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CF-188 Hornet, Canada's jet fighter

Well they would be wouldn’t they:

Boeing frustrated by Canada’s move to extend life of fighter jets

U.S. aerospace giant Boeing Co. is frustrated by Canada’s decision to extend the life of its aging fleet of fighter jets, a move that will delay a decision on buying replacements, a company official said on Wednesday [Nov. 19]…

Canada said in September that it would extend the life of its fighters to 2025 from the previous 2020 end-date.
That could be bad news for Boeing, which is seeking orders to keep its F/A-18 production line running past 2017…

Boeing says it is confident it can maintain F/A-18 output through the end of 2017. [Dan] Gillian [Boeing’s vice-president in charge of the F/A-18] said if more orders materialize, production lines could continue working beyond 2020.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/international-business/us-business/boeing-frustrated-by-canadas-move-to-extend-life-of-fighter-jets/article21659048/#dashboard/follows/

Mark
Ottawa
 
I hope our Hornets don't have this problem too:

Breaking Defense News

Oxygen Problems Afflicted 297 Navy & Marine Hornets
By Sydney J. Freedberg Jr. on February 04, 2016 at 4:24 PM


CAPITOL HILL: It turns out Navy pilots like to breathe. That’s a potential problem in the Navy’s mainstay fighter, the F-18 Hornet, which is suffering failures of its On-Board Oxygen Generation System (OBOGS). While rare, a single case of in-flight oxygen deprivation could potentially kill the pilot, destroy a $30 million to $60 million aircraft, or both — and after five years, the Navy’s still searching for a fix.

“I’m concerned about the high rate of hypoxia — which is caused by a lack of oxygen — and other physiological events apparently being experienced by the crew members of F-18 aircraft over the past five years,” said Rep. Niki Tsongas, a senior Democrat on the House Armed Services subcommittee on tactical air and land forces.

(...SNIPPED)
 
SupersonicMax said:
We don't have OBOGS.  We use LOX.

I have the right to remain silent....but not the ability.

Do you serve bagels with LOX? I'm joking.....

SO what is LOX?
 
S.M.A. said:
I hope our Hornets don't have this problem too:

Breaking Defense News

As Max notes, no, but the USN Hornets aren't the only plane having on-board oxygen generation issues.

Remember the F-22 Raptor's issues in 2011/2012 with pilots not getting enough oxygen?  Serious enough that some pilots refused to fly the F-22.  The F-22 now has a back-up oxygen system incase the OBOGS fails: F-22 Raptor stealth jets to get automatic backup oxygen systems to prevent new hypoxia-like symptoms.  Perhaps the USN Hornets will get the same type of upgrade?

Regards
G2G
 
i wonder if both have common systems or some common parts. O2 systems have been on the books for what, 60+ years and now we are seeing this?
 
Seeing as RCAF plans to fly CF-18 until 2025 could we benefit from US legacy Hornet SLEP?

U.S. Navy Budget Underscores Need To Extend F-18 Use

With F-35 Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) delays and continued expanded reliance on F-18 aircraft, the U.S. Navy and Marine Corps are working hard to make the legacy Hornets last much longer than they were meant to, budget documents show.

“Until the F-35B/C aircraft are available in required numbers, the Navy plans to mitigate the inventory challenge with service life extension of the legacy F/A-18A-D airframes to 8,000-10,000 hours (over original design of 6,000 hours),” the Navy notes in documentation supporting the fiscal 2017 budget request submitted this week.

“Extension of legacy Hornet life requires additional inspections and deep maintenance that were not originally envisioned for the aircraft,” the Navy says. “Average repair time has significantly increased because of required engineering of unanticipated repairs, material lead times and increased corrosion of airframes. Throughput at Navy aviation depots is improving in fiscal 2016 and is projected to achieve required capacity in fiscal 2017, which will improve inventory.”..
http://aviationweek.com/defense/us-navy-budget-underscores-need-extend-f-18-use

Mark
Ottawa
 
RAAF lesson for RCAF?

Australian algorithm extends life of “Classic” Hornets

A new fatigue monitoring algorithm for Australia’s Boeing F/A-18 A/B Hornet fighters will allow for greater operational flexibility.

The algorithm was created by Australia’s Defence Science Technology Office (DSTO), and is called MSMP3. It replaces an algorithm that, the DSTO says, “over-predicted the damage due to small load cycles resulting in unnecessary conservatism”.

