So, if this turns out to be true. Australia will pay 'only' $140 million each for the F35. ..

Correct me if I am wrong but, unlike Australia, the UK is looking at the -more complex and expensive- F35B STOVL version, so this Australian costing -if accurate- does not mean very much at all in terms of the proposed UK buy of a different, more complex and more expensive aircraft.

For Carrier operation the Super Hornet or, if it is affordable, even the F35C looks a much better bet for UK. For one thing Cat and Trap could give you Hawkeye AEW.

EMALS is now going very well. CVF is designed to take it. Fit it. Buy Super Hornet and a few Hawkeye. Seems to be the way the RN's minds are running since so many FAA pilots are training with USN on Hornets.

What is better for most purposes maybe 8 F35B and Helo AEW or 24 Super Hornet and Hawkeye AEW?

Re-read the ******* post, oldnotbold!

Yes, that is a "without engines or radar" cost, but read further down:

That "$140 million each" includes airfield modifications, ground support equipment, initial spares, and other "start-up costs"!!!!

Also figure in that those are Australian dollars, since the link was from an Australian news paper!

The Canadians just signed a contract for 65 F-35A... for C$138 million per total (US$130 million), and their Defense Minister said that Canadian dollar figure includes other costs like training, improvements to airbases as well as simulators.

NO MORE THAN C$90 million (US $85 million) of that was for the actual aircraft, everything else was those "start-up" costs I mentioned above.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/17/bu...hter.html?_r=1

Hmmm. I found another comment, from a different article by the same reporter, of the same briefing, much more interesting. You either take all the points reported with a pinch of salt, or accept all as true. But I would suggest not cherry picking the ones you prefer........

Adelaide Now: Australia flies away with strike fighters for $60m each

AUSTRALIA will pay a "flyaway" price of less than $60 million each for up to 100 of the world's most advanced fighter jets.

However, the final price will be more than double that for a total package that includes weapons, sensors, training and through-life support for the F35 Joint Strike Fighter (JSF).

At about $140 million each the single-seat jets will be cheaper than the 24 two-seat Super Hornets purchased by the Howard government for $6.6 billion, or more than $220 million a copy.

The multi-role JSF jet is powered by the biggest fighter engine built, that propels it at almost twice the speed of sound. However, Australia's aircraft will not be as stealthy as the U.S. version........

Ian McPhedran travelled to the US as a guest of Lockheed Martin

Firstly the reporter travelled to the US as a guest of LM, which has to make you wonder.

Secondly, as I posted before UK is looking at the STOVL 35 B, not the Australian or Canadian version. Even people who really like F35 admit that the STOVL B version is going to cost a fair bit more than the A or C versions.

If what I read is correct the STOVL B version also has a much shorter range and can carry only half the payload of the A and C versions.

According to the Israeli Defence Ministry their F35's will be around $100 million each, and since they will get them, more or less, free under a US Military Aid Programme I tend to give more weight to this than other sources, as they have no need of 'spin' to their public.

"The price tag for each plane, according to the ministry, is around $100 million. But there are experts, including Yiftah Shapir of Tel Aviv University's Institute for National Security Studies, who expect the cost to soar to around $150 million per plane, bringing the total cost of the 22 planes the IAF is seeking to obtain to over $3 billion"

http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition...ghter-1.308907

Who are these FAA pilots training with the USN? I know there has been a lot of rumour about it, but has anyone actually gone as part of a new FAA plan (rather than just usual exchange guys).

Moreover, if they are out there, who is paying, what are they going to do for 5 years or, what are they going to fly when they get back if they are just doing a quick qualification and CQ?

Adour

Found this on another forum

RN sends cadre of pilots to train on US carriers


"A larger than usual number of UK pilots are taking part in carrier training in the US


The move may indicate that the UK favours a commitment to conventional aircraft launched by catapult rather than a STOVL platform

An uprecedented number of UK Royal Navy (RN) Harrier pilots have begun training for catapult-assisted take-off but arrested recovery (CATOBAR) carrier operations in the United States, information obtained by Jane's has revealed.

The news further fuels rumours that the UK Ministry of Defence (MoD) may be re-assessing its previous commitment to fulfilling the UK's Joint Combat Aircraft (JCA) requirement with the F-35B short take-off and vertical landing (STOVL) variant of the Lockheed Martin Joint Strike Fighter (JSF), instead opting for a conventional aircraft launched by catapult.

