A400M Will Be A Sitting Duck At Farnborough

katekebo · Thu Jul 05, 2012 1:39 pm

Quote:
Airbus is pulling Europe's A400M airlifter out of flying displays at next week's Farnborough Airshow due to continued engine problems, forcing it to sit out popular annual stunts for the second year running, industry sources said.

http://news.yahoo.com/engine-woes-ag...mo-sources-185411080--finance.html

pygmalion · Thu Jul 05, 2012 3:48 pm

They slid first delivery to March 2013 as well.

They had only made it half way through the endurance testing when they had to stop due to metal chips found in the Avio gear box. They are on hold until they find the cause.

This continues to be a very troubled program. Good luck to them. Sounds like they need it.

http://www.businessweek.com/news/201...re-as-a400m-delivery-slips-to-2013

kc135topboom · Thu Jul 05, 2012 9:09 pm

The troubled A-400M military aircraft program is only challanged with delay after delay, cost increase after cost increase, and reduction in capability by the equilly failed F-35 program.

cmb56 · Fri Jul 06, 2012 12:39 am

Lets see now.
During WWII the B-29 was designed, brought into production, and went into combat in less than 3 years. How many crews were lost because of unreliable engines, including Boeing's chief test pilot. Granted that was war and a different time. But the complexity of the R3350 in that day has to be similar to the engine and prop combination on the A400 today. Those early R3350s maybe lasted 50-100 hours. It was not considered unusual at all to change an engine. Not so today, these engines are expected to stay on wing for thousands of hours. How often does an engine on a C-130 get changed because the chip detector showed metal in the gear box? No body is watching those aircraft with this kind of attention. As I recall the JT-9 engines on the original 747s were a nightmare in development but ultimately ended up being very reliable engines.
The standards today are much higher and the bar is being raised every day. In the past you would have simply changed the engine and continued on, now it is considered a failure. Not so, product develpment at this level and these standards is incredibly challenging. If the auto industry had to meet these standard we would all be walking or riding bicyles. A simply family car would cost a million dollars.
I can't think of a single new aircraft that has launched in the last 15 years that came on line early and under budget. Everybody just better get used to it or lower your standards.

autothrust · Fri Jul 06, 2012 8:53 am

Quoting KC135TopBoom (Reply 2):
and reduction in capability by the equilly failed F-35 program.

On the A400M it remains to be seen.

Quoting cmb56 (Reply 3):
The standards today are much higher and the bar is being raised every day. In the past you would have simply changed the engine and continued on, now it is considered a failure. Not so, product develpment at this level and these standards is incredibly challenging. If the auto industry had to meet these standard we would all be walking or riding bicyles. A simply family car would cost a million dollars.

Very well said.

Some people still don't understand how much new technology on the A400 can be found and how complex it is.

sweair · Fri Jul 06, 2012 10:57 am

The biggest mistake was to develop the engine, the politicians went against Airbus on this and now Airbus is paying the price. This whole program smells of political stupidity, it will never get repaid.

kc135topboom · Fri Jul 06, 2012 12:32 pm

Quoting autothrust (Reply 4):
Quoting KC135TopBoom (Reply 2):and reduction in capability by the equilly failed F-35 program.
On the A400M it remains to be seen.

It will never have the low level TFR Germany wanted for terrain following missions. It's tanker air refueling capability has been puch back several years, and to get that capability it needs more developement money.

Quoting sweair (Reply 5):
The biggest mistake was to develop the engine, the politicians went against Airbus on this and now Airbus is paying the price. This whole program smells of political stupidity, it will never get repaid.

Correct. EADS originally wanted to put a Canadian built engine on the A-400M, but the French politicians wanted (demanded) the engine be buit in Europe. At the time, the consortium that built the engine didn't exsist, nor was there any engine built in Europe that could be improved to power the A-400. Europrop, the consortium put together to develope and build the engine originally proposed the TP400-D1 engine until it was proven to be to heavy and the SFC was higher than what EADS wanted. So, Europrop with on the develope the TP400-D6 engines (11,000 shp) we have today on the A-400.

Pratt & Whitney Canada originall proposed a 10,000 shp turboprop engine called the PW-180, which was a version of the PW-10X program. This engine has been further developed into what is now called the PW-800 series engines, which has been further developed into the PW-1000G family of GTF engines.

