US AWACS recapitalization for the 21st century

“The big surprise there was [an] unexpected amount and degree of non-recurring engineering required to meet the requirement that the [US] Air Force specified, which we thought was very, very close to what the UK is currently procuring from Boeing,” Hunter said. According to an Air Force spokesperson, that non-recurring engineering work is a major driver in the difficulty to reach an agreement on price.

The service is working with the plane maker to “understand the specificity of what’s kind of implied in the Boeing proposal,” Hunter added, which will help identify features that are essential and those that could either be deferred or deemed unnecessary.
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Air Force 'having a hard time' on E-7 Wedgetail price negotiations with Boeing: Kendall - Breaking Defense

Development of the Air Force’s first two rapid prototype radar planes proved more difficult than expected, according to acquisition chief Andrew Hunter.
breakingdefense.com
 
TomcatViP said:

Air Force 'having a hard time' on E-7 Wedgetail price negotiations with Boeing: Kendall - Breaking Defense

Development of the Air Force’s first two rapid prototype radar planes proved more difficult than expected, according to acquisition chief Andrew Hunter.
breakingdefense.com
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What kind of hot garbage of a company is BDS these days? This is a bloody joke. The core specifications shouldn't be that far off from what the RAAF paid for to develop and upgrade and even accounting to new specifications tailored for USAF need, there's no reason for the price to go up that higg when there are so many new orders lined up woth future users.
 
Maro.Kyo said:
What kind of hot garbage of a company is BDS these days? This is a bloody joke. The core specifications shouldn't be that far off from what the RAAF paid for to develop and upgrade and even accounting to new specifications tailored for USAF need, there's no reason for the price to go up that higg when there are so many new orders lined up woth future users.
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It's a company that has taken big losses up front on way too many contracts recently, hoping to make it up later and mostly failing. They desperately need to be certain of a profit going in to a new project or the corporate bosses will have their heads.
 
Latest version of Erieye ER should fit the bill. Boeing is trying to squeeze the money from DoD and NATO to float. And not forget Sweden will be shortly in NATO.
 
Someone here predicted long ago that Boeing and the USAF will be in this very same situation due to the ever peculiar demands of the AF in terms of specifics gears and other electronic equipments.

Well, it seems that's where we are today.
 
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Maro.Kyo said:
What kind of hot garbage of a company is BDS these days? This is a bloody joke. The core specifications shouldn't be that far off from what the RAAF paid for to develop and upgrade and even accounting to new specifications tailored for USAF need, there's no reason for the price to go up that higg when there are so many new orders lined up woth future users.
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You want to bet on that?
 
The USAF probably has a lot of extra toys it wanted on the aircraft beyond the basic radar fit out, especially in terms of datalinks and other coms. A RAF bird doesn't have to worry about the intraflight data link for instance, and might ignore MADL and just dictate that F-35s need to light off their Link16 if they want to share. And that's just the kind of pedestrian stuff we know about without any secret squirrel details.
 
Also, I bet that Boeing is no longer willing to take a loss on one-time engineering charges. Not when everyone is having to write off losses on contracts in the design stages or in LRIP.

"Nope, you pay full price now."
 

Sticker Shock Drags Out USAF's E-7 Negotiations with Boeing

A deal is expected soon on the Air Force's buy of E-7 airborne battle management jets, but negotiations are stuck on the development price.
www.airandspaceforces.com

The Air Force won’t say what it thinks is a fair cost for the E-7, but in a hearing of the Senate Armed Services Committee this week, Sen. Markwayne Mullin (R-Okla.) said a figure of $2.5 billion per airplane is rumored, and neither Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall nor Chief of Staff Gen. David W. Allvin challenged that figure.
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An Air Force spokesperson said the $2.5 billion per jet figure is “inaccurate,” but declined to comment further.

The E-7s in question would be prototypes, and that cost would not necessarily correlate to the other 24 Wedgetails the Air Force plans to buy
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Well, I still believe, and that dearly, that they aren't crazy enought to jack up the prices that much. Though, even still, it sounds absurd... One way or the other, I seriously think that the programme should see some competition, and IAI CAEW has been a joint programme with L3 Harris for a while.

For dozens of aircraft, I don't think it would be far-fetched to think the L3 would be able to setup local production and localize the aircraft to an extent so that it conforms to Buy America.
 
Bhurki said:
Timeframes matter.

E-7 was fielded in the 2000s. Ofcourse the USAF designing its sensing platforms NOW will want to make them more capable and survivable.

Same with Tempest. Its timeframe trails NGAD by about 6-8 years.

On one hand you have a 2000s design Awacs and 2020s design Counter Air for E7 and Tempest.

On the other you have NGAD and Future US Awacs being designed and fielded in the same timeframe.
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So, where's the new US AWACS which is going to be in service in time to replace E-3? I don't see it.

E-7 is needed by the USAF because there's no other US system or set of systems which can replace the capabilities of E-3 in time. The surviving E-3s are wearing out.
 
swerve said:
So, where's the new US AWACS which is going to be in service in time to replace E-3? I don't see it.

E-7 is needed by the USAF because there's no other US system or set of systems which can replace the capabilities of E-3 in time. The surviving E-3s are wearing out.
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Exactly. The E3s are out of life, and the E7 is IIRC the 2nd or 3rd proposed replacement for them.

