Thread: Say bye to F-22

Originally Posted by zraver

You need 300+ if your going to meet global commitments, training cycles and rest for the squadrons for refitting and recuperation after missions. 187 might seem like a lot until your talking about long duration concurrent deployments on different sides of the globe.

Not to mention birds down for maintenance/upgrade cycles...

Originally Posted by zraver

You need 300+ if your going to meet global commitments, training cycles and rest for the squadrons for refitting and recuperation after missions. 187 might seem like a lot until your talking about long duration concurrent deployments on different sides of the globe.

Change how you deploy them then. Use them as 'fire brigades'. Countries dont go to war overnight, have your legacy a/c as well as the JSF forward located, keep the majority of your F22s stateside with a couple of squadrons on expeditionary alert and if required fly out a squadron or 3 to wherever required. If a major war starts faster than you can get a couple of squadrons of a/c in theater then im guessing a lot of termination notices need to be posted out at the CIA because someone has been watching too much internet porn rather than doing their job.

Originally Posted by chakos

Change how you deploy them then. Use them as 'fire brigades'. Countries dont go to war overnight, have your legacy a/c as well as the JSF forward located, keep the majority of your F22s stateside with a couple of squadrons on expeditionary alert and if required fly out a squadron or 3 to wherever required. If a major war starts faster than you can get a couple of squadrons of a/c in theater then im guessing a lot of termination notices need to be posted out at the CIA because someone has been watching too much internet porn rather than doing their job.

That's actually pretty close to how the USAF works. Most of the AF is separated into 10 Air Expeditionary Forces. AEFs operate in pairs. Two are supporting contingency operations (ie, OIF/OEF), two are spinning up to take over, two just got back and are reconstituting, and two are doing normal training and a blend of the reconstitution/spin-up phases. I think the plan is to have 10 understrength squadrons (about 60% strength, numbers-wise) so there are 2 squadrons available for deployment at any given time. A typical squadron will have about 24 jets. An F-22 squadron would have about 16, if we end up with 10 squadrons and the 43FS (training squadron) holds on to 23 jets (I think that's what they had when I was at that base). So a total of 32 F-22s ready to go...except the ones that are undergoing maintainance, also not counting any losses (I did not count the recent crash). 187 tails goes FAST.

The AEF cycle gives a level of predictability to deployments, makes life easier on families, and evens out (what used to be) a horrendously random training cycle. You could still deploy at any moment, but its a lot easier to see it coming early and prepare.

Originally Posted by chakos

I still dont see the fuss... A squadron or two of F22s is able to pretty much clean aside any air force currently flying short of maybe the Chinese and the Russians. And only then because of the limited amount of Amraams they can get aloft with. I just cant see an enemy that will require more than 187 F22s appear in the next 50 years.

Time is a enemy that will require more than 187 F-22s in the next 20-30 years.

Originally Posted by Dreadnought

*Wait until they unveil the newest carrier launched UAV that has three times as much punch as those flying over Pakistan. Not only have you removed the pilot, increased speed and made it stealth but now imagine how many can be carrier based upon one single carrier. Or even better one single hangar onboard. A proverbial hornets nest.

UCAV have two main problems: The autonomous ones have no situational awareness and the the ones with a human in the loop can be Jammed or hacked. I would rather not some chinese hacker be in control of our planes and if the UCAVs get situational awareness I'll be training just skynet shows up. A human has neither problem.

Originally Posted by BenRoethig

UCAV have two main problems: The autonomous ones have no situational awareness and the the ones with a human in the loop can be Jammed or hacked. I would rather not some chinese hacker be in control of our planes and if the UCAVs get situational awareness I'll be training just skynet shows up. A human has neither problem.

Ben, They are new and will need to have many bugs worked out but they bring alot to the table in terms of logistics,cost, crew safety/loss and firepower. A relatively newer design. Hopefully they will get all the bugs out of them early on. I would never take away from the human as far as pilot and rio however cost, survivability and many other factors weigh greatly against removing the human pilot, his rio and the cost of the aircraft and its maintenence and ofcoarse expanding a carriers air wing in greater numbers. All factor that will weigh greatly upon its future funding.