Revelation · Fri Jul 06, 2012 1:12 pm

Here are some more details about the issue and its impact:

Quote:

“We found metallic chips in one of the gearboxes and the origin is not yet identified,” said Maggie Bergsma, a spokeswoman for Airbus Military.

The discovery of shavings has interrupted testing, pushing back a multi-week production trial required for the European Aviation Safety Agency to certify the aircraft. Airbus, a unit of European Aeronautics, Defence & Space Co., aimed to deliver its first A400M to France this year.

Airbus already revised its delivery schedule to its lead customer to the end of March after initial setbacks. The latest gearbox problem arose on one of the four engines on the A400M undergoing a 300-hour function and reliability endurance flight test. Airbus has completed 160 hours of the program so far. The troubled engine has been replaced, though the test can only resume once the cause of the problem is determined.

Ref: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-0...-a400m-delivery-slips-to-2013.html

The timing is most unfortunate.

A week ago, Airbus announced both A380 and A400M would be in the flying demonstration at Farnborough.

Now they have to pull out the A400M on the eve of the air show, just like they did last year at Paris.

MD11Engineer · Sat Jul 07, 2012 9:59 am

AFAIK the A400M engine is one of the biggest, if not the biggest turboprop engine ever built. It is by far not trivial to design a gearbox, which on one hand can handle the torques and speeds involved and on the other hand be as light and compact as possible.

I think though that Airbus should have let the Canadians in to provide for an alternate engine instead of betting the house on the one RR engine. IMO it was mostly politics involved there, to save / create jobs at RR.

Jan

par13del · Sat Jul 07, 2012 12:12 pm

Quoting autothrust (Reply 4):
Some people still don't understand how much new technology on the A400 can be found and how complex it is.

Let's see, this is still an engine turning a propellor, the basic of this is essentially unchanged since first designed, the biggest change has been turbines, so methinks they are trying to complicate things too much. ATR's and Bombadier props fly the world over every day, they appear to be re-inventing the technology rather than perfecting.

Quoting sweair (Reply 5):
The biggest mistake was to develop the engine, the politicians went against Airbus on this and now Airbus is paying the price. This whole program smells of political stupidity, it will never get repaid.

A contributing factor no doubt

Quoting MD11Engineer (Reply 8):
AFAIK the A400M engine is one of the biggest, if not the biggest turboprop engine ever built. It is by far not trivial to design a gearbox, which on one hand can handle the torques and speeds involved and on the other hand be as light and compact as possible.

The Russians had a very large turbo-pro pax a/c that did trans-continental runs with contra-rotating props to boot, it was probably just as large.

Personally, I think engineers today want to prove their mettle with each and every thing that they do, imagine how easy it would be to design the Concorde or the SR-71 today with all the high speed computers and software available, should be out the gate within 12 months, the longest thing would be the actual building of the a/c and the engine. Today with all this technology the design phase takes just as long as long as building the initial a/c, go figure.

boeingfixer · Sat Jul 07, 2012 3:10 pm

Quoting MD11Engineer (Reply 8):
AFAIK the A400M engine is one of the biggest, if not the biggest turboprop engine ever built.

Actually the Russian Kuznetsov NK-12MV used on the Tu-95 and Tu-142 is the most powerful turboprop engine ever produced. It is rated at 15,000 ehp.

That being said I'm sure its on-wing time is nowhere close to what Europrop is striving for in the TP400.

Cheers,

John

cmb56 · Sat Jul 07, 2012 4:30 pm

Politics aside, my intent was to point out how difficult product development in aerospace has become. There certainly were other choices available like the Antonov or a combination of C-130/C-17. The EU partners decided to spend their people's money at home even if it ended up costing more in the end the money stayed in the EU. This is a very basic economic principle keep the money local don't spend it overseas or even the next town over.

nomadd22 · Sat Jul 07, 2012 6:06 pm

I'm not too sure about the name change either. Didn't Hercules make a fool out of Atlas?

L-188 · Sat Jul 07, 2012 6:08 pm

Quoting MD11Engineer (Reply 8):
AFAIK the A400M engine is one of the biggest, if not the biggest turboprop engine ever built. It is by far not trivial to design a gearbox, which on one hand can handle the torques and speeds involved and on the other hand be as light and compact as possible.

And it seems that the Soviets where the only ones who have ever gotten counter-rotating technology to work correctly.

Quoting boeingfixer (Reply 10):
Actually the Russian Kuznetsov NK-12MV used on the Tu-95 and Tu-142 is the most powerful turboprop engine ever produced. It is rated at 15,000 ehp.

