Re: News - U.S. Air Force considers pilotless U-2
Pat Flannery
Rusty wrote:
>U.S. Air Force considers pilotless U-2
>
>
There was a plan to make a drone version of the SR-71 at one time also.
I've got a pin of a SR-71 sans cockpit windows or bulge.
Looks damn slick like that with the smooth nose lines.
Pat
Dale
>U.S. Air Force considers pilotless U-2
>The Congressional Research Service reported the U-2 fleet should be
>capable of flying until 2050 because of engine and cockpit upgrades
>done in the last 10 years.
Will the time come in which we are depending on 100 year old planes?
I suppose eventually they will be cloaked, and no one will remain
alive who actually ever saw one fly :)
>Congress prohibited the retirement of any U-2s in the fiscal year 2007
>defense authorization report until the Defense Department certifies
>that support to the warfighter will not be degraded.
"The warfighter"? Sheesh- "Homeland" Security, "First Responders",
"Ground Zero", "Warfighters". It's like a cheap novel... :)
Dale
pr...@prep.synonet.com
> On 14 Oct 2006 21:53:40 -0700, "Rusty" <reuben...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>>U.S. Air Force considers pilotless U-2
>>The Congressional Research Service reported the U-2 fleet should be
>>capable of flying until 2050 because of engine and cockpit upgrades
>>done in the last 10 years.
> Will the time come in which we are depending on 100 year old planes?
> I suppose eventually they will be cloaked, and no one will remain
> alive who actually ever saw one fly :)
Hey, fair is fair: Dragon Lady is only 50 years old. Or 51 at the most.
> "The warfighter"? Sheesh- "Homeland" Security, "First Responders",
> "Ground Zero", "Warfighters". It's like a cheap novel... :)
They couldn't call it "Fatherland Security", then people might notice.
--
Paul Repacholi 1 Crescent Rd.,
+61 (08) 9257-1001 Kalamunda.
West Australia 6076
comp.os.vms,- The Older, Grumpier Slashdot
Raw, Cooked or Well-done, it's all half baked.
EPIC, The Architecture of the future, always has been, always will be.
OM
wrote:
>There was a plan to make a drone version of the SR-71 at one time also.
...Cite source on this one, Patrick. I recall the D-21 drone
*carrier*, but not a Mach 3+ drone version of the Habu.
OM
--
]=====================================[
] OMBlog - http://www.io.com/~o_m/omworld [
] Let's face it: Sometimes you *need* [
] an obnoxious opinion in your day! [
]=====================================[
OM
>>Congress prohibited the retirement of any U-2s in the fiscal year 2007
>>defense authorization report until the Defense Department certifies
>>that support to the warfighter will not be degraded.
>
>"The warfighter"? Sheesh- "Homeland" Security, "First Responders",
>"Ground Zero", "Warfighters". It's like a cheap novel... :)
...There is precedence for this. Remember, the Air Farce retardedly
retired the Habu for some of the lamest reasons ever given for
scrapping a superior program, and Congress had to order it back into
use for the last few years of its operational existence. The fastest
plane in the world, and the Air Farce didn't want to use it?
And to think we gave those blue suited morons a memorial in DC this
week...
Henry Spencer
OM <om@all_spammers_WILL_burn_in_hell.com> wrote:
>...There is precedence for this. Remember, the Air Farce retardedly
>retired the Habu for some of the lamest reasons ever given for
>plane in the world, and the Air Farce didn't want to use it?
As I understand it, probably a good part of this was a paperwork screwup:
the money for SR-71 operations was coming out of the USAF budget, but the
USAF wasn't a major user of the data. There is a separate pot of money
for operations of "national asset" intelligence-gathering systems, but
past attempts to switch the SR-71 to funding from there had failed for
various trivial reasons.
--
spsystems.net is temporarily off the air; | Henry Spencer
mail to henry at zoo.utoronto.ca instead. | he...@spsystems.net
Pat Flannery
pr...@prep.synonet.com wrote:
>
>
>>"The warfighter"? Sheesh- "Homeland" Security, "First Responders",
>>"Ground Zero", "Warfighters". It's like a cheap novel... :)
>>
>>
>
>They couldn't call it "Fatherland Security", then people might notice.
>
>
Speaking of which, our ANG unit at Fargo (The Happy Hooligans) just
deactivated their last F-16s a couple of days ago. From now on they will
be flying Predator drones, with the aircraft themselves being based at
Grand Forks.
When this plan was first floated it was stated that their Predators
would be operated over Iraq and Afghanistan while under control from
Fargo via satellite.
