F-32 selected for the JSF Program.

BlairWitch749

Banned
f1b0nacc1 said:
The Dreamliner is a commercial aircraft (and yes, I would agree with you that their problems there are serious impediments to sales, hence their choice to build in SC), and the tanker is more a political issue beyond Boeing's control. For most military deliveries, they aren't too bad, and at least they manage to deliver their aircraft without the blatant contract issues that Sukhoi (and virtually every Russian arms maker) presents. The Indians, quite apart from their issues with ships, have had endless problems with the Russians providing even basic maintenance support for the Su-30s that the Indians bought.

And lets not even get into quality control....
Click to expand...

The political problems with the tanker are Boeing's fault. The first contract was a complete political clusterfuck with bribes and conflicts of interest all around (the specs where purposefully skewed towards Boeing's aircraft); senator mccain calls hearings; the senate armed services committee throws out the first contract; the second contract is offered and is semi objective, Northrup-Airbus joint bid wins the contract, Boeing throws a shitfit and uses all their muscle on the hill to have the senate armed services committee throw out the second contract; the airforce then redesigns the specs so that only Boeing's aircraft can compete; Northrup-Airbus joint project drops out; Boeing wins the third contract, Senator McCain throws a shit fit and calls for more hearings... its like a tragic comedy; I assume McCain will get it thrown out again, and it will drag on long enough till he retires then Boeing will get the contract and actually execute

So things like that give me some pause in considering doing business with boeing:rolleyes:
 

f1b0nacc1

I'm Shocked, SHOCKED!

If you mean was Boeing's behavior appalling, of course it was...they are an aerospace contractor for pity's sake! There is probably some sort of obscure federal regulation somewhere that actually mandates crapweaseltude like this...grin....

Seriously though, do you really want to suggest that Boeing's problems are anything better or worse than every other aerospace contractor out there? I completely agree that Airbus should have won that contract outright and that Boeing used a pile of dirty tricks to even stay in the competition, but lets be honest, compared to Sukhoi, Boeing are choir boys. This is hardly anything new, the F-104 buy that the Euros were bribed into is the most egregious example that I can come up without thinking too hard. Complaining about Boeing's lack of buisness ethics as a part of the world of aerospace contractors is roughly akin to complaining about the honesty of politicians vis a vis one another.

And lets avoid talking about that worthless layabout McCain entirely....smile...
 

Hyperbolus

If a Country finds the F-35 too expensive, just wait.....about 2 weeks.
US Congress fails to raise the debt ceiling=default=dollar devaluation
suddenly the JSF is cost effective after all
 
TheMann

TheMann

Hyperbolus said:
If a Country finds the F-35 too expensive, just wait.....about 2 weeks.
US Congress fails to raise the debt ceiling=default=dollar devaluation
suddenly the JSF is cost effective after all
Click to expand...

True that. A $150M airplane will be a $50M airplane.
 

abc123

Banned
FlyingDutchman said:
abc123 said:
Take one guess what the prototype PAK FA cost.

I guarantee it was a lot more then 200 mln USD.

Even the preproduction F-35's don't cost 200 mln USD as far as I am aware.
The Netherlands are going to pay < 100 mln euro for their second test F-35A and that's also a preproduction aircraft. (source; letter from Dutch Secretary of Defence to Congress)
The 'normal' production aircraft are going to be a lot cheaper then that.




It's nonsense to compare a prototype with an aircraft which already has half a squadron of preproduction aircraft flying around and even the first aircraft handed over to the armed forces.



Ok, but will you do that with both Sukhoi and Lockheed Martin's claims?
Because there seem to be heaps of people around who'll question each and every piece of information released from Lockheed Martin, but who'll take everything said by Sukhoi as gospel.
Click to expand...

As I said, I have taken manufacturers numbers, both for F-35 and PAK FA.

About the price, Australia will pay about 200 mil USD for their first batch of 14 F-35.
Click to expand...
 