That's the one.......maybe the EU should have bought a de-rated version for the A-400

Actually I am sure they are going to be eventually kicking themselves for not going with a turbofan.

Quoting cmb56 (Reply 11):
The EU partners decided to spend their people's money at home even if it ended up costing more in the end the money stayed in the EU. This is a very basic economic principle keep the money local don't spend it overseas or even the next town over.

Funny how they scream that the US is doing it with their tanker contract at the 767, but it is ok for them and the A400.

Revelation · Sat Jul 07, 2012 8:58 pm

Quoting par13del (Reply 9):

Let's see, this is still an engine turning a propellor, the basic of this is essentially unchanged since first designed, the biggest change has been turbines, so methinks they are trying to complicate things too much.

If you had noticed that high pitched vacuum cleaner noise when you were near a turbine, you might have thought that the gearbox needs to deal with a very big difference in revolutions per minute.

I suppose in your world everything scales in a linear fashion and the answer is to just make it bigger and everything will be fine, but that's not true.

Quoting par13del (Reply 9):
Personally, I think engineers today want to prove their mettle with each and every thing that they do, imagine how easy it would be to design the Concorde or the SR-71 today with all the high speed computers and software available, should be out the gate within 12 months, the longest thing would be the actual building of the a/c and the engine.

I suspect engineers always have always wanted to prove themselves.

The main issues is that the bar has been raised.

You mentioned the Concorde, but didn't mention the Tu-144 "Concordeski".

scbriml · Sat Jul 07, 2012 9:11 pm

Quoting KC135TopBoom (Reply 2):

Never one to miss an opportunity, eh?

Quoting Revelation (Reply 7):
Now they have to pull out the A400M on the eve of the air show, just like they did last year at Paris.

Have they? One was flying at RIAT today and probably tomorrow. Don't see why it can't fly 100 miles to Farnborough on Monday.

Aesma · Sat Jul 07, 2012 11:41 pm

Quoting L-188 (Reply 13):
Funny how they scream that the US is doing it with their tanker contract at the 767, but it is ok for them and the A400.

Well, it's the US that gives lessons in free markets, allow us not to follow but to still point out the hypocrisy. Of course outside of military stuff the EU is actually the most open market there is, and we're being screwed big time for that.

Besides, the A330 and 767 are much closer airplanes than the A400M is of either the C130 or C17. And do you think the US manufacturers/politicians would have agreed to put assembly lines in the EU, like Airbus was prepared to do in the US (and is actually doing anyway) ?

As for designing planes being longer now, it's easy enough to understand, we're doing incremental stuff instead of revolutionary, while demanding extreme efficiency and low maintenance, some things the first jets or the Concorde are not really renowned for.

ebj1248650 · Sun Jul 08, 2012 12:02 am

Quoting autothrust (Reply 4):
Some people still don't understand how much new technology on the A400 can be found and how complex it is.

And the same can be said about the F-35.

ebj1248650 · Sun Jul 08, 2012 12:14 am

People seem to think that, because we have super computers, designing, building, testing, and then producing a new airplane ought to be pretty straightforward. The problem is super computers can compute huge volumes of numbers and statistics at phenominal rates but they can't solve the technical problems that go hand in hand with advanced technology. Bear in mind that advanced technology means stepping out with a determination to leapfrog what should have been the next logical technical gain. In other words, advanced technology means we're exploring uncharted territory and though we suspect we understand what we'll find, the truth often proves how very wrong we were.

Keep in mind too that building a highly advanced military airplane isn't nearly the same as producing the next year's model new car, allowing that the new car is a complete remake of the existing model or is an entirely new design.

I suppose what I'm trying to say is that the farther we reach in our attempts to make technological gains, the greater the danger that the uncharted ground will be very unforgiving.

kanban · Sun Jul 08, 2012 2:11 am

looking at Farnborough pictures, it looks wet, so the problem (reported in a deleted thread) of landing on wet soils may be in play as well.

par13del · Sun Jul 08, 2012 2:45 am

Quoting Revelation (Reply 14):
If you had noticed that high pitched vacuum cleaner noise when you were near a turbine, you might have thought that the gearbox needs to deal with a very big difference in revolutions per minute.

Well I did mention turbines in my initial post, guess it was missed.

Quoting Revelation (Reply 14):
The main issues is that the bar has been raised.

