UK Defence Forum

The Germans

Only probable if linked to a boxer deal.

shark bait wrote:The Germans

Only probable if linked to a boxer deal.

You have not seen the availability stats; the navy related helos are in dire straits there - even SAR capability has a question mark, not to mention being able to do any ASW (w/o a year of notice... buying some spares, and that kind of thing)

http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1 ... ode=cdan20

The readily available quote omits the ones that (supposedly) are available to operate from ships.

thought the germans were committed to NH90

Does anyone know if this will help sustain any jobs in Yeovil? I presume they are actually manufactured and built in Italy?

http://www.defense-aerospace.com/articl ... pters.html

Leonardo is an Italian firm with a site in the U.K., For now. I suspect that site lasts as long as 101 and 159 production and no longer, and the order book is very lean.

RichardIC wrote:Leonardo is an Italian firm with a site in the U.K., For now. I suspect that site lasts as long as 101 and 159 production and no longer, and the order book is very lean.

Thanks for the info

Opinion only. Leonardo will still have long-term maintenance deals. I'm sure they'll keep a rump operation going to soak up the cash, but I wouldn't be surprised if manufacture had ceased within five years.

Its not just a site, they have lots of site in the UK, doing more than just helicopters. For instance Leonardo are one of the leading authorities on electronic warfare in Europe, with those operations coming from the UK.

The question was about helicopter manufacture in Yeovil

"Somerset manufacturer awarded £8m grant to research army helicopter drones"

http://www.itv.com/news/westcountry/201 ... er-drones/

If they want to keep it open they need civil production/sales, not just niche military. Government should have bribed.... Ahmmmm, I mean, loaned Leo to build the 169 in the UK.

Backed by our rising defence budget and £178bn Equipment Plan, blah, Blah.. 8m doesn't seem like much. I can see Leonardo having to shed jobs soon.

They will do, there isn't a major development program on the way on the scale that they'd need to keep their staff as far as I know.

It's a strategic decision at the end of the day.

They have the Crowsnest conversions but that too is hardly enough to keep them active.

Phase 2 for the RWUAS program has been launched, Leonardo got £8 million for a 2 year R&D contract covering the operation of a RW/VTOL UAS. Progress to be based on that from Unmanned Warrior 2016

http://www.janes.com/article/68398/uk-m ... -programme

According to the 27 February UK Ministry of Defence (MoD) announcement, the MoD is partnering with Leonardo Helicopters to use the demonstrator as a tool to explore how unmanned air systems can support battlefield personnel and develop emerging concepts of operations (CONOPS), methods, and technologies.

https://www.aerosociety.com/news/radar- ... -frontier/

A major supplier of electronic and mechanical radar defence systems for leading aircraft programmes, including the Eurofighter Typhoon and Gripen E, Leonardo is developing a new lightweight compact range of radar systems designed for smaller and unmanned civil and military aircraft platforms. BILL READ FRAeS reports from Edinburgh and Milan.

Among the AESA products made in Edinburgh are the Seaspray and Osprey radars. Comprising two primary air-cooled line replaceable units (LRU), Seaspray uses composite mechanical and electronic scanning to cover air-to-surface, air-to-air and air-to-ground environments. “The advantage of Seaspray AESA radar is that it gets rid of lots of other equipment and allows us to put it onto platforms very quickly and efficiently,” said Brendan Nolan, Electronics division, Vice President Sales - Radar & Advanced Targeting. “The equipment needed for our Seaspray AESA radar can be summarised as two black boxes, a piece of electric string, GPS and power. With multiple transmit receive modules (TRMs), there is no longer the risk of one failure incapacitating the whole system. You can think of it like multiple LED lights in your kitchen - if one goes out, then you’ve still got all the others.”

The Seaspray range currently includes the Seaspray 5000E, Seaspray 7000E and Seaspray 7500E. The Royal Navy was the launch customer for the Seaspray 7000E for use in the AW159 Lynx Wildcat while the US Coastguard was the first to order the Seaspray 7500E for use on Patroller UAVs. Leonardo has since sold AESA surveillance radars to 30 countries.

Osprey
A new addition to Leonard’s expanding AESA portfolio is the Osprey E-Scan lightweight airborne surveillance phased array radar. Fitted with three fixed antennae panels, Leonardo claims that the Osprey is the only one of its type currently available which can offer full ‘spherical coverage’ with no moving parts. Launched in 2016, the Osprey low size, weight and power (SWaP) radar system incorporates elements from Leonardo’s maritime Seaspray, overland PicoStar and air-to-air Vixen radars.

