Leonardo has announced a contract worth around £115 million from the Ministry of Defence.
The contract will initiate the next phase of the Excalibur Flight Test Aircraft (FTA) project, a pivotal element of the UK’s Future Combat Air System (FCAS).
This next-generation fighter is set to be launched in 2035 by the Global Combat Air Programme (GCAP), an international collaboration between the UK, Italy, and Japan.
The Excalibur project will encompass a broad range of capabilities, including uncrewed aircraft, F-35, information systems, weapon systems, and a crewed fighter. The FTA, essentially a Boeing 757 aircraft converted into a flying laboratory for combat air technology, is central to the crewed fighter’s development.
As a founding member of the UK’s Tempest combat air partnership, Leonardo will predominantly use the airliner to test new technologies cultivated by the trilateral programme. In alliance with the Ministry of Defence, the UK Tempest Partners, BAE Systems, Leonardo UK, Rolls Royce & MBDA, are actively engaging in a variety of tests and demonstration activities, including Excalibur, to facilitate the successful delivery of GCAP within the stipulated programme timelines.
In the first phase of the Excalibur project, 2Excel conducted an in-depth engineering study on the 757 airframe, involving the meticulous dismantling of the retired aircraft by UK industry experts. The comprehensive study aimed to equip the UK team with adequate regulatory evidence and design information for the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA), thus paving the way for the certification of the second, modified aircraft for flight.
Having garnered the necessary knowledge for the modification of a second aircraft, the team is now ready to undertake the task. The aircraft, a commercial jet purchased from charter flight company Titan Airways, has already arrived at 2Excel’s facility in Lasham, Hampshire, for engineering.
The new contract will encompass the physical modification of the 757, along with flight tests, certification, and securing approval from the CAA.
The Excalibur aircraft will be adapted to accommodate integrated sensors, non-kinetic effects (ISANKE), and integrated communications systems (ICS) that Leonardo and its international partners are developing as part of GCAP.
Within the next three years, the aircraft, equipped with the new technology, is expected to conduct test flights while on-board scientists and engineers assess the sensors and communication systems.
Andrew Howard, Director Future Combat Air/GCAP UK, Leonardo UK, said: “The Excalibur programme will help us to accelerate the development of advanced electronics for the ISANKE & ICS domain via early flight testing, which can take place in parallel with the wider development of the core platform…”
Richard Berthon, Director Future Combat Air, UK MOD, expressed his excitement: “This contract is a major milestone for the FTA project and demonstrates our commitment in support of the UK Future Combat Air System…”
Chris Norton, Director and Excalibur programme lead at 2Excel Aviation, stated: “2Excel is excited and proud to be playing its part in such a unique, cutting edge and nationally important project. Conceived by Leonardo in Bedfordshire and 2Excel in Northamptonshire, designed in Yorkshire and built in Hampshire, Excalibur is already contributing to the UK’s economic recovery…”
Another positive step forward for Tempest….
So, in other news, apparently they plan to carry on the steady decline of the Army by reducing to 72,000, but increasing the AR to counter the drop?
All irrelevant really as the numbers are steadily dropping towards that number anyway without anyone’s assistance…
The jungle drums mention something about further reductions in MBT numbers, can’t be right I wouldn’t think…. Could it!
The army is already at 72,000 – the reduction was announced in 2021 to be implemented gradually before 2025, but came to pass more rapidly due to retention issues.
Admiral Radakin told the recent Defence Select Commitee meeting that the Command Paper would contain no new cuts. They would however be implementing the cuts previously announced. That being the case we’ll get 148 CR3s. Once they are all upgraded availability will most likely be better than it is now with 213 CR2.
The key question is whether we have more hot wars in the next decade with no lillihood of an increase in the defence budget. Meanwhile our social secutity budget is £240 billion (and rising) and our NHS bduegt is £140 Billion and rising. The key question is how to reduce the social security and NHS budgets, still deliver services and give enough headroom to pay off the interest on our debt whilst still maintaining a base defence infrastructure and capability.
NHS budget 23/24 is £155 billion plus around £30 billion for NHS social care. A one per cent increase in defence would add around £4/5 billion but don’t hold your breath.🙄
Our ageing population is taking a toll on social security and the NHS. Nice little snippet from the ONS:
“There will be an increasing number of older people; the number of people aged 85 years and over was estimated to be 1.7 million in 2020 (2.5% of the UK population) and this is projected to almost double to 3.1 million by 2045 (4.3% of the UK population).”
Their projections also say that in 2045 the number of working age people will be the same.
If that comes true then living standards for us all will decline. There are going to be some very difficult decisions to be made. Budgets in all areas will come under ever more scrutiny.