Yes, no new supersonic pax a/c and the SR-71 is still unmatched, and the advances on the 787 are in simple form scaling up existing tech.
I have watched shows of sea planes in Alaska - Beavers - being converted to turbines, it is well established tech.
How much are they raising the bar on the turbine engines being deployed in the A400M, will other a/c that presently use turbines be able to benefit from the new technology?

Quoting ebj1248650 (Reply 18):
People seem to think that, because we have super computers, designing, building, testing, and then producing a new airplane ought to be pretty straightforward.

Well if we follow the last two major aviation programs - A380 and 787 - the software worked like a charm, the folks using the software were the problem, none of the delays were due to the software having difficulty completing its tasks.

B737200 · Sun Jul 08, 2012 7:20 am

Quoting par13del (Reply 20):
Well if we follow the last two major aviation programs - A380 and 787 - the software worked like a charm, the folks using the software were the problem, none of the delays were due to the software having difficulty completing its tasks.

Yes because the software crunches numbers, the people using the software need to see if what is coming out is making any sense and if the assumptions taken are valid, when you are dealing with new technology, with limited experience and understanding (because it is new) then this becomes harder.

EZYAirbus · Sun Jul 08, 2012 11:11 am

Quoting kanban (Reply 19):
it looks wet, so the problem (reported in a deleted thread) of landing on wet soils may be in play as well.

Farnborough is a hard runway.....was pissing down at RIAT yesterday but it still got airborne and did a flypast with the RAF heavies then did a couple of solo passes

par13del · Sun Jul 08, 2012 1:17 pm

Quoting B737200 (Reply 21):
Yes because the software crunches numbers, the people using the software need to see if what is coming out is making any sense and if the assumptions taken are valid

Which becomes more difficult when the people in control of the software decide to use one version in one location, and another version in another location and expect the parts designed and influenced by the software to fit seemlessly when bought together.
Let's not talk about ensuring that all sites are working on the same templates, that for another thread.

Oykie · Sun Jul 08, 2012 5:33 pm

Quoting scbriml (Reply 15):
Have they? One was flying at RIAT today and probably tomorrow. Don't see why it can't fly 100 miles to Farnborough on Monday

I was wondering about the same thing.

Quoting EZYAirbus (Reply 22):
was pissing down at RIAT yesterday but it still got airborne and did a flypast with the RAF heavies then did a couple of solo passes

The newly named Atlas (After the Greek giant) A400M (with the same origin as the name Hercules) performed well yesterday. It did a nice flyby and landed and used the propellers to stop the plane shortly after landing. So the issue with the gearbox cannot be the that pressing. Otherwise Airbus would not have flown it complemented with a relatively short landing.

Francoflier · Sun Jul 08, 2012 6:05 pm

Quoting oykie (Reply 24):
So the issue with the gearbox cannot be the that pressing.

I'm guessing a few bugs still need ironing out, but they'd rather simply not take the risk of having to cut a demo short and land with a feathered prop in such a public and internationally renowned show... They've suffered enough bad press as is.

I'm one of those who find the engine decision ridiculous though.
This is what happens when politicians have a go at building an aircraft.
Europrop is a political baby, born from the brains (reluctant use of the word) of European politicians who all wanted a piece of the pie. They first determined what percentage of the engine was going to be built by their local company and only then did they let them try to sort it out within the boundaries that had been defined for them.

Now all four of these companies have to somehow build a single, functioning, reliable, highly complex piece of technology by combining four different design philosophies from four different countries. It must have been a nightmare and probably came out being orders of magnitude more difficult and expensive than if it had been done in the normal industrial fashion...
Are the extra billions spent on the program really worth the relatively few jobs that were created? And since this is such a niche market, what will these companies gain from it when it is all over?

Anyway. They're still a bunch of really smart people. They'll sort it. Eventually.

autothrust · Mon Jul 09, 2012 7:01 am

Quoting KC135TopBoom (Reply 6):

It will never have the low level TFR Germany wanted for terrain following missions. It's tanker air refueling capability has been puch back several years, and to get that capability it needs more developement money.

Source please?

MD11Engineer · Mon Jul 09, 2012 9:48 am

Quoting francoflier (Reply 25):
Are the extra billions spent on the program really worth the relatively few jobs that were created? And since this is such a niche market, what will these companies gain from it when it is all over?

It helps the politicians to get votes in their district. They can show off how they created jobs.

