What the RAF FAA should have bought
Discussion
All aviation enthusiasts can think of UK projects that looked like potential world beaters but got cancelled, but what of the reverse?
IE foreign aircraft the UK perhaps should have bought.
My suggestions. F14 or F15 for the RAF instead of Tornado ADV.
C141 Starlifter instead of Belfast.
A4 Skyhawk for the navy instead of Scimitars.
I've seen suggestions that the Saab Viggen would have been preferable to the Jaguar but I'm not sure in what way.
IE foreign aircraft the UK perhaps should have bought.
My suggestions. F14 or F15 for the RAF instead of Tornado ADV.
C141 Starlifter instead of Belfast.
A4 Skyhawk for the navy instead of Scimitars.
I've seen suggestions that the Saab Viggen would have been preferable to the Jaguar but I'm not sure in what way.
In an ideal world we could have had.
HS P.1154 supersonic Harrier for the RAF
HS.1197 Buccaneer for the FAA.
Hawker P.1083 Supersonic Hunter for the FAA.
TSR2 strike bomber
Armstrong Whitworth AW.681 transport.
Nimrod AEW/MRA4 eyes the sky.
BAe P.1233-1 Saba attack helicopter
And not rely on anyone else.
HS P.1154 supersonic Harrier for the RAF
HS.1197 Buccaneer for the FAA.
Hawker P.1083 Supersonic Hunter for the FAA.
TSR2 strike bomber
Armstrong Whitworth AW.681 transport.
Nimrod AEW/MRA4 eyes the sky.
BAe P.1233-1 Saba attack helicopter
And not rely on anyone else.
Post war there were far too many companies, the triple V bomber fleet being a perfect example, you only needed one, not three. Especially as one was clearly buggered from the off.
After that you had scores of companies all vying for contracts, and none of them ended up getting any as once Labour got in, they were hopelessly tied to US money so put off just about everything to make sure they got it and most projects were cancelled in favour of F4, C130, E3, etc etc
I certainly believe that Concorde if we were just building and funding it here would have been dropped like a stone. Thankfully we had someone to thank there for tying the UK and France into a binding contract.
SO you had Lightning, a fabulous plane but hopelessly useless at its later job which is why it was dumped, replaced by a Tornado that was actually better than a lot of people gave it credit for. The ground attack one also was a very good plane, so much so it still serves with lots of forces.
The F4 was a great plane, but perhaps not perfect for our uses mainly again as our dumb govt decided RR had to build engines for it. That were not used anywhere else worldwide in a widely sold plane. . The Jaguar was a fabulously put together project, delivered on time and in budget but difficult to fly, hopelessly underpowered and initially quite ruthless, but again once adapted a superb plane that delivered time and again.
Then you get to stuff like Nimrod, Shackleton, Buccaneer, all in service for far too long, Vulcan, Canberra, I think our airforce in the 90's and early 00's was delivering so far out of it's comfort zone it was astounding.
Very few success stories, Hawk maybe, to a certain extent Typhoon, and some smaller stuff, but the helicopter side has never really pushed on, so many other people do it better. SO many wranglings in the 80;s and 890;'s from Wetland etc cant have helped. The Lynx perhaps a standout
What might have been. Given time the TSR2 would have been a world beater but never really got a chance. Some of the transport planes were years ahead of their time. We had disasters like COmet yes. And Scimitar, a few others, but no worse than B70, Hustler, some Yank stuff was truly awful.
Sadly this was the beginnings of government not giving a toss about manufacturing and engineering, it was NOT ONLY Thatcher as everyone says it was happening in the aero industry in the late 50's, and now look at our pathetic dump of a country, full of warehouses, trucks, vans, half empty office block s and people who cant be arsed to g shopping, drive to a take-way or wash their car, while we pay millions to hotels every day to allow peopel to live here illegally, Joke
We got what we deserved but our leaders let us down hugely in the boom times.
After that you had scores of companies all vying for contracts, and none of them ended up getting any as once Labour got in, they were hopelessly tied to US money so put off just about everything to make sure they got it and most projects were cancelled in favour of F4, C130, E3, etc etc
I certainly believe that Concorde if we were just building and funding it here would have been dropped like a stone. Thankfully we had someone to thank there for tying the UK and France into a binding contract.
SO you had Lightning, a fabulous plane but hopelessly useless at its later job which is why it was dumped, replaced by a Tornado that was actually better than a lot of people gave it credit for. The ground attack one also was a very good plane, so much so it still serves with lots of forces.
