Posted on 11/20/2011 8:52:19 PM PST by sukhoi-30mki
Hawker Beechcraft loses out on big Air Force contract
By Dan Voorhis
The Wichita Eagle
Hawker Beechcraft Corp. says the Air Force has informed the company that it lost out on a military contract worth nearly $1 billion.
The company had hoped to win the Light Air Support contract with its AT-6, an armed version of its T-6 trainer. But on Friday, the company said it received a letter from the Air Force saying the AT-6 had been excluded from the competition. The company wants an explanation.
According to the company’s news release: “The letter provides no basis for the exclusion. We are both confounded and troubled by this decision, as we have been working closely with the Air Force for two years and, with our partners Lockheed Martin, CMC Esterline, Pratt & Whitney Canada, L-3 WESCAM and CAE, have invested more than $100 million preparing to meet the Air Force’s specific requirements.”
The piston planes are designed for counterinsurgency, close air support, armed overwatch and homeland security.
Hawker Beechcraft said it continues to believe the AT-6 is the most capable, affordable and sustainable aircraft in the competition based on the Air Force’s specifications. The company has said that winning the award would have kept its T-6 production line running after 2015. The company has said that 1,400 employees in 20 states – including 800 at Hawker Beechcraft in Wichita – work on the AT-6 and T-6 programs at the company and its U.S. suppliers and partners.
The company said Friday that it had no further comment, for now.
The decision appears to leave the field open to the Super Tucano built by Brazil’s Embraer for the initial contract to supply 35 with the potential for 55 aircraft worth up to $950 million. And that doesn’t include foreign sales.
The Air Force’s move surprised aircraft industry analyst Richard Aboulafia of the Teal Group.
“They seemed to be the front runner for the contract,” he said of Hawker. “They had the most infrastructure spread over the most states and the most political support.”
He said the loss is not critical to the company’s survival, but it would have been a great boost to maintaining work and workers as the company’s T-6 contract runs down.
“The challenge is to build for the military market until the civil market comes back,” Aboulafia said. “And nobody knows when the civil market will come back, probably some time next year, but there’s no guarantee.”
Analyst Wayne Plucker, industry manager for aerospace at Frost & Sullivan, downplayed the importance of the contract to the company.
“It might lead to more layoffs and other adjustments internally, but I don’t think it significantly affects them as a going concern,” he said. “They just need to find another product niche.”
He said the Super Tucano was built specifically for this kind of mission, while the AT-6 is an adaption that wasn’t perfect. Embraer has struggled to sell enough of the planes so it has priced them very aggressively.
U.S. Rep. Mike Pompeo, R-Wichita, said in an e-mailed statement that he was disappointed by the decision..
“I have already demanded answers from the Pentagon on why they made this very unfortunate decision, and will continue to do so,” he wrote. “This contract is critical both to our nation’s security and to jobs in Wichita, Kansas.”
It’s a sad state of affairs when the USA cannot build a prop driven fighter attack aircraft. And we buy something from foreigners, that a corsair, mustang, or thunderbolt could slaughter,, outrun, out carry, and out range.
We could bring back Skyraiders and totally stack the deck,, turboprop it if you want. But buying brazilian is silly when we have 20% unemployment.
Dude,, thats the story as it was all over the news at that time. The Berretta was a sop to the italians to get them to agree to let us place medium range nukes there in the early 80s.
The beretta sucks compared to what our guys should have. And that open top slide in the desert is retarded.
Awesome machine,,that super tucano. Half the range, slower by 40 mph 20% of the firepower and a third of the bombload of a Skyraider. Throw in Carrier us for a Skyraider for free.
Maximum speed: 322 mph (280 kn, 518 km/h) at 18,000 ft (5,500 m)
Cruise speed: 198 mph (172 kn, 319 km/h)
Range: 1,316 mi (1,144 nmi, 2,115 km)
Service ceiling: 28,500 ft (8,685 m)
Rate of climb: 2,850 ft/min (14.5 m/s)
Wing loading: 45 lb/ft² (220 kg/m²)
Power/mass: 0.15 hp/lb (250 W/kg)
Armament
Guns: 4 × 20 mm (0.79 in) M2 cannon
Other: Up to 8,000 lb (3,600 kg) of ordnance on 15 external hardpoints including bombs, torpedoes, mine dispensers, unguided rockets, or gun pods
Prestige is an abstract concept. The COIN market is very small and the Super Tucano is pretty much acknowledged as the leader in that segment;sure a USAF purchase would be a crowning achievement but a lot of countries with such a requirement will want to buy it any way.
The Skyraider was also a maintenance hog, and in an era of precision guided munitions, payload is not a big factor.
Roughly,,,the super tucano is an SBD Dauntless with no carrier capability. Look at load, guns, speed and range. Freaking amazing,, and if thats what we need,, we can’t build it herein this country when we need the jobs? Insane.
Roughly,,,the super tucano is an SBD Dauntless with no carrier capability. Look at load, guns, speed and range. Freaking amazing,, and if thats what we need,, we can’t build it herein this country when we need the jobs? Insane.
Roughly,,,the super tucano is an SBD Dauntless with no carrier capability. Look at load, guns, speed and range. Freaking amazing,, and if thats what we need,, we can’t build it herein this country when we need the jobs? Insane.
Hmm..Nice stealth characteristics!
In an ideal world, a digital skyraider would have been the way to go. But in reality, would it have been developed fast enough and at an acceptable cost? That would be unlikely given the kind of expenses you see in US defense procurement. I’d guess that the Super Hornet was the last such affordable ‘maturity-based’ project.
It wouldnt be a maint hog with a turbo prop in the place of a radial. And with precision munitions,, imagine the loiter time when it carried fuel a super tucano cant. And not to lay it on too thick,, but 20 years from now, we might be somewhere that support from a carrier would be nice.
True true, It would take 20 years of development here. When in reality, it should take 6 months to be rolling out the factory door if government would fund it, and get out of the way.
The Super Tucano is to be built in Florida. Or that’s what Embraer says.
About carrier capability, I don’t think that’s prerequisite since the LAS programme is mainly about the USAF training foreign air forces like Afghanistan.
The pilots fear sending these particular planes into the modern combat arena will be like the Army's experience with the Humvees. Always playing catch-up against the enemy, “up-amoring” them so they are battled hardened enough to take some hits, and losing maneuverability and usefulness in the process, not to mention pilots.
A-10’s are a whole lot more expensive to operate, but are about the only viable option for the expected tasks. This will be even more true after the Libyan missiles find their way to the enemy.
Oldplayer
ok,, you are totally correct. My sentimental thought aside,, an A-10 is everything we need.
I give up,, i suppose a Super tucano does look slightly more capable than a Stuka Ju-87.
From the article: “The Air Force’s move surprised aircraft industry analyst Richard Aboulafia of the Teal Group.
“They seemed to be the front runner for the contract,” he said of Hawker. “They had the most infrastructure spread over the most states and the most political support.”
So then the analyst must have been in the bag for Hawker according to what you say must be the answer, therefore the responses I’ve been receiving all tell me the article is BS written by a local journalist with a trembling lower lip.
That statement smacks of pure politics. Nothing about aircraft capabilities, just how many Congresscritters would be in their corner.
Congress is the big issue here.
The Super T is available right now and can be bought while there is still a budget and a need to build them.
If they wait until Beech can supply an AT-6 they will never see a single airplane.
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