Royal New Zealand Air Force

[ngatimozart]

The head of the Royal New Zealand Air Force claimed that NZ is also exploring options with its small NH90 fleet during a recent speech in Australia. Belgium, Norway and Sweden have announced that they are also dumping the NH90 citing exactly the same issues as the ADF. The German military aviation community is also not happy. The NH90 could have been so many things, but in reality it was undercooked and NHIndustries is a seriously underperforming entity.

Do you have a source for this claim?

NHI is now part of Airbus Helicopters and unfortunately has Airbus Military's poor after sales service philosophy and practice. That is quite similar to Kaman's lack of after sales service attitude, except Kaman is worst, but not by much. I think part of NHI's problem is its poor manufacturing capability, and is unable to keep up with demand, especially spares. The problem that haunts Airbus Military and Airbus Military Helicopters is their inabilities compared to Airbus commercial aviation.

The ADF, though, is just one of four NH90 operators who have decided to retire the type from service early. Sweden and Norway will cease operating the platform entirely, while Belgium will retire their NH90s while retaining the NFH90. The underlying reasons cited by these forces have also been consistently reported by other NH/NFH90 operators, the latter have just made a different decision about how to respond.

That then poses the question of what is the RNZAF doing differently to other operators? The RNZAF has the highest number of flight hours per airframe with one airframe achieving 2,000 hours flight time, and the best by far serviceability / availability rate at 72% than any other operator. One thing that the Clark govt did get right was acquiring the 9th aircraft for a source of immediate spares, and that has really worked for us.

Interesting how the NH90 turned out. When Canada wanted to procure a mix of 50 SAR and naval helicopters back in the 1990, the NH90 was considered but the EH101 was what the DND wanted. DND wanted a larger helicopter. Moving on PM Chrétien cancelled the order and at great expense Canada ended up with a SAR version of the EH101 and 20 plus CH-148 LM Cyclones, a paper design at the time. I guess time will time tell if the CH-148 was a better choice. Likely more successful outcome with LM in the long run I think. Better still would have been sticking with the original EH101 order.

The EH/AW101 was looked at originally, but it was rejected on the grounds that it was too expensive to acquire and operate for what was deemed as slightly better capability than the NH90.

Looking at a possible AW159 Wildcat acquisition, one advantage I see with that is that both variants could be acquired, giving us a LAH capability for the army. Eight of each would work well, in fact make it 12 of each and some of the 12 army ones could be deployed to Australia with the PLAN ANZAC contingent, working as recon helicopters for the Aussie Army AH-64 Apaches. That's how the Brit Army use some of their AW159 Wildcats.

 

[old faithful]

ngati, some of the problems encountered include....

Ron Mark, New Zealand First Deputy Leader and Spokesperson for Defence put out a press release in 2017 criticising the cost of the NH90, citing the statistics of 2015, "The NH90s cost $1,182 an hour to fly and that is 2.5 times more expensive than the Iroquois they replaced. They're also unreliable, chewing through $3.3 million worth of spares in just two years."[31]

In November 2011, the MRH-90 program was placed on the Australian Department of Defence's "Projects of Concern" list.[26] The most serious problem identified by a diagnostic review, which caused a brief grounding in 2010,[27] is compressor blade rubbing caused by the bending of a spool in the Rolls-Royce Turbomeca RTM322 engine due to uneven cooling after shutdown. Other problems identified include failure of transmission oil cooler fans, windscreen cracking, an inertial navigation system that is slow to align, and the weakness of the cabin floor to withstand the impact of soldiers' boots – a problem also encountered in German service.[28]

these quotes are taken from Wiki, yes i know wiki is frowned upon, but these are well documented elsewhere, and wiki has compressed it to a few paragraphs. there are more, but these are just an sample of problems.

 

[ngatimozart]

ngati, some of the problems encountered include....

Ron Mark, New Zealand First Deputy Leader and Spokesperson for Defence put out a press release in 2017 criticising the cost of the NH90, citing the statistics of 2015, "The NH90s cost $1,182 an hour to fly and that is 2.5 times more expensive than the Iroquois they replaced. They're also unreliable, chewing through $3.3 million worth of spares in just two years."[31]

In November 2011, the MRH-90 program was placed on the Australian Department of Defence's "Projects of Concern" list.[26] The most serious problem identified by a diagnostic review, which caused a brief grounding in 2010,[27] is compressor blade rubbing caused by the bending of a spool in the Rolls-Royce Turbomeca RTM322 engine due to uneven cooling after shutdown. Other problems identified include failure of transmission oil cooler fans, windscreen cracking, an inertial navigation system that is slow to align, and the weakness of the cabin floor to withstand the impact of soldiers' boots – a problem also encountered in German service.[28]

these quotes are taken from Wiki, yes i know wiki is frowned upon, but these are well documented elsewhere, and wiki has compressed it to a few paragraphs. there are more, but these are just an sample of problems.