The F4 was a great plane, but perhaps not perfect for our uses mainly again as our dumb govt decided RR had to build engines for it. That were not used anywhere else worldwide in a widely sold plane. . The Jaguar was a fabulously put together project, delivered on time and in budget but difficult to fly, hopelessly underpowered and initially quite ruthless, but again once adapted a superb plane that delivered time and again.
Then you get to stuff like Nimrod, Shackleton, Buccaneer, all in service for far too long, Vulcan, Canberra, I think our airforce in the 90's and early 00's was delivering so far out of it's comfort zone it was astounding.
Very few success stories, Hawk maybe, to a certain extent Typhoon, and some smaller stuff, but the helicopter side has never really pushed on, so many other people do it better. SO many wranglings in the 80;s and 890;'s from Wetland etc cant have helped. The Lynx perhaps a standout
What might have been. Given time the TSR2 would have been a world beater but never really got a chance. Some of the transport planes were years ahead of their time. We had disasters like COmet yes. And Scimitar, a few others, but no worse than B70, Hustler, some Yank stuff was truly awful.
Sadly this was the beginnings of government not giving a toss about manufacturing and engineering, it was NOT ONLY Thatcher as everyone says it was happening in the aero industry in the late 50's, and now look at our pathetic dump of a country, full of warehouses, trucks, vans, half empty office block s and people who cant be arsed to g shopping, drive to a take-way or wash their car, while we pay millions to hotels every day to allow peopel to live here illegally, Joke
We got what we deserved but our leaders let us down hugely in the boom times.
Edited by bergclimber34 on Saturday 31st January 12:34
bergclimber34 said:
Post war there were far too many companies, the triple V bomber fleet being a perfect example, you only needed one, not three. Especially as one was clearly buggered from the off.
The problem was, which one? The Victor was better in most respects for the initial role, but the Vulcan was better once they switched to low level. The Valiant B2 might have been better still.bergclimber34 said:
After that you had scores of companies all vying for contracts, and none of them ended up getting any as once Labour got in, they were hopelessly tied to US money so put off just about everything to make sure they got it and most projects were cancelled.
Once they amalgamated we had the worst of both worlds. Infighting within BAC, but manufacturing still down to blokes in sheds.bergclimber34 said:
I certainly believe that Concorde if we were just building and funding it here would have been droped like a stone. Thankfully we had someone to thank there for tying the UK and France into a binding contract.
Of course the parallel Anglo French program between Hawker Siddeley and Breguet to build a wide bodied subsonic airliner was dropped by the UK government. But Germany stepped in and it became the AIrbus A300.bergclimber34 said:
What might have been. Given time the TSR2 would have been a world beater but never really got a chance.
I did once read a comment that Bee Beaumont, chief test pilot of the TRS2, said that the TRS2 suffered a great deal from excessive vibration at low level and would have likely caused premature fatigue during its service life.Edited by bergclimber34 on Saturday 31st January 12:34
It may not have been quite the success as has been portrayed
FourWheelDrift said:
In an ideal world we could have had.
HS P.1154 supersonic Harrier for the RAF
HS.1197 Buccaneer for the FAA.
Hawker P.1083 Supersonic Hunter for the FAA.
TSR2 strike bomber
Armstrong Whitworth AW.681 transport.
Nimrod AEW/MRA4 eyes the sky.
BAe P.1233-1 Saba attack helicopter
And not rely on anyone else.
I get the “not rely” bit, but surely an A319 based European maritime patrol aircraft would have been preferable to all the cash that was wasted on the MRA4 & then the delay in getting hold of the 737 based Poseidon.HS P.1154 supersonic Harrier for the RAF
HS.1197 Buccaneer for the FAA.
Hawker P.1083 Supersonic Hunter for the FAA.
TSR2 strike bomber
Armstrong Whitworth AW.681 transport.
Nimrod AEW/MRA4 eyes the sky.
BAe P.1233-1 Saba attack helicopter
And not rely on anyone else.
alangla said:
I did, which is why I m wondering why you re advocating for a refurbished/re-engined/re-electroniced version of an aircraft built in the 1960s and based on one of the first jetliners, rather than a new build, fly-by-wire aircraft based on a 1980s design.
Some of the argument was that the older airframe was maybe better for that specific job, particularly due to the integral engines rather than larger low hanging external ones. The problem with updating was in trying to salvage/reuse the parts they did instead of just remanufacturing the whole thing.
The later airliners might be better aircraft in many ways but they had some different ideas as commercial designs that weren't necessarily great for that role vs what the Comet base could do.
