Forum: General F-22A Raptor forum

That just looks like a software and process update project, not an airframe redesign.

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disconnectedradical wrote:

Can this be any evidence of confirmation?

"Boeing (NYSE: BA) has won a U.S. Air Force award to provide mission planning support for the F-22 Raptor.

Boeing will continue to develop and integrate the existing F-22 mission planning environment... The order was awarded under the Air Force’s mission planning enterprise contract-II, which is worth up to approximately $920 million over 10 years and was awarded to five contractors.

The order is worth up to $24 million.

Sounds more like a next-gen 'Super Hornet'ing' of the F22's 'mission planning' systems?

disconnectedradical wrote:

http://www.govconwire.com/2011/09/boeing-to-develop-integrate-mission-planning-environment-for-f-22-raptor/

Can this be any evidence of confirmation?

Boeing to Develop, Integrate Mission Planning Environment for F-22 Raptor

"Boeing (NYSE: BA) has won a U.S. Air Force award to provide mission planning support for the F-22 Raptor.

Boeing will continue to develop and integrate the existing F-22 mission planning environment, which provides F-22 crews with a full range of mission information.

The order was awarded under the Air Force’s mission planning enterprise contract-II, which is worth up to approximately $920 million over 10 years and was awarded to five contractors.

The order is worth up to $24 million.

“Our current support of the F-22 program helped us better understand the Air Force’s mission planning requirements,” said Mark McGraw, Boeing’s vice president for training systems and services. “We will continue to work together to improve the integration and testing of mission planning products throughout the MPE development lifecycle.”"

Mission planning support - could that be an "Elvira" (Mistress of the dark) type program as was used for the F-117's? As I understand it F-22's can plan their own mission onboard but the wording of the quoted news suggests this is an update to that perhaps... (at least to me it does anyway)

Unlike some people I tend to like the F-35...But... Being a bit of a F-22 fan as well, I think at this point I'd take the 750 raptors we could've had over 2500 F-35s we might not get. At half the $$$$$. The only thing is we have a "BIG" Navy to think about. What's the point of having the worlds largest Navy (at about 6 or 7 billion per aircraft carrier) and not give it the best carrier aircraft in the world. I'm all for new top end F-22s but we need F-35c at least and without numbers behind it the F-35 will fail. And one more thing...THEY WANT TO SPEND 60,000,000,000 on a mars rocket and 28 billion was to much for 187 F-22s. Just my Two Cents

^^^ Welcome to Politics.

Here's a little lesson.

1. A Moon/Mars Rocket will get you reelected, ala JFK style. "We choose to go to the moon, blah, blah, blah..."

vs.

2. Nowadays, spending billions building stealth jets, gets you kicked out of office for spending too much money. Heck, the Coombyah crowd would find a reason to complain about it, even if the dang things were FREE!!!

Condor, if the block 35 F-22 program line had survived until FY11-FY12, costing about $185-190m per weapon system cost, they might have been a prudent buy and something politicians could stand behind.

Going forward, politicians might adjust their support towards future VLO UCAV, as they will be really cheap... but unfortunately, Congress should be following the lead from strategic-thinking USAF policymakers, as related to prudent and sustainable long-term procurement strategy, etc. imho.

They just need to shore up the voting requirements again and that 'coombyah' crowd fails to vote. Just little things like stick your finger in the ink after voting.

Lockheed is also apparently doing this on their own, in quiet cahoots with Boeing.
Kinda hard to keep soething like that under wraps, wouldn't you think?
I'm waiting for it to show up on wikileaks..

popcorn wrote:

Lockheed is also apparently doing this on their own, in quiet cahoots with Boeing.
Kinda hard to keep soething like that under wraps, wouldn't you think?
I'm waiting for it to show up on wikileaks..

Would anyone suppose that the F-22 may be going into a limited "black" production run? Something that actually *could* replace the F-117? A quiet production run of +48 updated units sure'd be nice to have.

Quote:

thestealthfighterguy
What's the point of having the worlds largest Navy (at about 6 or 7 billion per aircraft carrier) and not give it the best carrier aircraft in the world. I'm all for new top end F-22s but we need F-35C's

I agree - the Navy definitely needs something to fly off it's carriers and the F/A-18's can't do it all. Unfortunately once the F-22 was cut, it was only a matter of time before the F-35 became a target of budget cutters!

sewerrat wrote:

popcorn wrote:

Lockheed is also apparently doing this on their own, in quiet cahoots with Boeing.
Kinda hard to keep soething like that under wraps, wouldn't you think?
I'm waiting for it to show up on wikileaks..

Would anyone suppose that the F-22 may be going into a limited "black" production run? Something that actually *could* replace the F-117? A quiet production run of +48 updated units sure'd be nice to have.

They did it with the Silent Hawk, and AFAIK no airframes mysteriously vanished. That had to be a separate line, so I see no reason that Dreamland wouldn't have a dozen or so stashed away in NV...

1st503rdsgt wrote:

batu731 wrote:

Isn't F22 LM's jet?

And if this was true, the technologies would be more than a generation ahead of what made of Raptor.

BOEING could just go for bidding of 6-gen fighter, if there is any.

Boeing is a major partner on the F-22, which is probably one of the reasons LM allowed it to go to $hit while putting their senior-varsity team on the F-35 (profits for which they don't have to share with their main competitor).

I did know Boeing was a subcontractor of F-22 program, what I meant was if Boeing had such technologies, they may as well have used them to design their own 6 gen fighter instead of upgrading a 5-gen platform which technically isn't theirs property.

DOD must already have started harvesting all technologies for successor of F-22, nano composite material, ADVENT engine, probably even AI that can compete with human brains, etc.

We need a few years for these technologies to be mature of course.

condor1970 wrote:

It is also quite possible that all this testing going on is just a way for Boeing to use an existing program to do some further advanced materials R&D, instead of starting up a whole new program for just that purpose. ie, use an existing format which is in place, and makes it cost less. Odd, but true.

Nothing odd about it at all. It actually gives you a very good comparison of your new technology compared to the existing one. Obviously, you build up to that level with coupon and component testing first, but what better way to prove "we can save XXX lbs with this new tech" than by actually doing it? I know of at least one company that did exactly that, building composite versions of existing metal structures to see the difference.

Plus, you can probably reuse at least some of your (very expensive) tooling, and you learn a new process in an otherwise-familiar environment.

batu731 wrote:

DOD must already have started harvesting all technologies for successor of F-22, nano composite material, ADVENT engine, probably even AI that can compete with human brains, etc.

We need a few years for these technologies to be mature of course.

That's the more plausible reasoning. Boeing is apparently hard at work on a 6th gen fighter for the USAF/USN, and funding it with their own finances. The F-22 makes the perfect surrogate for some of the materials technologies considering that the Boeing 6th gen is a supercruiser, as is the F-22.

Still, I'd like to hold out hope that we will see more F-22s (in any capacity) being manufactured. A re-engineered F-22 would be the less costly way to develop a 6th gen fighter. Considering the flight perfmance calls for supercrusising, stealth, and maneuverability... all traits of the current F-22. And given that the Russians and Chi-Coms are just now developing their answer to the F-22.... a re-engineered F-22 would be suitable for a 6th gen fighter. Like the B-1A was brought back to life, so to may the F-22 - I hope.

Forum: General F-22A Raptor forum

Scuttlebutt!!!