The ADF MRH90 problems are nothing to do with NZ. That's an ADF inflicted problem. If it hadn't gone rip, shit and bust on the program, then the outcomes could've been different, plus the fact that they didn't bother ordering spares at the time of acquisition. Many similarities to the Tiger program. As far as operating costs go it's expensive and all the Kiwi authorities acknowledge that. Just because the ADF couldn't get all of its shit in the one sock, doesn't mean that the NZDF are as incompetent.

 

[Todjaeger]

The EH/AW101 was looked at originally, but it was rejected on the grounds that it was too expensive to acquire and operate for what was deemed as slightly better capability than the NH90.

In hindsight, this is somewhat ironic, as the capability claims of the NH90 have been found to be rather different than actual, real world deployment capabilities from what I understand. The NH90 20 troop capacity IIRC is for seated troopers not kitted out wearing full battle rattle, but the actual troop capacity for those kitted out to land and deploy in combat is more like a dozen or so, comparable to the troop capacity for the UH-60 Black Hawk. OTOH though the Merlin troop capacity is listed for fully equipped combat troops which is nearly three times the number of troopers equipped for combat actual experience has shown the NH90 can reasonably land. The reported ingress and egress issues involving the door gunner positions are also curious, given that other troop helicopters lack such reported issues and prior experience with transport helicopters should have caused the NH90 designers to consider how troops would need to enter and leave the cabin as well as how they would be kitted out whilst doing so.

Regarding the levels of support provided by Kama and Airbus Defence & Aerospace (Airbus's defence division), I agree that the support has been rather... poor. I will point out though that the Airbus division is considerably larger than the whole of the Kaman Corporation. Aslo, at this point it does appear that Kaman has exited the manned aircraft market and instead it's involvement in aerospace is either through UAS or the production of aftermarket parts and other aerospace components used in the production of other companies aircraft designs or production. It would be interesting to see how the parts & support for the NH90 by HH Industries compares to the support the H225M (the former Eurocopter EC725 Caracal) by Airbus Helicopters.

I remain quite interested in finding out the who/what/how/why NZ has managed their NH90 helicopters, given the difficulties that Australia and several other nations have had with the NH90 in service. If Australia was the only end user that was retiring the aircraft early, that would suggest that the problem was the user and/or the user-specified variant. If will also be 'interesting' to see what impact the composite construction of the airframe will have on long-term service life. IIRC one of the concerns voiced early on in design and production phases what that material fatigue for composite structures was relatively unknown and it was uncertain what would happen if cracks began to form, or how they would be managed. I know crack propagation has been an area of concern for aircraft, with elements of design attempting to mitigate risks from cracks forming in components, as well as testing and inspection regimens developed to check and monitor for this.

 

[old faithful]

ngati, some of the problems encountered include....

Ron Mark, New Zealand First Deputy Leader and Spokesperson for Defence put out a press release in 2017 criticising the cost of the NH90, citing the statistics of 2015, "The NH90s cost $1,182 an hour to fly and that is 2.5 times more expensive than the Iroquois they replaced. They're also unreliable, chewing through $3.3 million worth of spares in just two years."[31]

In November 2011, the MRH-90 program was placed on the Australian Department of Defence's "Projects of Concern" list.[26] The most serious problem identified by a diagnostic review, which caused a brief grounding in 2010,[27] is compressor blade rubbing caused by the bending of a spool in the Rolls-Royce Turbomeca RTM322 engine due to uneven cooling after shutdown. Other problems identified include failure of transmission oil cooler fans, windscreen cracking, an inertial navigation system that is slow to align, and the weakness of the cabin floor to withstand the impact of soldiers' boots – a problem also encountered in German service.[28]

these quotes are taken from Wiki, yes i know wiki is frowned upon, but these are well documented elsewhere, and wiki has compressed it to a few paragraphs. there are more, but these are just an sample of problems.