The latter could be the F-35C carrier variant of the JSF, which has a greater range and payload capability than the JSF STOVL variant and also costs less per unit, or even the Boeing F/A-18E/F Super Hornet on which the UK pilots are likely to be certified. The RN's two future Queen Elizabeth-class carriers that would operate the JCA are designed for, but not yet fitted with CATOBAR equipment.

The programme for this exchange of aviators is much larger than normal and was apparently initiated in April when a senior US Navy (USN) officer announced training and squadron integration for 12 UK pilots. This officer then briefed the US Commander Naval Air Forces (CNAF) in mid-April.

Sources who spoke to Jane's on condition of anonymity state that the Office of the Chief of Naval Operations (OpNav) is "driving the requirement and the CNAF is implementing [it]". Given the high level of support, the training and timing for the programme will be high priority for the local F/A-18 fleet replacement training squadrons (FRSs).

USN sources anticipate that this training programme will be scheduled so that the RN will have 12 fully qualified carrier pilots by 2012. They did not mention whether or not any of these 12 would be trained for the rear-cockpit weapon systems officer (WSO) position in two-seat carrier aircraft or as landing signals officers (LSOs).

According to the programme plan, eight of the 12 pilots will complete a full syllabus on the Boeing/BAE Systems T-45 jet trainer (a carrier-capable version of the BAE Systems Hawk Mk 60) and a full CAT I syllabus on the F/A-18 Hornet. The CAT I syllabus has recently been designated as the pilot certification training for the F/A-18. Three pilots will complete a partial T-45 syllabus and a full CAT II F/A-18 syllabus, which is the training for qualified pilot transition to the F/A-18. The training regime for the 12th and last pilot has not been specified, but it is anticipated that he will conduct some T-45 Goshawk training and a full CAT I or II syllabus that includes day/night landing carrier qualification. Eleven of the UK pilots will join USN fleet squadrons and will be flying both C/D legacy Hornet and E/F Super Hornet models of the F/A-18. The 12th pilot will remain at one of the FRS locations as an exchange pilot.

The RN pilots will also fly US Marine Corps (USMC) McDonnell Douglas/BAE Systems AV-8B Harrier IIs.

It is the much larger number of pilots included (typical exchange programmes with the USN involve only two or three pilots) along with the additional training involved that suggest this pilot training programme is not part of a standard exchange tour.

"It's typical to take the RAF [Royal Air Force]/RN guy to the carrier for some 'good deal' [carrier] traps," said the USN source, "but they go in daytime only and are scheduled on a 'not to interfere with [regular USN] student traps' basis. In other words they do not have a quota. All 12 of the RN pilots addressed by this training will have a quota."

Asked about the reasoning behind the programme, one source told Jane's that it is designed to "give additional STOVL and cat-and-trap experience and provide invaluable 'big deck' familiarisation prior to introduction of Queen Elizabeth . It will also further strengthen the bonds between the USN, USMC and RN".

In conjunction with Jane's reports in July that the UK MoD is continuing to contract Converteam UK for the design, development and demonstration of an electro-magnetic catapult system, news of a cadre of UK pilots being carrier trained would seem to confirm the ministry is reassessing its carrier options. The contractual decision on what variant of F-35 to buy does not have to be made until early in 2011, although RN sources indicated to Jane's in July that the B/C decision would be made as part of the UK's Strategic Defence and Security Review process, so a decision could come this year even if no contract is signed."

It is worth noting that these are FAA pilots, not RAF.

Just maybe the RN sees the Harrier going in the SDSR and is trying to keep a cadre of FJ drivers interested. The title of the thread and the totally unfounded speculation are classic Pprune, please keep it up :D

Unfortunately in the real world the CVs and JSF will be extremely lucky to survive the chop, I haven't heard anything from Dr Fox that requires them and the axe will have to swing hard on some big projects in order to make the savings required :{

I think it will be the the RAF and Army heavy equipment that takes the big hit in this round of cuts. I Found this on another forum. It makes good sense to me.


" ...Of course the Navy is going to have EMCAT - if they have to move heaven and earth to get it. It keeps them in the game. So whether it is F35 or F18, those carriers will have catapults. Don’t you get it?

And while I am on it, here is another thing some of you don’t get:

Jointery is over. Where is the jointery in the RAF pronouncements that RAF pilots only will fly F35? Where is Jointery in trying to kill off Harrier in order to kill off fixed-wing FAA? Where is the Jointery in announcing that F35 will operate from land bases most of the time?