Jan

Sinlock · Mon Jul 09, 2012 4:40 pm

Quoting cmb56 (Reply 3):
I can't think of a single new aircraft that has launched in the last 15 years that came on line early and under budget.

The Boeing F/A-18 E/F.
The Eurocopter UH-72 Lakota. On time and under budget but not a "New" aircraft.

Revelation · Mon Jul 09, 2012 7:43 pm

Quoting scbriml (Reply 15):
Quoting Revelation (Reply 7):
Now they have to pull out the A400M on the eve of the air show, just like they did last year at Paris.

Have they? One was flying at RIAT today and probably tomorrow. Don't see why it can't fly 100 miles to Farnborough on Monday

As per the thread starter:

Quoting katekebo (Thread starter):
Airbus is pulling Europe's A400M airlifter out of flying displays at next week's Farnborough Airshow due to continued engine problems, forcing it to sit out popular annual stunts for the second year running, industry sources said.

So it shall be flying the 100 miles, but it shall not be doing the "popular annual stunts for the second year running", sayeth the "industry sources".

Quoting par13del (Reply 20):
Quoting Revelation (Reply 14):
If you had noticed that high pitched vacuum cleaner noise when you were near a turbine, you might have thought that the gearbox needs to deal with a very big difference in revolutions per minute.

Well I did mention turbines in my initial post, guess it was missed.

I guess the other point being missed is that not everything scales linearly. Many things like heat scale to the second power, not the first, and many other effects scale to even higher powers, so simple scaling just doesn't work.

If it did, we'd just scale the Cessna 150 up to the Airbus A380 and be done with it.

It'd be a first: 600-across seating!

Quoting par13del (Reply 20):
Yes, no new supersonic pax a/c and the SR-71 is still unmatched, and the advances on the 787 are in simple form scaling up existing tech.

And the American SST never got past wooden mock-ups despite government support, and the Concordeski crashed twice before being relegated to supersonic cargo duty, and the FR/UK Concorde only flew due to massive government support that was never repayed. The stark reality is that while the idea of a SST is wonderful, the Concorde could only carry a 738's worth of passengers for not even 757 range while gobbling huge amounts of fuel and creating so much noise that it had to be exempted from noise regulations.

The SR-71 has been replaced because satellites and drones and the U2 perform its mission better and cheaper.

The bar has been raised.

The technology exists for nuclear powered aircraft and plans were being drafted, but saner minds prevailed.

Quoting par13del (Reply 20):
I have watched shows of sea planes in Alaska - Beavers - being converted to turbines, it is well established tech.
How much are they raising the bar on the turbine engines being deployed in the A400M, will other a/c that presently use turbines be able to benefit from the new technology?

No idea, but I'm sure the makers would love to have someone come along with a new application for the engine and would be willing to pay as much as the EU taxpayers are paying for the engine.

flightsimer · Mon Jul 09, 2012 8:33 pm

Quoting Aesma (Reply 16):
Besides, the A330 and 767 are much closer airplanes than the A400M is of either the C130 or C17. And do you think the US manufacturers/politicians would have agreed to put assembly lines in the EU, like Airbus was prepared to do in the US (and is actually doing anyway) ?

Why would we build a plant in the EU just to build planes to then have to fly back to the US? Airbus isn't building this A320 plant for Asian or African or European airlines... They are building it for the airlines of the America's, but more importantly because of the greatly lower cost to build them here rather than in the EU.

If a European customer wanted enough planes that an entire production plant could sustain the production plus others, I have no doubt a US company would do it... But the climate for that to happen isn't there...

Also, the C-17 and C-130 are very late in their production lives. Additional line would be able to be sustained so there would be no gain to it.

And I remind you, this plant will be built, what, 5 to 10 years after it was supposed to be for the tanker program?

scbriml · Mon Jul 09, 2012 9:18 pm

Quoting Revelation (Reply 29):
As per the thread starter:

Yes, I did read that.

I also asked a perfectly reasonable question. If the A400M is performing "popular stunts" at another air show immediately before Farnborough, why it can't perform them at Farnborough?

Quoting Revelation (Reply 29):
So it shall be flying the 100 miles, but it shall not be doing the "popular annual stunts for the second year running", sayeth the "industry sources".

As it happens, it's only 50 miles from Fairford to Farnborough, my bad. One also has to question "industry sources" that don't know that Farnborough runs every other year (so is not an annual event) and that the A400M DID fly at the last Farnborough show.

