A Final Push for the Bedeviled, Beloved Osprey

The New York Times ^ | 07/06/03 | LESLIE WAYNE

[Bobsat]

Thanks. I guess you weren't a rated pilot then.

There's some Evil Kneival-type daredevil in all military pilots so you can always tell them, but you can't tell them much. No matter what the rules are or what the flight manual says, they will push the limits to "find out" what they really are. If they didn't have that characteristic, they'd be smart enough to stay on the ground.

I agree on the cross training. You really learn your first serious aircraft's characteristics well because of the pucker factor. After you get comfortable with it, the neural patterns take over in emergencies, and they're based on THAT particular aircraft. If you then transition to a new aircraft with different flight characteristics, you're liable to resort to inappropriate "remembered" solutions to emergencies. Besides military pilots don't retain combat level skills for that long anyway. If they're good, they get promoted out of the cockpit, and if they're not, they get transferred or separated. If those things don't get them, they'll start failing flight physicals as they age.

It doesn't make economic sense either. It costs $X to get proficient in a C-130. It costs $Y to get proficient in another AC. Great, we've spend $X + $Y on a pilot who's dull to and set in his ways in the new AC, and won't be much good in either. Most of the cross trained pilots I gave standardization training to in Vietnam were "good" and "adequate" but they weren't the "best" pilots in the unit.

Bona fide "Test Pilots" are a different breed altogether. Their skill and air sense transcends any aircraft. They can fly anything, and they're rare. They're guys like Chuch Yeager. I don't know what the odds really are, but I'd guess that fewer than 1 in a 1,000 excellent military pilots has the innate talent to be a test pilot worthy of the genre.

[Poohbah]

There's some Evil Kneival-type daredevil in all military pilots so you can always tell them, but you can't tell them much.

I've ridden with THREE. After one almost smacked me into cumulo-granite out at Bridgeport, I had a long and rather profanity-laden conversation with the OPSO. (I came in cussing a blue streak, told OPSO what just happened, and the OPSO began cussing a blue streak--if someone had set up a beat track and gotten us to rhyme the cussing, we could've cut a gangsta rap album on the spot! :o)

That hotdog was FNAEB'd, and spent the rest of his time as the Clubs Officer at COMCABWEST.

No matter what the rules are or what the flight manual says, they will push the limits to "find out" what they really are.

And if they wax a couple dozen grunts in the process, hey, stuff happens, eh?

On the maintenance side of the house: helicopters have a LOT of kinetic energy whirling around in variously-opposed directions. Get sloppy on maintenance, and the forces can tear the airframe apart.

And it's that way for ANY helicopter. Lose either main rotor on a Phrog or a S***-Hook, and you're dogmeat...

[Bobsat]

And if they wax a couple dozen grunts in the process, hey, stuff happens, eh?

I never dealt with transport pilots on a professional basis, but I suppose they're the same as any others, and they may even be a bit envious of high performance pilots who can play tag with the clouds.

Flying passengers is a lot like being a glorified bus driver, and I'm sure the temptation to "wring it out" is there. When it takes over, that people will die is almost guaranteed.

A pilot's mind must always be faster than the airplane, and how easy is that when outside of the envelope...?

I always thought of choppers as thousands of parts dancing furiously with the need to stay in tight formation. It was a useful attitude to say goodbye to everything before getting in one....

[Poohbah]

Flying passengers is a lot like being a glorified bus driver, and I'm sure the temptation to "wring it out" is there. When it takes over, that people will die is almost guaranteed.

Most USMC pilots are disciplined enough to not yield to temptation, or they'd've washed out of OCS & TBS before they ever went to Pensacola.

[Missmyson]

Nothing I say or do is incorrect you jerk!!!! Did I read the accident report, P-lease!!!!!!!!! Have you read the autopsy report - not hardly!!!! Did your son burn up in the Osprey, NOT! By the way, do you have the Coyle report?? about 300 pages worth - I doubt that too. YOu don't have a clue.

[thedilg]

The Article tells us that the unit cost of the V-22 is now $68.7 million. I thought I knew a little bit about military costing.

Unit program cost is total cost divided by the units to be procured. $60 billion divided by 458 airframes = $131/copy

Ignore $12 billion sunk in R&D The unit cost becomes (Note the word program is missing) The calculation now is
$48 billion divided by 458 airframes= $105 milliion/copy

Both of these numbers is a long way from the advertised $68.7 price tag. What have I missed?

Godspeed, The Dilg

[Bobsat]

Weren't the numbers based on 900+ projected units?

It would probably really scare the folks back home to know the real numbers, so more smoke and mirrors are likely being used.

[Boiler Plate]

Smed,

I have met two people who have worked as engineers on the Osprey and they were happy to get of the program as soon as they could. The Osprey is an unqualified piece of crap. When the designers want to leave the program because it is destined to become an umitigated disaster, it is doubtful things will get better.

Regards,
Boiler Plate

[thedilg]

Weren't the numbers based on 900+ projected units?

