Airforce Going Retro? The Super Tucano

[saggs]

personally, i think the next attack aircraft should be a derivative of the A-26.

twin-engine piston aircraft, cheap to build, cheap to maintain, heavy ords load, room in the nose for 1 or 2 Bushmaster MK-44s maybe?

I'd agree with you except for the piston part.  Turbines are much simpler, much more reliable, much better power to weight ratio, can burn dang near any kind of fuel, need less maintenance, run much longer between overhauls. etc.

Basically turbines are superior to reciprocating pistons in every single way. (except initial cost)  A turboprop A-26 derivative would be sweet.

[Tac]

Meh they should just bring back the P-38 ....with modern materials and engines it should be able to haul a ton of ordnance

[Blackwulf]

It's just a matter of matching the aircraft to the mission.  Something like this makes a great ground support aircraft in a counterinsurgency environment.  That's pretty much what they've had in the drug war in Central America for how many years now?  I have to wonder why they have taken so long to look at something like this for the current Middle/Near East situation.  If I remember right, they are made by an American company, and sold to Central America through license by the State Dept.  Though with the state of globalization we have nowadays, that may have changed

The drones are great, but have their limits, especially in payload. The A-10C is awesome for it's intended role, which is to take out tanks, vehicles, and defensive hard points in support of ground troops in a large scale assault.  All of these are what is was designed for, and was originally intended to go against the Red army in Europe if need be.  It is not efficient in small scale assaults or support.

In the case of the A-10, politics also plays a major role.  The A-10 was originally developed and paid for by the Army, not the Air Force.  Once it was in production and placed in inventory, the USAF claimed ownership since it was a fixed wing aircraft.  Since it wasn't their idea, and it was an Army plane, once they were transferred over, they were sent to the Air Guard to basically dump them.  They couldn't be mothballed outright since the USAF didn't want to get Congress after them for the money spent (though the USAF did try to do that a couple times over the years).  So one of the best ground support aircraft in the world becomes the red-headed stepchild of the USAF due to power squabbles among the general staff. In the 1st Gulf War, the deployment of Air Guard units, and the new doctrine of combine force operations gave the A-10 it's chance to show what it can do, and the USAF has put some serious money into upgrading them and extending their service life.  They would be hard pressed to explain why they didn't   However, another retrofit to make them more of a counterinsurgency aircraft is very unlikely to happen, and would not be the most cost effective solution anyway.

[Rino]

Is JP-4 or whatever the military calls it, really any different then Jet-A?   It's basically all kerosene or naphtha.   I think an Airtractor and a F-22 burn pretty close to the same stuff, just the Airtractor is a lot more efficient.  Running turboprops where feasible instead of jets could potentially save the military a lot of money.

Right now around here Jet A is 40-50 cents a gallon cheaper then 100LL, so it's the little piston GA guys who are getting smacked hardest by fuel costs.

     The USAF stopped using JP-4 decades ago.  It now uses JP-5 aka Jet-A just like the Navy does.  JP-4 was preferred
before because it made airstarts easier, but JP-5 is safer to handle.

     One thing to remember about 100LL and Jet-A is that as a rule Jet-A aircraft use a heck of alot more of it than 100LL
birds do.  We had 40,000 gallons of Jet-A truckage and only 2,400 gallons of 100LL at Morristown.  The largest 100LL
aircraft I ever saw used <and that rarely> was a C-47 that held about 1200 gallons.  We regularly pumped 3-5,000
gallons into business jets.

[Rino]

I'd agree with you except for the piston part.  Turbines are much simpler, much more reliable, much better power to weight ratio, can burn dang near any kind of fuel, need less maintenance, run much longer between overhauls. etc.

Basically turbines are superior to reciprocating pistons in every single way. (except initial cost)  A turboprop A-26 derivative would be sweet.

     I'm not sure that an old design would necessarily be better than a new one.  You are absolutely correct about the
 engines but with new composite materials the airframes could be much lighter and stronger.

[Rino]

     Not sure what the Tucano would bring that the PC-9 doesn't already have.  The PC-9 from Pilatus has been a trainer
in service for years.  The Irish have even mounted weapons on it





     An interesting article about possible COIN airwing proposals for the US.

http://bayourenaissanceman.blogspot.com/2009/08/is-usaf-also-going-low-and-slow-route.html

[Old Sport]

Boeing is supposedly reviving the Bronco with the OV-10X

http://www.janes.com/news/defence/jdw/jdw100205_1_n.shtml

Older version with complimentary shark teeth paintjob. 

[Tac]

    I'd fly that thing!!!

[MiloMorai]

Old Sport, that is the a/c I first thought of.

[Buzzard7]

Tucano,Pilatus and Raytheon T-6 II are very similar. T-6 II is a good replacement for the tweets. Little turboprops are fairly fuel efficient.

If Boeing fixes the power problem with the Bronco it will be a nice COIN mount. Father flew them as FAC in Vietnam. Not a bad aircraft. I have seen photos of the OV-10 with a large hole in one tail where a SAM went through. The SAM couldn't arm fast enough to explode near the plane. It went through and exploded about half a mile from the Bronco.