 

[old faithful]

The ADF MRH90 problems are nothing to do with NZ. That's an ADF inflicted problem. If it hadn't gone rip, shit and bust on the program, then the outcomes could've been different, plus the fact that they didn't bother ordering spares at the time of acquisition. Many similarities to the Tiger program. As far as operating costs go it's expensive and all the Kiwi authorities acknowledge that. Just because the ADF couldn't get all of its shit in the one sock, doesn't mean that the NZDF are as incompetent.

wow!

the NZDF has 8 air frames to maintain.....just saying.

 

[RDB]

That then poses the question of what is the RNZAF doing differently to other operators? The RNZAF has the highest number of flight hours per airframe with one airframe achieving 2,000 hours flight time, and the best by far serviceability / availability rate at 72% than any other operator. One thing that the Clark govt did get right was acquiring the 9th aircraft for a source of immediate spares, and that has really worked for us.

Probably a whole raft of things, including potentially its methodology for calculating availability rates.

Flight hours is a pretty simple metric though, and doesn't really give much insight into availability and sustainment issues for a Defence force planning and running exercises of the scale of Talisman Sabre or even Hamel. While the RNZAF may be comfortable with the performance of its NH90s, that doesn't mean other defence forces would necessarily be happy with those outcomes given their own, broader defence force requirements.

 

[InterestedParty]

Probably a whole raft of things, including potentially its methodology for calculating availability rates.

Flight hours is a pretty simple metric though, and doesn't really give much insight into availability and sustainment issues for a Defence force planning and running exercises of the scale of Talisman Sabre or even Hamel. While the RNZAF may be comfortable with the performance of its NH90s, that doesn't mean other defence forces would necessarily be happy with those outcomes given their own, broader defence force requirements.

If the RNZAF is short of airframes, are they in line to buy some of the many that will be coming on the market in the near future. 4 for operations and another half a dozen for spares.

 

[Todjaeger]

If the RNZAF is short of airframes, are they in line to buy some of the many that will be coming on the market in the near future. 4 for operations and another half a dozen for spares.

Purchasing used aircraft that other soon-to-be former operators retired early due to problems those services had in sustaining operators sounds like a formula for failure. We understand that NZ has had success (largely) in operating their NH90's, but in not knowing the how & why of such success, as well as why the retiring services did not, there is very little to make any determination on whether NZ could continue successful operation using someone else's 2nd hand helicopters.

One consideration which did occur to me when I referenced the composite construction of the airframe, and how that material will handle fatigue over time is unknow, is the very real possibility that some of the composite components could have had quality issues during the production processes. Not sure if this would be why some of the users have encountered problems, but it had been reported that German NH90's were experiencing floor cracking which required mitigation and remedies be developed. It is distinctly possible that a part or parts could have issues during the casting or curing processes which could cause the parts to be weaker than specs require, or subject to greater wear than planned/called for by the design.

It would be quite interesting to be able to really dive into what is and has been going on with different operator's NH90 fleets, since that could point ways to avoid future problems with acquisitions and sustainment.

 

[John Fedup]

The EH/AW101 was looked at originally, but it was rejected on the grounds that it was too expensive to acquire and operate for what was deemed as slightly better capability than the NH90.

The EH101 was ordered by the Mulroney government and cancelled by Chretien. It may have been deemed too expensive at the time and as for its capability, it would seem the EH101 has fared better than the NH90 and the CH-148. The Chretien cancellation was pure politics. The later split buy of EH101s for SAR and CH-148s for the RCN was a political move by the Martin government to save Chretien any further embarrassment. There was only one correct choice in 1990 and it is still the correct choice now.

 

[ngatimozart]

wow!

the NZDF has 8 air frames to maintain.....just saying.

At least our ones are fully operational. It doesn't matter whether you have eight or 41 aircraft to maintain, it's your planning, systems and processes that matter. Clearly something that the Aussie Army and RAN have problems with. The only reason we bought the Sea Sprites was because of the RAN OCV and their Sea Sprite acquisition. We actually wanted the naval Lynx, and we should've stuck with it. So don't lecture us on what is best for us and what isn't especially when you can't even sort your own shit out.

Purchasing used aircraft that other soon-to-be former operators retired early due to problems those services had in sustaining operators sounds like a formula for failure. We understand that NZ has had success (largely) in operating their NH90's, but in not knowing the how & why of such success, as well as why the retiring services did not, there is very little to make any determination on whether NZ could continue successful operation using someone else's 2nd hand helicopters.

