Tornado Replacement
 

Reuters, Sun Dec 20, 2015 5:09pm GMT: Germany plans to develop new fighter jet to replace Tornado

BERLIN

Germany plans to develop a new fighter jet to replace Tornado jets in the long term and it aims to hold initial talks with European partners in 2016 about what features they want in the aircraft, according to a document seen by Reuters on Sunday.

A draft document from the Defence Ministry on 'military aviation strategy' said it was still unclear whether the new jet would be manned or unmanned. It said it was also possible that the jet would be designed for both options and then be flown with or without a pilot depending on the type of deployment.

As it would be a European project, it is likely that one or more European companies would be chosen to develop the jet. The Tornado jet, which Germany has been using since 1981 - although it now also has the newer Eurofighter jet - was also made in an international consortium called Panavia.

At the same time, Germany's armed forces are looking into whether it would be possible to extend usage of the Tornado jets into the mid-2030s, the paper said. The Tornado jets had been due to be phased out in the mid-2020s.

A spokesman for the Defence Ministry said the document had not yet been agreed with the other ministries so he could not comment on it.

The US are cracking on with an optionally manned long range bomber and I expect the UK might look into hanging onto the coat tails of that.

Surprised they are not taking the UK view, i.e. "Get rid of Tornado anyway and just hang a few bombs on a couple of Typhoons remaining"


:sad:

At currently quoted prices of $half a billion a pop, I reckon there's some doubt about that.

Sheesh, it's only the price of 2 x F-35Bs....

Under the current circumstances, is there anything particularly wrong with simply building more Tornadoes? We must have got them right by now... Can EJ200s be squeezed in?

I was going to say no chance, however, it seems weights are pretty close, the EJ is 2 and a bit feet longer, but a bit slimmer. Don't see how they could incorporate TR, but those dimensions do allow some fettling room for adaptors or airframe changes. The intake matching may be the biggest problem, along with all that extra power that would probably exceed the thrust mounting design limits.

So it would stick out the end a bit, the tin work round the intakes may have to change, and they'd have to put a bigger end stop on the throttle lever. Doesn't sound like a complete no-no...

Perhaps if they left the intake design alone that might take care of the too-much-thrust problem?!

In the good ol' days they'd just sling a different engine in just to see what happened. Pretty difficult with the current layouts. I guess one advantage of pylon engine pods (B58 Hustler) is that you could improvise pretty easily. Perhaps we should be designing aircraft to look like that. Also I guess with the Sukhoi designs the engines are nearly podded below the air frame.

I suggest they hand over the programme to the French and get them to build the whole thing.
the rafale turned out fine.


FISH.

Whatever is proposed is going to have to be a sufficient leap in capability to make not buying off the shelf the best option. Its also going to have be cheap enough that ut can be built in sufficient quantity that its worth having.

Mr Fish, Maybe the Germans have realised just how expensive and painful joint ventures are, and will go it alone to get what they really want.

'Optionally manned' could mean the cockpit will be just another underwing stores option in future.

The original EJ200 design specifically included a retrofit option for the Tornado.

The Germans last looked at fitting the EJ200 to some of their Tornados over 20 years ago. Where did all those years go?

Wasn't the EJ200 originally intended to fit into an RB199 space, ie as a potential replacement powerplant for RB199-equipped aircraft? My memory grows dim... (I ask only because I've half a memory that it was, not because I'm suggesting a Tornado retrofit...) EDIT - posted before seeing JTO's comment.

While the EJ200 was designed to fit in the RB199 hole, the ancillaries such as the gearbox aren't compatible (rotates different speed and direction) so it isn't too feasible to swap. ECS tappings are different too. I think studies were done for an ADV retrofit but the benefits were rather limited due to the high wing loading; there would only be a performance benefit where thrust was dominant.

EAP

As an attack aircraft, what would improve on Tornado's seemingly great attributes as a weapon delivery/recce platform?? Where is it lacking? range, payload, speed, loiter time, reliability, sensors, interoperability. Is it difficult to operate?

It's obviously not the stealthiest, although I'm sure the intake ram addition would be a interesting story to read one day.

You don't see enough Tornadoes round these parts anymore, just loads of Typhoon flying out of Warton, which is better than nothing i suppose.

more wing area


more thrust


more reliability :)

Tornado replacement
 

Why does it need more wing area ?. I can agree on more thrust and more reliability. However, when the GR4 programme was configured, additional thrust was not a requirement, which now does seem very short sighted taking the current operational stores requirements. Not that long ago, an engine upgrade programme was proposed to either give additional thrust or life cycle enhancements. The engine reliability is now surprisingly good, especially with the GAF who have the improved Fan. EJ200 was looked at for the F3, but all the funding went to Typhoon. if the GAF are now only starting to look at a replacement, it looks like they will keep operating Tornado well beyond the 2025 timeframe and beyond. How very sensible of them.

More wing area?

To fly higher, turn better and carry more further.

Tornado was designed to be operated at low level high speed - it did that well but that environment is just an option not the automatic go to tactic these days.

We are in with the French for a Taranis/nEUROn derivative

Award of £120M Anglo-French Defence Co-Operation Contract

In the meantime, further F-35s are likely to be the short term Tornado replacement

Oh, if we're going down this path just build some new Buccaneers... :ok:

Great plane, antiquated avionics, etc.

It's interesting that there's not really anyone shouting that the systems on Tornado need chucking out and replacing. If the systems are generally OK and don't need a whole lot of updating, why not re-use them, keep them in a Tornado-shaped arrangement, and clad them with a new build Tornado-ish air-frame?

I guess we could make the air-frame bigger, maybe sit the crew side by side in an escape capsule, give it bigger engines and lots of fuel for huge range. Just so long as we don't put the digits 111 into its name...

