Azimuth Posted April 27, 2015 Posted April 27, 2015 (edited) I know most of the Test Booms currently in Seattle working on the KC-46 program. I worked at the KC-135 FTU with a few of them, and suffice to say they are very hard to please (sts) about any changes. They all speak of great things with the AAR system on the KC-46, and I would take their recommendations without a second thought. People said the same thing to McDonald Douglas when they built the C-17. Put a fly-by-wire and a stick in a heavy? That's stupid said all the -141 drivers that were transitioning. Now the Golden Child of AMC is the C-17. Let it prove itself (or not) before passing judgment, the first aircraft doesn't even have a boom on it yet. Edited April 27, 2015 by Azimuth
Fuzz Posted April 27, 2015 Posted April 27, 2015 I know most of the Test Booms currently in Seattle working on the KC-46 program. I worked at the KC-135 FTU with a few of them, and suffice to say they are very hard to please (sts) about any changes. They all speak of great things with the AAR system on the KC-46, and I would take their recommendations without a second thought. People said the same thing to McDonald Douglas when they built the C-17. Put a fly-by-wire and a stick in a heavy? That's stupid said all the -141 drivers that were transitioning. Now the Golden Child of AMC is the C-17. Let it prove itself (or not) before passing judgment, the first aircraft doesn't even have a boom on it yet. That's good to hear I think the F-35 cluster is making us paranoid of break through technology.
Lord Ratner Posted April 27, 2015 Posted April 27, 2015 They all speak of great things with the AAR system on the KC-46, and I would take their recommendations without a second thought. That's interesting. The Italian and Japanese booms I spoke with and the I KC-767 universally disliked the digital boom pod.
Prozac Posted April 27, 2015 Posted April 27, 2015 The story I've heard is that the rear pressure bulkhead on the 767 would have to be redesigned/moved in order to accommodate a conventional boom pod. This is supposedly more cost prohibitive than designing and producing the virtual boom station. Actually seems reasonable to me.
Lord Ratner Posted April 27, 2015 Posted April 27, 2015 The story I've heard is that the rear pressure bulkhead on the 767 would have to be redesigned/moved in order to accommodate a conventional boom pod. This is supposedly more cost prohibitive than designing and producing the virtual boom station. Actually seems reasonable to me. I call shenanigans. They are creating an entirely new aircraft from different 767 variants, but the bulkhead would have been too much? I'll bet if you factor in maintenance costs for the vastly more complicated new system, like every single other new system on the -46, it'll end up costing much much more. But who cares? It's what we have now. And since we can't afford enough of them, we'll have real boom pods for decades to come
MC5Wes Posted April 27, 2015 Posted April 27, 2015 At the end of the last link posted. They have a Boeing Engineer commenting on the KC-46. And it's issues Ah, the KC-46. The airplane I ended my career at Boeing with. What a train-wreck that thing is. If you only knew the half of it, you would be shocked. Boeing will never make a single penny on that program. Not one. First thing is that the major airframe structure is actually based on the 767-400 freighter. What is that you ask? I know that's not an actual thing, yet, but it's in the engineering database... Oh, and did you know that the first major hick-up was that someone forgot to actually calculate the volume of the cargo deck to see if it could actually hold the required amount of fuel per contract? Yeah, it was too small. Solution? Take your already-engineered airplane and throw the majority of the drawings away and start over! Lower the cargo floor, revise the stanchion locations, push out the sidewalls, come up with thinner designs for the main deck, fittings, etc. Then we can just barely squeeze those tanks in there! Oh, you mean we have to actually have enough room for a man to bolt those tanks in place in the factory? Crap! And I suppose you are going to require us to have enough room for an airman in arctic gear to be able to unbolt them and remove all the tanks in under an hour? Good news! If we have floor panels that flip up on the main deck, we can then grab that airman by his ankles and lower him/her head first to the locking bolts. Oh, and we're going to save tons of money by reusing pre-engineered systems too! Wait, those "engineered" systems that have non-conforming hand-drawn sketches and are rife with errors? Oh, I guess we need to update those! Don't worry, we've been building the derivative that those systems exist on for decades! We'll make it up by reusing the installation plans the factory has successfully been using without error! Yeah, the plans that say "install per drawing" and references the already mentioned poor engineering and don't meet any Boeing process specification in existence. Guess we'll have to work our Manufacturing Engineers 7 days a week for 8 months straight! Don't worry, we'll lay them off when we're done with them! I can go on...and on...and on...super panels, panoramic fairings, promising work to Japan for cost-sharing, then undercutting them and stealing it back, fuel lines that don't conform to spec, center hose pressure bulkhead...oh wait, that actually worked out really well. Oh, want to know why there isn't a man laying in a pod looking out a window? Because there's no room once the lower 46/47 is stuffed with fuel in order to meet requirements. So, spit shine it with some high-tech razzle dazzle and talk of "better teaming on the flight deck" and call it good. 1
StoleIt Posted April 27, 2015 Posted April 27, 2015 So if the only reason not stuffing a guy back there is due to poor Boeing engineering/planning then why doesn't the A330 MRTT have a boom pod?
Prosuper Posted April 29, 2015 Posted April 29, 2015 Is it too late for new build KC-135's? It works! 1
Right Seat Driver Posted April 29, 2015 Posted April 29, 2015 Is it too late for new build KC-135's? It works! If only the Air Force bought them before Boeing shut down the 707 line in the early 90s...
