Hello everyone.
So I was reading a bit about several US military procurement programs who ended up being competitions between two companies and their designs. In some cases the choice of one particular design was a political one (for example one company has more influence than the other, or the government wants to prevent one from getting a monopoly).
So just for fun, what if the results of every US procurement program were reversed? Would some of the losing designs in OTL actually be good, or even be better than their competitor?
There is only a single rule: you can't have a design that had very serious, almost FUBAR issues win. It needs to be plausible.
So here are some of the examples I know of:
- General Motors' XM-1 wins against Chrysler's competitor. The latter ended up being the famous Abrams MBT. Yet the former actually won Army trials and Chrysler only made it because SecDef Rumsfeld asked for new trials at the last minute, changing the requirements to favor Chrysler's design few advantages while the strenghts of GM's were devalorised.
The decision mostly had to do with the fact that Chrysler was nearing bankruptcy and was the main and in fact sole MBT manufacturer for much of the Cold War. In the end General Dynamics bought it in 1982.
The GM XM-1 featured a variable compression ratio diesel engine and a turret that would later evolve to be the Abrams' one (Chrysler asked for the design when its design was chosen) among other differences.
- .276 Pedersen cartridge against 30.06. In the 30s this intermediate cartridge design was proposed to be used in the future semi-auto rifle (a Pedersen design and what would become the M1 Garand in .276).
It was more practical to use in a self-loading rifle (the mechanisms were easier to make reliable, it was a bit ligher and had less recoil), but the Army Ordnance still prefered 30.06 because it was widely available, was common with .30 cal machineguns and was more suitable to the US doctrine that still emphasized long range accurate fire.
Interestingly enough, due to being easier to use in a Garand (which was developed with this in mind from the start), the .276 could have allowed the rifle to come into service earlier had it been adopted.
- Boeing's CX-HLS proposal against Lockheed's C-5 Galaxy. Lockheed's design was chosen as it was the lowest-cost bidder. However the aircraft ended up being plagued with serious wing craks. Plus the program suffered from significant cost overruns.
Boeing's proposal apparently evolved into the 747. There is no garantee that choosing it would have avoided the aforementioned issues, but it might have prevented Lockheed from being in a hard financial situation. Moreover, commonality with the 747 could have been interesting.
Have fun!
So I was reading a bit about several US military procurement programs who ended up being competitions between two companies and their designs. In some cases the choice of one particular design was a political one (for example one company has more influence than the other, or the government wants to prevent one from getting a monopoly).
So just for fun, what if the results of every US procurement program were reversed? Would some of the losing designs in OTL actually be good, or even be better than their competitor?
There is only a single rule: you can't have a design that had very serious, almost FUBAR issues win. It needs to be plausible.
So here are some of the examples I know of:
- General Motors' XM-1 wins against Chrysler's competitor. The latter ended up being the famous Abrams MBT. Yet the former actually won Army trials and Chrysler only made it because SecDef Rumsfeld asked for new trials at the last minute, changing the requirements to favor Chrysler's design few advantages while the strenghts of GM's were devalorised.
The decision mostly had to do with the fact that Chrysler was nearing bankruptcy and was the main and in fact sole MBT manufacturer for much of the Cold War. In the end General Dynamics bought it in 1982.
The GM XM-1 featured a variable compression ratio diesel engine and a turret that would later evolve to be the Abrams' one (Chrysler asked for the design when its design was chosen) among other differences.
- .276 Pedersen cartridge against 30.06. In the 30s this intermediate cartridge design was proposed to be used in the future semi-auto rifle (a Pedersen design and what would become the M1 Garand in .276).
It was more practical to use in a self-loading rifle (the mechanisms were easier to make reliable, it was a bit ligher and had less recoil), but the Army Ordnance still prefered 30.06 because it was widely available, was common with .30 cal machineguns and was more suitable to the US doctrine that still emphasized long range accurate fire.
Interestingly enough, due to being easier to use in a Garand (which was developed with this in mind from the start), the .276 could have allowed the rifle to come into service earlier had it been adopted.
- Boeing's CX-HLS proposal against Lockheed's C-5 Galaxy. Lockheed's design was chosen as it was the lowest-cost bidder. However the aircraft ended up being plagued with serious wing craks. Plus the program suffered from significant cost overruns.
Boeing's proposal apparently evolved into the 747. There is no garantee that choosing it would have avoided the aforementioned issues, but it might have prevented Lockheed from being in a hard financial situation. Moreover, commonality with the 747 could have been interesting.
Have fun!