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now I read Lawmaker pushes to keep low-cost interceptor in Army inventory
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There’s growing concern the U.S. Army’s munition stockpile is shrinking as it supports operations in the Middle East and Rep. Bill Shuster (R-Penn.) is pushing to prevent the service’s lower-cost interceptor -- the Patriot Guided Enhanced Missile -- from being phased out of the inventory.

Aside from the U.S. Army, GEM-T -- used to intercept tactical ballistic missiles -- is in the inventory of five countries where all, except one, are in the Middle East and is likely being used to intercept TBMs launch by the Houthi militia in Yemen.

The Saudi Arabian government most recently reported intercepting four TBMs fired by Houthi at the end of March, just another attack in a long string of attacks.

“Since Jan 1, 2015, Patriot has intercepted more than 100 Tactical Ballistic Missiles during combat operations; more than 90 of those 100+ intercepts were with the GEM-T,” a letter from Rep. Shuster, circulated to House colleagues last month, reads.

But while TBM attacks heat up in the Middle East signaling a greater need, the Army made a decision not to recertify the GEM-T missile several years ago and it now stands to be slowly phased out of the inventory.

The decision not to recertify the GEM-T seems to have been based strictly on the budget woes the Army faced in 2013 under the Budget Control Act, according to a senior Capitol Hill defense staffer.

In a perfect world, the Army would have funded both the recertification of the GEM-T missile and the production of its most state-of-the-art Patriot missile -- the Missile Segment Enhanced version. But with depleting funds, the Army had to prioritize Patriot MSE, the staffer said.

Indications from the Army is it wants to have GEM-T in the toolkit should funding become available, the staffer added.

The Army’s decision has now led to a couple of problems. The service is headed toward an inventory issue, for one. Ten years from now, as systems reach the recertification timeline, they will be taken out of the inventory and demilitarized instead. At the same time, MSE missiles are not being produced at a rate of one-for-one to replace GEM-Ts as they are taken out of service.

Therefore the inventory levels are going creep lower and lower to a point where there’s not enough in the Army’s stockpile to safely meet the threats GEM-T is designed to defeat, according to the staffer.

The Army will also have to turn more and more to deploying MSE missiles for jobs against threats the GEM-T was meant to take out, essentially using a missile roughly twice the cost of GEM-T for targets that don’t require that level of capability.

It’s estimated the cost to recertify the GEM-T missile is roughly 5 percent of the cost of a PAC-3 MSE that has a price tag of roughly $5 million. A new GEM-T would cost roughly 50 percent less.

Shuster is introducing his stand-alone bill to look at preserving the GEM-T missile at a time when the budget environment is set to change, possibly with increased defense funding. And the growing concern over munitions stockpile shortages could serve as an impetus to keep capable and low-cost interceptors around longer.

The bill “would avert a potential missile defense crisis within the Army and would have the potential to save American taxpayers millions of dollars,” Shuster said in a statement provided to Defense News.

The bill would not allow funds to demilitarize GEM-T interceptors until after the Army delivers an evaluation of its ability to meet its requirements and operational needs if GEM-Ts were taken out of the inventory.

The legislation instructs the Army chief of staff and secretary to evaluate whether the service can maintain an inventory of interceptors that retain GEM-T capability either through recertifying the interceptors with or without modification or upgrades or by developing, testing and fielding a new low-cost interceptor that can be placed in the service’s inventory before the retirement of GEM-Ts.

Letterkenny, the Army’s primary missile depot, is in Shuster’s district. The majority of Patriot interceptors come through Letterkenny.
 
Yesterday at 12:58 PM
44 minutes ago
and this is also interesting:
Air Force authorises extended life for F-16
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"... The upgrade to existing Falcons leverages technology from Lockheed’s F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, such as Northrop Grumman’s APG-83 Scalable Agile Beam Radar. The programme could also integrate additional capabilities down the road, including auto ground collision avoidance and a joint helmet-mounted cueing system. ..." etc.
now a little bit more inside
Lockheed says it can double F-16's service life, but will have to compete for opportunity
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The U.S. Air Force appears to be breathing new life into its fleet of F-16s, with plans for upgrades and structural work inching forward as the service contemplates whether to replace its F-15C/Ds with the newer, less expensive F-16.