Anyway, I'll be there tomorrow and will report.

[Edited 2012-07-09 14:27:04]

Revelation · Mon Jul 09, 2012 10:31 pm

Quoting scbriml (Reply 31):
Yes, I did read that.

Quoting scbriml (Reply 31):
I also asked a perfectly reasonable question. If the A400M is performing "popular stunts" at another air show immediately before Farnborough, why it can't perform them at Farnborough?

The various articles above seem to distinguish between simple fly-bys versus much more strenuous "flying demonstrations" which presumably the "stunts" are a subset of.

I think many of us have seen videos (if not the real deal) of such "flying demonstrations" and know they are a lot more than fly-bys.

http://www.flightglobal.com/news/art...riat-a400m-reborn-as-atlas-373861/ says that A400M was on "static display" at RAIT.

Do you know if it did more than fly-bys at RAIT?

Quoting scbriml (Reply 31):
One also has to question "industry sources" that don't know that Farnborough runs every other year (so is not an annual event) and that the A400M DID fly at the last Farnborough show.

The 2nd sentence of the article says:

Quote:

The move repeats a decision at last year's equivalent event outside Paris, but is not expected to disrupt plans to deliver it to its first customer, France, around the end of the year.

So the "second year running" statement gets clarified shortly thereafter.

Hope you enjoy Farnborough tomorrow!

zanl188 · Mon Jul 09, 2012 11:28 pm

Quoting nomadd22 (Reply 12):
I'm not too sure about the name change either. Didn't Hercules make a fool out of Atlas?

Why did they change the name?

View Large View Medium
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Photo © A J Best

scbriml · Tue Jul 10, 2012 5:45 am

Quoting Revelation (Reply 32):
Do you know if it did more than fly-bys at RAIT?

It certainly looked like it to me through the rain, yes. It seemed to be the normal demo, then it participated in a flypast with the RAF.

nomadd22 · Tue Jul 10, 2012 7:04 am

Quoting ZANL188 (Reply 33):
Why did they change the name?

Not really a change. It didn't have an official name before.

MadameConcorde · Tue Jul 10, 2012 8:34 am

Quoting kanban (Reply 19):
looking at Farnborough pictures, it looks wet, so the problem (reported in a deleted thread) of landing on wet soils may be in play as well.

Beautiful pictures of yesterday's official opening ceremonies at Farnborough with the mighty XH558 Avro Vulcan now named 'The Spirit of Great Britain' doing a flypast with the Red Arrows.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...ed-Arrows-Farnborough-Airshow.html

Show and tell: David Cameron was shown around an Airbus A400M airlifter by chief test pilot Edward Strongman

It did not look too wet. The storms stayed out of the area it seems.
I will be there Friday, maybe Saturday also. I hope nothing will keep XH558 from flying at the air show this weekend.

zanl188 · Tue Jul 10, 2012 9:37 am

Quoting nomadd22 (Reply 35):

Grizzly was pretty official. Press releases etc.

Revelation · Tue Jul 10, 2012 12:19 pm

Apparently she made it there and is sat on the tarmac.

Quote:

The first production model of Airbus Military's A400M tactical airlifter is on display at the Farnborough Air Show in England.

Airbus Military, headquartered in Spain, said the aircraft – designated the MSN6 – will be on static display, which will allow potential customers to view its cargo hold.

The aircraft will not participate in flight demonstrations because of recent engine issues which are under investigation.

Read more: http://www.upi.com/Business_News/Sec.../UPI-76621341850064/#ixzz20Dn1utKu

As above, incredibly unfortunate timing two years in a row.

This can't be helping potential sales campaigns.

I wonder if the lessons learned about pricing via the Eurofighter "loss" in India will be applied to the A400M.

It's hard to see how, with the current plan of paying back some loans via revenue from future export sales.

[Edited 2012-07-10 05:23:00]

bigjku · Tue Jul 10, 2012 5:37 pm

I still say the A400M was always an odd mix of requirements and goals. It looks like and is equipped like a very big tactical air-lifter. Like an overgrown C-130 class plane. But it has weights much more along the lines of a C-141. Russia is doing (or has been trying to do) something similar with the AN-70 but it has been an on and off program at best, though they did just order the thing again I suppose. For a group of nations that really had not built a plane anything like this it just seems like building a jet-engined transport would likely have been a good bit simpler.