This will not be a popular opinion but I think we’ll end up competing for immigration rather than trying to deter it.
As it happens 2045 is the year I am due to get my state pension. I wonder what age it will be put back to by then!
To retire is to expire!!
Unfortunately the only way to reduce the healthcare budget is to reduce life expectancy…you cost more the older you get..the NHS keeps you alive for a few more years it’s cost the NHS more. If we all agreed to end active life extending healthcare beyond the age of 80 you would save an absolute fortune…strokes are an example, 15 years ago you had a dense Stoke we piped you to bed and you would be dead in a few weeks-months. Now we can effectively treat dense strokes and keep you ticking for another decade or two..the problem is to treat you we need 24/7 access to CT, 24/7 access to a Neuro consultant, 24/7 access to an acute team trained in delivery of Thrombolysis..24/7 transfer to neuro surgery if needed..it was cheaper to pop you into bed and let you die..( if you tot all that up making sure everyone can get to a centre in 30 mins it’s literally billions just for that)…even the old MI ( heart attack)..15 years ago we shot you full of an anticoagulant hoped you did not die ( it’s nasty stuff) and popped you to bed, now we ship you strait to a cardiac surgeon and give you immediate heart surgery ( primary angio). We now have drug treatments that cost 50k a pop, just to keep you ticking for another 6 months…this is why healthcare cost spiral…health care inflation relates to not only other stuff like normal inflation..but how long we all live ( when the NHS started life expectancy was 64 now it’s 82), how much new treatments cost over old ( popping you into bed vs a 24/7 massively complex system ) also how unhealthy your population is…and the UK is just about the most destructive just after the US…every spoon of sugar you have in your tea will cost the NHS at some point.
I know you will not believe me but we have massively underpaid the NHS for what it has provided and that’s been year on year.
That will be why they announced the NMH cuts from 44 down to 25-35 cabs at RIAT 2023 last week then!
Also because Ukraine shows the army needs more air defence, drones and artillery, the money will be diverted from NMH among other things I guess.
Hi James,
I’m under the impression that we already have a funding line(£850 million ish) for new artillery (both guns and rockets?), although not sure about any new AD systems.
As for drones, seeing is believing where their procurement is concerned.
We had a budget of approx £1.4 billion for NMH if memory serves, so a 40% reduction in cab numbers will only drive up the cost of however many we decide to buy surely? Even if the savings are several hundred million, that’s pretty minor in the grand scheme of things, especially when you factor in any further life-ex for the Pumas.
Maybe he was just talking about no new cuts to those areas already being cut. I bet the Command Paper is going to be fun reading.
May be buying 5 H135’s and then finding the operational needs have changed and they were not required has made MOD cautious on initial numbers for NMH.
That may very well be the case, we were replacing 36 cabs with 44, so a few spare as an OCU/attritional reserve perhaps!
Stating 25-35 cabs makes me rather cynically think that we won’t be getting towards the higher number of cabs, but more towards the lower number. Perhaps/hopefully I’m wrong and we do get 35, would be preferable I imagine.
Unfortunately there are not 214 CR2 available. Not counting the squadron of 18 we gave to Ukraine or those already disassembed for CH3 the Defence Committee was told recently there were “about” 40 immediately available.
CDS was quite vague during the DSC meeting. He was quite insistent though that more were available than that. He didn’t put a number on it though. When you look at the actual deployments to Estonia, the US, and in the UK on exercise it does back that up. So 41 then….. 😂
What makes you think the CR2 Fleet has had a significant number of examples already disassembled ? .
Nah, they’re not increasing the AR, from the sounds of it they’re going to reinvest in the Regular Reserve. It’s an old force that existed during the cold war, and in theory exists now. Every soldier on leaving the service is liable to be recalled to the colours for like 4-5 years after signing off. Back then you could geniuenly get a letter through the post announcing an exercise and you’d be required to muster at a nearby garrison, get sized and issued kit, then demobed, paid, and sent home. (Baisically “Just making sure we can get you back to camp and into uniform sharpish if push comes to shove?”)
They stopped doing it in the 90’s for budget reasons and because the need wasn’t there with the cold war ending, but now apparently someone realised it exists and thinks reviving it sounds like a good idea (it is a good idea and we should be doing it anyway, but it’s not a solution to a shrinking army).
Ah the Regular reserve, I think mate was in that in the late 1980’s, odd weekend a couple of times a year in tatty old DPM’s blatting away with an SLR on the range, happy days….
Will there be naval variant of Tempest?
I doubt it as you would have to convert the Queen Elizabeth and PoW to enable them to fly off the decks. You then have the costs of navalising tempest. I agre after the F35B is retired we have to have a plan and naval variant would make sense apart from costs given a very restrictive defence budget.