And I don’t you see? The Navy has dealt itself a Get-out-of-Jail-Free-Card. It’s called F18. Buy F18 themselves i.e. from their own agreed budget and the tables are reversed - the RN gets its fixed-wing FAA back under its own control.

There is no way that the Navy is not going to try for that. And it’s got an awful lot going for it - F18 appears cheaper and promises to save a lot of money. Whether or not it is and will is irrelevant. It’s the cheap package presented in the NOW that counts with the decision makers. But the real clincher is Sovereign Control. Because no-Sovereign Control means huge amounts of - you’ve guessed it, money. Money to the outfit that’s got you by the short and whatsits.

It is the dream of every corporate to tie their customers into a close relationship which they control. For there lies untold wealth. I know, I’ve seen it happen a few times now. I’ve worked for the screwer, where obscene amounts of money were extracted from the locked-in customer who couldn’t do anything about it - if indeed they knew what was happening. And I’ve worked for the Screwee where the company was in the grip of a large corporate who charged enormous amounts of money for services - and do you know Management didn’t question it. They felt safe and protected and more importantly their jobs were safe and protected. And most of these, both screwer and screwed, were large American corporates.

So the RN’s get-out-of-jail card is completely financial and in these straitened times is therefore very powerful. All these arguments about the relative merits of one plane over another matter nothing. We only have a few weeks to go and then the unceasing wittering will stop.
And Amen to that brothers.


I agree with this post just about 100%. It is what I have been banging on about

Leave aside every argument about LM and the F35B, (although Israel are saying their F35's - which will be considerably less expensive than F35B- will be about $100 million each. Why should we believe that over other figures? Because Israel will actually get them more or less free under the US military aid programme, and they have no need to cook their figures for public consumption. Inside Intel / Who wants the Stealth fighter? - Haaretz Daily Newspaper | Israel News ) it still comes back to the very long running history of the RN and the RAF and control of the FAA.

The RAF, having already spent something like four times the amount of money the QE Class Carriers will cost on Typhoon -optimised for Air to Air combat and yet to be deployed operationally or do any harm to anyone except the British Tax payer- planned to kill off the joint Harrier force and saw F35B, among other things, as final victory for the RAF flying all British fast jets, with the added bonus that the RN would greatly ease their constant deployment problems by actually transporting their aircraft to the war zone.

STOVL was an RAF concept and came about because the RAF believed its airfields in Germany would not last long in the face of a Soviet attack. The RN adopted STOVL only because it did not get CVA, in the 1960's, and did not have a large Carrier that could operate CATOBAR aircraft.. When CVF -the now building QE Class Aircraft Carriers- was being designed all systems of operation were looked at. The RN's, realistic, view was that STOVL and CATOBAR both had pros and cons, Some people at MoD actually favoured CATOBAR, but the RAF, for its own reasons, was adamant for STOVL. Since, for the RN actually getting the Aircraft Carriers into Service was the main thing, at that time they sided with the RAF, since doing anything else risked the RAF coming out against the Aircraft Carriers, as they had with CVA, with disastrous results for the RN.

The CVF concept has gone through various stages. Put very simply: Large- smaller- large. At one stage they were looking at a very large ship with 'gold plated' systems including very large amounts of automation, very fancy radars, high quality self defence systems and very advanced propulsion and prop systems, etc. It all started looking very expensive. A smaller ship in the 30,000-40,000 tons area was looked at and a lot of work was done on it, but, in the end it became obvious that any money saved was not worth it in terms of the operational limitations on a smaller Aircraft Carrier. The design grew again in size, but lost most of the 'gold plated' options. The RN, because they lacked any real commitment to STOVL, ensured the design could, easily, be fitted for CATOBAR.

The world turns and you have an economic crisis, a change of Government and a new Defence review-round of Defence cuts. Whatever LM claims, the British Treasury does not like the look of the costs of the F35B programme at all. The Royal Navy, having recently breathed a huge sigh of relief having seen its longed for QE Class Aircraft Carriers actually start building, is not about to let the RAF F35B programme sink them.

