B-52J: Wait, I never left to come back!
Well, as they say, “the song is sung”: it has been officially announced that the service of the main American strategic bomber B-52 in the B-52J modification will be extended until 2040 after the completion of the work.
The aircraft, which has been in service with the US Air Force since 1955 and is already the record holder for service duration, is approaching its centennial. At least in 2040, the B-52 will have served for 85 years. And this is simply an unimaginable duration for an aircraft. In 2055, if everything goes as planned, the B-52 will be able to celebrate its centennial in military service, and, it should be noted, not everyone reading this will be able to witness such a remarkable service life. The author, for example, is completely confident that he will not write an article dedicated to this event.
But if it is "well-cut and tightly sewn", then why not? In the end, let the American crews worry about this, who will decide for themselves whether they are getting into the cockpit of a piece of junk or a combat aircraft.
Naturally, a lot of those billion dollars that are so dear to the hearts of the American military will be spent on all of this.
Since the condition of the airframes satisfies American aviation experts, who extend the service life with unwavering hands, so that's how it is, we won't argue. After all, they know how to fly airplanes there too.
So, the upgrade will affect other things. And it really is, because there is an EVENT coming: the B-52J will finally get new engines!
This is how it happens in our world: literally recently the Pentagon seriously considered the issue of completely writing off the B-52 fleet, but alas, it did not work out. We must maintain our fragile primacy in the world by all means, including in terms of airborne nuclear carriers weapons. This is a theoretical matter in principle, but politically advantageous. Therefore, contrary to all expectations, a decision was made to extend the service life of strategic bombers until 2040, and in the future even further.
The main obstacle to this used to be the problem with engines. The Pratt & Whitney JT3 was the engine that carried the strategic might of the US Air Force for more than half a century. But only diamonds can be considered eternal in this world, and even then, only conditionally.
Today, this engine does not meet any modern requirements, especially in terms of efficiency. But the main problem is that a long time ago, during a fire, a significant part of the technological information was lost, which was not digitized. A decent problem, which did not allow the re-establishment of engine production. Yes, there was a decent stock of engines from the first series of aircraft, but sooner or later everything ends.
The bomber will be given new life by an engine from Rolls-Royce.
The BR725 engine, which the US military called the F130, has been faithfully carrying Gulfstream G650 business jets into the skies.
The engine, of course, is not comparable to its predecessor from Pratt & Whitney in terms of efficiency and service life, so it came in handy.
The F130 engine version was generally liked by the military and was provisionally registered on C-37 and E-11 aircraft. Civil and military aircraft with these engines have already flown more than 29 million hours and have proven their reliability. The new engine is capable of developing thrust up to 75,6 kilonewtons, the same as the TF33, but with much lower (estimated savings of about 30%!!!) fuel consumption.
The work is complex, the work is expensive. Of course, such a thing as 3D modeling helps to solve many issues, but still, the engine replacement program is complicated. Remember, there was an idea to install 52 engines from a Boeing 8 on the B-4 instead of 747 standard engines? Why didn’t this seemingly good idea work? It’s simple: it turned out to be very difficult to redesign the wing, engine nacelles, fuel supply system and fire protection system.
For the F130 engines, the nacelles had to be redesigned, and it is worth noting that modern nacelles turned out better than the classic ones: the efforts of the developers were successful and now the new engine can be serviced and repaired without removing it from the aircraft. And this saves both money and time. The latter is even more useful, especially when it is necessary for bombers to work hard.
Complex testing of the new engines in the new nacelle is planned to begin in the fourth quarter of this year. The tests will be conducted at NASA's John Stennis Space Center in Mississippi. There is a test complex E there, which is designed for testing small engines. And by the standards of space testers, the F130 is a very small engine.
The first group of modified B-52s is expected to enter service by the end of 2028.
But not just the engine, as they say... Naturally, replacing the engines will entail fundamental changes in their control system, replacing sensors, etc. At the end of it all - digital engine control for pilots and new information displays in the cockpit.
