in the RN :)

Deja vu. This from the House of Commons Defence Committee a few months ago.

General Sir Kevin O'Donoghue: At the moment, and this is still a decision-making process going on, we are looking at buying three [F-35B], which are the Operational Test and Evaluation aircraft [due to be ordered very very shortly].

Robert Key: Beyond that?

General Sir Kevin O'Donoghue: Why do we not wait and see what the Operational Test and Evaluation comes out with? [due to end 2014ish]

Robert Key: Is a marinised Typhoon still an option?

General Sir Kevin O'Donoghue: That is not being looked at, no.

Robert Key: What discussions have you been having with the French about the possibility of purchasing a French aircraft that could fly on the French aircraft carriers and the British aircraft carriers?

General Sir Kevin O'Donoghue: I have not been having any.

Mr Jenkin: Would we still consider buying the non-STOVL version [F-35C] if the STOVL version [F-35B] was not available?

Rear Admiral Lambert: At the beginning of the process we looked at the capability requirement needed for both carrier strike and for our future combat air capability, and the option that met the bill was STOVL. We revisit it every so often to make sure that we have got all our figures right, and the requirement right, and the answer still comes up as STOVL.

Mr Jenkin: So would we develop STOVL on our own account if the Americans did not want to develop it?

General Sir Kevin O'Donoghue: The carriers are not fitted for, but could be fitted for, the carrier variant.

Chairman: Was that a yes?

General Sir Kevin O'Donoghue: No, it could be - if STOVL went, which I think is your question?

Mr Jenkin: Yes, that is what I am asking.

General Sir Kevin O'Donoghue: Then carrier variant must be an option.

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Dai - BAe have not carried out any conversions or tests on a navalised Typhoon.

They have done some computer modelling and concluded that it would be feasible if anyone wanted to throw billions of quid at making it a reality.

A navalised Typhoon doesn't exist; it hasn't been funded; it hasn't been designed.

And adding cats and traps to the carriers would require considerable time and cost. There is (supposedly) some margin for future growth built into the design. But there has been no detailed work done, let alone cash set aside for the hardware. And it's not just a case of bolting the equipment on. Cats require enormous amounts of extra power that has to come from somewhere, and that somewhere doesn't exist on the current design.

And how much energy would it take to launch a Typhoon N? Answer: Dunno because it hasn't been designed and doesn't exist.

Blue Sky Thinking....
 

Surely if the real and pertinent question was posed:

'How much does it cost to eliminate a man on a 20 year old motorcycle carrying an even older RPG",

then any answer which cost £9 billion pounds would not get past the starting post?

Or am I being naive again?

I'll get my coat.

Yes.

JSF and the CVS are for the war but one. Tiffy is for the next one. JFH was for the current one but now we might get rid of it.


hat, coat, umbrella (it's snowing).

Really! Was that on DA2 or DA4, the only reason I ask is that when I worked on them they hadn't had any such testing carried out, and I haven't heard anything from my collegues that still work at Warton to substantiate your claim. I would have thought that would be quite a major rework too - beefed up landing gear and all the fittings that it bolts to, beef up the hook, install a hook retraction hydraulic system, and beef up the frames that the hook attaches to. Then theres all the EMC testing that needs to be carried out to put an Air Force fighter onto a boat

Yep - great way to spend 9 billion quid I'd say, or you could just by some F-35's

Given the £12 Billion for St Athan which asks the question what is the money really being used for then how does it sit with the concept of Naval aviation in the future ?

Is the money better spent on the development of pilotless drones flown from anywhere....ok I guess this is really popular with Pilots.

If you look at Aircrew being the most important asset.........some will get big heads with statement like this.

Equipment can be replaced..eventually but air crew trained to that level cannot and while you can train others it uses up scare resources and can be delivered too late to make an impact when required.

Surely resources should be looking more at the development of pilotless aircraft / drones that can do the same thing i.e. eliminate an enemy. Bottom line whether eliminated by a JSF or Typhoon or Drone the impact is still the same.

Losing a £500k drone v a JSF with crew is an easy calculation to make but harder when you consider the impact of a Senior Defence Chief's ego.

