How long is the P-3 RAG?

[Bonko]

Don't take the naive comment as a slam. It wasn't.

I know not to take things personally here. We are all family. I just noticed I made a couple of wrong assumptions in this thread and so I figured I should probably stop before I say something really dumb , though I have learned alot over these last two days. Alot of differences between military and civilian flying.

 

[smittyrunr]

This again makes me curious. After you have the 700 hours required for PPC why would guys be so desperate to get .2 I didn't think hours were such a big deal in the military. Do they work into promotions or something? I can't think of a reason I would need to have an extra 1000 hours at the end of the 8 years. Even if they are worrying about Civi jobs they would have plenty of hours. Seems silly to pad the time.

You are never done upgrading... even if you manage to make magic happen and get 700 hours by month 18 and qualify right then, your squadron or wing may have an A-time (hours you have actually signed for the plane) requirement for FCF pilot, Mission Commander, Instructor Pilot, etc... Plus, it's usually the 2P who does the paperwork at the end of flight and they are upgrading and want to get their 700 hours, therefore giving it an extra .1 here or there.

Flight hours do not figure into promotions.

 

[torpedo0126]

Any helo - get enough civilian multi-engine, fixed-wing to meet the minimum requirements. Until then, the helo time is meaningless. After that, it shows aeronautical experience.

Is that to a strict airline sense? I thought having helo time was money?

 

[BACONATOR]

Is that to a strict airline sense? I thought having helo time was money?

Helo time is basically worthless in and of itself. If you have the multi with the minimum multi hours, the helo hours counts toward total time, experience and airmanship, I suppose. But without the min required hours, helo hours are worthless to the airlines.

 

[HAL Pilot]

^ What he said. I know of only one regional airline that will take helo time as part of their minimum experience requirements. I don't know of any majors that do. Where the helo time comes in is after you meet the mins, you may can sell it at the interview as additional aeronautical experience and it can also be used as a tie breaker when all else is equal.

 

[Pags]

Not to mention it jacks up the Maintenance plan...etc, etc.

It also screws up the lifetime management of the a/c. Most a/c usually have a set lifespan, say 10k hrs that's supposed to last 10yrs. The extra .1-.5 here and there do add up and can cause the aircraft to fly through it's lifespan ahead of schedule, which screws up things on a big navy level.

 

[xj220]

It also screws up the lifetime management of the a/c. Most a/c usually have a set lifespan, say 10k hrs that's supposed to last 10yrs. The extra .1-.5 here and there do add up and can cause the aircraft to fly through it's lifespan ahead of schedule, which screws up things on a big navy level.

Not in the P-3 world. They'll just extend the life and lower the performance limits. Or duct tape it together and call it good.

 

[GroundPounder]

I have a dumb ass question. If ya'll are short of aircraft, why is it that we can pull old airframes out of storage and sell them to other countries and not be able to do something to to build your numbers up to something more manageable?

It would seem that even if you couldn't totaly replicate what you had now, that you could end up with a number of aircraft that might not be 100% mission capable but yet still had enough secret squirrel equipment to do some training in and save the hours on the good airplanes.

From reading about the programmes to aquire new equipment, it seems as if even " off the shelf " products take years to field, and ends up costing multiples of the original estimate.

Obviously all my information comes from reading what it out there for the general public, and I'm sure that there are reasons that we have no need to know, as well as the coverage being subject to bias.

 

[Gatordev]

They do do that depending on the airframes, but part of the problem is that many of the systems on the airframes aren't relevant anymore to provide adequate training. However, when they are, it is an option. As the T-34s continue to run out of life, they've pulled parts off of mothballed airframes in the desert to bolt on to current, flying airframes. Of course, there's only so many parts in storage available to use.

 

[zab1001]

I work in FMS.

I have a dumb ass question. If ya'll are short of aircraft, why is it that we can pull old airframes out of storage and sell them to other countries and not be able to do something to to build your numbers up to something more manageable?

It would seem that even if you couldn't totaly replicate what you had now, that you could end up with a number of aircraft that might not be 100% mission capable but yet still had enough secret squirrel equipment to do some training in and save the hours on the good airplanes.

From reading about the programmes to aquire new equipment, it seems as if even " off the shelf " products take years to field, and ends up costing multiples of the original estimate.

Obviously all my information comes from reading what it out there for the general public, and I'm sure that there are reasons that we have no need to know, as well as the coverage being subject to bias.

Very very basically, having to modify an older airframe and then maintain it as an additional, permanently partially mission capable aircraft does not work out in the overall cost-benefit analysis.