We had a RNZAF engineering team at the NHI Assembly Plant in France when our NH90s were being assembled, so our technical people were fully conversant with the aircraft before it even arrived here. It's something that we have done since with other aircraft and naval acquisitions. Maybe it's a more cautious approach since we don't have the necessary funds to cover ginormous stuff ups and also something from lessons learned from previous acquisitions.

One consideration which did occur to me when I referenced the composite construction of the airframe, and how that material will handle fatigue over time is unknow, is the very real possibility that some of the composite components could have had quality issues during the production processes. Not sure if this would be why some of the users have encountered problems, but it had been reported that German NH90's were experiencing floor cracking which required mitigation and remedies be developed. It is distinctly possible that a part or parts could have issues during the casting or curing processes which could cause the parts to be weaker than specs require, or subject to greater wear than planned/called for by the design.

I think that we have to look at the airline industry where composites are becoming far more common. However, there isn't the 40+ year aviation experience with composites to provide a baseline yet. NZ does have a lot of expertise and experience with composites because of our yacht and boat build industry, and those skills are transferable to other industries. For example, Rocket Lab recently acquired Sail GP and are going to use Sail GPs factory and workforce in rocket manufacturing.

It would be quite interesting to be able to really dive into what is and has been going on with different operator's NH90 fleets, since that could point ways to avoid future problems with acquisitions and sustainment.

Yes that would be quite interesting indeed.

Probably a whole raft of things, including potentially its methodology for calculating availability rates.

Flight hours is a pretty simple metric though, and doesn't really give much insight into availability and sustainment issues for a Defence force planning and running exercises of the scale of Talisman Sabre or even Hamel. While the RNZAF may be comfortable with the performance of its NH90s, that doesn't mean other defence forces would necessarily be happy with those outcomes given their own, broader defence force requirements.

Yep, but because of our short numbers of NH90, we have to fly them more often to achieve the policy requirements of the govt. It harkens back to the initial SH-2G(NZ) Sea Sprite fiasco, where not enough airframes were acquired so we thrashed the ones we had resulting in serious fiscal consequences, due to increasing aircraft unavailability because of deferred maintenance along with a veritable lack of support from the OEM. In 2013 we compounded that issue by acquiring the ex RAN SH-2G(A) Sea Sprite rebranded as the SH-2G(I). That has come back to bite us in the arse again. We should've bitten the cannonball and acquired the Lynx / AW159.

 

[old faithful]

At least our ones are fully operational. It doesn't matter whether you have eight or 41 aircraft to maintain, it's your planning, systems and processes that matter. Clearly something that the Aussie Army and RAN have problems with. The only reason we bought the Sea Sprites was because of the RAN OCV and their Sea Sprite acquisition. We actually wanted the naval Lynx, and we should've stuck with it. So don't lecture us on what is best for us and what isn't especially when you can't even sort your own shit out.

We had a RNZAF engineering team at the NHI Assembly Plant in France when our NH90s were being assembled, so our technical people were fully conversant with the aircraft before it even arrived here. It's something that we have done since with other aircraft and naval acquisitions. Maybe it's a more cautious approach since we don't have the necessary funds to cover ginormous stuff ups and also something from lessons learned from previous acquisitions.

I think that we have to look at the airline industry where composites are becoming far more common. However, there isn't the 40+ year aviation experience with composites to provide a baseline yet. NZ does have a lot of expertise and experience with composites because of our yacht and boat build industry, and those skills are transferable to other industries. For example, Rocket Lab recently acquired Sail GP and are going to use Sail GPs factory and workforce in rocket manufacturing.

Yes that would be quite interesting indeed.

Yep, but because of our short numbers of NH90, we have to fly them more often to achieve the policy requirements of the govt. It harkens back to the initial SH-2G(NZ) Sea Sprite fiasco, where not enough airframes were acquired so we thrashed the ones we had resulting in serious fiscal consequences, due to increasing aircraft unavailability because of deferred maintenance along with a veritable lack of support from the OEM. In 2013 we compounded that issue by acquiring the ex RAN SH-2G(A) Sea Sprite rebranded as the SH-2G(I). That has come back to bite us in the arse again. We should've bitten the cannonball and acquired the Lynx / AW159.