"...I expect the UK might look into hanging onto the coat tails of that."

We've never bought any bomber from the US after the B-29 - no B47, B52, B58, F111 (close shave), B1 or B2. Odlly they bought the Canberra from us.......

I guess they are too expensive, there are technology isssues (certainly on the B2) and the roles are different

My guess would be that any future government, especially the current one, is likely to inform us that they've just delivered a very generous SDSR and that they are buying F-35, which is supposed to keep dropping bombs for decades to come. They may also ask why, if the MoD wants a new bomber, are they paying for the new wonder jet and why is so much money being spent on expanding Typhoon capability?

I don't think they would see the logic for a new bomber. In any case, its traditional to wait until the old bombers are defunct and on the point of being scrapped (if not after they have been scrapped) before looking for something new.

F-15 Silent Eagle built as a risk-shared development partnered by Boeing and an EU consortium?

F-15G Schlamm-Henne - 'G' for 'Germany! (For those who remember 1974!)

I guess 'Schlammigen Adler' might not go down too well...:eek:

Heathrow Harry - no, we didn't but that doesn't mean we won't in the future. As we know, times are a-changing and development costs are astronomical. Anyway, I only said we might look into it...

The German musings, back in the day:

https://www.flightglobal.com/FlightP...20-%201610.PDF

I'm with CC, bring on the Buccaneer with new systems (but I might be biased) :ok:

JF90
 

It reminds me of 3 decades ago, in parallel with the then EAP program, the then MBB proposed the JF90 ,

cheers
http://i57.photobucket.com/albums/g2...psqtgcrmhz.jpg

Rafale would be a good complement to Typhoon.

The only modification the Luftwaffe made to their Tonka fleets was to re-fuel them. I think this is the German response to UAV development as they probably want to grow their own expertise in the field, rather like they did with Taurus and Iris-T.

A whole aircraft programme is ambitious though, but while the UK piles money into housebuilding, failing to provide apprenticeships for future UK brickies, the Luftwaffe will be churning aerospace engineers through university and TechnischeSchule to support this programme. And all funded by their 1.5% of GDP NATO contribution.

"Harry - no, we didn't but that doesn't mean we won't in the future. As we know, times are a-changing and development costs are astronomical. Anyway, I only said we might look into it..."

I'm sure the SO's in the RAF would love to buy a state-of-art US penetration bomber but you hit the nail on the head - development costs are through the roof and even the USAF can't afford the aircraft they spec.

The B2 cost $2 Bn per aircraft and costs $135k an hour to run

The UK Defence Budget is around £ 38 Bn a year ...........

Well, I rekon we have had a "US" Bomber with the AV-8B.;) F-35 is a similar multi-role airframe. Don't think we will ever get another strategic "bomber", this side of a World-order meltdown.:oh:

OAP

It cost $2 billion to build each aircraft, or that's the total programme cost divided by the number of aircraft built? Genuine question.

quick question regarding a German/European developed new aircraft.

given the fun and games that have occured with German pissing about in both the Typhoon and A400M programmes, would anyone have any interest whatsoever in getting involved?

I think you make a very important point. In terms of programme and cost risk, multi-nation JVs can be severely impacted by political change - as we have seen. I wonder if the Germans are courting partnerships from the Eastern side of Europe, rather than the usual suspects.

Perhaps, but the East Europeans might take exception to it being called 'Stuka II'... :}

"It cost $2 billion to build each aircraft, or that's the total programme cost
divided by the number of aircraft built? Genuine question."

Programe cost but that's what the taxpayer has to shell out so thats the critical number for National Budgets etc

Some other (VERY LARGE) numbers:-

In 1996 the Clinton administration,authorized the conversion of a 21st bomber, a prototype test model, to Block 30 fully operational status at a cost of nearly $500 million.

In 1995, Northrop made a proposal to the USAF to build 20 additional aircraft with a flyaway cost of $566 million each.



In 1996, the General Accounting Office (GAO) disclosed that the USAF's B-2 bombers "will be, by far, the most costly bombers to operate on a per aircraft basis", costing over three times as much as the B-1B (US$9.6 million annually) and over four times as much as the B-52H (US$6.8 million annually).

In September 1997, each hour of B-2 flight necessitated 119 hours of maintenance in turn. Comparable maintenance needs for the B-52 and the B-1B are 53 and 60 hours respectively for each hour of flight. Maintenance costs are about $3.4 million a month for each aircraft.

The total "military construction" cost related to the program was projected to be US$553.6 million in 1997 dollars. The cost to procure each B-2 was US$737 million in 1997 dollars, based only on a fleet cost of US$15.48 billion.

The procurement cost per aircraft as detailed in GAO reports, which include spare parts and software support, was $929 million per aircraft in 1997 dollars.

The total program cost projected through 2004 was US$44.75 billion in 1997 dollars. This includes development, procurement, facilities, construction, and spare parts.

The total program cost averaged US$2.13 billion per aircraft. The B-2 cost up to $135,000 per flight hour to operate in 2010, which is about twice that of the B-52 and B-1.

http://www.pogoarchives.org/labyrinth/08/03.xls

For anyone interested in Air Force's Total Ownership Cost, costs per flight per hour, up to 2013.

Shockingly expensive MV-22...

Peter we
 

A very interesting set of numbers........ But over the last year the RAF's most expensive types per flying hour are both gliders !

Honest question A and C, where can I get those sort of numbers from please?

OAP

Chuck Hagel's A-10 Legacy
Jan 2014.

I've not found a newer version or the original source of the XLS. Presumably, you could request it from here?

http://www.saffm.hq.af.mil/questions/index.asp

Figures are averages. Some Wings of the f-16 cost twice as much as others, with the KC-135 its 3x

http://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand...AND_TR1275.pdf