But that seemed odd at the time because it would make more sense to
deploy the Predators on one of the coasts, where they could be ferried
to where they were going to be used.
Now that plan seems to have changed...now the Predators are supposed to
be used over the Canadian border to prevent illegal entries. But after
hurricane Katrina a law got passed that allows the military to operate
reconnaissance drones over the continental U.S., so I suspect the reason
Fargo was chosen is due to its position pretty well dead center in the
North American continent, allowing the drones to fly all over the place.
Surprisingly, this planned change in mission predates the hurricane and
the new law.
This spooks me a bit, as without that law the Predators would have no
real mission they could perform from Fargo.
Pat
Pat Flannery
Henry Spencer wrote:
>As I understand it, probably a good part of this was a paperwork screwup:
>the money for SR-71 operations was coming out of the USAF budget, but the
>USAF wasn't a major user of the data. There is a separate pot of money
>for operations of "national asset" intelligence-gathering systems, but
>past attempts to switch the SR-71 to funding from there had failed for
>various trivial reasons.
>
It was also supposed to be very maintenance intensive, and required
dedicated tanker aircraft to carry its special jet fuel around, so that
operating it ate up a lot of money
According to this formerly classified history of the aircraft:
http://www.blackbirds.net/sr71/oxcart/successortou2.html
It really wasn't as capable in the photographic job as the A-12 CIA
variant either.
"The OXCART did not even outlast the U-2, the aircraft it was supposed
to replace. The OXCART lacked the quick-response capability of the
smaller craft: a U-2 unit could be activated overnight, and within a
week it could deploy abroad, fly sorties, and return home base. The
OXCART planes required precise logistic planning for fuel and emergency
landing fields, and their inertial guidance systems needed several days
for programming and stabilization. Aerial tankers had to be deployed in
advance along OXCART's flight route and be provisioned with the highly
specialized fuel used by the J58 engines. All of this required a great
deal of time and the effort of several hundred people. A U-2 mission
could be planned and flown with a third fewer personnel."
"The CIA contended that the A-12 was the better craft because it flew
higher, faster, and had superior cameras. The Air Force maintained that
its two-seat SR-71 had a better suite of sensors, with three different
cameras (area search, spotting , and mapping), infrared detectors,
side-looking aerial radar, and ELINT-collection gear. In an effort to
resolve this argument, the two aircraft were pitted against each other
in a fly off codenamed NICE GIRL. On 3 November 1967, an A-12 and an
SR-71 flew identical flight paths, separated in time by an hour, from
north to south roughly above the Mississippi River. The data collected
during these missions were evaluated by representatives of the CIA, DIA,
and other Defense Department intelligence organizations.
The results proved inconclusive. Both photographic systems provided
imagery of sufficient quality for analysis. The A-12 Type-I camera's
72-mile swath width and 5,000-foot film supply were superior to the
SR-71 Operational Objective camera's 28-mile swath and 3,300-foot film
supply. On the other hand, the SR-71's infrared, side looking aerial
radar, and ELINT/COMINT equipment provided some unique intelligence not
available from the A-12. Air Force planners admitted, however, that some
of this equipment would have to be sacrificed in order to provide the
SR-71 with ECM gear. Information supplied by [38 spaces]"
Pat
Paul Suhler
> It was also supposed to be very maintenance intensive, and required
> dedicated tanker aircraft to carry its special jet fuel around, so that
> operating it ate up a lot of money
It's amusing to look at the early Project GUSTO maintenance estimates
for a Mach 3+ aircraft. In January 1959, GUS-0086 estimated FISH (B-58B
plus the FISH parasite) as equivalent to four times that for a U-2
mission. Lockheed's A-3 was estimated at two U-2s' worth.
I mentioned this to someone familiar with the Blackbird and he laughed
and said "Maybe two orders of magnitude more than a U-2."
The original A-11 design was intended to get around the difficulties of
operating out of foreign bases by flying out of the zone of the interior
(CONUS) and refueling. While the A-12 and the SR-71 depended on
refueling, they were still forward-based, in Kadena and Mildenhall.
Paul
Pat Flannery
Paul Suhler wrote:
>
> It's amusing to look at the early Project GUSTO maintenance estimates
> for a Mach 3+ aircraft. In January 1959, GUS-0086 estimated FISH
> (B-58B plus the FISH parasite) as equivalent to four times that for a
> U-2 mission.
The disposable ramjet pod on the FISH couldn't have helped as far as
mission cost went; you were dealing with a semi-disposable aircraft.