I have followed fairly closely for about the last 2 years. The quantity of 458 has been relatively static. Just recently the cost quietly jumped $2 Billion. I expect that the cost will continue to rise.

If the original program cost was $58 billion for 900 airframes, the original program unit cost was $64 million a copy vs todays $131 million a copy. So far this is just a doubling of the cost estimate. I always figure on a Phi factor increase. (3.1416) It hasn't happened yet because of the difficulties. Once they get production release from the DSARC principals look for the cost to about double again. My prediction. Hold me too it.

Godfspeed, The Dilg

[Jonx6]

I lost friends to aircraft mishaps. Never a child, or a spouse, just beer drinking friends of mine.

I always appreciated the sacrifices that the pioneers of flight and the pilots after them have made. They made great strides that others would expand on, and we all owe them a great thanks.

God bless the men and women who volunteer for these duties and missions, and God bless the families who brought up these people of such conviction.

It was an honor to work with these people then and I enjoy the honor of working with the very same caliber of people in the fire service.

I hope the work done in this Osprey program is not in vain, and I hope it yields much fruit.

[Bobsat]

The CATO Institute report referred to in #42 by Drago mentioned 913, but that was many years ago. It's basically 50 year old technology that they've been trying to get to work on the V-22 for 15 years. Bear in mind that we landed on the moon (repeatedly) 34 years ago, and even with all the advances since then, the Osprey is still plagued with seemingly insurmountable shortcomings.

Even if the technical problems were overcome )and it could land power-off), its horrendous price tag puts it in the company of the F-111 and Harrier as an expensive (potential) solution in search of a problem.

When the Military-Industrial Complex Eisenhower warned of wasn't looking, the excellent A-10 was developed and deployed. Relatively cheap, very effective, and irreplacable in the current inventory as the USAF geniuses found out when they tried to mothball it before Desert Storm. There's was just nothing like that flying gun to zap tanks!

Presuming that there is a real need for a fast VTOL transport, tell me again why Harrier technology won't work....

[thedilg]

Presuming that there is a real need for a fast VTOL transport, tell me again why Harrier technology won't work....

It was not my intent to badmouth the Harrier. But I will anyway. The Harrier is the Marines CAS (Close Air Support aircraft. It cost about $30 million a copy vs the A-10s $3 million a copy. The Harrier has short legs and short loiter time. About 1/3rd that of A-10. It is not a robust aircraft. It has fuel over, under and around the intake. It is full of high temperature tubing to provide Vstol control. It does not have a the mighty 30-mm armored killer. It has maybe 4 munitions passes per sortie. The A-10 has maybe 20 if you count the cannon which I do.

Even though investment cost of the Harrier is 10 fold greater than the A-10 it generates about .5 sorties per day. The A-10 generates 1.5 sorties per day. You get the equivalent of 3 fleets of fighters per airframe.

It can not take off loaded in VSTOL. When loaded out it needs a runway albeit a shorter one. It has the worst accident record of any jet fighter by far.

There is a technology called Short take off and land.(STOAL) It consists of bush pilot type technology. Lots of low speed wing, low wing loading, lots of flaps and a big engine putting air across the wing. It would cost about 10% of the the Harrier approach. It would be extremely robust easy to maintain and we could get many times more for the same investment.

The Harrier approach for a troop carrier /transport is a non sequeter. Once loaded it is no longer VSTOL. It does fine empty.

Godspeed, The Dilg

[Bobsat]

And you told me again! That's why I include the Harrier on my "solution in search of a problem" list. A complex AC like the Harrier cannot "live" in forward areas despite it being "designed" to.

The fallacy in the whole V-22 concept is that VTOL is needed or has ever been practical.

Hueys were theoretically capable of hovering out of ground effect at a significant altitude on a standard day. In Vietnam's Central Highlands where they had to operate tactically, the typical ground level density altitude precluded hovering out of ground effect at all. The routine was to fly them like STOL aircraft -- fly into the LZ on a final approach, enter ground effect, flare, touch down. Taking off was coming to a hover in ground effect, accelerating while staying in it until enough airspeed was obtained to climb and fly out. What made it all work was that improved surfaces and complex landing gear weren't necessary.

The Army had a twin transport built by DeHavilland designated a C7 Caribou, which was taken over by the USAF in the late '60s. I once saw about 30 ARVN soldiers board one along with a jeep and other equipment to take off from An Khe one summer. I was convinced it had to be overloaded, but it was at about a thousand feet above the runway end as it passed overhead.

STOL works, it's well proven, and it's cheap. One of the best examples I'm familiar with is the Helio Courier, a turboprop tail dragger that basically only needs a short area without too many tree stumps or large rocks.

A significant percentage of the world has a brushy ground cover and terrain that's unsuitable for any aircraft. It's also nearly impossible for a human to traverse without the use of a machete. Once troops are inserted, two problems remain: they have to be supported, and they have to be extracted. There are simply a bunch of acres of briar patches and mountain sides where that's not going to be possible via aircraft. There will always be some degree of humping that troops will need to do.