Why are you being hostile defensive toward me?
Not that I give a shit.
I have not "lectured you" in any way. I have pointed out that NZ has had a different experience with their fleet of NH90s.
That could be for a lot of reasons. One of those reasons is that maintaining a very small fleet is much easier than maintaining a fleet 4 and half times bigger. I would imagine NZ only has 6 NH 90s available at any one time. That fleet of 6 is easier to monitor. If you had a fleet of say 12, and all of a sudden one of the 12 developed a problem, then all 11 other aircraft need to be looked at to see if they have a similar problem. If none of the 6 develop a problem, then great!
You labelled Australia and it seems you have singled out the Australian Army as being incompetent, your words, you are suggesting that NZ trades people are superiour, it's a very shallow view you have.
Yes, Australia made some dumb decisions by going with Euro helicopters, the product offered did not meet the expectations of what the Army wanted or needed in the first place, and as a result, the tigers needed to be modified. That turned out to be a bigger problem.
It's been that way for a long time.
It's the old Army wants product X.
Army is delivered product Y. Product Y is then modified to do what product X could do. Product Y ends up costing 2 times what product X did and it still can't do what product X can.
Get rid of product Y and buy product X which has ended up costing 4 times its original price.
That is where the incompetence is, not the soldiers maintaining them.

 

[ngatimozart]

Why are you being hostile defensive toward me?
Not that I give a shit.
I have not "lectured you" in any way. I have pointed out that NZ has had a different experience with their fleet of NH90s.
That could be for a lot of reasons. One of those reasons is that maintaining a very small fleet is much easier than maintaining a fleet 4 and half times bigger. I would imagine NZ only has 6 NH 90s available at any one time. That fleet of 6 is easier to monitor. If you had a fleet of say 12, and all of a sudden one of the 12 developed a problem, then all 11 other aircraft need to be looked at to see if they have a similar problem. If none of the 6 develop a problem, then great!
You labelled Australia and it seems you have singled out the Australian Army as being incompetent, your words, you are suggesting that NZ trades people are superiour, it's a very shallow view you have.
Yes, Australia made some dumb decisions by going with Euro helicopters, the product offered did not meet the expectations of what the Army wanted or needed in the first place, and as a result, the tigers needed to be modified. That turned out to be a bigger problem.
It's been that way for a long time.
It's the old Army wants product X.
Army is delivered product Y. Product Y is then modified to do what product X could do. Product Y ends up costing 2 times what product X did and it still can't do what product X can.
Get rid of product Y and buy product X which has ended up costing 4 times its original price.
That is where the incompetence is, not the soldiers maintaining them.

It's real simple. What may work for Australia may not work for NZ and vice versa. In 2012 -14 a comprehensive restructuring of NZ defence acquisition was undertaken after many acquisition fubars. Part of the problem was Treasury and another the pollies in Cabinet. Treasury and the pollies had no clue on how and why Defence uses its equipment and didn't understand why Defence cannot be treated like another govt dept or as a business. We still have problems, but they aren't as bad as what they were.

You cite an old Ron Mark item from 2017. He was always a critic of NZ defence procurement (and rightly so) however changed his tune when he became Defence Minister and ordered an assessment of the NZMOD / NZDF procurement process. That document has been linked to a few times on this thread and the NZDF thread.

The Aussie Army and RAN have been incompetent in their defence acquisitions and still are. They sometimes have unrealistic expectations and stubbornly stick to them. Yes, the govt bureaucrats and pollies are also equally at fault, with enough blame to cover lot. However just because Australia uses it doesn't make it god given kit with no faults. Also, when it does go wrong stubbornly sticking to it and blaming the vendor for what a systemic faults within Australian defence procurement etc., is a sign of ignorance and immaturity. To whit the RAN SH-2G(A) Seasprite saga and the Aussie Army acquisition of the NH90 and Tiger helicopters. You don't see the RAAF making such costly fubars do you?

 

[Todjaeger]

The Aussie Army and RAN have been incompetent in their defence acquisitions and still are. They sometimes have unrealistic expectations and stubbornly stick to them. Yes, the govt bureaucrats and pollies are also equally at fault, with enough blame to cover lot. However just because Australia uses it doesn't make it god given kit with no faults. Also, when it does go wrong stubbornly sticking to it and blaming the vendor for what a systemic faults within Australian defence procurement etc., is a sign of ignorance and immaturity. To whit the RAN SH-2G(A) Seasprite saga and the Aussie Army acquisition of the NH90 and Tiger helicopters. You don't see the RAAF making such costly fubars do you?