Clark Griswold Posted July 21, 2015 Posted July 21, 2015 Problems but still on track for a September first flight of the KC-46 https://www.seattletimes.com/business/boeing-faces-8-month-delay-on-3b-tanker-contracts/ https://www.military.com/daily-news/2015/07/21/first-air-force-tanker-flight-on-track-despite-cost-overruns.html Sexy beast... 1
B52gator Posted July 22, 2015 Posted July 22, 2015 Problems but still on track for a September first flight of the KC-46 https://www.seattletimes.com/business/boeing-faces-8-month-delay-on-3b-tanker-contracts/ https://www.military.com/daily-news/2015/07/21/first-air-force-tanker-flight-on-track-despite-cost-overruns.html Sexy beast... A program that has delays and cost overruns? Surely you jest!
Azimuth Posted July 22, 2015 Posted July 22, 2015 Except it's a fixed pricing contract, so Boeing is eating up all the delays and budget overruns.
StoleIt Posted July 22, 2015 Posted July 22, 2015 Except it's a fixed pricing contract, so Boeing is eating up all the delays and budget overruns. I feel like this style contract needs to happen more often...
Ram Posted July 22, 2015 Posted July 22, 2015 Lockheed's lawyers are way too smart to agree to something like that.
Clark Griswold Posted July 22, 2015 Posted July 22, 2015 A program that has delays and cost overruns? Surely you jest! Shocking but true... however as Azimuth said this is on Boeing to eat (sts) Question if anyone has heard this discussed or can comment on an open forum about it: has it been discussed to buy more 46s as the 17s are retired? A friend who flies the 135 seems to think that is the going to be be the case as the 17s reach the end of their service life. Seems reasonable but wondered if this idea is circulating...
ThreeHoler Posted July 22, 2015 Posted July 22, 2015 Shocking but true... however as Azimuth said this is on Boeing to eat (sts) Question if anyone has heard this discussed or can comment on an open forum about it: has it been discussed to buy more 46s as the 17s are retired? A friend who flies the 135 seems to think that is the going to be be the case as the 17s reach the end of their service life. Seems reasonable but wondered if this idea is circulating... Why? The 46 is a shitty trash hauler.
Azimuth Posted July 22, 2015 Posted July 22, 2015 You will always need an airlifter that can haul more than six pallets, oversized Army equipment that can't be rotated via a side cargo door, and land in austere locations. The -46, or really any tanker, will never replace that requirement. 2
Truman08 Posted July 23, 2015 Posted July 23, 2015 Shocking but true... however as Azimuth said this is on Boeing to eat (sts) Question if anyone has heard this discussed or can comment on an open forum about it: has it been discussed to buy more 46s as the 17s are retired? A friend who flies the 135 seems to think that is the going to be be the case as the 17s reach the end of their service life. Seems reasonable but wondered if this idea is circulating...
Clark Griswold Posted July 23, 2015 Posted July 23, 2015 (edited) Why? The 46 is a shitty trash hauler. Don't doubt that it is not its strong suit but his idea was that we would accept having less dedicated airlift / air delivery capability to have more modern full time tanker part time cargo hauler capability, his opinion and was just an interesting idea I thought. Basically to save hours on the remaining C-17s and have the dedicated regular airlift movements from CONUS to established OCONUS locations flown by less expensive per flight hour aircraft, etc... saving the C-17s, etc... for operations that specifically need that capability You will always need an airlifter that can haul more than six pallets, oversized Army equipment that can't be rotated via a side cargo door, and land in austere locations. The -46, or really any tanker, will never replace that requirement. No doubt Minor edit. Edited July 23, 2015 by Clark Griswold
ThreeHoler Posted July 23, 2015 Posted July 23, 2015 Don't doubt that it is not its strong suit but his idea was that we would accept having less dedicated airlift / air delivery capability to have more modern full time tanker part time cargo hauler capability, his opinion and was just an interesting idea I thought. Basically to save hours on the remaining C-17s and have the dedicated regular airlift movements from CONUS to established OCONUS locations flown by less expensive per flight hour aircraft, etc... saving the C-17s, etc... for operations that specifically need that capability No doubt Minor edit. Six pallets at a time is even less efficient than the flight hour cost of a C-17.
Tonka Posted July 23, 2015 Posted July 23, 2015 Six pallets at a time is even less efficient than the flight hour cost of a C-17. At least we could move tops in blue around.
Clark Griswold Posted July 23, 2015 Posted July 23, 2015 Six pallets at a time is even less efficient than the flight hour cost of a C-17. True but his argument was the total overall cost of flying a few KC-46's inefficiently to move cargo occasionally vice keeping older C-17s flying was probably cheaper, as we were discussing this over a cold beer at the end of the day neither of us did any math or research on this. We got on this subject as I was talking about how few KC-46s the AF was planning to acquire (at least officially) compared to the current fleet size of the KC-135s & KC-10s - he believes that more will have to purchased but my cynical hunch is that as the F-35 goes into full rate production, there will be no money for more 46s, just thinking positively... not...
ThreeHoler Posted July 23, 2015 Posted July 23, 2015 Unless things have changed, the "plan" is for the current purchase of KC-46, an as yet unannounced KC-Y competition to replace the rest of the KC-135s, and the KC-Z program even farther in the future to replace the KC-10. Although RUMINT has it that as an operational KC-46 comes online a KC-10 will go to the boneyard. So, who knows?
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