F-16 manufacturer Lockheed Martin announced early Wednesday that the Air Force had authorized service life extension work, which could keep the fighter jets flying past 2048. The service life extension program (SLEP) will encompass lengthening the lifespan of up to 300 F-16C/D Block 40-52 aircraft from 8,000 to 12,000 flight hours.

That means that the Air Force has validated that, with modifications, it can almost double the life of the F-16, Randy Howard, Lockheed’s director of F-16 business development, told Defense News. However, the service still needs to make a final decision on when to start the SLEP process, how many planes to modify and whether to rely on organic or contractor-provided labor.

“What would be the next natural step is for the USAF to contract to have the work done that our data indicates needs to be done in order to certify and extend the life of the aircraft,” he told Defense News. “That’s what lies ahead.”

An Air Force spokeswoman said the service will compete the opportunity to SLEP the 300 F-16s, but could not confirm when it will issue a request for proposals to industry.

Several years ago, the Air Force put Lockheed under contract for the beginning stages of the SLEP. During that time the company cycled F-16s through a series of tests that simulated flight hours and put stress on the aircraft, and then figured out which areas of the plane would need structural modification in order to extend the life of the plane, Howard said.

“The structural elements of the aircraft that typically have life-limiting hours to them are wings and bulkheads, those kinds of areas because of the high Gs the airplane [experiences],” he said.

Lockheed believes it may be able to push the aircraft’s lifespan beyond 12,000 hours.

“In our testing, we took the units out beyond 27,000 hours,” Howard said. Manufacturers are usually able to certify the aircraft for about half the number of hours that aircraft fly during tests — meaning that there is still room to validate an even longer lifespan. “So there is still some ongoing effort to take our testing and certify the aircraft beyond what this announcement does.”

Aside from a potential SLEP, the Air Force is also considering several upgrades to the F-16’s avionics system. Earlier this year, the service chose Raytheon to modernize the aircraft’s mission computers with a new version with added memory and processing power.

Officials also view replacing the F-16’s current radar with an active electronically scanned array (AESA) as key for future operations, particularly if the aircraft replaces the F-15C/D, which was developed for the air superiority mission.

The Air Force’s 416th Flight Test Squadron is continuing developmental tests of one such system, Northrop Grumman’s APG-83 Scalable Agile Beam Radar, or SABR. The service has integrated SABR with F-16s for ground and flight tests, and will use that data to assess whether the radar will meet its operational needs, it said in a March news release.

Lockheed is performing similar F-16 upgrade work for Taiwan, Singapore and South Korea that puts SABR radars and new mission computers into those countries’ jets.
 
Today at 7:57 AM
Yesterday at 12:58 PM
now a little bit more inside
Lockheed says it can double F-16's service life, but will have to compete for opportunity
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and in The National Interest:
Lockheed Martin’s F-16C Fighting Falcon: Flying Until 2048 (Thanks to the F-35)?
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The venerable Lockheed Martin F-16C Fighting Falcon multirole fighter could be flying with the United States Air Force for decades to come. Indeed, the jet could be flying until 2048 before it finally retires.

The Lockheed Martin F-35A Joint Strike Fighter is slated to eventually replace the long-serving “Viper”—as the F-16 known by its pilots—but the new stealth fighter is not being built fast enough or in the quantities needed to recapitalize the Air Force’s vast fleet of Fighting Falcons in the near term. As such, the Air Force is funding a program to extend the F-16’s airframe life from 8000 hours to 12,000 hours to “augment” the F-35 as it struggles to maintain its force structure.

"This accomplishment is the result of more than seven years of test, development, design, analysis and partnership between the U.S. Air Force and Lockheed Martin," said Susan Ouzts,
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. "Combined with F-16 avionics modernization programs like the F-16V, SLEP [Service Life Extension Program] modifications demonstrate that the Fighting Falcon remains a highly capable and affordable 4th Generation option for the U.S. Air Force and international F-16 customers."