So if so, welcome to the 21st century...
In total, the entire program to upgrade B-52 strategic bombers to the B-52J level is planned to cost $11,9 billion. For the 76 aircraft remaining in combat service, that is more than impressive.
Here is another thing to think about: new, more economical engines, if they really save a third of the fuel compared to the previous ones, can affect the bomber's range. It already has more than that - more than 7 km, plus the ability to refuel in the air... But even with such a range, the B-000 can approach the territories of Russia and China at 52 km without refueling. And if its range on the new engines increases by 2 km, this will be even easier. And here it is worth looking at another nuance.
What else besides the engine and controls?
That's right, weapons.
As part of the modernization of the B-52J, they have prepared the ability to operate hypersonic cruise missiles rockets (HACM).
This Mach-plus, scramjet-powered hypersonic missile is still in development, but developments are finished sooner or later. And while the Air Force has confirmed that it will not buy any hypersonic weapons in FY5, that’s only because it doesn’t have one yet. But it does have a budget request for FY2024 that includes $2025 million for HACM research and development, followed by another $380 million in FY517 for production. And so the Air Force plans to have the missile operational by 2026.
And the B-52J is planned to be modernized by 2028. In general, everything fits together. The main thing is that everything goes according to the developed plans. Then in 2028, 76 bombers will become B-52J, with hypersonic missiles and new engines.
Is this an option? Yes. Is it possible that the Americans won't be able to do all this by the deadline? Also yes. In fact, there isn't that much time, only three years.
Considering that the US Air Force did not send its aircraft to the scrap heap, there is something to keep the remaining 76 aircraft operational, especially since they were all manufactured in the last years of production, that is, in 1961-1962.
And the "Buffs" (nicknamed B-52) will have to squeak for a very long time. We all understand that hopes for the B-1 and B-2, to put it mildly, were not justified. We will see if something meaningful comes out of the B-21 program, but not soon. And there must be defense. Therefore, the 52nd will serve as a scarecrow, a carcass, but. There is simply nowhere to go, just write off 76 strategic bombers - the US cannot afford this, because they will be left with nothing.
What will happen there in 2040, whether the B-21 will fly by then or not, is a second question. And the first is that if anything happens, the US Air Force missiles and bombs will be able to move from point A to point B on D-Day in the bomb bays and on the pods of the B-52. And that is much better than not moving.
But what to do if out of 100 B-1Bs, less than half remain today? And the condition of those remaining is satisfactory and nothing more? And as carriers of nuclear weapons, B-1Bs have all served their purpose.
Two dozen B-2s, whose average age has already crossed the 25-year mark, also seem to hint that there are no special prospects ahead. And we all understand that if any of the aforementioned trio have prospects for the next 20 years, then these are definitely not the “newbies”.
This is where such an ugly comparison comes to mind: "kopecks" and "sixes", the average age of which is 50 years, are found on the streets about as often as "tens" and "elevens", which are on average 25 years old. In approximately the same degree of wear and tear, "kopecks" even often win. I don't even want to talk about modern miracles of the auto industry like "Granta" and "Vesta", after five years they already start to rust at an accelerated rate. And the fact that they will not survive at least until 25 years - here I am ready to argue.
It's about the same with American aircraft. The most modern B-2s will end up in the trash in the next 10 years. B-1 Lancers will get there a little later. And B-52s will only appear when something really flying appears. There are many of them, and they are still combat-ready, although their combat capability is very conditional. But they will be able to fly to the launch distance of China from the Pacific Ocean. If they are not detected, and even if they are detected, then this is a completely different conversation in terms of tactics. And missiles on suspensions or in compartments with a flight range of 1500 km are very serious. Not as serious as ours, which are capable of flying 6 km, but nevertheless.
So in 2028 we're expecting old new B-52Js with new Rolls-Royce engines and new missiles. It's not that long of a wait, but something tells me that in those three years we'll see more than one interesting black comedy moment.
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