As the two carriers have an at least 50 year life cycle. There may be a case for a manned naval fighter to replace the F35. Which then means the carriers will need the catapults and arrestor gear for operating something like Tempest.
I’m pretty sure BAe will be modeling it as a private venture. It would be easier at this stage to model the various design iterations, to see not only if it can be marinized, but also to predict the costs in doing so. It will be a lot more expensive if the land design is finalized and then a request comes in for the naval version.
The other French, German and Spanish FCAS effort, the next generation fighter (NGF). Will have both land and naval versions. Which is likely to push up the costs. Can both Germany and Spain soak up these costs, especially as its only a French requirement?
The original requirement for the carriers was that they were supposed to be built with the space/weight allowance for Cat/traps to be fitted as the carriers would be around for double the lifetime of F-35. but as usual our glorious f*ckwits in Westminster screwed about to save few quid now not giving toss that would probaly cost more than the original caariers cost to now refit.
They do retain the area below the flight deck to fit cats and traps but not sure what else has been retained, potential power generation for an EMALS system for example, would need serious upgrades I suspect especially come next decade.
DON’T TELL HIM YOUR NAME PIKE!
Remember loose lips sink grain ships and Frost is a clear vodka swilling morse tapper if there ever was one….
Has he replaced MK? Anyone seen him since the Wagner dismantling and their troll network at least temporarily closed down.
John in Minsk is on the front lines I would guess, replaced his laptop with a beaten up old AKM…
Being critical of aggressive forced regime change by the US on other states, NATOs expansion post cold war, lapdog UK and Brexit, does not make me Russian.
Oh yes it doesl
Well, I was going to say, if quacks like a duck, looks like a duck, then it’s probably a Russian morse tapper!
Definately not – there has never been a requirement for Tempest to be Carrier Capable.
No.
I’d settle for getting some ‘planes on them now. not worrying about Tempest.
The UK’s MOD have failed again. China, US, and France will have 6th generation fighters on their nuclear carriers by 2045. The UK will be stuck with short range F-35Bs, too close to the shore in any conflict with a major power. Again the US will be kicking down the doors, with the UK mopping up the mess.
What happened to Frost001 ? Did he end up in the T72 aerial display team ? If you’re supposed to be an improvement on 001 then holy fuck but he must have been as thick as a nun’s bush.
Frost001 is currently in London, something to do with buying property and iron ore imports, you know the kind of stuff the West need the Russians for, despite sanctions.
I doubt it. To judge by the idiocy and banality of your posts, both of you would struggle to sell ice cream at the FA cup final.
Agree, nobody wants to eat ice cream when it is raining
Its raining in Moscow then?
The Troll Farm Diaries
Chapter 3
Frost and his wife had been spotted talking on their I phoneski bean can and string mobiles, what could they do, make a break for it, or give up….
Giving up would mean a trip to the Gulag
(Wagner recruitment center), no, they had to run for it!
Luckily Frosts quick thinking wife emptied a bag of potatoes on the tarmac and the drunk Kremlin Guards scrambled for the bounty!
In the confusion, they ran for their Lada, pulling out the choke, that fine piece of Russian engineering sped off down the road, only being overtaken by speeding bicycles…
Think, he screamed at his wife, where can we hide!
Stay tuned for chapter 4
Lada? Remind me of British mass produced affordable car…….oh yeah forgot Uk roads are full of French and German cars, what was Brexit about again…..the Sun and Mr Farage. Enjoy high inflation UK
I don’t know what the others are on about but you’re probably right regarding aircraft on the carriers. Lockheed are cutting back on deliveries and once again the setting up of our second F35b squadron is delayed…end of 2023 or early 2024, apparently because of the lack of U.K. personnel. Typical.
On the plus side the Aussie’s are bringing forward the development of the Ghost Bat drone and the U.S. are also interested so another AUKUS project?
Asking for a friend again?
Pity they weren’t 737s. Could have done with those in a couple of years time…would’ve gone very well with Radars N5 & No6…
We are repeating the mistakes of the 1930s when the whole of Europe could see WW2 coming – all except the British government.
We need to expand the Armed Forces.
We also need to make the NHS aware that they should be able to manage without having to rely on the British Army. £186bn + this year and they strike!
The UK needs Ben Wallace. What will it take to retain him as Defence Secretary? Urgent Operational Requirement
Neville Chamberlain was no mug – he implemented a Rearmament programme just in the nick of time – our current Govt must be confident that no escalation of the Ukraine War is imminent.
AT this moment in time the army stands at around 78 060 but with the next General Election that could change , TOTAL Army at this moment 114 ,210 etc . With the tempest not due to enter service until 2035. surely it will be the amount of aircraft we buy as a replacement but its good news hopefuly ,