With the F-16 SLEP structural modifications installed, the Air Force could safely operate its fleet of F-16 Block 40 through 52 aircraft out to 2048 and beyond. “The Air Force and Lockheed Martin also reduced projected service life costs for the Block 40-52 fleet, paving the way for safe, cost-effective F-16 flight operations decades into the future,” reads a Lockheed Martin statement.

The Air Force hopes to extend the service lives of up to 300 F-16C/D Block 40-52 aircraft. Validating that the F-16 airframe is capable of being flown for 12,000 hours (with modifications) allows the service and Lockheed Martin to move the second part of the Viper’s SLEP program. The modified aircraft will need a Military Type Certificate (MTC)—which Lockheed will have to submit to the Air Force's Technical Airworthiness Authority in the coming months. “Part II seeks to validate further extending the F-16's operational life based on final service life analysis from extended durability testing,” a Lockheed statement reads.

The Air Force’s current F-16 life extension effort is a new iteration of an earlier effort to modernize and extend the life of the service’s Viper fleet. The original effort included a program to upgrade the avionics called the Combat Avionics Programmed Extension Suite (CAPES) and a tandem SLEP program. The CAPES program included a host of upgrades including the Northrop Grumman AN/APG-83 Active Electronically Scanned Array (AESA), the ALQ-213(V) electronic warfare suite and a new display among other improvements.

Though the CAPES/SLEP upgrades were cancelled due to the Congressionally mandated sequestration automatic budget cuts that were enacted in 2011, elements of the program have survived out of necessity. The Air Force is currently testing the AN/APG-83 at Edwards Air Force Base, Calif. However, while the service has expressed renewed interest in the radar, it is not clear that the Air Force will buy the APG-83 for its own F-16s in the immediate future. “The APG-83 will be a form, fit and function modification that will operate within existing space, power and cooling capabilities of the platform,”
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, commander of the 416th FLTS—which is testing the new radar.

Eventually, the Air Force will have to upgrade the F-16’s sensor package if the jet is to stay relevant against tomorrow’s threat environment.
 

Air Force Brat

Brigadier
Super Moderator
Today at 7:57 AM

and in The National Interest:
Lockheed Martin’s F-16C Fighting Falcon: Flying Until 2048 (Thanks to the F-35)?
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SLEP on the the F-15 is gonna be 30-40 million per bird, that's very expensive and half the cost of a new F-35,,, so that's no bargain, old airplanes are old airplanes, like a classic car??

Its definitely time to re-open the F-22 line and get the Air Force back on track!
 
found it: Jan 31, 2016
yes but it would be similar as if you sought large nickel-steel face-hardened 16"-thick plates now: you would get the charts from an archive quickly, go to Pennsylvania, but I guess you would hear "We don't produce nickel steel anymore ... and we don't have that big ingots for face-hardening ... and anyway we don't know the chunk will withheld the stress you specified, so why don't you ask elsewhere" LOL
in response to:
Lots of companies aren't around Bub, but where there is a will there is a way. The BHO administration has been very, very hard on most businesses, even though LockMart is doing OK, this administration has hammered all businesses with a business is the bad-guy mentality. Lots of folks are out of work, and even lazy Americans love to make airplane parts. LOL
in
F-22 Raptor Thread
 

Jeff Head

General
Registered Member
Great video of the use of the MOAB on the Afghan pAkistani border against terrorists who hide out in cave complexes there.


President Trump ordered the release, for the first time in actual combat, of the MOAB (Massive Ordinance Air Blast), or as it is better known as, "The Mother of All Bombs." This was against our ISIS and Taliban enemies on the Afghan Pakistan border. It is a 21,000 lb, guided bomb that is like 80 feet long. You will see it enter the picture and the blast literally effects the entire side of that mountain. These were created to use against Saddam Hussein's army in 2003...but we ended up not needing it as the army was defeated so handily...and then it was not deemed useful in the guerrilla war. I would have used a couple on Fallujah instead of sending the Marines in there. But that's just me.
 
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