BlairWitch749

Banned
f1b0nacc1 said:
If you mean was Boeing's behavior appalling, of course it was...they are an aerospace contractor for pity's sake! There is probably some sort of obscure federal regulation somewhere that actually mandates crapweaseltude like this...grin....

Seriously though, do you really want to suggest that Boeing's problems are anything better or worse than every other aerospace contractor out there? I completely agree that Airbus should have won that contract outright and that Boeing used a pile of dirty tricks to even stay in the competition, but lets be honest, compared to Sukhoi, Boeing are choir boys. This is hardly anything new, the F-104 buy that the Euros were bribed into is the most egregious example that I can come up without thinking too hard. Complaining about Boeing's lack of buisness ethics as a part of the world of aerospace contractors is roughly akin to complaining about the honesty of politicians vis a vis one another.

And lets avoid talking about that worthless layabout McCain entirely....smile...
Click to expand...


That tanker contract, even by american military contracter standards is appalling 8 fucking years; 8 and they can't produce a semi objective contract; the whole washington state zomg we will lose jobs if the tanker is built by northrup on airbus bodies was complete bullshit because Boeing has a 8-11 year backlog of production contracts... plus with their huge labor disputes (not just the SC thing either) they are going to progressively get more delays (especially if you look at the supply chain problems they always seem to have)...we use Italian pistols in the army, German sub machine guns why should buying an airbus aircraft which will be heavily modified by american companies in the US be such a big deal (US commercial airlines own plenty of air busses and they have a decent service record)

I have mixed feelings about McCain, but he was right to cancel the first contract and to continue to attack the airforce's lack of objectivity about this whole situation
 

abc123

Banned
Well, IMO, 170 millions of USD per KC-767 is a pretty decent price and supporting of domestic manufacturers is a good thing.
;)
 

Riain

The Australian continually quotes $6 billion for Super Hornets, but that's for 30 years of spares, mid life updates and possibly even the conversion of 12 into Growlers. If you almost halve that you'd get get $3.2 billion for 14 F35s.

But the purchase of 14 aircraft, 3 years spares and other stuff won't cost $3.2 billion.
 

f1b0nacc1

These are tankers, not jobs programs...

Buying from Boeing to support domestic manufacturers is recipe for disaster. You end up with inferior aircraft (and I haven't seen a single convincing analysis yet that doesn't show the Airbus product to be a better one), your domestic manufacturers quickly catch on that the game is rigged and gouge you with low-ball bids combined with long delays, overruns, etc., and you corrupt the procurement process (which is a sewer already) even further. Oh, and if that isn't enough, you end up with years (8 years in this case) of delays while all of the players in what was SUPPOSED to be a (semi-)honest competition challenge the results over and over again till someone drops from exhaustion.

BW was right to express outrage here. We have KC-135s older than the parents of some of the pilots flying them dropping out of the sky (metal fatigue is a huge problem, for instance, though hardly the only one) while the lawyers joust in the halls of the Pentagon and the price only goes up. The only place I disagree with him is that this is anything unique to Boeing, or Airbus, or Sukhoi, or .....

By the way, do anyone really believe that the price will be $170 each for the tankers when all is said and done? The AVERAGE cost overrun on these programs is about 25% (though if you want to see some real graft, go look at navy shipbuilding, that is truly amazing), while some of them (*cough* F-35 *cough*) is over 200% depending upon how you want to calculate it. As long as this utterly unreasonable bias against foreign manufacturers continues to erode competition, the existing vendors have very little reason to clean up their acts, and the post-contract shenanigans will continue...

