Military History | How To Make War | Wars Around the World Rules of Use How to Behave on an Internet Forum
Fighters, Bombers and Recon Discussion Board
   Return to Topic Page
Subject: Boeing wins KC-X tanker contract.
heraldabc    2/25/2011 4:19:55 AM
http://www.airforcetimes.com/news/2011/02/defense-boeing-win-tanker-contract-022411/ Boeing wins KC-X tanker battle By Dave Majumdar - Staff writer Posted : Thursday Feb 24, 2011 17:13:42 EST Boeing has won the long-running battle to supply the U.S. Air Force with a new aerial refueling tanker, the service announced today. The initial contract was a fixed-price incentive firm contract valued at over $3.5 billion for KC-X engineering and manufacturing development and the delivery of 18 aircraft, dubbed KC-46As, by 2017. The Air Force will eventually spend an estimated $35 billion to buy 179 planes. Based on the modern Boeing 767 twin-engine widebody airliner, the new tankers will replace many Eisenhower-era KC-135 aircraft, based on the Boeing 707. Deputy Defense Secretary William Lynn, along with DoD acquisition executive Ashton Carter, Air Force Secretary Michael Donley and Chief of Staff Gen. Norton Schwartz made the announcement during a briefing at the Pentagon this evening. In a Feb. 24 statement, the chairman and ranking member of the House Armed Services Committee vowed “to continue the necessary oversight to ensure the evaluation was transparent and fair to each competitor.” “We look forward to receiving more information from the Air Force as we review their decision-making processes. The Seapower and Projection Forces Subcommittee will hold a hearing on this issue as soon as enough information is publicly available,” said the statement by Reps. Howard P. “Buck” McKeon, R-Calif., and Adam Smith, D-Wash. “A Boeing victory means that the company retains a 50-year franchise in being the sole supplier of aerial refueling tankers to the U.S. Air Force. It’s worth tens of billions of dollars to the company and it also assures the commercial arm of EADS will not start building airliners in North America,” said Loren Thompson of the Lexington Institute. He said that Boeing’s victory caught most observers off guard; an EADS victory seemed all but certain. “The Boeing victory suggests that the Air Force was concerned about the higher cost of building and then operating an A330, which burns a ton more fuel per flight hour than the Boeing aircraft,” he said. Thompson said service officials did not consider the industrial base when making their selection. “This is purely about the price and performance of the competing aircraft,” he said. The program is likely to be the largest award during the Obama Administration, and a source of steady work for decades. If EADS decides to protest, the European firm may have the upper hand in a political battle, thanks to Republican control of the House of Representatives and their increased presence in the Senate, said Richard Aboulafia, an analyst at the Teal Group, Fairfax, Va. By contrast, Boeing’s political power seems to be waning. Still, he said, a lengthy battle is all but unavoidable. EADS sees the tanker contract as crucial for breaking into the U.S. military market, Aboulafia said. Despite EADS’ participation, the tanker contract does not signal that the United States is necessarily more open to foreign companies acting as prime contractors for large military contracts. “I don’t think this tells you much about the future access of foreign companies to the U.S. market,” Thompson said. “This is a one-shot deal.” The analyst said there were unique factors surrounding the tanker contract. Because the Air Force wanted a competition, industry sources said, EADS received a number of waivers for several “key performance parameters,” including the ability to take off from 7,000-foot runways, fitting into existing hangars, and refueling all types of Air Force aircraft — it reportedly cannot pass fuel to Air Force V-22s. As well, the sources said, the contractor will not be required to integrate government-furnished classified hardware. EADS and Boeing have been battling over the tanker for nearly a decade. In the early 2000s, the Air Force tried to lease 767-based tankers from Boeing under a sole-source contract, then tried to appease critics by switching to a plan to buy 80 aircraft and lease 20. But opposition to the plan, led by U.S. Senator John McCain (R-Ariz.), torpedoed the deal in November 2003. The tanker contract was further marred with the revelation that a senior Air Force contracting official named Darleen Druyun had steered contracts at inflated prices to Boeing in exchange for employment for herself and family members. The contract was formally ended in January 2006. In January 2007, the Air Force launched the KC-X tanker competition, drawing bids from Boeing and archrival EADS, which partnered with Northrop Grumman. In February 2008, the Northrop-EADS team won the contract with their Airbus A330-based aircraft. The following month, however, Boeing protested, claiming the Air Force failed to evaluate the two proposals using the published criteria. That June, the Government Accountability O
 
Quote    Reply

Show Only Poster Name and Title     Newest to Oldest
Pages: 1 2
hybrid       2/26/2011 5:02:11 AM
I've said it before and I'll say it again, the beast that EADS proposed is NOT what is flying in the skies for the UK and other countries that ordered the A330 MRTT variant tanker. It is also as much vaporware as the Boeing design. Both designs needed to be heavily modified to do the proposed roles and neither are flying. Furthermore its kinda pointless as has been said before to be buying a bigger plane for bases that can't support them (due to their size and space they take up at the base), having more carrying/offload capacity when we currently don't even use the maximum current capacity, and finally hell even fuel consumption was taken into account with the EADS bird having a much higher consumption (especially when calculated for a fleet over its entire lifetime). The RFP the last time around showed the Boeing bird had clearly hit almost all the marks requested and was supported by the GAO, if the RFP resubmitted basically still favors a Boeing bird then thats what the AF wants. Yes theres always politics involved but thats the world we live in. And yes I agree with Heraldabc, we're probably going into round 26 by the time this is over.
 
