Possible non-fighter options to replace the CF-105 Arrow?

Let me figure the math. Yep. 4 across, rear row fires first.

Pinetree radars were there, financed and manned by Americans.

I have no idea how Canada was roped into the nuclear strike role, because the Starfighters were replacing Canadair Sabres in the day fighter role, and the Starfighter's replacement was the CF-18 which wasn't configured for the strike role. It wouldn't seem to me to be a major problem to push it all the way out the door, but I don't rule Canada. The big part of the Starfighter program was industry off-sets, like Canadair building the bird and Orenda building the engines. That's a little harder to push back.

Earlier in the thread it was mentioned that the method of payment for the initial 66 Voodoos was the RCAF agreeing to operate Pine Tree radars. If the Arrow is built then the RCAF doesn't need the Voodoos and as a result doesn't need to man Pine Tree radars to pay for them. If the RCAF isn't operating them does the US still do it or does it all pretty much fall over in favour of the DEW line?

If the Arrow is built then the Canadair Industry offsets aren't needed, Canadair is fully occupied building Arrows. I imagine the Arrow would also replace the Sabre as a fighter, but what was the RCAF using as a fighter-bomber in the late 50s early 60s?
 
Earlier in the thread it was mentioned that the method of payment for the initial 66 Voodoos was the RCAF agreeing to operate Pine Tree radars. If the Arrow is built then the RCAF doesn't need the Voodoos and as a result doesn't need to man Pine Tree radars to pay for them. If the RCAF isn't operating them does the US still do it or does it all pretty much fall over in favour of the DEW line?

If the Arrow is built then the Canadair Industry offsets aren't needed, Canadair is fully occupied building Arrows. I imagine the Arrow would also replace the Sabre as a fighter, but what was the RCAF using as a fighter-bomber in the late 50s early 60s?

The Americans were operating, and would continue to operate Pinetree radars, and DEW line radars.

Canadair didn't build the Arrow. Avro Canada did. Canada doesn't need fighter-bombers unless they agree through commitment to NATO that they will operate them.
 

Archibald

Banned
Hughes MX1179 fire-control, and 8 Falcons, in the weapons bay, in two rows. No such installation was made to test prototypes.

i said it many times before, but if that fire control / missile had been adopted from the beginning of the program in 1955 the Arrow might have survived. The Arrow airframe and engines were perfectly on time and on budget. The Sparrow II cost, delays and glitches ballooned the overall program cost and led to the cancellation.
The Sparrow II was ditched in September 1958, but that was already too late.
 
The Arrow airframe and engines were perfectly on time and on budget.

Not exactly true. It has very rarely been true that advanced tech aircraft and engines could be built to an estimated budget. And it is certainly less true today. The engines were awaiting the installation of the latest parts when the axe dropped. The axe was cleverly dropped early, by establishing a 3 month period for review of the program, and cancelling before the 3 months was up. What I find odd is that the latest engines were scheduled to be tested in RL206. It seemed to be an act of desperation to break records before cancellation. It didn't work out. Anyway, the engines were not on time, and nothing was really on budget.

Orenda Engines were given a contract to build GE J-79 engines for the Starfighter in late summer 1959, and the first engine rolled out in December 1960, on budget. It would seem that a smaller, less ambitious Arrow might have fared better. Certainly, the Voodoo's performance was accepted as adequate, although politicians were slow to realize that they carried two 1.5 kt Genies in their belly. Talk about a pig in a poke. It was a period of diplomatic manipulation.
 
Hydraulic system

The Avro Arrow's hydraulic system was a long way from ready for production. It was one of the first 5,000 psi hydraulic systems tried - back when most aircraft only had 3,000 psi hydraulics.
An old RCAF technician told me: "The Arrow leaked like a sieve! We'd do functional tests in the hangar, but it would start leaking again as we towed it out onto the ramp."
It was decades before Boeing figured out how to install 5,000 psi hydraulics in airliners, and Boeing used a vastly different hydraulic system.
 
The Avro Arrow's hydraulic system was a long way from ready for production. It was one of the first 5,000 psi hydraulic systems tried - back when most aircraft only had 3,000 psi hydraulics.
An old RCAF technician told me: "The Arrow leaked like a sieve! We'd do functional tests in the hangar, but it would start leaking again as we towed it out onto the ramp."
It was decades before Boeing figured out how to install 5,000 psi hydraulics in airliners, and Boeing used a vastly different hydraulic system.

No wonder it leaked. It was supposed to be a 4,000 lb system. Why was an old RCAF technician working at the Avro factory with Avro technicians?
 
No wonder it leaked. It was supposed to be a 4,000 lb system. Why was an old RCAF technician working at the Avro factory with Avro technicians?

Military attached to the company for trials? That gets done these days (I've done it myself, working with BAE on trials of comms kit).
 
The Americans were operating, and would continue to operate Pinetree radars, and DEW line radars.

Canadair didn't build the Arrow. Avro Canada did. Canada doesn't need fighter-bombers unless they agree through commitment to NATO that they will operate them.

I've never really looked at Cando but they had a hell of a lot going on in the Cold War era. In 1959 it looks like the Government decided 1 aircraft manufacturer was enough by cancelling the Arrow from Avro and buying the CF104 from Canadair to equip 8 nuclear strike squadrons in Europe. The air defence task was undertaken by 66 Voodoos paid for by transferring a number of Pine Tree radars to RCAF operating and the purchase of 2 squadrons of BOMARCs. At the same time Canada was playing around with its Brigade Group in Germany.

