Historic Air Force Plant 42 ramping up to build the B-21 Raider!

[Toxsins]

Yeah so some years back Iran managed to hack one of our stealth drones and make it crash land on an Iranian airstrip.

The big take away from this event is not the fact that the Iranians were able to hack one of our stealth drones.

The big take away is that the Iranians even knew it was there.

At this point, any adversary with the ability to shoot down these aircraft will also be capable of seeing through their stealth capability. As a consequence, we should abandon stealth technology in favor of high speed, high maneuverability, with a low cost, unmanned and disposable design with the expectation that losses will be massive.

[Wiyld]

Interesting. I noticed that Lockheed Martin is also hiring 500 new people in Dec here in Dallas/FtWorth TX for the F35 production.

Were building some crazy murder weapons here in the USA, may god have mercy on the next dip shit country that tries to attack us.

Meh, those plants hire/fire hundreds at a time all the time per the ebb and flow of production.

[Allybeboba]

More innovations!!

[Zeta333]

Solution is extremely simple. One you might have overlooked, even tho you did touch upon continuous buying. Guess what it is? Buy continuously, but here comes the very important part: without demanding xxx number planes within first few years. Why do you need production line for 50 planes a year to be open, when you could simply have it for one or two. That's right, minimal crew making one or two planes. You don't need to even gather grew and tools for 50 plane production line to begin with, and then turn it all off because "too costly", or minimal crew after churning them out en masse the first years, because "too costly". Start with the minimal crew. There you have it, production line open for 30 years, with new planes rolling out the whole time. No need for any sort of restarts either that way.



Pretty sure I know they haven't done raids on Russian or Chinese ICBM sites. Guarantee. You can take your clue and shove it.

Pretty sure you dont know shit about that planes operation history as its classified. But do keep pretending.

[Kellhound]

Yeah so some years back Iran managed to hack one of our stealth drones and make it crash land on an Iranian airstrip.

The big take away from this event is not the fact that the Iranians were able to hack one of our stealth drones.

The big take away is that the Iranians even knew it was there.

At this point, any adversary with the ability to shoot down these aircraft will also be capable of seeing through their stealth capability. As a consequence, we should abandon stealth technology in favor of high speed, high maneuverability, with a low cost, unmanned and disposable design with the expectation that losses will be massive.

Even if it was actually brought down intentionally by Iran (not a proven fact), the method describe by Iran to bring it down did not actually require the Iranians to know the exact location of the UAV.

[Nihilist74]

Isnt this the same as B-2 but with upgrades?

[Wildtree]

So you tell me, why is there need for more of them, when even last ones remained unused? The jihadis can be bombed with WW2 era gear, and that's where the limit of use has seemed to be for many decades, and some more to come.

The answer is simple...

Military Industrial Complex.
The USA's entire economy relies on it, down to the last job that exists. It's an artificially overblown economy that must - at all costs - be kept at it's size.

However, this comes with a hefty price..
The resistance, the disdain for the US's power grab all over the planet is an ever growing movement, and eventually that US strategy will be its undoing.
That's a slow process nonetheless, yet with the current administrations policy of isolationism, and nationalism, a slight speed boost is in place. The world trend is globalism, and a single entity trying to play the big shot is an outdated concept. We don't need that. We don't want that. And if said entity does not cut back and joins in the global community by itself it's perceived as a bully and thread, and sooner or later will be disposed of one way or another.

[Kellhound]

The answer is simple...

Military Industrial Complex.
The USA's entire economy relies on it, down to the last job that exists. It's an artificially overblown economy that must - at all costs - be kept at it's size.

However, this comes with a hefty price..
The resistance, the disdain for the US's power grab all over the planet is an ever growing movement, and eventually that US strategy will be its undoing.
That's a slow process nonetheless, yet with the current administrations policy of isolationism, and nationalism, a slight speed boost is in place. The world trend is globalism, and a single entity trying to play the big shot is an outdated concept. We don't need that. We don't want that. And if said entity does not cut back and joins in the global community by itself it's perceived as a bully and thread, and sooner or later will be disposed of one way or another.

The US military budget is 1/31 of the US total GDP, while the US spends about 1/10 of its GDP on health care. Numbers to not back up your claim.

[Skroe]

The answer is simple...

Military Industrial Complex.
The USA's entire economy relies on it, down to the last job that exists. It's an artificially overblown economy that must - at all costs - be kept at it's size.

However, this comes with a hefty price..
The resistance, the disdain for the US's power grab all over the planet is an ever growing movement, and eventually that US strategy will be its undoing.
That's a slow process nonetheless, yet with the current administrations policy of isolationism, and nationalism, a slight speed boost is in place. The world trend is globalism, and a single entity trying to play the big shot is an outdated concept. We don't need that. We don't want that. And if said entity does not cut back and joins in the global community by itself it's perceived as a bully and thread, and sooner or later will be disposed of one way or another.