Sorry, wandered far, far off-topic here....short version, BW is largely correct in his outrage, though I differ slightly in intensity. As for 'buying American', foolish...buy the best, typically that will be American if we force the vendors to compete.
 

abc123

Banned
f1b0nacc1 said:
Buying from Boeing to support domestic manufacturers is recipe for disaster. You end up with inferior aircraft (and I haven't seen a single convincing analysis yet that doesn't show the Airbus product to be a better one), your domestic manufacturers quickly catch on that the game is rigged and gouge you with low-ball bids combined with long delays, overruns, etc., and you corrupt the procurement process (which is a sewer already) even further. Oh, and if that isn't enough, you end up with years (8 years in this case) of delays while all of the players in what was SUPPOSED to be a (semi-)honest competition challenge the results over and over again till someone drops from exhaustion.

BW was right to express outrage here. We have KC-135s older than the parents of some of the pilots flying them dropping out of the sky (metal fatigue is a huge problem, for instance, though hardly the only one) while the lawyers joust in the halls of the Pentagon and the price only goes up. The only place I disagree with him is that this is anything unique to Boeing, or Airbus, or Sukhoi, or .....

By the way, do anyone really believe that the price will be $170 each for the tankers when all is said and done? The AVERAGE cost overrun on these programs is about 25% (though if you want to see some real graft, go look at navy shipbuilding, that is truly amazing), while some of them (*cough* F-35 *cough*) is over 200% depending upon how you want to calculate it. As long as this utterly unreasonable bias against foreign manufacturers continues to erode competition, the existing vendors have very little reason to clean up their acts, and the post-contract shenanigans will continue...

Sorry, wandered far, far off-topic here....short version, BW is largely correct in his outrage, though I differ slightly in intensity. As for 'buying American', foolish...buy the best, typically that will be American if we force the vendors to compete.
Click to expand...

I don't see any problem with this contract if you force defence contractors to pay out of their own pockezt for any cost over-run and penalties for delay.
In any NORMAL buissnis that's the case.
Why not in defence business too?

After for example LM or Boeing pay's 20 billions USD because of overruns, NOBODY will repeat such shenningans...
 
paulo

paulo

LOL - I like too see it forced.... the poor soul that try is in the way of an accident - too many corruption :rolleyes:
 

abc123

Banned
Riain said:
The Australian continually quotes $6 billion for Super Hornets, but that's for 30 years of spares, mid life updates and possibly even the conversion of 12 into Growlers. If you almost halve that you'd get get $3.2 billion for 14 F35s.

But the purchase of 14 aircraft, 3 years spares and other stuff won't cost $3.2 billion.
Click to expand...

I remain unconvinced, but I certainly hope so, because if otherwise, ADF-people will be hungry next 10 years while they buy F-35.
;)
 

abc123

Banned
paulo said:
LOL - I like too see it forced.... the poor soul that try is in the way of an accident - too many corruption :rolleyes:
Click to expand...

I know.
But, until that is solved, all our discussions here are for nothing....
;)

I hope so that now people here see why I think that the price of F-35 will be 200 millions apiece, if not even higher...
 
paulo

paulo

In the case of Australia, they need an long range multi-role aircraft.

In production , only two exist - the F-15E and the Su-3x.
After that, enter politics, bribes....
Price and capability are way low in the decision....

For me, the best solution - right now - is do what India as done.
Buy Sukhoi and improve with advanced western tech - in India case, home made + Israel + France....

And negotiate full tech transfer and local production - also India as done that....
 

abc123

Banned
paulo said:
In the case of Australia, they need an long range multi-role aircraft.

In production , only two exist - the F-15E and the Su-3x.
After that, enter politics, bribes....
Price and capability are way low in the decision....

For me, the best solution - right now - is do what India as done.
Buy Sukhoi and improve with advanced western tech - in India case, home made + Israel + France....

And negotiate full tech transfer and local production - also India as done that....
Click to expand...

No, Russian products are not an option for Australia. If someone attack's Australia, Russia won't defend her. USA will ( or should be ).
So, only various USA products are a option. Maybe something from Europe, but I'm not convinced.
So, IMO, for Australia buying of Silent Eagle would be a good solution. Probably way cheaper than F-35, maybe less capable, but good enough for region.
 
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