The RCAF's Next Generation Fighter (CF-188 Replacement)

[GR66]

I believe he meant the CCA that goes with the Gripens.

Yes and no I guess. Building a one-off batch of Gripens doesn't make a lot of sense to me. You need something to follow to keep domestic production going and more Gripens after the initial contract don't make sense when other options like GCAP will be coming online.

I've always felt the plan should be to assemble Gripens here and use that time/experience to develop and build a domestic CCA platform that is suited to our vast distances and specific defence requirements. The could be co-developed with Saab but I think it would make more sense for them to be controlled from stealthy F-35's rather then by the Gripens.

 

[Nvlgzr]

I believe he meant the CCA that goes with the Gripens.

I don’t believe SAAB has controlled another aircraft with the Gripen, unlike the F-35 which has controlled a MQ20

 

[Czech_pivo]

Trump looking to sell 48 F35’s to the Saudi’s.

Nuclear tech and now F35’s.

U.S. advances $24 billion F-35 deal to Saudi Arabia as Houthis escalate attacks
Trump administration advances $24.3 billion fighter jet deal to Saudi Arabia as Houthis escalate attacks

 

[brihard]

Trump looking to sell 48 F35’s to the Saudi’s.

Nuclear tech and now F35’s.

U.S. advances $24 billion F-35 deal to Saudi Arabia as Houthis escalate attacks
Trump administration advances $24.3 billion fighter jet deal to Saudi Arabia as Houthis escalate attacks

Selling F-35s to Saudi seems like a really bad idea from a security standpoint.

 

[Good2Golf]

Selling F-35s to Saudi seems like a really bad idea from a security standpoint.

It’s not like five Houthis and a tourist with a bum pack could shoot down an F-35…

 

[Cloud Cover]

Did Trump really just allocate our future F35 production slots to Saudi Arabia or is that just more internet slop? I thought we weren’t ordering any more than 16 at this point.

 

[brihard]

It’s not like five Houthis and a tourist with a bum pack could shoot down an F-35…
View attachment 102284

Oh, it makes a ton of sense for Saudi Arabia to purchase F-35s from the U.S. if they can.

It makes very little sense for the U.S. to sell F-35s to Saudi Arabia.

 

[dapaterson]

Oh, it makes a ton of sense for Saudi Arabia to purchase F-35s from the U.S. if they can.

It makes very little sense for the U.S. to sell F-35s to Saudi Arabia.

If you can't trust the state sponsor of the 9/11 attacks, who can you trust?

 

[Czech_pivo]

If you can't trust the state sponsor of the 9/11 attacks, who can you trust?

Just imagine if 17 of the 19 attackers came from Canada…..

 

[Good2Golf]

If you can't trust the state sponsor of the 9/11 attacks, who can you trust?

…as opposed to the training sponsor?

 

[OldSolduer]

Did Trump really just allocate our future F35 production slots to Saudi Arabia or is that just more internet slop? I thought we weren’t ordering any more than 16 at this point.

Who the fck actually knows.

 

[Maxman1]

Did Trump really just allocate our future F35 production slots to Saudi Arabia or is that just more internet slop? I thought we weren’t ordering any more than 16 at this point.

We ordered another 14.

 

[markppcli]

Yes and no I guess. Building a one-off batch of Gripens doesn't make a lot of sense to me. You need something to follow to keep domestic production going and more Gripens after the initial contract don't make sense when other options like GCAP will be coming online.

I've always felt the plan should be to assemble Gripens here and use that time/experience to develop and build a domestic CCA platform that is suited to our vast distances and specific defence requirements. The could be co-developed with Saab but I think it would make more sense for them to be controlled from stealthy F-35's rather then by the Gripens.

Its less the F35s stealth and more its processing power. That said if we bought Gripens tomorrow, production of them in Canada wouldnt have jets rolling off the line until 2034 - so CCA in 2040. I'd like a quicker delivery timeline myself.

 

[Halifax Tar]

Logistics, Logistics, Logistics.

https://twitter.com/x/status/2101089081463832736

For context: a 2023 GAO report found over 1 million F-35 spare parts had gone missing over five years, and the Pentagon couldn't audit the losses because Lockheed holds the data.