Over 40 Ospreys have been ordered by eight different customer and it is now in use on platforms ranging from the US Navy’s MQ-8C Fire Scout unmanned helicopter to Leonardo’s AW101 search and rescue helicopters operated by the Royal Norwegian Air Force. A larger aperture variant, the Osprey 50, was launched in 2018, for which Leonardo says it has already received two orders.

Seapray and Osprey AESA radars can detect small and fast-moving targets at long range and over a wide area. They can be used at sea in both good and bad weather conditions, are able to detect oil slicks, icebergs and air-to-air targets as well as being used for ground mapping. The radar systems can also utilise long range inverse synthetic aperture radar (ISAR) to generate a two-dimensional high-resolution image of a target.

“Using ISAR can greatly aid classification and ID,” said Nolan. “To track targets at sea used to involve flying a surveillance aircraft at 10,000ft for up to four hours. With the new radar technology we can now automatically detect targets and identify what they are. For example, we could identify a target at a range of 54nm travelling at 11kt in a Force 7 wind. We can command the radar to ‘stop and stare’ and get an image showing the outline of the ship, its shape and dimensions, course and speed. If the ship is using an automatic identification system (AIS), we can identify it. If it’s using a false AIS, then we can check to see what it is. We don’t need a camera, we can look through cloud and all this can be achieved using a basic radar 20in long.”

Another advantage of AESA radar is their ability to detect small targets – a great advantage in air-sea rescue missions. “Detecting a small target in high sea states is tough,” said Nolan. “A traditional mechanical scan radar finds it hard to find an individual in water – you either have to fly low or spin the radar faster to eliminate clutter to try to see into wave. However, Seaspray/Osprey radars can get multiple hits electronically – the equivalent of operating a mechanical radar at 5,000rpm.” He also gave an example of how, on a military surveillance mission, the radar can detect a moving or stationary submarine attack periscope, even if it had only broken the surface for 15-20secs

AESA radars can also be used for ground surveillance missions. “A radar can take pictures as good as a camera from an aircraft flying at 10,000ft above cloud,” said Nolan. He gave an example of how an AESA radar had been able to identify the position of a golfer’s aircraft on the ground and identify it as a King Air 350ER.

Interesting tilt rotor concept from Leonardo. Could be of interest to the RN?

Looks like the USAF are having a look see at BriteCloud for their F-16, just a trial but could lead to an order. This will be in the 218 form factor Britecloud that was recently tested on a Danish F-16 (UK uses the circular 55mm version).

https://airforcesmonthly.keypublishing. ... oud-decoy/

https://www.leonardocompany.com/en/prod ... itecloud-3



https://ukdefencejournal.org.uk/leonard ... -exercise/

Not sure what market Leonardo are aiming for with this one. The Italian's have recently bought Reaper and the European MALE drone (the Mantis look alike) is at the show as well.

Possibility of an order for a further two Wildcat for the Philippine Navy.

https://www.defense-aerospace.com/artic ... ettes.html

Really fascinating research paper on Westland designs for attack helicopters over decades from the RAS. Lots more than most people are aware of.

Well worth the read, Westland were really ahead of the game on design, particularly for LO and UAS. Its debatable if Westland had the developmental scale to carry these to fruition on their own (money not withstanding) in addition to other projects.

Timmymagic wrote:Really fascinating research paper on Westland designs for attack helicopters over decades from the RAS. Lots more than most people are aware of.

Well worth the read, Westland were really ahead of the game on design, particularly for LO and UAS. Its debatable if Westland had the developmental scale to carry these to fruition on their own (money not withstanding) in addition to other projects.

No kidding. This is an absolutely fascinating paper. Thanks so much for sharing.

Bit sad that Westlands, like so many other valuable UK assets, was needlessly pissed away.

Brilliant piece of work by the Author, thanks for sharing it.

Sad but not entirely unpredictable news....Yeovil really does need to win some work soon...German Navy has already gone for NH-90 (which was always predictable). They might get a couple more orders from the Phillipines but you have to wonder where any further Wildcat orders will come from....particularly with H160 on the way.

Ignore people saying the South Korean's have made a mistake. SK needs a decent ASW helicopter as well, and Wildcat just isn't it.

Read the 'expert' piece that had been appended to the above news item, and
" For the case of the South Korean military's second batch of ASW helicopters"
the first batch was ordered as flying, quickly deployable artillery for the Marines
- the Marines are normally kept as a strategic reserve
- following the shelling of the island within the ROK, by the North, which went unpunished as the (cheaaaap) rockets, hundreds of them, were fired from within pre-prepared, hardened positions, two things happened:
1. the related islands were grouped as a defence zone, and allocated to the Marines
2. the Lynxes were bought as launch platforms for the precision missiles that we call Exactor
... if there is an opening for the Katyuschka rockets to fly out thru, then the missile's optical homing will guide it in as 'contraflow' traffic