Originally Posted by Dreadnought

*What they rolled out was a one of a kind hybrid whose tiltrotor technology will change the way Marines are delivered into the LZ be it hot or not.
The marines of the "ThunderChickens" tend to like the aircraft quite well and having it based in Iraq in such terrain only adds to the knowledge they will need for future weapons, aircraft,tanks,humvees etc. There is no substitute for testing under real conditions as opposed to labratories, speculation and theory. To date the Osprey has done quite well since entering the theatre and from what interviews show their marine pilots are quite proud of their new toy and its capabilities. They are already armed with miniguns and piece armor. Upgrades have not yet even begun for armamment, armor or other.

Yes, the crews have done a lot with what they were given. My point is that what they were given is a lot less than was promised. The Osprey is smaller inside, with less carrying capacity than intended. They could never get it to autorotate, so that requirement was dropped to keep the program going. As to armament, it was supposed to carry the GAU-19 integrally, but instead had to be shipped unarmed. Its handling characteristics are not as good as had been intended, and when first deployed it was placed under flying restrictions (I don't know if they have been lifted).

Don't misunderstand: I like the concept, and the execution wouldn't be bad for a test model. But forcing technology the way they did to create a production model resulted in an aircraft that was less capable than it should be, at a very inflated cost.

Originally Posted by GraniteForge

Yes, the crews have done a lot with what they were given. My point is that what they were given is a lot less than was promised. The Osprey is smaller inside, with less carrying capacity than intended. They could never get it to autorotate, so that requirement was dropped to keep the program going. As to armament, it was supposed to carry the GAU-19 integrally, but instead had to be shipped unarmed. Its handling characteristics are not as good as had been intended, and when first deployed it was placed under flying restrictions (I don't know if they have been lifted).

Don't misunderstand: I like the concept, and the execution wouldn't be bad for a test model. But forcing technology the way they did to create a production model resulted in an aircraft that was less capable than it should be, at a very inflated cost.

*I do know that the autogyro funtion was dropped as mating and controlability appeared diffacult. They are however armed with miniguns internally and they are looking at other armament and armor. As far as testing I have seen testing where they pull barrel rolls with her at speed.

So long as she performs well in Iraq I think you will see several different versions of her appear as time roll forward. So far nothing bad has come from her operating at normal in Iraq.

A briefing release months ago.

The Marine Corps recently touted the success of the V-22 Osprey tilt-rotor aircraft that just returned from its first combat deployment to Iraq. A squadron of Ospreys successfully flew more than 2,500 missions during six months in support of Marines based in western Iraq’s Anbar province.

The Marines initially feared that the Ospreys in Iraq would be tucked away and not used because of the aircraft’s high profile, said Lt. Col. Paul Rock, who commanded the Osprey squadron in Iraq. But it turned out they were used in a wide range of missions across western Iraq, including raids, air assault missions, medevac operations and as scout aircraft.

Lt. Gen. George Trautman, the Marines’ deputy commandant for aviation, was effusive in his praise of the aircraft’s performance in a meeting with reporters, saying it exceeded all expectations for reliability and performance. The Osprey required nine and a half hours of maintenance per flight hour, versus 24 hours for the CH-46, according to statistics provided by the Marines.

The flying conditions in Iraq’s desert were surprisingly less harsh than those encountered during operational testing in the deserts of Arizona, Rock said. The squadron did not have to replace rotor blades or other parts as often as they had expected, although the region’s fine dust and intense heat meant the aircraft’s engines had to be replaced frequently. The Ospreys that have returned from Iraq are being stripped down and thoroughly examined for wear and tear on all parts of the aircraft, he said.

