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zaphd

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The IOC of the PCA/NGAD will come faster. The reason being that the RCO is involved in running the program, not the usual USAF procurement. They are modeling it after the LRSB. As for not having funding:

The total request was for ~$492 million FY19 (just passed). The projected FY20 is showing a $1.3B request and a projected $1.9B in FY21 and $3.2B in FY22.

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The B-21 is going to take 8 years from contract to IOC (if they can keep the schedule). There's no reason a PCA couldn't do the same.

For historical comparison, the ATF spent $3.2B through the production of the 4 prototypes in now year dollars (adjusted for inflation).

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The NGAD budget NOT strictly a development budget. Something(s) is being produced for $3.2B.

The F-22 was originally going to IOC in 1995, but was delayed for budgetary reasons (Cold War was over, Peace Dividend, etc). The F-35 took so long because it was so ambitious. They really made three different aircraft that shared parts and winked at Congress. Making sure all the parts worked together was part of the problem (others being bad management and stupidity in adding more requirements after the contract award, always bad that).

Assuming the PCA/NGAD sticks to the B-21 script, it'll come far, far faster.
PCA at the moment is a technology maturation and demonstration program, and thus not directly comparable with the B-21. The bomber is also much less ambitious and a lot of work and money had gone into it before contract award. When you include the R&D for the cancelled next generation bomber it was around a few billion according to the contract announcement press conference. So eight years from today is not a credible date for PCA IOC. The figure the Air Force has been floating is around 2030, and in aerospace the schedule often, if not always, moves to the right.
 

Air Force Brat

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Super Moderator
More like 6-8 years and production 10-12 with IOC 17-18 years. With the limited buy of F22 The Airforce has been looking into a gap filler due to the age of F15 that were supposed to be boneyard now.
Yet the USAF is not quite ready to put down any money.
Boeing's offer of the F15X is interesting from the financial side but not nessisarily going to be able to keep relivent it's fine for defence but with proliferation of airdefences not likely to be able to fight first day of war. They leverage the current open production line but not much else.

Lockheed Martin is basically pitching is a fighter that could more than gap fill, potentially leverage tech with F35, F22 and sweeten there deal with Japan and the USAF as the two investments drop the price from the 10 Billion US estimate to restart F22 and fill missions into the 2070s. It would cost more but has a longer potential service life and more potential front line service perhaps even roadmap F22 SLEP.

Yep, I'm gonna go with Terran's timeline here! the Raptor 2.0 has a lot to commend it with a proven airframe and proven performance in excess of its near peers,,, I'd would like dispense with OVT and go for more efficiency and thrust, the Raptor is more than capable without OVT, OVT just provides an awesome Pitch Rate!, but after watching the F-35's "tactical pitch" at RIAT, these birds are already at the top of their class....
 

anzha

Senior Member
Registered Member
PCA at the moment is a technology maturation and demonstration program

The funding profile would argue rather differently. It's following the same trajectory as the B-21 and has the same people (or at least office) in charge. If it walks like a duck and quacks like one...
 
The funding profile would argue rather differently. It's following the same trajectory as the B-21 and has the same people (or at least office) in charge. If it walks like a duck and quacks like one...
would you provide some links:

my #1 google search
(PCA+us+air+force)
hit is
U.S. Air Force Next-Generation Fighter Taking Shape
blah blah blah Aug 23, 2017
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anzha

Senior Member
Registered Member
NGAD Budget:

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LRSB Budget:
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The LRSB started with a baseline of $300M (+/-) annual through FY14. Then a jump to $900M FY15. When we had a jump to $1.2B and a contract award. Since then it has grown to $1.3B FY17, $2B FY18, $3B FY19 continuing until FY23 when it falls to $2.4B. FY24 is when the IOC is supposed to be done for the B-21. Supposed to be.

Now then.

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NGAD goes from $23M in FY17 to $294M FY18 to $500M FY19. FY20 is projected to be $1.3B. FY21, $1.9B. FY22, $3B. FY23, $2.9B.

