Little Bird helicopter replacement in question after Army cancels FARA

Sur le même sujet

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  29 novembre 2018 | International, Aérospatial

  Will the Thai Air Force get more Gripen jets?

  By: Valerie Insinna SURAT THANI AIR FORCE BASE, Thailand — The Royal Thai Air Force's Wing 7, home to all of the country's Saab Gripen aircraft, wants more jets. The question is whether the country's defense budget will allow for it, one official said Tuesday. “As operators, we know that this is a very good aircraft, and we would love to have more,” said Group Capt. Prachya Tippayarat, deputy commander of the RTAF's Wing 7. “But it's just that I don't know when. The Air Force will have to think about that.” The RTAF currently operates 11 Gripen C/D fighter jets, bought from the Swedish government and manufactured by Saab. The Air Force lost one Gripen in a 2017 crash that destroyed the jet and killed the pilot. With 11 jets left, it is more difficult to accomplish both training and maintenance, Tippayarat said. “So of course we are looking for the replacement for the 12th one. It's just a matter of when. As the operator, we cannot tell when we are going to have that aircraft,” he said, adding that the service might have other budget priorities. Thailand's 11 Gripen aircraft are operated from Surat Thani Air Force Base, located about 328 miles south of Bangkok. Defense News visited the base Nov. 27-28 and accepted airfare and accommodations from Saab. Surat Thani plays a key role in defending southern Thailand. Although the nation also operates Northrop Grumman F-5s and Lockheed Martin F-16s, Wing 7's Gripens are the Royal Thai Air Force's premier fighters, used primarily for air-to-air and air-to-ground combat, and for secondary missions such as reconnaissance, Tippayarat said. The Thai government is also considering an upgrade of the RTAF Gripens' software suite, he added. The jets are currently configured to the MS19 standard, but the potential upgrade to MS20 would bring the jets into the most advanced configuration for the Gripen C/D. The MS20 software adds capabilities that make the Gripen a more formidable jet for air-to-ground attacks, including an electro-optical pod that allows the jet to drop laser-guided weapons, the addition of Boeing's Small Diameter Bomb and MBDA's Meteor missile, and new radar modes. One MS20 enhancement that the RTAF won't need is the addition of Link 16 capability, the data link used by NATO and its partner nations. The RTAF Gripens run on the Thai military's indigenous network, Link T. If Link 16 functionality is needed, the service can use its F-16s, but operating Link T on the Gripen allows Thailand to protect its homegrown capabilities and information, Tippayarat said. Saab delivered the first Gripens to Thailand in 2011. Other Gripen C/D users include Sweden, Hungary, the Czech Republic and South Africa. https://www.defensenews.com/global/asia-pacific/2018/11/28/will-the-thai-air-force-get-more-gripens

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  9 novembre 2018 | International, Terrestre

  From crowd control to ‘wireless energy beaming,' the Army’s new vehicles must have more power but use less fuel

  By: Todd South As Army leadership looks to transform ground operations and logistics experts shave supply requirements such as fuel, work being done to generate more electric power with less fuel is at the heart of the land fight in the next wave of warfare. The two paths converge at work being done to “electrify” the future vehicle fleet at the Army's center for vehicle research – the Tank Automotive Research Development and Engineering Center. A November forum at TARDEC focused on advances in vehicle electrical power as service leaders, industry experts and researchers pursue ways to give more soldiers more power to run complex systems of the future. The first such forum took place in June and laid out an overview of what will need to happen to reach Army goals. Over the next year, participants will refine their plans to build a complex fleet of vehicles capable of a host of tasks not yet fielded. Vehicles have come a long way from moving forward and backward and carrying troops and ammo. “The electrical demands on the Army's vehicles today are growing far beyond anything we've seen before,” said George Hamilton, TARDEC's lead for Vehicle Electronics Architecture. “Our focus is on developing and providing a modular, flexible and adaptable vehicle architecture that can expand to meet future demands of all kinds.” And the goals are ambitious. The Army wants most of the electrification infrastructure in place or ready for testing by mid-2024 and a working, all-electric power train for the fleet by 2027. The systems and capabilities that the electrification project is pursuing are aimed at enabling seamless Multi-Domain Operations in which forces can access limited windows in the fight at various domains, from the traditional air-land-sea to cyber-electronic warfare-space domains. But, power demands on legacy vehicles only grow as more systems are added, experts said. Over time, that's meant entirely new wiring, amplifiers and other electronics architecture for the same vehicles that have been in service for decades. For example, in 2001, the standard vehicle only required a 150 amp alternator to power its onboard systems. Today, that same vehicle needs 10 times the amperage to run all of the weapon systems, computers, radios, monitors and cameras on current vehicles. At a recent talk at the Association of the U.S. Army, Lt. Gen. Aundre Piggee, the Army G-4, said that future combat operations will not be able to rely on forward operating bases. Logisticians will need to find expeditionary ways to move supplies, especially fuel, to combat units. Current brigade combat teams are able to operate for about three days before a full resupply. But Piggee said that the goal is to stretch that to seven days. To meet that end, a variety of options are being explored, but the main supply saver is reducing demand, specifically fuel. BCTs will need to use at least one-third less fuel to keep their standalone abilities at the one-week mark, he said. That extends beyond petroleum and to battery life, power consumption on smart grids, and anywhere else that technology procedures and advancements can make the formation lethal as long with less fuel or power consumption. So, at the same time that larger formations must be more self-sustaining and use less fuel, the systems that enable their fighting might will need more power. Tomorrow's vehicles will need to do much more than what's being demanded now. On the Army wish list are energy weapon systems to counter rockets, missiles and drones, wireless energy beaming to help with running unmanned ground vehicles and aerial drones with remote power, non-lethal energy weapons for crowd disbursement, silent modes for vehicle movement, high-power electronic jamming, electronic armor to deflect electromagnetic spectrum and projectile attacks, and long-range electromagnetic guns for multiple uses. And the backbone of those capabilities is an open architecture powering system on the next wave of ground vehicles that nearly any system built today or decades from now can plug into, and it will provide the power needed to run. Part of that, the Next-Generation Combat Vehicle Electrical Power Architecture, has been in development at TARDEC since 2012. Once implemented, the system is expected to provide fuel efficiency that will reduce fuel consumption by more than 10 percent and provide 20 percent more efficient power generation and energy transfer. That will put less strain on the vehicle systems while using less fuel and providing more power. And, it can take powerful hybrid vehicles, those using both petroleum-based fuels and battery or fuel cell power. This effort is coupled with a recent partnership between TARDEC and the U.S. Department of Energy into hydrogen fuel cell technology. “We think hydrogen as a fuel source, and the fuel cells that generate electricity from the hydrogen, will enable enormous capability for our warfighters,” Paul Rogers, director of TARDEC, said in a release. The applications go beyond fuel efficiency and reducing fuel logistics burdens. “Vehicles using hydrogen run on electric motor propulsion, giving very low noise and thermal signatures while in operation,” Rogers said. “Additionally, we can generate valuable electrical power using hydrogen fuel cells that currently requires noisy and heavy generators.” Both of those efforts could help not only operational forces in the tactical fight but the surrounding support that brings them their supplies. https://www.armytimes.com/news/your-army/2018/11/08/from-crowd-control-to-wireless-energy-beaming-the-armys-new-vehicles-must-have-more-power-but-use-less-fuel

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  18 juillet 2024 | International, Terrestre

  Missile Framework-contract for Rheinmetall: Bundeswehr orders 70mm-practice rockets for combat helicopters – envisaged order value over €100m

  An initial order worth a mid-double-digit million euro amount was booked in the second quarter of 2024