The new algorithm has already been applied to Canberra’s fleet of Hornets, with the strain records of each aircraft adjusted from September 2015.

“As a direct result of the upgrade of the Hornet monitoring program, the reprocessing of the entire fleet’s usage history indicates that fatigue is no longer the main driver to the planned withdrawal date,” says DSTO research leader Loris Molent.

The DSTO adds that the modified monitoring programme will give the Royal Australian Air Force more flexibility amid “the increased tempo of current operations”...
https://www.flightglobal.com/news/articles/australian-algorithm-extends-life-of-classic-horn-423803/

Mark
Ottawa
 
USN and USMC plan to operate their classic Hornets for quite some time:

F/A-18 Hornet Service Life

...The United States Navy is the most important user of the aircraft type and, according to the present plans, the USN will decommission its F/A-18 C/D models by 2025. The United States Marine Corps will continue using the aircraft until the end of 2031. The USMC and Switzerland are upgrading their mission computers so as to be comparable with those in the F/A-18 Super Hornets.

Upgrading the mission computer is a long and expensive project. Australia will phase out its F/A-18 A/B aircraft in 2022 and Canada in 2025. In the early 2020s Finland will be solely responsible for the software development of the present mission computer, as a result of which the costs of software updates and support will grow exponentially...
http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/systems/aircraft/f-18-service-life.htm

Mark
Ottawa
 
That article is wrong, after the Liberals reset the process, we'll be using the CF-188 until late 2030s.
 
MarkOttawa said:
USN and USMC plan to operate their classic Hornets for quite some time:
Mark
Ottawa


Interesting, I wonder how they are going to do that with no money, and having to reclaim parts from museums just ti keep the F-18 fleet flying.

The video was interesting: "we don't know where the wings are" ; "we are supposed to be flying jets, not rebuilding them". ; "Marine Corps squadron to deploy in the next few days with only 2 of 14 aircraft capable of flying"..

Budget cuts leaving Marine Corps aircraft grounded:  URL:http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2016/04/15/budget-cuts-leaving-marine-corps-aircraft-grounded.html


EXCLUSIVE: Since 1775, the U.S. Marine Corps has prided itself on being “The Few" and "The Proud." But while the Corps takes pride in doing more with less, senior Marine officers are warning that the Corps' aviation service is being stretched to the breaking point.

Today, the vast majority of Marine Corps aircraft can’t fly. The reasons behind the grounding of these aircraft include the toll of long wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, the fight against ISIS and budget cuts precluding the purchase of the parts needed to fix an aging fleet, according to dozens of Marines interviewed by Fox News at two air stations in the Carolinas this week.

Out of 276 F/A-18 Hornet strike fighters in the Marine Corps inventory, only about 30% are ready to fly, according to statistics provided by the Corps. Similarly, only 42 of 147 heavy-lift CH-53E Super Stallion helicopters are airworthy.

U.S. military spending has dropped from $691 billion in 2010 to $560 billion in 2015. The cuts came just as the planes were returning from 15 years of war, suffering from overuse and extreme wear and tear. Many highly trained mechanics in the aviation depots left for jobs in the private sector.

“Quite honestly, it is coming on the backs of our young Marines,” Lt. Col. Matthew “Pablo” Brown, commanding officer of VMFA(AW)-533, a Hornet squadron based at Marine Corps Air Station Beaufort in South Carolina. “They can do it, and they are doing it but it is certainly not easy.”

Brown's squadron is due to deploy to the Middle East in the coming days.

Lack of funds has forced the Marines to go outside the normal supply chain to procure desperately needed parts. Cannibalization, or taking parts from one multi-million dollar aircraft to get other multi-million dollar aicraft airborne, has become the norm.

To get one Hornet flying again, Marines at Beaufort stripped a landing gear door off a mothballed museum jet. The door, found on the flight deck of the World War II-era USS Yorktown, was last manufactured over a decade ago.

“Imagine taking a 1995 Cadillac and trying to make it a Ferrari,” Sgt. Argentry Uebelhoer said days before embarking on his third deployment. “You're trying to make it faster, more efficient, but it's still an old airframe … [and] the aircraft is constantly breaking.”

Maintaining the high-performance Hornets is a challenge with 30,000 fewer Marines, part of a downsizing that has been ongoing since 2010.

“We don't have enough of them to do the added work efficiently. We are making it a lot harder on the young marines who are fixing our aircraft,” said Maj. Michael Malone of Marine Aviation Logistics Squadron 31.