That pattern ought to look really, really familiar. The NGAD just jumps up faster, probably because they are not planning on shifting gears like the LRSB had to. Based on the budget numbers, I'd guess a contract award in FY21, possible, but not likely to be in FY20.

Anyone can browse through the budget here:

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As a reference, the US Navy's Next Gen Fighter Budget just sorta dorks around at $5M:

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Now as for what the aircraft will be, I'll get to tomorrow. Getting a bit tired and its affecting my google-fu.
 
NGAD Budget:

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LRSB Budget:
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The LRSB started with a baseline of $300M (+/-) annual through FY14. Then a jump to $900M FY15. When we had a jump to $1.2B and a contract award. Since then it has grown to $1.3B FY17, $2B FY18, $3B FY19 continuing until FY23 when it falls to $2.4B. FY24 is when the IOC is supposed to be done for the B-21. Supposed to be.

Now then.

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NGAD goes from $23M in FY17 to $294M FY18 to $500M FY19. FY20 is projected to be $1.3B. FY21, $1.9B. FY22, $3B. FY23, $2.9B.

That pattern ought to look really, really familiar. The NGAD just jumps up faster, probably because they are not planning on shifting gears like the LRSB had to. Based on the budget numbers, I'd guess a contract award in FY21, possible, but not likely to be in FY20.

Anyone can browse through the budget here:

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As a reference, the US Navy's Next Gen Fighter Budget just sorta dorks around at $5M:

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Now as for what the aircraft will be, I'll get to tomorrow. Getting a bit tired and its affecting my google-fu.
this post is actually cool
 
Jun 25, 2018
Dec 23, 2017partly related:
USAF proposes MOAB-sized bomb carriage for B-52H wings

22 June, 2018
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while now (dated Aug 29, 2018) B-52 Readied For Intense Hypersonic Weapons Test And Deployment Role
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The B-52H’s ample wing and external load-carrying capability have contributed to the aircraft’s prominent role in hypersonic testing and, as a result, the bomber’s future is closely tied to the upcoming demonstration and deployment of the U.S. Air Force’s first-generation hypervelocity strike weapons.

With major upgrades underway and reengining planned to sustain the B-52H to 2050, the Air Force intends to retain the long-serving bomber as the mainstay of its long-range strike fleet alongside the new
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B-21s as they are delivered beginning in the late 2020s. In particular, the B-52 is set to play a major role in enhancing standoff capability because rocket-boosted and air-breathing hypersonic weapons will be large, making them a challenging store for internal carriage.

“On hypersonics, there are several activities going on, mostly in terms of different types of weapons demonstrations,” says
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Bombers Program Manager Scot Oathout. “The B-52 is in the middle of those as the technology and the two approaches to hypersonics mature.” The program is involved in much of that flight test and evaluation. It is a very fluid and dynamic world we are in now, he notes.

The Air Force says the B-52 “is scheduled to be the launch platform for several hypersonics weapons demos in the 2019-20 time frame,” and adds that in view of the urgency placed on these efforts, two of them are being accelerated for rapid prototyping under the Pentagon’s new Section 804 approach to acquisition policy. These are the
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AGM-183A Air-Launched Rapid Response Weapon (ARRW) and Hypersonic Conventional Strike Weapon (HCSW). “The expected success of one or more of these hypersonic programs would not change the mission of the B-52, but only enhance its long-range strike capability,” the service explains.

Nearer-term testing already is planned for DARPA’s Tactical Boost Glide (TBG) demonstrator, a rocket-powered Lockheed Martin hypervelocity glider that provides the basis for the AGM-183A. The TBG is scheduled for flight tests in 2019 while the follow-on rapid-response weapon is targeted at early operational capability in 2021. The solid rocket-powered HCSW meanwhile is slated to enter initial service in 2022.