Yeoman,

Is this a new story or just speculation on your part?

FWIW I believe the CVF design has space set aside for steam gennys for any future cats.

cheers

Perverse logic
 

There is a possible perverse logic. That is:

We're going to spend around £8bn of tranche 3 Typhoon, and £9bn on JSF.

If you go for Typhoon M, you could spend an extra £3 - 4 bn navalising the 80 or so tranche 3 aircraft (plus fit cats and traps to the 2 CVF).. and still save £5bn. You end up with a one type airforce, but fantastically expensive aircraft.

BUT - this has been done to death. There are a load of other factors - including the work you'd need to do on the airframe, CTOL training regimes, UK earnings from the JSF programme etc etc etc. Use the search function!

I think we've concluded time and again that it's JSF or nothing.

once more an ill thought out question, and the limitless cynicism of the military mind gets me a shouting at. I'll try again... and I really apologise to you who have wasted your time reading the above mentions and i'll admit I should really have added the news story into the link (i've lost the damnable thing now) and not taken the info at quite such face value (note to self, stop trusting journo's). So, i'll try re-write to get an answer I was origionally looking for.


Which is the most capable airframe?

NOT could it be done, not which is more expensive, not any of the prblems i've been listed.

Which, the JSF, or the EF, if flown as part of the carrier air wing, would be the more capable airframe for ground attack, and defending the airspace?

Someone is bound to say its acedemic, and it'll never happen so there's not point speculating, but, well, humour me, i'm only young lol

Yeoman Dai
 

Thank you for your admiration.:O
But no Typhoon has been fitted for, or tested fully on a carrier so I stand by what I say.
If you consider that even differing flying clothing has to be tested to ensure it's safe to use in the cockpit, then an aircraft re-made in different alloys and a differing construction, is a whole new ball game (literally)

Do you have a reference to the testing that BAE have done?. I'm sorry to be old fashioned here, but on paper the 400M looks a top aircraft, but just does not quite live up to it's computer performance in real life.

(Beags I'm sure it will be great one day, but I am thinking more of how the floor worked on a PC screen more robustly than on the finished article:rolleyes:)

To my microsopic knowledge, no Europhoon has ever had hardware for deck operations tried, though I'm sure BAe will have tried simulated projections.

About the best thing out of a conventional rather than STOVL design seems to be AEW, though that doesn't seem an insurmountable snag.

If really wishing to save money, how about warmed-over Harrier 2+ , some with buddy tanks...? They carry AMRAAMS, Sniper etc, and not many potential enemies can leg it past those !

Harrier 2+ & V-22 seems a good bet ( so won't happen ).

There was a good post on the other thread which summarised as:
If you want a 5th generation fighter - it's the JSF, if you want a 4.5th gen - then you have choices.

Rafale M or Super Hornet off the shelf are the quick answers ( and the Rafale is stunning).

Britain considers £9bn JSF project pullout - Times Online this is one of them, i'll endevour to locate the other one, it's on a mil news page somewhere, I just can't remember exactly where :O :\

i'm aghast, that last post was almost an actual answer!!! gosh! ;)

Damn my eyes Yeoman Dai - you're right.

I'll start altering it now:eek:

Capable at what?

At air to air combat? At air to ground? At range carrying what ordnance? At penetrating heavily defended airspace?

A navalized Typhoon would have to be greatly redesigned, so you can't take assume that its performance would mirror the current Typhoon.

Your question simply can't be answered.

There was an assessment a while back with kill ratios - how many bandits you could kill for the loss of your jet. I can't remember the absolute figures but the F22 was way ahead. The Typhoon was something like 5:1, the Rafael was, IIRC but I stand to be corrected, 1.6:1.

No match really. The study which was recent did not, again IIRC, include JSF but if it had it would presumably be like including Harrier in the fight evaluation.

There is the other old saw, you can make a bomber out of a fighter but not a fighter out of a bomber - Hurricane, Mosquito, Hunter, F3. You might suggest that the FA2 disproves that theory or that the FA2 was really a different design from a Harrier GR.

