North American Rockwell / Boeing B-1 Lancer

[Forest Green]

Don't think they got rid of the capability but rather never used it. The long bay option was for the ALCM and ACM. The ALCM could only be carried internally because of the harsh acoustical environment that it wasn't designed for under the aircraft and the ACM integration was canceled at the end of the Cold War. At that time there was no need for carrying long weapons. Interesting that the AGM-183A fits in the long bay. Is the B-52's bay 269 inches or was it designed to fit in the B-1's bay? Just read where the bay was designed so that the bulkhead could be removed entirely resulting in a 31 ft. bay. Think the rotary launcher for that length would have too great of diameter to be useful (rule of thumb suggests 15 inches) but sure they could come up with other suspension systems.

All the wiring for nuclear pylons and nuclear weapons was removed.

START Lanced the B-1's Nukes, But the Bomber Will Still Get New Bombs

Every year, 10 Russian officials travel to either the Ellsworth or Dyess global strike air bases to review the B-1B Lancer.

www.military.com

 

[rooster]

Off topic perhaps, but when was the tooling for the bone scrapped and the ability to procure more bombers lost? When the B2s were looking like we weren't going to get what we needed, I had hoped for someone to realize a modernized bone with aesa and other upgrades would suffice as multirole bomber with a2a and maritime abilities. If we could have built just 48 in the 90s they would still be filling a gap or a need that still exists today. What would they be able to carry? 24 aim120d on rotary launchers? Heck that would be a great cruise missile killer with huge loiter times over thousands of miles.

 

[Foo Fighter]

It seems to me that we spend decades on projects, moving the goalpost. I believe early adoption with modernisation is the best way, look at how the 16 has changed from the original electric jet. Why should the bone not have a role with new wings or even new build airframes? Do they need the 21 for every role? Why not haul out the BUFF airframes from the boneyard and refit them, give the aircraft new engines and systems and you can retain the 21's for the high threat environments they were intended for leaving the rest for other duties? They apparently want MORE bomber airframes do they not?

 

[sferrin]

Because basically everything needed to make new B-1Bs is long gone. And has been for decades.

 

[Foo Fighter]

Reverse engineering the wing and main spars is hardly difficult. Improving them either.

 

[Forest Green]

There is no reverse engineering required really. The designs will still be stored somewhere, as will the designs for the jigs and the tooling list required.

 

[sferrin]

There is no reverse engineering required really. The designs will still be stored somewhere, as will the designs for the jigs and the tooling list required.

LOL Good luck with that.

 

[Forest Green]

LOL Good luck with that.

Oh it's not easy. You would have to rebuild the jigs etc. and arrange the staff and tooling, but there is no reverse engineering, it's merely repeat engineering.

 

[sferrin]

LOL Good luck with that.

Oh it's not easy. You would have to rebuild the jigs etc. and arrange the staff and tooling, but there is no reverse engineering, it's merely repeat engineering.

The required drawings are almost certainly gone. Probably a lot of the vendors too. Hell one of the buildings they used to build the B-1B was used as a soundstage to shoot the whirlpool scene in Pirates of the Caribbean. They could do that because the building was EMPTY.

 

[Forest Green]

The required drawings are almost certainly gone. Probably a lot of the vendors too. Hell one of the buildings they used to build the B-1B was used as a soundstage to shoot the whirlpool scene in Pirates of the Caribbean. They could do that because the building was EMPTY.

Wow, really? I worked in the UK defence industry and every document gets warehoused until after the aircraft is withdrawn from service. Naturally different companies would be involved where others have ceased to exist.

That said, I don't see more B-1s as a way forward.

 

[Foo Fighter]

No but, new wings might just be a way to maintain the ability of the bomber fleet via diversity. Why use a B-21 for low intensity ops and why not have a variety of aircraft in supporting roles to the 21's?

 

[TomcatViP]

because sooner or later the cost of a derelict complex airframe to sustain will offset that of a shiny modern one. If it cost less, is safer and can fulfill a larger set of mission, it's way more interesting to divest the old one.

 

[Colonial-Marine]

Back when Boeing offered the B-1R wasn't it implied those would be new aircraft?

 

[Orionblamblam]

I worked in the UK defence industry and every document gets warehoused until after the aircraft is withdrawn from service.

"Warehoused" as in "we shoved everything in a bunch of unmarked boxes and sent them to Iron Mountain to be forgotten alongside the Ark of the Covenant, the One True Cross, the card catalog from the Library of Alexandria, Excalibur, Flight 19 and season 4 of Star Trek, the one where Yeoman Rand came back and married Captain Kirk?"