Quote    Reply

kensohaski       3/3/2011 6:30:34 PM

Welcome to my corner of the woods as regards typos.

 

Seriously with democrats and labor unions, did you think NG and the right-to-work states had a chance here, Doggtag?


 

This is not capability. If it was, there would be a fly-off and it would be done.

 

This is politics, so expect lawyers. 




Never mind that the under-built Airbus A-330 is a flying maintenance nightmare, still full of unknown design faults that will bite its users in the ass as it ages. The 767 has crashed just enough so that we have a good idea of what the new tanker has to be designed to overcome. Besides, the next AWACs supplement may be another 767 derivative the way things follow from this debacle.     


 

H.


 
What is it about the maintenence of the frog bus that is worse than the 767?  Just a question...
 
Quote    Reply

VelocityVector    In Comparison   3/3/2011 8:17:39 PM

What is it about the maintenence of the frog bus that is worse than the 767?  Just a question...


Access and points of attachment in the field.  Platform vibrating its constituents to premature failure.  On paper technically superior local electronics fail at a very very profitable rate. Airbus went light on a jumbo precursor for performance-sake and the chickens came home to roost. It's a flimsy system.  0.02

v^2

 
Quote    Reply

heraldabc       3/3/2011 8:24:02 PM
 

What is it about the maintenance of the frog French bus that is worse than the 767?  Just a question...

1. Longerons and stringers. The Boeing design is somewhat STIFFER.
2. I don't like the A-330 tail design. It has had some delamination failures that makes it still suspect.
3. Skin panels at the join. I'm not happy with Boeing's fit and finish but that is still better than Airbus. Still both of them are inferior to Bombardier and look at the problems they have!
4. Panel cracks. Boeing uses a better alloy. More fatigue resistant. We sell an inferior grade to Airbus (Yes Airbus buys a lot of skin panels from the US.)         .
5. Those are all maintenance problems
 
H.
 
 
Quote    Reply

Blue Apple       3/4/2011 6:26:14 AM
"What is it about the maintenence of the frog bus that is worse than the 767?  Just a question..."
Easy. One require an A-check evey 600 hours and C-checks every 18 months (and is made by Boeing) while the other require an A-check every 800 hours and C-checks every 21 or 24 months (and is made by Airbus).
 
Quote    Reply

heraldabc       3/4/2011 8:24:21 AM

"What is it about the maintenence of the frog bus that is worse than the 767?  Just a question..."


Easy. One require an A-check evey 600 hours and C-checks every 18 months (and is made by Boeing) while the other require an A-check every 800 hours and C-checks every 21 or 24 months (and is made by Airbus).

It might help to read.

The Airbus checks were recently revised  upwards at Airbus insistence. MOST average airliner A checks are averaged  between 500-800 hours and are subject to change upon discovery of stress problems in the flying fleet. Existing B767s had an engine pylon design  fault that introduced unexpected skin stress. Hence the 600 hours in that flying fleet (average). The C-check claim  for Airbus is for the 330 and 340 by the way-not just the 330.
 
 
 
Note that the 767 has skin problems, while there is now a known FRAME design fault in the existing A-330? 
 
H.
 
 
Quote    Reply

Phaid       3/5/2011 10:52:49 AM
 

?We?re stepping aside? because there ?are no grounds for protest,? said EADS North America Chairman Ralph D. Crosby, announcing the decision in Washington.

?What determined the outcome here was price,? he said of the Air Force?s decision, calling Boeing?s offer ?an extremely low-ball offer.?

Boeing?s bid price for the 179 airplane tanker fleet was $20.6 billion in today?s dollars compared with EADS?s offer of $22.6 billion, Crosby said. Taking into account inflation over the life of the project, EADS?s offer was $35.1 billion, compared with Boeing?s $31.5 billion, he said. Boeing?s bid details were based on the briefings provided by the Air Force, Crosby said.

 
 
Quote    Reply

eldnah       3/5/2011 2:02:38 PM
Also infrastructure costs were less because of size and take off distance of the 767.
 
Quote    Reply
1 2



 Latest
 News
 
 Most
 Read
 
 Most
 Commented
 Hot
 Topics