Nimrod Rplacement

[thomasburnside]

Scrapping the MRA4 was stupid thing to do it was ready to go. Tell u what its like it like me walking into subway asking them to make me a sandwich and then as soon as it done oh sorry dont want it anymore.

[Garry Russell]

Indeed stupid as it was as good as it already was. Anyone can demand ahead of a design and then say..."Ah yes but it can't do this". Well maybe but it could do a whole host of other things and so it sould have been issued to do what it could do, then continually developed

The rapid scrapping always smelled of trying to quickly get rid in case someone else came along afterwards and found out the truth.
.

Now, it could be argued that the Nimrod was a mistake from the beginning with the narrow fuse limiting development, but the fact is it was made to work and did so very well in the MR role and the R1 were also very effective. The AEW failed but that does not mean it couldn't have been made to work eventually and if not it takes nothing away from the versions that did work.

Once they had committed themselves to the MR4 it matters not if it had been better to start with another frame. The decision had been made, the product had been developed, the money spent and the job was largely done.

If it had been discovered that perhaps there might have been an advantage swapping frame types the inception stage, that would have just been put down to experience and life would move on.

To decide to just throw it all away, a decision made by people who not understand or know the whole story and never look out of their own box is scandalous.

[DaveB]

Not quite Tom.. more like you going into a Subway, asking for your sandwich, having to wait years for it to arrive and all the time.. the cost is going up. You have to decide when to say no mate While the MRA4 looked like being on the threshold of going into service (and it can be argued it was ready to go).. it was already years behind schedule and way over budget. Perhaps they finally pulled the plug on it too late.. I dunno.. I'm not qualified to answer that

ATB
DaveB

[Scorpius]

Nimrod crews are now flying the P8 in the US. we have been very involved in the testing too.

Nev

[thomasburnside]

it was already years behind schedule and way over budget. Perhaps they finally pulled the plug on it too late.. I dunno.. I'm not qualified to answer that

ATB
DaveB [/quote]

The F-35 is also way behind schedule and its cost is growing everyday its plagued with problems yet we are still getting it. I personally think putting catapults on the carriers and getting the Super Hornet would have been better. Or get the Hornet for the RAF and get the F-35 for the Navy.

[SkippyBing]

because the P-8 fails to meet one nebulous part of a specification that's no longer relevant.

I take it that you're referring to the fact the P-8 is not four-engined.

P-8's perfectly suitable for the UK.

I wasn't referring to anything in particular, more our general inability to buy anything off the shelf if it'd be twice as expensive to either create our own design or f*** around with someone else's to protect UK jobs to the point where it'd be cheaper to pay all the affected workers £1 Million and buy off the shelf.

Regarding the Nimrod MRA4, read the Haddon-Cave review into the crash of XV230 and the MAA Duty Holder structure, all available here: http://www.maa.mod.uk/. Then tell me you'd be happy to be the named individual responsible for the operation of an aircraft modified by the people who'd told you the original had been perfectly safe to fly because they lied when they did the safety case.

To summarise, BAE Systems said No 7 Tank Dry Bay wasn't a fire zone, which is odd because a fuel pipe with multiple couplings runs through it along with a pipe carrying high pressure high temperature bleed air. By any definition, including the one BAE was using to write the safety case, it was a fire zone, but, because the safety case ended up being a rush job, as they'd under-estimated the size of the task, it was missed, along with a number of other failings. Subsequently fuel leaked, high temperature air ignited it, 14 people died.
Because of this there was a big enquiry the result of which was the creation of the MAA and the duty holder structure for military aviation*. This means there are named individuals holding various levels of risk, low is held by people close to the coal face, i.e Station/Force commanders, medium and high are held at Group level, i.e 1, 2 and 22 Group, JHC and Navy Command, and Very High risks are held by the Chiefs of the Naval, General and Air staffs. Of course to decide what level a risk is at you have to have information you're confident in to accurately sentence it. Could you do this for the MRA4, probably although you may not trust the manufacturer to do it. But, can you imagine the s*** storm if an MRA4 crashed with any loss of life? Ultimately there was very little appetite from anyone to hold the risk, and under the Duty Holder structure if CNS, CGS or CAS don't want to hold the risk then the Secretary of State can so there was no political will there either.

*If you work in Civil Aviation it's like what you've had for decades.

[Vancouver]

They replaced the Shackleton?

[NigelC]

Yeah, I recognise the structure, for Duty Holder read Post Holder in the civvie world.

[Chris Trott]

The MRA.4 would have been a great asset, but as was stated, what doomed the program wasn't the costs incurred to that point, it was the revelation that a major design modification would have to be under taken because of the inquiry into the loss of XV230 that meant the already modified aircraft would have to essentially rebuilt again (after already being rebuilt once) and all the donor airframes would require much more extensive rework than originally planned. If you want to compare it to the F-35, it'd be like finding out that the engines are all bad and the (now cancelled) second engine would have to be used.

As for the P-8 and the time they're spending with Boeing, that isn't unusual. The plane is in what we call "LRIP" (Low Rate Initial Production) where Boeing still has a large share of the development and testing responsibility. They are still heavily involved in the testing and while the US Navy and RAF are training to use them, there is still a lot of final software/hardware integration required as several pieces of the equipment aren't fully done with testing. Once IOC is reached at the end of the year, there will be an authorization for full production and Boeing won't be holding onto the planes for quite as long. Also, yes the planes when first flown are empty shells. I believe part of their equipment is coming off of P-3's as they're being retired, so they're flown from Seattle to Wichita, KS, and Greenville, TX, for fitting of the mission equipment.

[thomasburnside]

I think what the RAF should do is do what they did with the R.1. We are getting second hand RC135s so I think we should just get some second hand P-3s.