There were concerns about the Osprey’s vulnerability to groundfire in Iraq, since insurgents there have shot down a number of U.S. helicopters. But no Osprey was damaged by groundfire. Rock said that since the Osprey flies much faster than the CH-46 and has maneuverability similar to a fixed-wing aircraft, its vulnerability to groundfire can’t really be compared to that of conventional helicopters.

Another Osprey squadron of 12 aircraft is currently flying in Iraq. Trautman said there are no plans to deploy the Osprey to Afghanistan, where 3,500 Marines are currently fighting in the southern parts of the country. But he said he is convinced the aircraft would perform better there than the CH-46 helicopters the Marines are using.

The Marines have taken delivery of 50 Ospreys and plan to buy them at a rate of 30 aircraft per year. The Air Force wants 50 Ospreys for its special operations troops, and the Navy wants 48 for search-and-rescue operations. Gen. Trautman said the Air Force Special Operations Command is “leaning forward” in plans to use a modified version of the Osprey, which may include the addition of a belly-mounted turret to give the aircraft a better field of fire.

Asked about the lack of a turret-mounted weapon on the Marine variant, Col. Rock quipped: “Never ask a Marine if he wants more guns on his airplane. More guns is good.”)

The Golden Eagles of Marine Medium Tiltrotor Squadron 162 are busy preparing to relieve the VMM-263 Thunderchickens according to the squadron sergeant major. Though the squadron was activated on June 30, 1951 as Marine Helicopter Transport Squadron, VMM-162 became the second Osprey squadron in August

187 F-22s is more than sufficient to meet all possible future threats.

Russia & China have not even fielded any 5th generation fighters yet, their planes are still on the drawing boards. By the time the Russian & Chinese air forces become a viable threat to the USAF (15+ years from now) they could re-open the F-22 production line and produce another batch but I doubt it will even come to that as they will have many F-35s flying then.

Nebula82.

Originally Posted by nebula82

187 F-22s is more than sufficient to meet all possible future threats.

Russia & China have not even fielded any 5th generation fighters yet, their planes are still on the drawing boards. By the time the Russian & Chinese air forces become a viable threat to the USAF (15+ years from now) they could re-open the F-22 production line and produce another batch but I doubt it will even come to that as they will have many F-35s flying then.

Nebula82.

Once you close that production line, it's done. The tooling is gone, the people are gone, the facilities are gone, the supply chain is gone. Re-opening the line in 15+ years will be only marginally less expensive than designing and building a whole new airplane because they will have to rebuild the factories and the entire supply chain from the ground up.

Originally Posted by Johnny W

Japan, Australia, Israel and Saudi Arabia could all end up getting F22's. The push will be on, if for no other reason than to keep the production lines open.

My understanding is that the technology is too sensitive for it to ever fly in foreign hands, no matter how close the ally (not to say Saudi Arabia is a close ally of the US!).

Plus the UK & Australia are among 10-15 countries involved in the F-35 development so they will obviously be getting the F-35s.

Nebula82.

Tooling wise not so. You would be surprised how long the tooling gets held on to. They spent alot of money for master tool makers to produce them and if the line is closed they will be treated and stored. I think I can speak for a bunch of people here familiar with the concept as we (company I worked for) have found tooling going back to the 30's for Westinghouse turbines but it was in the mid 1980's. Tooling is priceless if kept properly. I'll bet somewhere Boeing stores an awful lot of tooling from the past. Knowledge is there but you have to find it. In other words go beyond looks.

Originally Posted by nebula82

My understanding is that the technology is too sensitive for it to ever fly in foreign hands, no matter how close the ally (not to say Saudi Arabia is a close ally of the US!).

Plus the UK & Australia are among 10-15 countries involved in the F-35 development so they will obviously be getting the F-35s.

Nebula82.

For now, thats probably true. But ever is a long time.

IMO, eventually they will be sold to allies, the only question is when.

johnny,

For now, thats probably true. But ever is a long time.

IMO, eventually they will be sold to allies, the only question is when.

not for the next 15-20 years, and even then US law will need to be changed.