From a very reliable source -

A section had a toilet seat fitted. Instead of just getting one from B&Q and fitting it which would have cost £20 let's say, they had to have surveyors, health and safety inspectors in before hand. All of these little things added up in the end to £1,500.

If people had their head screwed on in Whitehall, then we wouldn't be having this debate..

Therefore, wouldn't keeping the Reds at Scampton save money!

Rumour has it that a move has been totted up and is in the billions, with new hangars, buildings etc.. plus the fuel that is needed to get to and from Scampton.

Dave

The Sea Harrier FA2 was equipped with overall decent kit ( GPS, link etc ) about 5 seconds before it was binned !

New - build Seajets, or Harrier 2+ with modern BVR radar /weapons, IRST & AIM9X / ASRAAM etc should be more than enough to knobble anything, plus a good A-G capability with Sniper etc ?

Couldn't agree more with Poose. Some plonker re-re-restarted this tiresome debate in the DT by saying that the RAF should be binned and now everyone else is jumping in and proposing the end of every other Service. Why not let each Service do what it's best at in/on its chosen medium? The end. :*

assuming it was possible to navalise typhoon, givien the cost of redesign, flight test, trials etc, how would she stack up against rafale.
or, given the hornet is available, a few F18Gs as well.
oooh, now yer talking!!!!

Mr Fish, provided navalising didn't degrade the Tiffy there would be no contest. As I said 3: against Rafaele and I think 2:1 on the Hornet.

I will have to put my thinking cap on and remember where I read it.

Pontious

"The study which was recent did not, again IIRC, include JSF but if it had it would presumably be like including Harrier in the fight evaluation."

"Mr Fish, provided navalising didn't degrade the Tiffy there would be no contest"

You may be correct, but you have put forward no evidence for this whatsoever.

YD,

I must agree with MM that this thread starts with a false premise - that Typhoon can be navalised.

If you mean could it recover to and launch from a carrier reliably, the honest answer is that it can't. Not now, not ever, not at a cost and risk that our defence budget can stand. And even if it were, for some benighted reason, made to happen, the performance of the resulting aircraft would be a huge disappointment.

It's never been 'tested' and the navalized variant has never been 'designed'. Trust me (and others) on this.

Happy to converse via PM if you wish - I've posted plenty on this subject before - do a search, take a look and come back to me if I can help more.

Best Regards as ever

Engines

just a question, could the V22 Osprey be converted for AEW or are there any plans to do so? that way there would be no need for a cat to be fitted to the carriers so not spending more money on them.


Just on another note, I'm sure Im not the only one getting sick of the in fighting between the services on doing away with one service or another. I have never served and I would have thought the Admirals, Air Vice Marshalls etc would have more knowledge than me,

But looking at the bigger picture, perhaps we should be fighting the Treasury not ourselves!!!!!!

Duncan

Pontius Navigator,

Could well have been the DERA study into the Eurofighter's BVR capability

Eurofighter Technology and Performance

Cyclone, thank you. The figures match although the presentation is different. I guess that it was the same source albeit different article.

Tourist, I accept your apologies.

Pontious.

Assuming you are being obtuse rather than just irritating,

That study has no JSF in it, so how can that answer the "Which, the JSF, or the EF, if flown as part of the carrier air wing, would be the more capable airframe for ground attack, and defending the airspace?" question that was asked by Yeoman.

You have presented figures for various carrier aircraft, but dismissed the JSF with a silly harrier comparison.

YD,

accepting that marinised Typhoon is not a reality, I think there are still quite a few reasons why this really comparing apples with oranges.

Who are you fighting? What do you want to do? JSF is stealthy and can carry a small bombload against a very high threat. It can also carry a slightly bigger weaponload if it sacrifices stealth, but that means it doesn't go very far at all. Typhoon carries much more, further, but probably won't do as well against a very sophisticated enemy. I would venture to suggest that our nation's air capability would be well served by having a mix of the two types.

As for what you fly off the carrier, it's only going to be a very small part of the combat power in any significant op; having carriers is probably more about the ability to put them somewhere to make a statement than exactly what you can do with the aircraft on them.