I located photos BTW of the radar pole test item of the final Kingfish
configuration:
http://www.testpilot.ru/usa/convair/kingfish/kingfish.htm
> Lockheed's A-3 was estimated at two U-2s' worth.
>
> I mentioned this to someone familiar with the Blackbird and he laughed
> and said "Maybe two orders of magnitude more than a U-2."
I talked to a guy who had horror stories about what engine maintenance
was like on one; the high heat precluded the use of Dzus fasteners
(whose springs would de-temper) so the nacelle was held closed by a very
large number of screws that had to be all removed one by one to get at
the engine- this apparently took almost forever to do.
What I found interesting was the fact that although it looked very
solid, the airframe wasn't stressed to take many G's, and the aircraft
was actually quite fragile when it came right down to it.
Pat
Paul A. Suhler
>The disposable ramjet pod on the FISH couldn't have helped as far as
>mission cost went; you were dealing with a semi-disposable aircraft.
>I located photos BTW of the radar pole test item of the final Kingfish
>configuration:
>http://www.testpilot.ru/usa/convair/kingfish/kingfish.htm
Actually, FISH was a single unit. The two-stage parasite was the original
Super Hustler bombing/recon variant. It had no requirement to be stealthy.
Here is FISH:
http://www.testpilot.ru/usa/convair/b/58/fish/fish.htm
And here's Super Hustler:
OM
wrote:
>Actually, FISH was a single unit. The two-stage parasite was the original
>Super Hustler bombing/recon variant. It had no requirement to be stealthy.
>Here is FISH:
>
>http://www.testpilot.ru/usa/convair/b/58/fish/fish.htm
>
>And here's Super Hustler:
>
>http://www.testpilot.ru/usa/convair/b/58/super/super.htm
...One of these days I need to quit goofing around, get 3DS fully
under my belt, and do up some meshes of these birds. These designs
deserve to be immortalized in some way, dammit!
Pat Flannery
Paul A. Suhler wrote:
>
>Actually, FISH was a single unit. The two-stage parasite was the original
>Super Hustler bombing/recon variant. It had no requirement to be stealthy.
>Here is FISH:
>
>http://www.testpilot.ru/usa/convair/b/58/fish/fish.htm
>
>And here's Super Hustler:
>
>http://www.testpilot.ru/usa/convair/b/58/super/super.htm
>
>
You got me on that one...did you ever see an illustration of the
Goodyear inflatable rubber ramjet that was suppose to go up under the
giant balloon? I'd love to see that one.
Pat
OM
wrote:
>>Actually, FISH was a single unit.
>You got me on that one..
...Congrats, Paul. You win an "I Corrected Pat" Army Surplus ProKit!
Paul Suhler
isometric drawing done forty years later. You might almost mistake it
for a D-21 until you see that the fuselage diameter is 15 ft.
David Lesher
>Henry Spencer wrote:
>>As I understand it, probably a good part of this was a paperwork screwup:
>>the money for SR-71 operations was coming out of the USAF budget, but the
>>USAF wasn't a major user of the data. There is a separate pot of money
>>for operations of "national asset" intelligence-gathering systems, but
>>past attempts to switch the SR-71 to funding from there had failed for
>>various trivial reasons.
>>
>It was also supposed to be very maintenance intensive, and required
>dedicated tanker aircraft to carry its special jet fuel around, so that
>operating it ate up a lot of money
A friend was slightly involved in the beancounting of same and when
I told him that NASA was flying same, he was agog....
Do you have ANY idea how much money it took to
run that program?
he commented
Mary pointed out it cost NASA a lot less to run one more weird bird
than it did for USAF to deploy to wherever and run a squadron of
same..
--
A host is a host from coast to coast.................wb8foz@nrk.com
& no one will talk to a host that's close........[v].(301) 56-LINUX
Unless the host (that isn't close).........................pob 1433
is busy, hung or dead....................................20915-1433
pr...@prep.synonet.com
> A friend was slightly involved in the beancounting of same and when
> I told him that NASA was flying same, he was agog....
> Do you have ANY idea how much money it took to run that
> program?
> he commented
> Mary pointed out it cost NASA a lot less to run one more weird bird
> than it did for USAF to deploy to wherever and run a squadron of
> same..
3 at the peak. The biggest saving would be that it is all from
Edwards, and if one HAD to go somewhere else you could go an get it
later. Having an operative 71 `drop in' without pre planning would be
at least very embarasing. So all those possibilities had to be factored
in and planned for.
Maintainance of them was also a right pain at every level.