Japan Military News, Reports, Data, etc.

SamuraiBlue said:

When this hits the commercial market it will kill C929 project before it leaves the hanger. With Boeing utilizing this technology along with CMC engines it will dramatically up heave energy efficiency which is the most critical in long haul passenger airliner business.

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gelgoog said:

Not really. Most of the CRAIC929 project's clients are basically captive clients. Either they depend on funding by the governments who are building the aircraft or they cannot buy aircraft from Western countries. Also AFAIK at least China has been working on ceramic materials for quite time now on things like ball bearings. The Japanese idea to glue the fuselage to the frame is a neat idea which might make all composite airplanes lighter than with the usual all composite structures. But it remains to be seen in practice what will happen. The Japanese aircraft industry had a huge lead in composites (i.e. J-2 fighter) and then it turned out the USA beat them to the commercial market with the Boeing 787 (for which Japan also manufactures components including the composite wings).

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Safety concerns delay delivery of V-22 Osprey aircraft to Japan
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TOKYO — Japan’s first Bell-Boeing V-22 Osprey tilt-rotor aircraft are ready for delivery, but a dispute over where they will be based is holding up the process.

Speaking to Defense News at the

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, retired Lt. Gen. George Trautman, a former U.S. Marine aviator and commander of all Marine Corps aviation who now works as an

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, said “four or five” of the tilt rotors are ready for delivery at Patuxent River in the United States.

However, the Japanese government, which reportedly hoped to bring the aircraft into Japan this month, has run into opposition by local governments and residents near the planned Osprey base, due to fears over what they claim is the aircraft’s poor safety record.

The Japan Ground Self-Defense Force plans to temporarily base its Ospreys at Camp Kisarazu near Tokyo while it constructs additional facilities at Saga Airport near the city of Nagasaki, which is expected to become the permanent base of Japan’s tilt rotors.

This plan ran into opposition with local residents living near Camp Kisarazu, even though the base is already the site of a maintenance depot for American Ospreys based in Japan, and specifically Okinawa.

Marine Corps commanders in Japan on Monday gave the green light to resume flight operations for MV-22 Ospreys, which had been suspended for six days after a crash on Dec. 13.

By: Andrew Tilghman
Other than the basing issue, Trautman said that the program is going well, adding that 13 or 17 aircraft are under contract with Japan and the aircraft are on Bell’s production line. The budget for the remaining four aircraft has been approved, and they are expected to be contracted sometime before the end of Japan’s current fiscal year, which ends in March 2019.

When asked if Japan was keen on acquiring more Ospreys, Trautman told Defense News there was “no formal dialogue” beyond the 17 aircraft for Japan.

Other than the basing issue, Trautman said that the program is going well, adding that 13 or 17 aircraft are under contract with Japan and the aircraft are on Bell’s production line. The budget for the remaining four aircraft has been approved, and they are expected to be contracted sometime before the end of Japan’s current fiscal year, which ends in March 2019.

When asked if Japan was keen on acquiring more Ospreys, Trautman told Defense News there was “no formal dialogue” beyond the 17 aircraft for Japan.

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Bell pitches Viper attack helo to replace Japan’s Cobra copters
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TOKYO —

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is promoting its AH-1Z Viper attack helicopter at the

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as its entrant for Japan’s attack helicopter replacement program.

The East Asian U.S. ally is seeking a new helicopter to replace the approximately 70 Bell AH-1S Cobra helos currently in use by the Japan Ground Self-Defense Force. The country had released a request for information in May seeking a new helicopter.

Speaking to Defense News at the show, retired Lt. Gen. George Trautman, a former U.S. Marine aviator and commander of all Marine Corps aviation who now works as an adviser for Bell, said the company responded to the RFI through the U.S. government with 50 AH-1Z helicopters.

John Woodbury, Bell’s director of global military business development in the Asia-Pacific region, added that the RFI called for an attack helicopter with “marinization and shipboard compatibility,” with Trautman asserting that the AH-1Z can “operate onboard ships far better than the competition.”

