Tanker wars hot up

With a source selection due early in 2004, Boeing and EADS are working hard to promote their rival bids for the RAAF's tanker project, Air 5402.
Bids for the RAAF's new generation air-air refueller program, Project Air 5402, closed in October and a source selection is due in early-2004.

Boeing already has runs on the board: its B767-200ER-based proposal (in various configurations of flying boom and both centre line and underwing hose and drogue pods) has been selected by Italy, Japan and, most recently, the US Air Force following a bitter Congressional wrangle over the cost-effectiveness of leasing versus purchasing.

EADS is offering a tanker variant of its A-330-200, equipped with both wing-mounted hose and drogue and centreline flying boom refuelling systems, but this has yet to score a launch order. However, a source selection in the UK's FSTA program, for which both companies have submitted tenders, is imminent. This will see the acquisition of up to 28 tankers to replace the Royal Air Force's ageing fleet of TriStar and VC10 tankers, and if the UK chooses the Airbus, this will bring the aircraft further into the Commonwealth's notoriously tight comfort zone.

At first glance the B767 and A-330 tankers are very similar aircraft, being converted twin-engine, twin-aisle passenger jets. The resemblance ends there. The Boeing 767 is a proven workhorse - over 860 aircraft have accumulated some 30 million flying hours between them - which has been in production for nearly 20 years, and has been in widespread airline service in Australia for most of that time, while the A-330 is very much a new aircraft.

The Boeing 767-200ER proposal, dubbed the 767 TT (for tanker transport), draws on Boeing's long experience of designing and building aerial tankers - the company has built 1,900 tankers over 75 years, about 95 per cent of the world total. Over 100 B767-based tankers alone have been ordered by Italy, Japan and the US Air Force and Boeing's unique experience of integrating its flying boom refuelling system with both dedicated tankers and converted airliners gives it the advantage of incumbency in this market.

Boeing has been developing the 767 TT concept since the mid-1990s. Italy placed the launch order in 2002 and the first flight of the KC-767 is scheduled for mid-2004, followed by several months of flight testing and then delivery of the first aircraft in mid-2005.

The 767 TT is equipped with a modern two-crew digital cockpit with a remote air refuelling station, the RARO II, at the front of the cabin. The aircraft can carry both cargo and passengers in combi configurations, and employs additional under-floor fuel tanks to increase its total fuel uplift. Taking off from an 8,000ft runway the 767 can offload 117,000lb (53,180kg) of fuel at a range of 500 nm. It can carry up to 200 passengers and up to 19 cargo pallets

The company says the 767 TT's "soft footprint" allows the use of more airfields than the older B707/KC-135 and, especially on poor-quality runways, allows it to carry more fuel from a given runway than any of its rivals - notably the A-330-200. Boeing also claims significantly lower direct operating costs than the Airbus.

Both Boeing and Airbus have presented statistics and performance figures which support their respective sales pitches - direct comparisons are consequently not easy or necessarily meaningful.

The A-330-200 Multi-Role Tanker Transport (MRTT) incorporates much contemporary air transport technology, enabling EADS to offer five tankers and the first three years' in-service support for a price well below the published budget for Project Air 5402. The aircraft features extensive use of composites in the airframe, a fly by wire control system and, claims Airbus, lower direct maintenance and operating costs than its rival.

It's significant that Qantas Airways and its subsidiary Qantas Defence Services, have chosen to team with EADS on this particular project: the airline currently operates both aircraft types on its domestic and international routes and now has orders and options for up to 39 A-330s.

As a bigger aircraft, the A-330 needs no extra tankage; it can carry up to 110,000kg of fuel, and for example could remain on station for two hours at a refuelling point 1,000nm away and offload 65,000kg while it's there. Also, the company says, it has superior "hot and high" performance to the B767 and a considerably higher take-off weight than a B767 using the same runway, including all 12 RAAF airfields and, says EADS, all airfields used by the RAAF. The A-330 boasts either 1,100nm more range for a given payload, or carries 12 tonnes more payload over the same sector.

The A-330 is designed to carry the full range of airline industry-standard cargo containers and pallets; the underfloor cargo space isn't compromised by extra tankage, while the main cabin can carry up to 293 passengers in single-class configuration. There is therefore no need for a role change between passenger/cargo and air-air refuelling sorties; indeed, EADS says the aircraft could carry the ground crews and support equipment for six Hornets, along with a 43 tonne fuel payload to refuel those Hornets, on a trans-continental sector.

Furthermore, says EADS, because the A-330 wing is identical to that of the four-engine A-340, it already incorporates the necessary wiring, fuel
The big unknown is the flying boom system; EADS has never manufactured such a system nor integrated one into one of its aircraft before - Boeing has been doing this for decades. The A-330 flying boom system is being developed by EADS-CASA in Spain, the Airbus consortium's military airlift specialist. The company has taken the opportunity to engineer a new fly by wire design with a higher fuel transfer rate than Boeing's flying boom system. This is scheduled for certification by the end of 2005; EADS says any slippage in this part of the project shouldn't have too much effect on the overall project schedule, which calls for aircraft to be in service in 2007. And the underwing refuelling pods will have been proven and certified on the German Luftwaffe's A-310-300 MRTTs by the time contract negotiations for Air 5402 get under way in early-mid-2004.

EADS has offered also to deliver an unmodified aircraft within 18 months of contract signature in order to take over some of the strategic airlift duties of the RAAF's ageing B707 tanker/transport fleet. The other four aircraft would be modified as planned (the first by EADS, the remainder by Qantas Defence Services in Brisbane) and then that first aircraft would be rotated through Brisbane in turn for modification. Other AII partners include Australian Aerospace, CAE Australia, ADI Ltd and GKN Aerospace and the company says it will achieve or exceed 90 per cent AII in the Through Life Support Phase of the project.

Moreover, the French Air Force is now evaluating the A-330-200 MRTT as replacement for its own KC-135 tankers. The configuration sought is identical to that of the RAAF. However, the UK does not require a flying boom capability so even if it selects the A-330 MRTT and Australia follows suit it still looks as if the RAAF may be launch customer for the Airbus flying boom capability, something which Defence may resist; it would resist such a move even more if there any danger of it becoming an orphan capability, or part of a relatively small customer base.

Boeing recognises it has the advantage of incumbency. But one of the unknowns that may inform the tender evaluation process is the issue of size - given that the RAAF's Hornets and, eventually, F-35 Joint Strike Fighters will lack the payload/range of the F-111, which of these tankers will be able to provide the additional range and endurance required by the RAAF across what seems to be an expanding range of operational scenarios?

By Gregor Ferguson, Adelaide