Posts like this make me fundamentally question your value to this forum. I'm not sure where to begin with the outright lies and opinion masquarding as fact here. I will try to account for them all.

Military Industrial Complex.
The USA's entire economy relies on it, down to the last job that exists. It's an artificially overblown economy that must - at all costs - be kept at it's size.

This is the laugh line that got me replying in the first plasce. I was tempted to let this go as "oh this shit again" and go back to doing something else, but the more I look at it, the more the gall of even throwing this out here is just shocking.

Let's take a look at this claim shall we?

This is the US economy by sector.



*gasp*, as an advanced economy the US is, unsurprisingly, service dominated. What could be called the "Military industrial complex" would be some subset of "Government" and "Manufacturing", and maybe "Transportation". That would account for 13.1% + 12.3% + ~5% = 30.3%. But that's deeply inaccurate because i counted ALL of government, ALL of manufacturing and ALL of transportation. Clearly, GM building cars is not the Military Industrial Complex, nor is Vacuum Cleaner manufacturing.

So let's dig further.

This is industry as a percentage of GDP.



The Military indistruaal complex would fall largely under "durable goods manufacturing", maybe with some subset of "federal government". That comes to a total of 11% of the economy. But this includes ALL durable goods.



And at last we have arrived. It's a little old, but not much has changed. The Defense Industry accounts for about 3.8% of GDP, probably lower now considering budgets have been slashed from 2007 (the Iraq War surge). TO BE CLEAR SO THERE IS NO CONFUSION: this is not the defense budget as a percent of GDP, but the actual share of the entire industry versus the economy. 3.8%.

Lockheed martin has $47 billion in assets.
Boeing has $90 billion in assets
Northop Grumman has $25 billion in assets
Raytheon has $29 billion in assets


By contrast Microsoft has $251 billion in assets
Google (Alphabet) has $167 billion in assets
Apple has $375 billion in assets.
Cisco has $129 billion in assets.
Amazon has $83 billion in assets.

The Defense Industry employs 1.2 million workers directly, and 3.2 million workers indirectly (people employed in local communities).
Source: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-a...-idUSKCN0VP1PE

By contrast the Beureau of Labor Statistics reports that the Service sector employs 125 million workers directly. 80% of the work force. The information services industry alone is twice as large as the defense-industrial complex.

So let's have it Wildtree. Back your assertion. You tell me how companies like Lockheed Martin with revenues of $46 billion and income of $5.3 billion per year drive the entire $18.6 trillion US economy. You explain to me how, in your words, "The USA's entire economy relies on it, down to the last job that exists. "

The answer is, of course, they don't. You're a liar who made it up, on the spot, because you have a political opinion and you worked backwards from it. You don't like the global US strategy no matter who is president (second paragraph nonsense), so you want to poke us in the eye.

Let met just get a sense of your psychology. What are you hoping to accomplish by lying like you are? I mean, lets presume no one challenged your little work of fiction here. Do you feel better about yourself now or something? What just happened? Because that being the case would not alter the reality that your assertion is groundless, and it took a few minutes to dig up the data to show for it. And it's not hard data to find, because the impact of the defense industry on the broader economy is kind of a big, historic question that's been carefully tacked since World War II.

Honestly, and I don't say this often, you got some nerve. In my first post I linked an article about something that was happening, that fairly laid out the pros, cons, opportunities and risks. Then I went to the trouble of explaining this history of the B-21's predecessor, the B-2, and explained, in detail, why the argument for the B-21 is being made and why it is not the B-2. This is not an "America fuck yeah" thread. This is a thread about a major aerospace engineering / military procurement program that will take many years, cost tens of billions, and has significant implications on the broader defense budget, defense priorities, US strategy deeper into the 20th century and defense policy. It is not some kind of flying stealth hot rod that exists in a vacuum. It's technical specifications are ACTUALLY the least interesting part. What I find most interesting is the justification, how it is riding off of F-35 technology, and the industrial policy questions.


This thread has been an interesting exercise in psychology too. Heaven forbid the US buys a new military aircraft that "looks" advanced. And the best part is, I actually addressed a specific point on that topic on page one. It's totally a matter of familiarity. People somehow still think that a flying wing is somehow exotic. It's not. It's the best shape for the purpose, and no more difficult to build in 2017. We're used to tube+wing jets because we fly them all the time. It doesn't seem exotic to us. We don't fly a flying wing ever, so it does. But that is no different than taking a rounded 2017 Ford F-150 and transporting it back to 1980. People would think the advanced look is exotic, because they're used to the hard angles of the time. So in this thread, we've also seen who is capable of stepping outside their comfort zone a bit.