By the late 60s Canada had changed tack, it had drawn down from 8 to 3 CF104 squadrons and re-roled them to conventional attack. They had also created a mobile force to reinforce Norway which had 2 squadron of CF5s and an army Brigade plus naval support.

The question or questions is/are how does the Arrow fit into all of that? It strikes me as somewhat difficult now I'm learning more about it.
 
The Arrow's real primary purpose would be to defend the US from Soviet bombers. Defense of Canadian cities would be a bonus.
The question or questions is/are how does the Arrow fit into all of that? It strikes me as somewhat difficult now I'm learning more about it.
 
The Arrow's real primary purpose would be to defend the US from Soviet bombers. Defense of Canadian cities would be a bonus.

The real purpose of the F4 was to defend USN carriers but the first export customer tasked it to drop bombs on Soviet Armoured Divisions. Similarly the primary purpose of the Lighting was to defend V Bomber bases but the only combat action it saw was in 1966 strafing and rocketing Yemeni rebels. The Arrow would have been ordered into production to do the job that IOTL was done by Voodoo and BOMARC but once in production its role would have expanded.
 
The question or questions is/are how does the Arrow fit into all of that? It strikes me as somewhat difficult now I'm learning more about it.

The Arrow was never more than it was, an intercepter to replace the CF-100. There's hundreds of opinion pieces available, for and against. Fact is, it was an expensive, capable aircraft not fit for a gummint that arranged to supply the Canadian Forces with CF-5. The defense minister liked Northrop, and didn't like the RCAF. They deleted the windshield de-icers on the CF-5 to make it come on budget for the quantity required, and then a bunch went into storage. The CF-5s were a mobile strike force unable to deploy more than 4 at a time, due to logistics reestrictions, and only to Norway, not the big show. It'll give you a headache.
 
The Arrow's real primary purpose would be to defend the US from Soviet bombers. Defense of Canadian cities would be a bonus.
As well as to keep the USAF out of Canada. Had we neglected air defence in those days, the US would have been obliged to base fighters in Canada. They could use the Delta Daggers at Ernest Harmon Air Force Base in Newfoundland as a precedent https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernest_Harmon_Air_Force_Base

http://www.dykhuis.ca/projects/cold-war/delta-dagger/delta-dagger.php
 
The defense minister liked Northrop, and didn't like the RCAF. They deleted the windshield de-icers on the CF-5 to make it come on budget for the quantity required, and then a bunch went into storage. The CF-5s were a mobile strike force unable to deploy more than 4 at a time, due to logistics reestrictions, and only to Norway, not the big show. It'll give you a headache.
From what I've read, the CF-5 was one of the favourite rides of the CAF fighter pilots. Looks like fun to me https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fTpUDS9x4hU

Didn't they eventually go to Turkey? How'd they do there?
 
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Does 'fun to fly' equate well to 'destroy the attacking enemy'? If some pilot has fun flying the most lethal machine in the sky that's well and good but I'm not paying tax so can have a good time. I could have a good time with that money!
 
From what I've read, the CF-5 was one of the favourite rides of the CAF fighter pilots. Looks like fun to me https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fTpUDS9x4hU

Didn't they eventually go to Turkey? How'd they do there?

In addition to the original sales to Venezuela and the Netherlands a few of the upgraded* CF5's were sold to Botswana after the CF retired them.

I believe some of the aircraft from the Netherlands made their way to Greece and Turkey.


*The CF upgraded a portion of their CF5 fleet with the intention of using them as a fighter lead in trainer for the CF18. The post cold war cut backs put an end to the CF operating the the CF5. The upgraded CF5 were considered somewhat combat capable.
 
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Does 'fun to fly' equate well to 'destroy the attacking enemy'? If some pilot has fun flying the most lethal machine in the sky that's well and good but I'm not paying tax so can have a good time. I could have a good time with that money!
Certainly the predictable response. :p

For attacking the enemy, within the limitations of its shorter range, there's no combat mission the CF-18s have done OTL that the CF-5 could not have. Bombing Serbs, Iraqis, Libyans and ISIL under the umbrella of total US/NATO air superiority is certainly with capability of the CF-5.

cf5_and_cf18.jpg
 
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Does 'fun to fly' equate well to 'destroy the attacking enemy'? If some pilot has fun flying the most lethal machine in the sky that's well and good but I'm not paying tax so can have a good time. I could have a good time with that money!

The other aspect of this is that air craft have a finite life, if by flying the CF5 for certain tasks (ie. fighter lead in training), the CF18's were preserved then the tax payers may have gotten a good deal.

It's worth noting that the reconnaissance version of the CF5 was actually flown operationally during the Oka crisis in the early 1990's. As far as I know the CF18's don't have this capability.

As a Canadian Tax payer the disposal of the CF5's shortly after a portion of them were upgraded at considerable expense irked me a bit. Now as the CF18's are approaching end of life and a replacement aircraft hasn't' been chosen I'm more irked. I have a sneaking suspicion that a portion of the CF18 fleet may eventually be life extended at considerable expense. I hope I'm wrong.

I would have been curious to see the business case for eliminating the upgraded CF5's and putting more hours on the CF18 fleet.
 
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