Aesma · Tue Jul 10, 2012 8:05 pm

Quoting flightsimer (Reply 30):
Why would we build a plant in the EU just to build planes to then have to fly back to the US? Airbus isn't building this A320 plant for Asian or African or European airlines... They are building it for the airlines of the America's, but more importantly because of the greatly lower cost to build them here rather than in the EU.

If a European customer wanted enough planes that an entire production plant could sustain the production plus others, I have no doubt a US company would do it... But the climate for that to happen isn't there...

Well, we were talking about European customers buying a bunch of C-130 and C-17 instead of making the A400M. Airbus was going to build the tanker for the US in the US (and EADS is building copters in the US for the US), so my question is would Boeing and Lockheed have built C-130 and C-17 in Europe for Europe ? Because if not, then that's a non starter.

Quoting ZANL188 (Reply 33):
Why did they change the name?

Quoting ZANL188 (Reply 37):
Grizzly was pretty official. Press releases etc.

Maybe because that animal is north american ? Canada was offered the plane but bought in the US instead.

Quoting BigJKU (Reply 39):
For a group of nations that really had not built a plane anything like this it just seems like building a jet-engined transport would likely have been a good bit simpler.

The A400M Atlas will replace the Transall C-160 which was built by France and Germany.

Revelation · Tue Jul 10, 2012 9:26 pm

Quoting BigJKU (Reply 39):
For a group of nations that really had not built a plane anything like this it just seems like building a jet-engined transport would likely have been a good bit simpler.

Wiki sez:

Quote:

The project began as the Future International Military Airlifter (FIMA) group, set up in 1982 by Aérospatiale, British Aerospace (BAe), Lockheed, and Messerschmitt-Bölkow-Blohm (MBB) to develop a replacement for the C-130 Hercules and Transall C-160.[10] Varying requirements and the complications of international politics caused slow progress.

So the starting point was replacing the C-130 (i.e. a intra-theater airlifter) rather than going for something like a C-141 or C-17 (inter-theater airlifter). At the time, the customer's primary needs were based on the NATO - Warsaw Pact type of cold war scenarios. Now they find themselves in the unhappy scenario of buying an system to fight the last war, not the next one, and there's no backing away from it (although they could have called Airbus's bluff to walk away from it a few years ago).

I think one of the reasons the UK is so happy with its C-17s is that their roles in the Middle East needed an inter-theater airlifter. Of course they're also happy that the USAF shook out all the bugs, unlike their unhappy early days with the C-130J.

scbriml · Tue Jul 10, 2012 10:21 pm

Quoting Revelation (Reply 38):
Apparently she made it there and is sat on the tarmac.

Yes, it didn't fly, which, given it's the very same aircraft that DID fly at RIAT two days ago, all the more confusing. In EADS position, I would have rather had it in the static at RIAT and flying at Farnborough. I don't know why they didn't ask me.

In the static display it was close by a C-130J and made it look pretty small. It does look a beast.

bigjku · Tue Jul 10, 2012 11:07 pm

Quoting Revelation (Reply 41):

So the starting point was replacing the C-130 (i.e. a intra-theater airlifter) rather than going for something like a C-141 or C-17 (inter-theater airlifter). At the time, the customer's primary needs were based on the NATO - Warsaw Pact type of cold war scenarios. Now they find themselves in the unhappy scenario of buying an system to fight the last war, not the next one, and there's no backing away from it (although they could have called Airbus's bluff to walk away from it a few years ago).

Nah, I know what it was originally going to do but there were no orders until 2003 so up until then they could have respecified the thing. It was 2002 before they knew they were going to need a new, bigger engine at which point I would think one might ask the question of if we are approaching this right. The need to build a new and unique engine for the thing has caused a lot of problems. Once you went to that size I think you have to consider something with jet engines you could have bought off the shelf.

Revelation · Wed Jul 11, 2012 12:48 am

Quoting scbriml (Reply 42):
Yes, it didn't fly, which, given it's the very same aircraft that DID fly at RIAT two days ago, all the more confusing. In EADS position, I would have rather had it in the static at RIAT and flying at Farnborough. I don't know why they didn't ask me.

I'm still not sure what kind of flying it did at RIAT.

The source I listed above said it just did flybys, which are in essence circuits displaced a bit, not the max-g loading you'd see in a "flying demonstration".

Quoting scbriml (Reply 42):
In the static display it was close by a C-130J and made it look pretty small. It does look a beast.

I'm sure it's a wonderful aircraft to crawl around.