But no, we can't have an adult conversation about interesting things as adults. It always reverts to the same old lies, the same old slogans and the same old default positions. You don't like what you'd call "American military adventurism", so queue factually basis slam.

You should be ashamed of yourself. I thought better of you. Not a mistake I'll make again.

- - - Updated - - -

Isnt this the same as B-2 but with upgrades?

No. It's completely new. First few posts I made explain the difference.

Short version:
-1/2 to 2/3rds the size of a B-2.
-Probably 2x F135 engines (from the F-35) instead of 4x F118 engines. As a whole it likely integrates a whole slew of F-35 tech.
-Optimized for high altitude and stealth compared to the B-2, which had design compromises for low altitude penetration. So it will have a better range.
-All three of the above significantly drive down costs compared to the B-2.
-Planned equally as much as a flying stealthy sensor node and battle command hub as a bomber, which is not something the B-2 can do.
-Optionally manned. It will have a "drone" mode.
-Will probably replace the B-1B first, which is the fleet in the worst shape thanks to the War on Terror.

- - - Updated - - -

Yeah so some years back Iran managed to hack one of our stealth drones and make it crash land on an Iranian airstrip.

The big take away from this event is not the fact that the Iranians were able to hack one of our stealth drones.

The big take away is that the Iranians even knew it was there.

At this point, any adversary with the ability to shoot down these aircraft will also be capable of seeing through their stealth capability. As a consequence, we should abandon stealth technology in favor of high speed, high maneuverability, with a low cost, unmanned and disposable design with the expectation that losses will be massive.

The RQ-170 Sentinel... this aircraft...



[img]https://cdn-images-1.medium.com/max/1600/1*beKsf69EmbylMMazy7oDJA.jpeg[/img]
Is a stealth drone, but also older. Yet again, the psychological unfamilarity of a Flying wing has a "spooky" factor on people, even though flying wings are no more difficult to build in today's world than a tube-and-wing shape.

The RQ-170. Was declared operational in 2007, but first flew in 2001. The Iranian takedown, whatever that was, was the one blemish on a decade-long record, that includes, reportedly, missions over North Korea, China, Pakistan, Iran on other occasions, Syria and Russia.

THe RQ-170 is also an operational aircraft, which means that in its operation, the Air Force was prepared for a loss of it. It was state of the art... for the early 2000s. By 2011, it was in not.

What was? It's larger successor, the RQ-180.



The RQ-180, never photographed, has been flying since at least 2013. It ishuge... with a 130 foot wingspan, over 24 hour endurance, 2200km range, and a 60,000 foot ceiling. This puts it at about the size of a Global Hawk Procurement of the RQ-180 is actually believed to be what prompted the US Air Force to stop procurement of the Global Hawk - the RQ-180 can do the job, better and stealthier. It is believed that the success of the program was also a major factor in Northrop Grumman being awarded the B-21 contract over the Lockheed/Boeing team. The RQ-180 and B-21 are complementary.

If the US flies drones into enemy air space, it is periodically going to lose them. It is a shame a RQ-170 went down there, but it changes nothing with respect to the viability of the concept of stealthy, long range, high endurance platforms.

[Vertigo X]

Well at least it looks like it's going to be re-engined at last, either with four F138 (CF6) or, more likely, eight PW1000Gs.

Should have been done 20 years ago.

There's been talk about a re-engine for like 25 years. Maybe this will gain some traction. The interesting part will be after an engine update. When they trim the fat it will allow for more space for munitions. Also I believe they plan on doing a glass cockpit (like the J model c-130's) which means we may have a 100 year old airframe at the end of it all.

[hakujinbakasama]

I'm still hoping the SR-72 gets done.

Despite most of the armchair warrior poet philosophers, it's nice to see they are finally getting around to taking things seriously with regards to the B-2. It's still interesting to me that the A10 operates but given the last 15 years of engagement I'm not too surprised. What I wish they would partially phase out is the tank divisions but I get why they exist.

[Symphonic]

Hmm, doesn't seem so top-secret to me.

[Skroe]

Hmm, doesn't seem so top-secret to me.

It's actually quite top secret. We know extremely little about it. Most of what we know is based on very rational logical leaps from what information has been released. That process alone is rather interesting

We know that in 2017, the bomb load of the B-2 is excessive. Precision bombs have made that obsolete. The only use of the B-2's carrying capacity is for the very largest bunker buster we have. A follow up bomber would probably be smaller as Cold War era bomb loads are a thing of the past.

We also know that if the bomb load is smaller, then the aircraft would likely be smaller too, especially to keep within the $550 million per aircraft price target.

And if the Aircraft is smaller, the Air Force would probably want to make it a two engine, rather than four engine aircraft. Two engines makes the entire program far cheaper (you buy 200 engines + 50 spares for 100 aircraft, rather than 400 engines + 100 spares for 100 aircraft) and because maintainers will have to care for only two engines per aircraft instead of four, combat readiness goes up. THis is this the same economic case that saw two engine jetliners supplant four engine jetliners (i.e. why the 777 is more successful nowdays than the 747).