As everyone and his dog, who follows the doings of the Royal Navy, knows the Queen Elizabeth Class Aircraft Carriers are the future of the RN, the RN has watched over them, worked hard and sacrificed for them for years now. To be a front rank, first class, Navy you have to be able to do Carrier Strike and serious CAS. The Royal Navy is not the USN, but it is the Royal Navy and British Admirals certainly do not see it sinking into some kind of European style coastal defence force, not on their Watch. So the RN has a plan, ready and waiting, buy Super Hornet F18: It will be on cost and on time, it is a battle proven design that the USN intends to operate for at least the next 25 years and it will be able to do anything the British Government wants it to do. It gives interoperability with the USN (and, in due course, CATOBAR might well allow RN Aircraft Carriers to have excellent AEW aircraft) and says the RN, actually a very high proportion of our FAA pilots just happen to be slated for training -on F18- with the USN, so we can save money with our own, independent of the RAF, training pipeline... So we can have our Fleet Air Arm back. ... That's the same FAA that, since WWII, has actually provided UK with extremely good value for money and has always actually been able to do the job it is designed for. The Royal Navy may not have the large PR Department of the RAF, but they go on, quietly and efficiently, doing the vital job they are paid for in the UK National interest.

And as for the RAF, don't be totally surprised if they end up with Typhoon and, perhaps, some Tornados, to compensate for no F35B any time soon, or, maybe, Typhoon and F35 but in very small numbers and over a very long time."

Well it was RAF that was making noises about all F35's being flown by RAF pilots, and F35's leaving the RN Carriers as soon as possible for land bases and it was the RAF that was happy enough to kill off the joint Harrier force. The RN has also never forgiven the RAF for 'moving' Australia while helping to kill off the CVA Carriers in the '60's.

The future might be F35, although I hope not F35 B for UK. Having said that F35, and certainly F35 B, could go the way of F22: Priced out of the market, especially if orders keep getting cut or even cancelled, as well may happen.

According to the Torygraph the decision is to scrap the F-35B order and buy the F-35C instead. In that context the USN training for the RN crews makes sense.

That does mean fitting Cat & Trap to the carriers, but the option is built in; it also allows for the option of buying Hawkeye AEW off the shelf, rather than a rotary AEW.

In the slightly longer term it opens the option of replacing the Tornado force with a smaller force of either F-35A or F-35C. with the radiply reducing commonality between the two models, and the flexibility of being able to cross train if and when required, then a future RAF F-35B would seem logical.

The Torygraph does seem to totally misunderstand the situation, however, as if they think the "cheaper" F-35C is somehow inferior - rather than superior in both range and payload.

Torygraph: Jump jets to fall victim to spending cuts

Jeez oldnotbold do you want salt and vinegar on those chips of yours?

Fly Navy ;)

The big question, that everybody at Warton must be asking, does BAe get to keep its big piece of the F35 action, if the UK is no longer funding the STOVL version development?

...if the sources at the employment agencies are correct, not after October matey, ................................unless you sit under a jesus bolt.

:uhoh::{:{

Is it not the case that the original decision to adopt the STOVL F-35B allowed some 'trades' in CVF performance? I understand that USN CVNs are capable of some pretty eyewatering (for a ship) speeds in order to recover damaged FW a/c by giving them suffcient wind over deck to recover if, for example, their flaps/slats etc. are inoperable.

Can CVF operate F18 safely with it's current powerplant? Is there a risk that yet another requirement change will drive extra cost (and delays) into the CVF programme?

A bit. Yes. Yes. No.

Brevity is the soul of wit - though I hear in some quarters that we are back to the Dave-B solution again.

In a post strewn with inaccuricies and cast aside shoulder chips its difficult to reply to it without writing yet another essay, so rather than bore all I'll stick with just the one, almost throwaway, line from from the chucklemeister, 'Oldnotbold'.

Wasn't the F15E, one of the most successful strike fighters in the US arsenal for many a year now, a development of an aircraft designed originally as purely an 'air superiority' fighter, without even the slightest consideration to dropping bombs?

No matter what you read on 'Rum Ration' the Typhoon in UK service was always designed to have an air-to-ground role, but the priority was to replace the Tornado F3 initially (thus an emphasis on the air-to-air) and replace the Jaguar GR3's at a later date (with those aircraft in the initial tranche, with so-called 'austre' A/G capability, being upgraded to full capability as the later tranches enter service).

This round of Defence cuts is going to fall on the RAF, Army Heavy equipment and Senior Officers. The RN, as everyone knows, is now very stretched indeed, while the Army is taking the main burden of the very long COIN war in Afghanistan.The Navy could very well lose more Type 42 Destroyers, which will leave the escort force even shorter, but there is very little fat left on the RN or the British Army.

ps
I do not read Rum ration, but do check out ARRSE...