 

[Oldgateboatdriver]

There are only about 1400 of those things currently built. To lose one million spare parts in five years and still have enough make it to the final users for the planes to fly, how many god damn spare parts do you need every year to keep those damn things flying ????

 

[Halifax Tar]

There are only about 1400 of those things currently built. To lose one million spare parts in five years and still have enough make it to the final users for the planes to fly, how many god damn spare parts do you need every year to keep those damn things flying ????

Remember spares aren't just wings and engines it's right down to every little widget, nut and bolt that's installed on the plane.

1 F35 is roughly 300k parts + 90k fasteners.

For scale a modern warship is millions of individual items.

 

[Oldgateboatdriver]

I understand that, but how many of those need replacement and how often? Do they have to replace every bolt and nut every time they "open the hood"?

That just looks like huge employment of consumables to me compared to other planes I know of.

 

[NavyShooter]

Remember that aircraft parts tracking and replacement is very different from that on ships. The aircraft maintenance records are very in depth - how many hours can the airplane fly with this gasket in place before it has to be replaced? If it's 47 hours, then at 45 hours they do the replacement because on the next flight, it might exceed the 47. Lets say to replace that gasket, they need to remove a panel with 24 fasteners, single use, so there's 24 items. Then the 12 bolts that hold down the cover for the gasket need to come off too...so there's another 12 single use items, plus the gasket, so you're up to 37 items that have to be replaced for a single gasket, then you have the lock-wire, and so forth that has to be put in.

The box of fasteners for the panel comes in bx of 50, so they now have 26 extras that they don't use against this work order and so need to be returned afterwards since they can't use it on another work order. The box of 12 is actually a package of 20, so they have 8 extras that get returned.

Or.

They throw the extras in the garbage along with the extra gasket they ordered and the rest of the spool of lock wire because doing the return after the work order is a pain in the butt as compared to just throwing it out and ordering new for the next aircraft.

Bear in mind that due to the way maintenance records for aircraft probably work, they cannot reuse the extras from a previous work order because then there's no source history on the parts.

So, for a simple/notional gasket replacement, they've thrown out 35 leftover parts.

Multiply that by 1400 aircraft and you've got 49,000 items, multiply that by 10 years and you're up to a half million of the missing 'parts' quite easily.

Not saying that's what it's all about, but that's probably what it's all about.

There are probably a few dozen/hundred items missing that are actually important and trackable, but most of it is probably nuts, bolts, and gaskets.

 

[Halifax Tar]

I understand that, but how many of those need replacement and how often? Do they have to replace every bolt and nut every time they "open the hood"?

That just looks like huge employment of consumables to me compared to other planes I know of.

That's outside my depth. I do materials management.

But I do know aircraft spares, like submarine spars, brings with it a whole extra level a stringent requirements.

 

[NavyShooter]

To add....

On a ship, let's say there's a gasket that needs to be replaced. The stokers head up to the stoker workshop on 3 deck, grab a strip of gasket material, bring a bit of that along with a hammer and a knife down to the space.

They isolate the valve, drain the line into the bilge, unbolt it using the 4-8 old bolts that are on the valve, they split the valve, scrape off the old gasket, place the piece of new gasket material over the valve body, use the hammer to trace out the edges with light taps (which also cuts the edges of the new gasket to match) then take away the extra material, maybe trim one spot with their knife, then re-assemble the valve using the old bolts again.

When they drop one of the bolts and nuts into the bilge, they assemble it anyhow with the 7 remaining bolts, head up to the stoker workshop again, grab a random/close size bolt and nut from the 'spare' drawer, and go install it. "Close enough" for most of the valves on the ship. They de-isolate, test for leakage, call it good enough, and carry on with their day.

Or.

They order a new valve because the old one is leaking by slightly (meaning the valve seat/stem gasket inside is worn). They isolate the valve, drain the line into the bilge again, undo the cover of the valve with the handle on it (leaving the valve body in-line with the piping) and strip the new valve stem/handle from the new part they received, and put that on the old body that's still in-line. The new valve stem/handle has a new gasket that they transfer over, and they dump the old part in the box with the good bottom half that they never used, and send that back to return stores in about 3 years and 2 crews later when they find it under the bench in the stoker workshop.

Or something like that.