The Air Force’s air-breathing hypersonic weapons are powered by scramjet engines, prototypes of which were launched by a B-52 during
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’s X-43 tests in the 2000s and by the follow-on Air Force/Boeing X-51A in 2010-13. Lockheed Martin’s Skunk Works and
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are working under contract with DARPA to develop the conceptually similar Hypersonic Air-breathing Weapon Concept (HAWC). Flight tests of the winning HAWC design on a B-52 are expected to begin before fiscal 2020.

Regardless of the mix of final configurations, “the B-52’s future is enhanced by that potential capability,” Oathout says. “It is a big truck and easy to modify to carry extremely large things long distances, so it fits well with that profile well into the 2040s and 2050s and whatever technology that brings us.”

To prepare for the larger weapons, Boeing and the Air Force are studying “enhanced carriage options and exploring different pylons,” Oathout says. With the B-52 having carried such external loads as the 10,150-lb. AGM-28 Hound Dog supersonic missile and special-mission heavyweights such as the D-21 stealth drone and X-15 hypersonic test aircraft, the design team now is studying configurations to increase capacity for multiple high-speed weapons. “We are looking at more than a single carriage type of pylon,” Oathout explains.

Moves in this direction were signaled in June when Air Force Materiel Command issued a request for information on a new external weapons pylon that will take the B-52’s current 10,000-lb. maximum external load (across two underwing pylons) to 40,000 lb. The new pylon is planned to succeed the current Improved Common Pylon, which has been in service since the 1960s. “When it was introduced, there wasn’t a requirement nor did anyone foresee a need to carry weapons heavier than 5,000 lb.,” adds the Air Force, which is targeting a development to fielding time of 36-72 months.
 

anzha

Senior Member
Registered Member
this post is actually cool

Thank you.

I am a bit pressed for time this morning, but let me do this first.

*IFF* the same schedule is followed, then we would see a CDR by FY23. Then we see public prototypes pdq, within a year or two. Probably two. Then the EMD will be short. MUCH shorter than the F-35 or F-22. 4 to 5 years tops. We have a fighter in IOC no later than 2030 and I better sooner. The reason i think sooner is because the USAF seems to know where its going with this with the budget trajectory. Otherwise, it would have a flatter budget for longer doing demos and whatnot. Likewise, the RCO is helping run the show just like it is for the B-21. They have almost a Black World approach to getting things done rather than the nominal USAF procurement process.

I'm not going to address what the NGAD/PCA might be right now. That's going to require some google-fu that will take more time. Instead, it's consider the timeline for a F-22C.

This would be a coproduce with the Japanese so we would need to have an agreement banged out with them. That will take at least a year (see all the agreements that have been worked on for the KF-X). Likewise, the Japanese will need to actually select the FrankenRaptor for its new fighter. That's probably another year or two more. The 22C will need time to do an EMD. Let's say 3 years, to be generous. Then we get a ramp up of production. Call it 20 the first year, then 20, 40, 60 and then 80 for two years and a ramp down, 40, 20, done. Let's go with the fastest possible schedule. The soonest this could start would be FY20. The Japanese selection and US negotiation finish FY22. The EMD is finished in FY25. Production starts and the first 22Cs are paid for in FY26, but get delivered in FY27. Production is finished in FY34. The Japanese want 70. The US would get the rest, 290. +/-, I'm rushing. The total production cost would be $61.2B over 14 years. This is the best case scenario and it beats out the NGAD by 4 years tops, possibly much less or even ties it depending on development issues, contract/negotiation issues and if the NGAD can go faster than the B-21.

A similar problem hits the F-15X. It will go faster, has less risk and will 'only' cost $26B for 400 fighters compared to the 22C's $61B for 360. The 15X will get ahead of the NGAD for sure, but it wouldn't be more than 6 years....and...wouldn't it simply be better to up the order of F-35s and order some more tankers in the mean time?
 
Thank you.
as I can see, you're new here LOL

money-related posts are generally ignored here (except if they showed what, ehm, enthusiasts had claimed) , so ... you're welcome

...wouldn't it simply be better to up the order of F-35s and order some more tankers in the mean time?
LOL a good question, if F-35s are such marvels, why not to get even more of them
 
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