Author Topic: Going Foreign Again?  (Read 1337 times)

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Offline Crazy Horse

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Going Foreign Again?
« on: February 06, 2008, 07:30:37 AM »
It's amazing the stupidity of these poo flinging primitive idjits

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=259x10994

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unhappycamper   (1000+ posts)       Wed Feb-06-08 06:54 AM
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Going Foreign Again?
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Going Foreign Again?

It's 2015. Both the long-lived Boeing C-17 and extremely long-lived Lockheed Martin C-130 production lines either have just shut down or are finally about to close.

Neither Boeing's engineers in Long Beach nor Lockheed's engineers in Marrietta have anything new in the pipeline. Sure, there's some paper drawings of stealthy tactical airlifters getting some buzz, but nothing within at least five to 10 years of coming to flying fruition.

So, both manufacturers decide to do what all US defense companies do in this situation: they go foreign!

Lockheed locks arms with the company they spurned more than 15 years before on a potential joint tanker bid. So the Lockheed/Airbus axis offers the USAF the in-production A400M, which of course will be assembled in Mobile or Marrietta (or both) and fitted with a new 10,000shp-class General Electric turboprop or the Pratt & Whitney PW800, which was actually the orignal A400M engine before "the Chirac affair".

Boeing, which will never partner with the likes of Airbus, has to be more clever. They decide to link up with the manufacturer they briefly considered for a Joint Cargo Aircraft bid: Ukraine's Antonov! The AN-70 is a rugged beast of an airframe, and Boeing's engineers believe they can smooth out its aerodynamic and mechanical quirks. Boeing parks the new AN-70 assembly line somewhere in the US southeast, with Charleston (South Carolina), Jacksonville or San Antonio on the shortlist.

Article and pretty interesting discussion at: http://www.defensetech.org/archives/003987.html?wh=wh
 


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DrDan  (1000+ posts)      Wed Feb-06-08 07:08 AM
Response to Original message
1. sad to see these production lines shut down
 spent many many hours in the C-130.
Seems to me to be a turning point in the U.S. when we must venture with other countries for planes and the like
.

They are shutting the assembly lines down...............not grounding the aircraft.

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unhappycamper   (1000+ posts)       Wed Feb-06-08 07:17 AM
Response to Reply #1
2. I suspect there won't be much flying done in another 30~50 years.
 We should be well on the downside of peak oil and we damn sure won't be driving around 70~80,000 pound vehicles in foreign countries.


Also the joint ventures are for replaceing the KC-10's and KC-135's tamkers. Not transport aircraft as the C-130 and C-17 are.

Economics, military and sanity.............three things never to seek on Skins Island
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Offline Lord Undies

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Re: Going Foreign Again?
« Reply #1 on: February 06, 2008, 07:54:23 AM »
When are the DUmbasses going to join the 21st century and get off that "peak oil" meme?  Currently, the consumption of oil could double and we would still have enough known reserves to last two hundred years.  As  a bonus, new reserves are being discovered all the time.

Then there is my idea.  We must begin cloning dinosaurs right away.  If science can compress a lump of coal into a diamond, they can certainly squeeze oil out of a dinosaur.