It's similar with other ASW/ground surveillance jobs; the choice of airframe is more about making the sensors work than anything else.
My vague memories of ASTOR were that it started off looking at a different older non current airframe than it ultimately ended up with because they would have worked better with the design & antenna position.
trevalvole said:
I don't have the knowledge of many on here, but I'm inclined to say we should have bought the following two US aircraft that were designed with the KISS principle in mind:
A-10
F-16
A10 is a bit specialised. F16 was very briefly considered but rejected before the F14 and F15. Perhaps pilots didn't fancy chasing a Bear halfway to Norway with just the one engine. A-10
F-16
But for the wars we actually fight as opposed to cold war gone hot they both could have been useful.
FourWheelDrift said:
In an ideal world we could have had.
HS P.1154 supersonic Harrier for the RAF
HS.1197 Buccaneer for the FAA.
Hawker P.1083 Supersonic Hunter for the FAA.
TSR2 strike bomber
Armstrong Whitworth AW.681 transport.
Nimrod AEW/MRA4 eyes the sky.
BAe P.1233-1 Saba attack helicopter
And not rely on anyone else.
Politicians dear boy, politicians. People elected by people more interested in benefits and windmills than defence.HS P.1154 supersonic Harrier for the RAF
HS.1197 Buccaneer for the FAA.
Hawker P.1083 Supersonic Hunter for the FAA.
TSR2 strike bomber
Armstrong Whitworth AW.681 transport.
Nimrod AEW/MRA4 eyes the sky.
BAe P.1233-1 Saba attack helicopter
And not rely on anyone else.
Simpo Two said:
FourWheelDrift said:
In an ideal world we could have had.
HS P.1154 supersonic Harrier for the RAF
HS.1197 Buccaneer for the FAA.
Hawker P.1083 Supersonic Hunter for the FAA.
TSR2 strike bomber
Armstrong Whitworth AW.681 transport.
Nimrod AEW/MRA4 eyes the sky.
BAe P.1233-1 Saba attack helicopter
And not rely on anyone else.
Politicians dear boy, politicians. People elected by people more interested in benefits and windmills than defence.HS P.1154 supersonic Harrier for the RAF
HS.1197 Buccaneer for the FAA.
Hawker P.1083 Supersonic Hunter for the FAA.
TSR2 strike bomber
Armstrong Whitworth AW.681 transport.
Nimrod AEW/MRA4 eyes the sky.
BAe P.1233-1 Saba attack helicopter
And not rely on anyone else.
HS.1197. Yes, for RAF as well. Mk2 Buccaneers only got retired because they were old.
P.1083. Not really ambitious enough, no air to air missiles.
TSR2. Over ambitious spec and a simpler version would have been preferable. But yes it probably could have been made to work at the expense of the same teething problems the F111 had.
Nimrod AEW too ambitious. MR4A yes but new build rather than a restomod approach that superficially looked cheaper.
P.1233. Could have been a good anti drone aircraft.
The real answer to 'what should have been done with the TSR2 project' is IMHO, that the TSR2 and F111 should have been the same aircraft. The US should have realised earlier that the F111 would never have worked as a naval interceptor. The Warton and Weybridge bits of BAC should have talked to each other so Vickers swing wing research (which allegedly went into the F111) would have been available for TSR2.
Eric Mc said:
Austin Prefect said:
Eric Mc said:
Why?
Because they might have been better, or cheaper.And at that time, we still had an aviation industry that needed support.
I think the main word you need to understand is "politics".
The whole point of my question was what might have been different if politics hadn't got in the way.
Anyway 'supporting'. the UK aviation industry didn't work very well did it?
Governments should generally take the Swallows and Amazons approach to private companies.
'Better drowned than duffers, if not duffers won't drown'.
Austin Prefect said:
I'm asking which ones would have been better and/or cheaper.
The whole point of my question was what might have been different if politics hadn't got in the way.
And yet our armed forces now find themselves with US kit* which requires US support in an era where the US president is treating us like sThe whole point of my question was what might have been different if politics hadn't got in the way.
t. IF (big question, let's not go there) US politics get worse and there is a clear and long-term separation between the USA and Europe (inc. us), where does that leave our nuclear deterrent and the RAF?You can't ignore politics** when talking about defence - the French and Swedish have got that one completely right.
* Trident and F35 immediately spring to mind.
** I'm not just talking about 'keeping jobs on UK shores', but about simple viability and supply-chains.
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