One version was the E10. A plane intended to do both AWACS and JSTARS at the same time. Oops, the two radars didn't like working on the same airframe, and a 737 is a little too small to hold the JSTARS radar (engines block the view a little). Edit: E10 was originally proposed on 767 airframe, then downsized to 737 to save some money.

I think there was also an E767 variant proposed for the USAF, but I don't know how serious that was.
 
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Scott Kenny said:
Exactly. The E3s are out of life, and the E7 is IIRC the 2nd or 3rd proposed replacement for them.

One version was the E10. A plane intended to do both AWACS and JSTARS at the same time. Oops, the two radars didn't like working on the same airframe, and a 737 is a little too small to hold the JSTARS radar (engines block the view a little). Edit: E10 was originally proposed on 767 airframe, then downsized to 737 to save some money.

I think there was also an E767 variant proposed for the USAF, but I don't know how serious that was.
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Boing has built a number of E-767s for Japan... but they were simply 767s with the radome, radar, and systems of the E-3 - so nothing new.

A UASF E-767 type would require a new radar etc... with the E-7 the radar is already developed and in production.

JASDF E-767:

Boeing E-767 9 August 2007.jpg

E-767-AWACS-JASDF.jpg
 

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Kiltonge said:
No need for a new radar, the MESA tophat was already planned for Spiral 2 increment of the E-10. That structural design could be carried forward.
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There is a lot more than just the rotating dome and its supports involved with the AWACS radar--- all the electronics etc need to be different.

If the MESA dome was a new RADAR inside the dome housing, and had new consoles, processors, etc to go in the fuselage already designed along with the new antenna etc, then maybe it could have been used.

Having it "planned" for a later increment is not necessarily "designed" in terms of "ready for production".

It was the "in-service, thus no design etc work needed" nature of the Aussie Wedgetail AWACS (USAF E-7) that got it selected.
 
Scott Kenny said:
One version was the E10. A plane intended to do both AWACS and JSTARS at the same time. Oops, the two radars didn't like working on the same airframe, and a 737 is a little too small to hold the JSTARS radar (engines block the view a little). Edit: E10 was originally proposed on 767 airframe, then downsized to 737 to save some money.
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Each Spirals of E-10MC2A (1, 2 and 3) were later separated into their own stand-alone models, E-10A, B and C respectively, which solely focused on their intended missions.

Kiltonge said:
MESA tophat
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Tophat is the name of the endfire array component of the MESA system, afaik. The whole system is just simply "MESA".
 
Christopher Wang said:
Have the McDonnell Douglas DC-10 or Lockheed L-1011, specifically their proposed twinjet variants, ever been considered as AWACS platforms? What about the Airbus A300?
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Both of those were being touted during the whole of the 1970s--- but there was no way the USAF would base a critical warfighting system on a "paper" airplane when it looked like their order may well be the only ones ever for that type aircraft!

Boeing, Douglas, and Lockheed were given development contracts in 1963 - Lockheed was eliminated in July 1966.

Boeing initially proposed a new purpose-built aircraft for the contract but the USAF strongly preferred the in-production B707. Boeing then proposed that the 4 JT3D (TF33) engines be replaced by 8 TF34s to meet the endurance requirement, but that was relaxed, allowing the retention of the current engine fit.

Boeing won the competition in July 1970 - right when McD and Lockheed were proposing their wide twins... but the USAF had decided for an already-flying aircraft, not napkinware.

The E-3A began deliveries to the USAF in March 1977, continuing to be produced until 1992.


The USAF picked correctly, as both McD and Lockheed had dropped their proposed twins by the early 1980s (Lockheed in particular announced its ending of all airliner production in 1981).

This is an interesting telling of the sad saga of McD's wide-body twin proposals:


As for the A300... while there was any US manufacturer capable of building a suitable airframe, there was no chance whatsoever they would select a foreign design in that time period.
 
BlackBat242 said:
As for the A300... while there was any US manufacturer capable of building a suitable airframe, there was no chance whatsoever they would select a foreign design in that time period.
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Raytheon bid as prime contractor using the A310 for the Australian contract that was won by the Wedgetail. It used a non rotating AESA from IAI, albeit in a conventional E3 style radome.
 
bobthemonkey said:
Raytheon bid as prime contractor using the A310 for the Australian contract that was won by the Wedgetail. It used a non rotating AESA from IAI, albeit in a conventional E3 style radome.
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That was some 29 years after the AWACS contract award.

E-3A (USAF) contract awarded 1970, Wedgetail (RAAF) contract awarded 1999.
 
French MPs call for AWACS aircraft to be replaced by 2025.
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The article is almost 6 months old.

And it does NOT call for the replacement to be done by 2025, rather the start of the replacement has that date.

According to information published by Opex360 on November 11, 2024, a recent parliamentary report has highlighted the urgent need to accelerate the replacement of the E-3F AWACS aircraft operated by the French Air Force.
The report points out that prolonging the service life of the current E-3F fleet until 2035 could be counterproductive.
.....
The report, therefore, recommends a 2025 timeline for launching a replacement program as part of the next annual adjustment of the military budget.
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