 

[apparition13]

Back when Boeing offered the B-1R wasn't it implied those would be new aircraft?

No, they were to be refurbishments. Swap out the engines, activate the pylons, etc.

 

[rooster]

LOL Good luck with that.

Oh it's not easy. You would have to rebuild the jigs etc. and arrange the staff and tooling, but there is no reverse engineering, it's merely repeat engineering.

The required drawings are almost certainly gone. Probably a lot of the vendors too. Hell one of the buildings they used to build the B-1B was used as a soundstage to shoot the whirlpool scene in Pirates of the Caribbean. They could do that because the building was EMPTY.

Don't bet on the drawings being gone! One of my very first jobs out of college was transferring engineering drawings from a nameless combat aircraft into a digitized computer database such that the government could rebuild parts as the aircraft was going to serve a vital role for decades to come. At least that was the story that existed as to why it was being done.

I would not be surprised from that experience if there are digital records going back as far back as the F4 and F111.

My buddy ironically got a similar job for another company except he was cleaning up digital images of parts that had blotches caused by early photocopiers.

I guess no one knows then the bones tools were scrapped. The government probably didn't brag about it like with the tomcat. Either way, such a shame to have only built 100. Had tons of potential relevant even today. We throw away more capability than the rest of the world has combined.

 

[Forest Green]

"Warehoused" as in "we shoved everything in a bunch of unmarked boxes and sent them to Iron Mountain to be forgotten alongside the Ark of the Covenant, the One True Cross, the card catalog from the Library of Alexandria, Excalibur, Flight 19 and season 4 of Star Trek, the one where Yeoman Rand came back and married Captain Kirk?"

The documents all have specific numbering and their location is stored on the Iron Mountain database. E.g. the Ark is BAE/MAD/ARK/001 and 002 for the Spear of Destiny and so forth.

But seriously, the warehousing isn't that bad, after all, they are still releasing declassified documents from 50+ years ago.

 

[Orionblamblam]

But seriously, the warehousing isn't that bad, after all, they are still releasing declassified documents from 50+ years ago.

Sure, some. And often in terrible reproduction quality. Many's the scan of a diagram where only a few scattered line fragments remain to tempt you with the *idea* that there might have once been a general arrangement drawing there at one time. Look at what NASA-Langley did to the large format diagrams of hypersonic vehicles in the Penland collection. Gah.

 

[Silencer1]

We could see something similar on the other shore of Atlaintic ocean (Pacific as well) - Russia restore production of Tu-160 Blackjacs after decades of launching the last (Soviet-time) example. I'm sure that's not an easy task, though...

 

[sferrin]

We could see something similar on the other shore of Atlaintic ocean (Pacific as well) - Russia restore production of Tu-160 Blackjacs after decades of launching the last (Soviet-time) example. I'm sure that's not an easy task, though...

Difference is the line never went anywhere. It just collected dust. Big difference.

 

[Forest Green]

Sure, some. And often in terrible reproduction quality. Many's the scan of a diagram where only a few scattered line fragments remain to tempt you with the *idea* that there might have once been a general arrangement drawing there at one time. Look at what NASA-Langley did to the large format diagrams of hypersonic vehicles in the Penland collection. Gah.

The B-1 isn't that old though, there are probably electronic archives for its drawings.

 

[sferrin]

Sure, some. And often in terrible reproduction quality. Many's the scan of a diagram where only a few scattered line fragments remain to tempt you with the *idea* that there might have once been a general arrangement drawing there at one time. Look at what NASA-Langley did to the large format diagrams of hypersonic vehicles in the Penland collection. Gah.

The B-1 isn't that old though, there are probably electronic archives for its drawings.

I wouldn't bet money on it.

 

[Orionblamblam]

The B-1 isn't that old though, there are probably electronic archives for its drawings.

Electronic archives seem to be especially easy to corrupt, lose or delete. A single unfortunate click and you've welcomed a virus that will erase or encrypt every damned thing.

 

[Orionblamblam]

More prosaically, there could be significant issues with launching 30 year-old software applications, and converting data structures and formats, so they can be read by modern IT equipment. This is assuming the files are intact and readable in the first place.

Indeed. I've recently come across a pile of my old files... on floppy disks. Into the trash they go, because what the frak am I gonna do with a floppy disk? Is there a smartphone app I can download? Just imagine if they were on casettes (like back when I had a Texas Instruments computer with a casette tape memory system), or 8-tracks, or real-to-reals, or the giant magnetic disks?

And hell, I haven't played my favorite video game in some years becauae the frakkin' thing won't run on Windows 7 and beyond.