The representatives from Bell said there’s more to marinization than additional corrosion protection from saltwater. They said this also includes foldable rotor blades and other measures that reduce the stowage footprint onboard the limited space on ships, as well as a design that minimizes electromagnetic interference.

The requirement for the new attack helicopter to operate from ships suggests Japan plans to use them on Izumo-class helicopter destroyers or the smaller Hyuga-class of the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force, which are equipped with a long flight deck to operate multiple helicopters.

Japan will likely require at least a degree of technology transfer and local production for the new helicopters.

The requirement for the new attack helicopter to operate from ships suggests Japan plans to use them on Izumo-class helicopter destroyers or the smaller Hyuga-class of the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force, which are equipped with a long flight deck to operate multiple helicopters.

Japan will likely require at least a degree of technology transfer and local production for the new helicopters.

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SamuraiBlue said:

I doubt PRC and Russia alone can fulfill the order to break even so the project will be a bust.

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Gloire_bb said:

Finally, it is in no way obvious what even an updated b-787 will match an all-new cr929. Current composite tech behind cr929 is ahead of one behind b-787.

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siegecrossbow said:

CG images of the F-3. Can someone translate the captions?

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Japan is pushing ahead with research and development into advanced fighter jet technology, despite uncertainty over its acquisition strategy for a next-generation fighter and questions about the degree to which Japanese industry will be involved in the program.

These technologies include a new fighter engine, thrust vectoring control, stealth shaping for low observability as well as the weapons carriage and release mechanism for internal weapons bays, according to representatives from Japan’s Acquisition, Technical and Logistics Agency, or ATLA, who spoke at the

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, which ended Nov. 30.

Several of these technologies were fitted on the Mitsubishi X-2, a technology demonstrator built by the Japanese and used to test and validate several of these features.

Since then Japan has continued development work on the 15-ton thrust XF-9 afterburning turbofan. That turbofan displayed an improvement up to 70 percent during the time it took to spool up to full thrust from idle, when compared to the earlier XF-5 used by the X-2, said Lt. Gen. Hiroaki Uchimura, director general of aerial systems at ATLA.

Japan is also working on an advanced active electronically scanned array radar, as well as manufacturing techniques to reduce or eliminate the need for fasteners in aircraft structures. Neither feature found its way to the X-2, but work continues on both fronts, with the radar having been tested in the laboratory and slated for flight tests onboard a Mitsubishi F-2 fighter jet test bed.

The continuing R&D effort is reflected in the budget requests the Ministry of Defense made for next fiscal year, which begins in April 2019. This includes $194.6 million for research into fighter “mission system integration studies and manned-unmanned aircraft teaming technology,” and is on top of the $1.7 billion Japan has invested in fighter research since 2009. That first figure is also more than 10 times the amount spent on R&D for Japan’s Mitsubishi F-2 fighter, according to Uchimura.

Japan’s next-generation fighter will replace the F-2 around the mid-2030s, and both Uchimura and ATLA Commissioner Nobuaki Miyama, who spoke at different conference sessions at the aerospace exhibition, touched on five critical attributes for Japan’s next fighter program.

These include its ability to secure air superiority over potential adversaries; the ease of upgrading as new technologies emerge; the latitude to domestically perform upgrades and sustainment without requiring overseas approval; the level of involvement of local industries in performing those upgrades and sustainment; and the need for the fighter and program as a whole to have a “realistic and feasible” cost.

Japan is currently studying several different procurement strategies for its next-generation fighter, including a wholly domestically developed and manufactured design, an international collaboration, or what it calls a “spinoff” development of an existing design.

Japan and the United Kingdom have agreed to exchange information with each other for their respective fighter programs. Reuters previously reported that both Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman responded to Japan’s request for information on potential fighter offerings, with the former said to have an “F-22/F-35 hybrid” in mind.

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Jura said:

"To keep the Eagle flying past the 2020s would require a series of service life extension programmes including a center fuselage overhaul estimated at $40 million per unit, according to the service’s head of Air Combat Command." sounds like a lot
Amid budget uncertainty, USAF weighs F-15 retirement

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