Warbird Information Exchange

Do you mean that the Avenger II will be a tanker, or is there a KB-2 in the future?
Norm

You're one to be talking Sabredriver/HGUCSU/Wixlova! You are the king of spam and that's why you were banned from this forum.

Kettle meet black..........black meet kettle!

Man I almost put my last video link on the main page

Hope my measly number of postings doesn't disqualify my response.

I really don't understand why anyone makes any kind of a deal on where posts should be located. Yes, there are more appropriate places for certain posts, but whoop de doo. Get over it. It is a topic for discussion on an information forum. If you don't like the topic, don't read it - skip to the next one. It's not like it was a topic about cooking utensils.

My .$02

Tommy

Does anyone even care if the end user -- the USAF -- gets a capable tanker in a timely fashion?

This protest means my bros flying the 135 will still be flying the 135 in God-only-knows how many years.

Apparently this decision ensures exactly that. Except the timely part I guess. So who is to blame here- Boeing, EADS, the GAO or the USAF itself?

Certainly not! (Because I agree with you!)

Opinions are fine, I just found it odd that someone new was already trying to take over the place.

Another take:

http://blog.washingtonpost.com/capitol- ... llion.html

Quite honestly, I could not care less about blame.

I want to get a tanker in the air and in service.

I wish the rest of the world could see that is the actual objective.

All of the other squabbling about what's fair, how much of the airplane will be built where, who will gain and lose jobs -- that's all adding time into the replacement cycle for combat aircraft that are all ready serving WELL past their intended life span.

Meanwhile, the war goes on.

Yes, but in the end do you want a capable replacement for the KC-135 or another limited acquisition like the KC-10 where the resource is spread WAY too thin and is unable to really support its mission because it's having to split time between multiple missions and being kept from others because there aren't enough? Remember, the KC-10 was supposed to replace the KC-135. It didn't, and now you get what I spoke of - a resource that is over extended.

This is the issue that Boeing brought up in their protest. The USAF said it wouldn't give extra credit for an aircraft that exceeded the need and yet it did. The GAO now has told the USAF to account for doing this and either reevaluate the submissions or revise the proposal and allow submission of revised proposals.

As for the delay, yeah it sucks, but again - would you rather have the right plane for the mission or have another KC-10?

Three words:

Prince
Bernhard
Lockheed


Chicanery is so much more sophisticated these days....and the view on it somewhat affected by which side of the Atlantic you come from! 'twas ever thus....

I wholeheartidly agree with Randy. It appears that you dont want the best for your Air Force, you just want to buy Boeing.

Your loss

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I actually like the KC-10 much more than the KC-135 as an end-user of its product.

Well, I can't speak for anyone else, but I want the USAF to have the best tools for the job, and I want them to follow the rules they're supposed to in order to get them.

My very limited understanding of what happened is that they apparently didn't do that.

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Maybe so in the minds of the corporate 'slicks', their politician whores, and military procurement folks ready to retire
into cushy civilian jobs in the industry, but little things like Duhbya's Secretary of the Air Force appointee James G. Roche
who also happened to be a recent former VP of Northrop Grumman...conflict of interest bells start a'ringing here!

Not a very sophisticated image at all...

Aircraft _______cost_______fuel capacity_____Availability_________

KC-135.............N/A.............90tons................phase out
KC-767............$120M..........90tons................now
KC-30/45.........$160M..........110tons..............now, but need bigger runways/hangars
KC-777.............$230M.........148tons..............3yrs&needs bigger runways/hangars

The KC-767 is an upgrade in medium tanker replace requirement utlizing currently available infrastructure runways/hangars

KC-30/45 and KC-777 are heavies and beyond the KC-135 replacement requirement...infrastructure mods add to
an already overburdened defense budget.

Is my understanding and math even close to the issues involved here?

The idea, I thought was to replace the KC-135 as soon as possible with a bird for the least cost, but fitting into the
current support/mission needs structure as soon as possible???

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DBF

I won't disagree with you on that Randy and that's a lot of why they're so overworked. They are much more flexible than the KC-135, but also much more expensive to operate and harder to support at FOB's because it needs much larger facilities to support it than does the KC-135.

The USAF in their RFP for the KC-X tanker specified that a replacement for the KC-10 would be forthcoming in a KC-Y RFP to be issued in the future (timeline I heard was 3-5 years after the KC-X IOC). The KC-45A / KC-777 would be the perfect replacement competitors for the KC-10 and would be able to be procured in larger numbers than the KC-10, but less than the KC-135/KC-X. There are 2 tanker requirements in the USAF today - Theater Support & Strategic Support. The KC-135 and KC-X fill the Theater Support role in that they are more numerous and are capable of operating into smaller airports with less room and support structures. The KC-10 and KC-Y fill the Strategic Support role because of their larger offload capability and larger cargo capability can support deployments of fighters and bombers better by not only giving them fuel to help them reach their destination, but also carrying some of the supplies and personnel required to get those aircraft into the fight as soon as they land (something pioneered by the 366WG and their KC-135Rs in the mid-1990s, even with the drawbacks of the KC-135).

The point is - it doesn't help to get a weapon that is only marginally capable of filling the need. Yeah, it can cary a lot of cargo and fuel, but it can't get into all the same airports and its higher cost makes its acquisition in number to be less likely, again leading to another KC-10 - too few planes, too many jobs.