Sometimes it takes the Marines 18 months to get parts for early model F-18 jets whose production was halted in 2001.

“We are an operational squadron. We are supposed to be flying jets, not building them,” said Lt. Col. Harry Thomas, Commanding Officer of VMFA-312, a Marine Corps F/A-18 squadron based at Beaufort.

The cuts include those made by the Obama administration as well as the sequestration cutbacks agreed to by Congress.

Asked about the Marines’ concerns on Friday, White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest put the onus on Congress to right the problem – and said Republicans have blocked spending reforms that would have helped military readiness. He said Republicans “championed” the sequester cuts.

Lt. Col Thomas, call sign “Crash,” deployed to the Pacific with 10 jets last year. Only seven made it. A fuel leak caused his F/A-18 to catch fire in Guam. Instead of ejecting, he landed safely, saving taxpayers $29 million.

Thomas has deployed eight times in all, including six to Iraq and Afghanistan. Right now only two of his 14 Hornets can fly. His Marines deploy in three months.

“We are supposed to be doing the type of maintenance like you would take your car to Jiffy Lube for replacing fluids, doing minor inspections, changing tires, things of that nature, not building airplanes from the ground up,” he added.

The aircraft shortage means pilots spend less time in the air.

“This last 30 days our average flight time per pilot was just over 4 hours,” said Thomas.

Ten years ago, Marine Corps pilots averaged between 25 and 30 hours in the air each month, according to one pilot. “This is the worst I’ve seen it,” he added. Another pilot who asked to remain nameless told Fox News that Chinese and Russian pilots fly more hours each month than Marine Corps pilots.

Marine Corps F/A-18 Hornets are supposed to have a shelf life of 6,000 hours, but they are being refurbished to extend the life to 8,000. There is talk that some aircraft might be pushed to 10,000 hours while the Marine Corps waits for the 5th-generation Joint Strike Fighter, which is slated to replace the F-18, but has been plagued by cost overruns.

“Our aviation readiness is really my No. 1 concern,” Marine Corps Commandant Gen. Robert Neller told Congress last month. “We don’t have enough airplanes that we would call ‘ready basic aircraft."

Col. Sean Salene oversees nine helicopter squadrons at Marine Corps Air Station New River in North Carolina.

“Unlike previous wars, we did not have a period of time afterwards where we did not have tasking,” said Col. Salene. “There was no time to catch our breath.”

Maj. Matt Gruba, executive officer of HMH-461, a Super Stallion squadron at New River took Fox News reporters inside one of the large helicopters, which has sent thousands of fully loaded Marines into combat over the past three decades.

Inside, hundreds of small wires cover every surface of the helicopter except the hard non-skid deck. It’s up to the Marine maintainers to inspect each one. One failure could be catastrophic, as happened in 2014 when a Navy MH-53E Sea Dragon crashed off the coast of Virginia after a fire engulfed the aircraft due to faulty fuel lines.

"It would be easy to miss some small minute detail, some small amount of wear [which] could potentially, eventually cause a fire,” Gruba said

Lt. Gen. Jon M. "Dog" Davis is the Marine Corps' deputy commandant for aviation, tasked with getting his aircraft back in the air.

Davis ordered the Corps to refurbish all of the old CH-53E helicopters to their pre-war condition, including fixing the chafing wires and jerryrigged fuel lines that were repaired in theater.

"The biggest thing is right now after 15 years of hard service, of hard fighting and deploying around the world, is we don't have enough airplanes on the flight line,” Davis said.

The cuts have not sat well within the military leadership. Former Defense Secretary Robert Gates told Fox News’ Bret Baier in a recent interview that he felt betrayed when told to cut billions from the budget after having already done so.

“I guess I’d have to say I felt double-crossed. After all those years in Washington, I was naïve,” he said.

And last week, the Army’s top officer, Gen. Mark Milley, said cuts could mean more American troops could lose their lives.

“If one or more possible unforeseen contingencies happen, then the United States Army currently risks not having ready forces available to provide flexible options to our national leadership. ... And most importantly, we risk incurring significantly increased U.S. casualties,” Milley testified last week on Capitol Hill.


Lucas Tomlinson is the Pentagon and State Department producer for Fox News Channel. You can follow him on Twitter: @LucasFoxNews

Jennifer Griffin currently serves as a national security correspondent for FOX News Channel . She joined FNC in October 1999 as a Jerusalem-based correspondent. You can follow her on Twitter at @JenGriffinFNC.
 