Quoting BigJKU (Reply 43):
Nah, I know what it was originally going to do but there were no orders until 2003 so up until then they could have respecified the thing.

Quoting BigJKU (Reply 43):
It was 2002 before they knew they were going to need a new, bigger engine at which point I would think one might ask the question of if we are approaching this right.

Not really, IMHO. Four different governments would all have to agree to change direction at the same time.

Quoting BigJKU (Reply 43):
The need to build a new and unique engine for the thing has caused a lot of problems. Once you went to that size I think you have to consider something with jet engines you could have bought off the shelf.

I don't know what the tradeoffs would be. I guess the turboprops have better short field performance but I could be wrong on that.

cmf · Wed Jul 11, 2012 3:02 am

Quoting KC135TopBoom (Reply 6):
EADS originally wanted to put a Canadian built engine on the A-400M, but the French politicians wanted (demanded) the engine be buit in Europe.

I seem to remember that is exactly what you and many US politicians advocated in regards to USAF tankers.

Quoting par13del (Reply 9):
Let's see, this is still an engine turning a propellor, the basic of this is essentially unchanged since first designed, the biggest change has been turbines, so methinks they are trying to complicate things too much. ATR's and Bombadier props fly the world over every day, they appear to be re-inventing the technology rather than perfecting.

The basic technology is the same but the requirements are drastically different.They need to scale up power without scaling up fuel, maintenance, etc. Actually they are required to improve them despite that all low hanging fruit has been picked long time ago. Thus they need significantly more advance technology to reach the acceptable performance levels. It is the way it should be but it is not simple. Certainly not just scaling well known technology.

Quoting par13del (Reply 9):
The Russians had a very large turbo-pro pax a/c that did trans-continental runs with contra-rotating props to boot, it was probably just as large.

But very noisy, horrible fuel consumption and I expect unacceptable maintenance requirements.

Quoting par13del (Reply 9):
Personally, I think engineers today want to prove their mettle with each and every thing that they do, imagine how easy it would be to design the Concorde or the SR-71 today with all the high speed computers and software available, should be out the gate within 12 months, the longest thing would be the actual building of the a/c and the engine. Today with all this technology the design phase takes just as long as long as building the initial a/c, go figure.

Designing to the same technology level would be done in no-time. Design to acceptable technology level is as big or bigger challenge today.

Quoting Aesma (Reply 40):
Well, we were talking about European customers buying a bunch of C-130 and C-17 instead of making the A400M. Airbus was going to build the tanker for the US in the US (and EADS is building copters in the US for the US), so my question is would Boeing and Lockheed have built C-130 and C-17 in Europe for Europe ? Because if not, then that's a non starter.

Several US fighters used by European air-forces have been built in Europe. Many in Netherlands, some in Finland. I expect there are more examples.

GPHOTO · Wed Jul 11, 2012 10:15 am

Quoting Revelation (Reply 41):
I think one of the reasons the UK is so happy with its C-17s is that their roles in the Middle East needed an inter-theater airlifter. Of course they're also happy that the USAF shook out all the bugs, unlike their unhappy early days with the C-130J.

A fair swap maybe

We got fully matured C-17's from the off and we took the pain on the C-130J development for everyone else.

Quoting cmf (Reply 45):
Several US fighters used by European air-forces have been built in Europe. Many in Netherlands, some in Finland. I expect there are more examples.

Belgium, Italy and Germany have also produced US fighters in the past.

A number of American helicopter types were built over here as well. Many Sikorsky products were fully built or at least assembled in Europe. Apache's were assembled at Westland too, so not just transport types.

Sikorsky never seemed to have any problems with licensing their products to European contractors. Boeing seem much more reluctant (as is their right).

Best regards,

Jim

bikerthai · Wed Jul 11, 2012 1:37 pm

Quoting gphoto (Reply 46):
Boeing seem much more reluctant (as is their right).

Boeing has two core competency. Large Aerospace System Engineering/Integration and Large Aerospace System Manufacturing. They would more likely fabricate their product using an in-country partner than license the product out right.

bt

kanban · Wed Jul 11, 2012 4:29 pm

I seem to recall some planes or choppers being manufactured in Italy under Boeing license.

bikerthai · Wed Jul 11, 2012 6:55 pm

Quoting kanban (Reply 48):

Do you mean this?

http://blog.seattlepi.com/aerospace/...licopter-for-presidential-contest/

bt

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