And if the Aircraft needs two engines, then the only real option if the aircraft is going to be larger than an F-15E, but smaller than a B-2, is a modified, non-afterburning variant of the F135 engine used in the F-35, which is the most powerful engine of its type ever produced. For comparisons sake, the F135 has 43,000 lbf per engine (so 86,000 lbf for both). The F118 engine in the B-2 has 19,000 lbf per engine, so with 4 engines, 80,000 lbf. But the F118 is modified to be a more efficient variant of the F110 used in the F-16 and export F-15E (and it's predecessor, the F101). A modified F135 would have greater efficiency at the cost of less thrust.


And this hooks into other observations:

First, Northrop almost certainly isn't going to do a cranked kite flying wing design. This concept was kicked around for the "Next Generation Bomber" for many years.



Why not? It's easier and cheaper to build a traditional flying wing. Not having a cranked kite design optimizes low-observability against lower-frequency radars. Additionally, the aircraft’s longer outboard wing sections would likely help increase endurance and operating altitude.

Which drives the second observation: since it is being designed with high altitude / high endurance, without the later low altitude pentrator mission that required a costly and complex late redesign for the B-2, the aerodynamically ideal shape is the original Advanced Technology Bomber design.



https://foxtrotalpha.jalopnik.com/ev...-an-1761480107

There's lots we don't know.
-It's being described as half bomber, half airborne battle manager. We don't know anything about the technical specifications of what that means.
-We don't know how drone mode is supposed to work.
-We don't know what the intakes and exhaust are supposed to look like (the Air Force still controls photography of the B-2's exhaust while it is on the ground. ).
-We don't know if the stealth coating is going to be easier to maintain or safer than the B-2 (its toxic).
-We don't know the degree to which it is going to raid the F-35 program for tech. It's believed to be substantial, but will it include F-35 computers?
-We don't know what the sensors are going to be.
-We don't know details of the design. Is it going to have windows at all? The Air Force has been kicking around for years having future aircraft entirely closed in to maximize stealth and have pilots be able to see outside based on images projected into their helmets (the F-35 also features this, in a different way).
-We don't know the maximum operating altitude or maximum range beyond what extrapolations of a modified F135 are capable of.


One thing is for sure though. The B-2s are centrally located at Whiteman Air Force base due to the need for unique support facilities. Those facilities have been replicated over the years in Guam, Diego Garcia (Indian Ocean) and the United Kingdom. From these locations, the B-2 can reach the entire world. But if the B-21 is going to replace the B-1B first, and then the B-52, it's going to need to be able to be stored in conventional hangers, or in less specialized facilities than Whiteman.

This however is in conflict with the statement "the B-21's stealth is far more modern and superior to the B-2s", unless there is a new type of stealth that can't be retrofitted to the B-2 (for cost or technology reasons) that is more rugged and durable. With the other two stealth platforms in service, the F-22 is less stealthy than the B-2, more stealthy than the F-35 and F-117, but has required constant care. The F-35 is less stealthy than the B-2 or F-22, but far more stealthy than the F-117 or any other aircraft, but requires no special care.

is the implication that the B-21's skin an up-rated version of the F-35's skin? We don't know.

- - - Updated - - -

I'm still hoping the SR-72 gets done.

The SR-72 is probably flying. Or at least a demonstrator is.
http://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone...-test-aircraft
https://www.thedailybeast.com/secret...ane-re-emerges
http://www.popularmechanics.com/mili...t-skunk-works/

But to be clear, it is very likely that a good portion of the SR-72 program is to move technology and aircraft that's been utilized for years, even decades, out of the classified world into the public sphere.

What I wish they would partially phase out is the tank divisions but I get why they exist.

Thats a strange statement.

[Kellhound]

There's been talk about a re-engine for like 25 years. Maybe this will gain some traction. The interesting part will be after an engine update. When they trim the fat it will allow for more space for munitions. Also I believe they plan on doing a glass cockpit (like the J model c-130's) which means we may have a 100 year old airframe at the end of it all.

To really trim the fat, they would have to pull the miles of unused wiring in those airframes. So long as the airframes are still safe structurally, updating them makes sense for the missions they do, though I wouldnt mind seeing a new bomber build off of a 787....

[Xargoth6634]

While I agree with Skroe on a great many things, I'm definitely not a fan of constantly pumping money into these military projects because boogeymen.

[Kellhound]

While I agree with Skroe on a great many things, I'm definitely not a fan of constantly pumping money into these military projects because boogeymen.

Just because you are paranoid does not mean someone isnt after you....

[ParanoiD84]

Looks pretty sexy, always nice with some new toys.