I guess this could help explain the USN asking congress for X number of additional Super Hornets, referring to the "fighter gap."

On paper, the USN has more than enough aircraft.  But, if only 2 of 14 aircraft are operational in the example squadron, and other aircraft are being cannibalized for wings, engines, etc - then they can't really be counted as being "in service".  In service doesn't always mean operational, I suppose.

What are the options available to the USN in regards to this problem?  I'd think a SLEP program for Super Hornets could be done via Boeing in a fairly organized manner.  Is it just not able to process aircraft fast enough?  Or is the SLEP expected to be done at the squadron level using USN maintainers, which could very well hinder progress.

Just curious.
 
This 2 out of 14 airframes operational per squadron seems to be very similar to the problem the Germans are currently having.
 
CBH99: See:

US Navy: Slow F-35C Arrival=Super Hornet Life Extension
https://cgai3ds.wordpress.com/2015/08/13/mark-collins-us-navy-slow-f-35c-arrivalsuper-hornet-life-extension/

US Navy plans SLEP for Super Hornet fleet
http://www.janes.com/article/57646/us-navy-plans-slep-for-super-hornet-fleet

How Long Will the F/A-18E/F Line Growl On? Part 2 (with RCAF implications)
https://cgai3ds.wordpress.com/2016/02/08/mark-collins-how-long-will-the-fa-18ef-line-growl-on-part-2-with-rcaf-implications/

Mark
Ottawa
 
CBH99 said:
I guess this could help explain the USN asking congress for X number of additional Super Hornets, referring to the "fighter gap."

On paper, the USN has more than enough aircraft.  But, if only 2 of 14 aircraft are operational in the example squadron, and other aircraft are being cannibalized for wings, engines, etc - then they can't really be counted as being "in service".  In service doesn't always mean operational, I suppose.

What are the options available to the USN in regards to this problem?  I'd think a SLEP program for Super Hornets could be done via Boeing in a fairly organized manner.  Is it just not able to process aircraft fast enough?  Or is the SLEP expected to be done at the squadron level using USN maintainers, which could very well hinder progress.

Just curious.

The USMC doesn't operate USN aircraft.  And the Marines don't have Super Hornets (and don't want them).

I believe that one of the many issues is fleet management:  they don't manage the fleet as a whole, but they manage aircraft in a squadron.  Some squadrons have all their jets and some have 2...  But no tail swaps between Squadrons.

We have same and older lots aircraft and we manage to have a decent serviceability rate.
 
Perhaps the USMC would operate the Super Hornet if they did not have reason to believe that doing so would cut their numbers of STOVL F-35? It seems to me the long  term goal of marine corps aviation is to get their aircraft entirely off of the decks of CVN's for some reason (corps cohesion?). I'm not suggesting they are running down their fleet on purpose, the op tempo is taking care of that.....but they were forced to agree to dedicate 5 squadrons of their F35 order to the flight decks of the USN super carrier fleet.  It seems to me the RN queen Elizabeth class would be the preferred type of flight deck for marine corps aviation doctrine. (without the RN of course...)
 
Torn 50-50 on this piece between this and the F-35 thread, but landed here ...
The Liberal government is intent on buying Super Hornet fighter jets, according to multiple sources.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s cabinet reportedly discussed the issue last week, and while no formal decision was taken, one top-level official said: “They have made up their minds and are working on the right narrative to support it.”

Rather than a full replacement of the air force’s aging CF-18 fighter fleet, it’s believed the purchase will be labelled an interim measure to fill what Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan has warned is a pending “gap” in Canada’s military capabilities.

The Liberals promised during the election campaign not to buy the F-35 to replace the CF-18s. But the government has been struggling with how to fulfil that promise for fear any attempt to exclude the stealth fighter from a competition will result in a multi-billion-dollar lawsuit, according to one senior defence official.

There is precedent for purchasing Super Hornets on an interim basis; Australia bought 24 of the aircraft about five years ago for $2.5 billion, to replace that country’s antiquated F-111 jets until newer F-35s were ready.

Sajjan, who recently visited Australia, warned last month that Canada’s CF-18s “need to be replaced now. And the fact they have not been replaced means we are facing a capability gap in the years ahead.” He indicated the government planned to move quickly.

An official in Sajjan’s office reiterated that sense of urgency on Saturday, saying the Royal Canadian Air Force has had to “risk-manage” its fighter jet fleet. Recent air operations in the Middle East and Eastern Europe have exacerbated the problem, the official said ...
 
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