 

[Colonial-Marine]

Surprisingly enough there are companies out there that still make 3.5" floppy drives and disks. 5.25" is dead and buried though and presumably everything before that.

 

[sferrin]

More prosaically, there could be significant issues with launching 30 year-old software applications, and converting data structures and formats, so they can be read by modern IT equipment. This is assuming the files are intact and readable in the first place.

Indeed. I've recently come across a pile of my old files... on floppy disks. Into the trash they go, because what the frak am I gonna do with a floppy disk? Is there a smartphone app I can download? Just imagine if they were on casettes (like back when I had a Texas Instruments computer with a casette tape memory system), or 8-tracks, or real-to-reals, or the giant magnetic disks?

And hell, I haven't played my favorite video game in some years becauae the frakkin' thing won't run on Windows 7 and beyond.

Or old burned CDs that can't be read for whatever reason.

 

[Orionblamblam]

Surprisingly enough there are companies out there that still make 3.5" floppy drives...

Hell, there are companies that still make nixie tubes and Che t-shirts, but they're all still decades out of date and essentially useless for most people.

 

[Forest Green]

Surprisingly enough there are companies out there that still make 3.5" floppy drives and disks. 5.25" is dead and buried though and presumably everything before that.

I still have a 5.25" with Platoon on it for a C64 in the loft. I have it on tape too. Are we saying that my loft has better data storage integrity than the DoD?

 

[_Del_]

Well, A) it is the federal government. Someone could have wiped it with a cloth or something

and B) somewhere in Uncle Sam's attic covers a lot of area with several nooks and crannies, and the note he wrote fo remind himself of where it was stashed over thirty years ago could itself very well be stashed in it's own corner of the attic underneath piles of old National Geographic magazines, elementary school report cards and high school yearbooks, old luggage, boxes of books Uncle Sam still hasn't unpacked, baby clothes and kindergarten pictures, and clothes Lady Liberty promised herself in 1955 that she would lose the weight to fit back into one day.

 

[Silencer1]

In my humble opinion, this thread initially dedicated to current options for B-1' improvement and modernization. And now some posts (including mine) are mostly studing problems of information' storage, availabilty for usage after archiving/mothballing, different media types etc. Perhaps, this topic would be splitted - B-1 and infromation preservation?

 

[sferrin]

Surprisingly enough there are companies out there that still make 3.5" floppy drives and disks. 5.25" is dead and buried though and presumably everything before that.

I still have a 5.25" with Platoon on it for a C64 in the loft. I have it on tape too. Are we saying that my loft has better data storage integrity than the DoD?

You're assuming they still work. I had more than a few burned CDs from the 90s that no longer work.

 

[Forest Green]

You're assuming they still work. I had more than a few burned CDs from the 90s that no longer work.

It worked as of 1 month ago. As did Pac-Man on the VIC-20. To get back on topic, a B-1 is no different to Pac-Man, except the ghosts are the Taliban.

 

[sferrin]

You're assuming they still work. I had more than a few burned CDs from the 90s that no longer work.

It worked as of 1 month ago. As did Pac-Man on the VIC-20. To get back on topic, a B-1 is no different to Pac-Man, except the ghosts are the Taliban.

Best case, and all engineering drawings for the B-1B are in pristine condition, that doesn't mean all the subs did the same (they might not even be in business). Also, the production line is gone, the tooling is gone, etc. The odds of the B-1B being resurrected are zero.

 

[Ronny]

There are tools for new B-52 but there are no tools for new B-1? that sad

 

[Forest Green]

You're assuming they still work. I had more than a few burned CDs from the 90s that no longer work.

It worked as of 1 month ago. As did Pac-Man on the VIC-20. To get back on topic, a B-1 is no different to Pac-Man, except the ghosts are the Taliban.

Best case, and all engineering drawings for the B-1B are in pristine condition, that doesn't mean all the subs did the same (they might not even be in business). Also, the production line is gone, the tooling is gone, etc. The odds of the B-1B being resurrected are zero.

In that case I hope the USAF have lots of araldite.

 

[sferrin]

(J-B Weld. Bondo also applies. )

 

[sferrin]

 

[Ronny]

I really hope that this will help extend her life, I always feel like B-1 will retire too soon

 

[Foo Fighter]

This thread would seem to belong elsewhere.

 

[sferrin]

In the on again, off again, on again, off again saga of the B-1B it looks like, maybe, it's future is bright (until the next time it isn't)

Lengthening Life for the B-1 Lancer

P.S. I know this has been discussed in other threads but damned if I can find them.