If memory serves, Army preferred the then being developed version of the UH-60M Black Hawk over the NH90. However, someone or perhaps a group of people in gov't decided on the NH-90, to be built in a facility in Australia, and that the aircraft would serve as a common replacement for the retired Sea Kings as well as the existing fleet of Black Hawks in Army service as part of an overall fleet rationalization. I also seem to recall some consideration for the naval version, the NFH90 to get selected since the Seasprites never actually got into service, and the S-70B-2 Seahawks were getting rather old. At some point someone bothered to check and found that most of the RAN MFU's could not realistically hangar the NFH90, which shot that idea down.

The RAN Seasprite debacle certainly did not cover Australian defence procurement in glory but again gov't had hand in that in a way that the services could basically do nothing about. At one point, close to the end, the Seasprites were close to being suitable for acceptance into service, but gov't moved goalposts. IIRC the US FAA had adopted a rule about the flight control systems which if the system was digital, a full digital backup was required. At the time, the Seasprite opted for by the RAN was kitted with a digital flight control system, but because the rule was not in existence at the time the programme started, a manual backup flight control system was included, not another digital one. Were the gov't interference came in was that the Australian aviation authorities decided to adopt the US FAA rules and suddenly Kaman needed to develop a new backup flight control system. IIRC it believed that Kaman could have done that for a relatively low cost, $24 mil. is the figure I recall. However, it was expected that Kaman would need another 36 months or so to develop a system which would satisfy the new requirements. It was at this point the Australia finally bit the bullet and pulled the plug on the programme.

An area where things are IMO 'interesting' in a rather darkly humourous sense, are the number of times that Australian services state a preference for the XYZ entrant to satisfy a procurement programme, only to have gov't award contracts to a different contender and then later on the winning bid/design ends up running into issues which would have been less likely, had the entry preferred by the service actually been selected.

 

[Maranoa]

The concept that the RNZAF's operation of its NH90s is trouble free is simply wrong and not supported by statements made by RNZAF officials. Even NHIndustries, the manufacturer of the NH/MRH90 helo, have acknowledged the extreme shortcomings of their logistical sustainment/support for their own platform and promised to better. Australia, Sweden, Belgium, Norway already binning the aircraft and Germany and the Netherlands whinging very loudly about there NH90s with extremely low availability suggests to me that the problem is extreme.

 

[old faithful]

It's real simple. What may work for Australia may not work for NZ and vice versa. In 2012 -14 a comprehensive restructuring of NZ defence acquisition was undertaken after many acquisition fubars. Part of the problem was Treasury and another the pollies in Cabinet. Treasury and the pollies had no clue on how and why Defence uses its equipment and didn't understand why Defence cannot be treated like another govt dept or as a business. We still have problems, but they aren't as bad as what they were.

You cite an old Ron Mark item from 2017. He was always a critic of NZ defence procurement (and rightly so) however changed his tune when he became Defence Minister and ordered an assessment of the NZMOD / NZDF procurement process. That document has been linked to a few times on this thread and the NZDF thread.

The Aussie Army and RAN have been incompetent in their defence acquisitions and still are. They sometimes have unrealistic expectations and stubbornly stick to them. Yes, the govt bureaucrats and pollies are also equally at fault, with enough blame to cover lot. However just because Australia uses it doesn't make it god given kit with no faults. Also, when it does go wrong stubbornly sticking to it and blaming the vendor for what a systemic faults within Australian defence procurement etc., is a sign of ignorance and immaturity. To whit the RAN SH-2G(A) Seasprite saga and the Aussie Army acquisition of the NH90 and Tiger helicopters. You don't see the RAAF making such costly fubars do you?

RAAF are delivered what they ask for, Army and Navy are not.

 

[Rob c]

That could be for a lot of reasons. One of those reasons is that maintaining a very small fleet is much easier than maintaining a fleet 4 and half times bigger. I would imagine NZ only has 6 NH 90s available at any one time. That fleet of 6 is easier to monitor. If you had a fleet of say 12, and all of a sudden one of the 12 developed a problem, then all 11 other aircraft need to be looked at to see if they have a similar problem. If none of the 6 develop a problem, then great!

Having spent 20 years ( a long time ago) maintaining RNZAF aircraft, I have not found that maintaining a small number of units any less challenging than larger numbers. In fact larger numbers tend to be a little easier as you have a greater number of servicing personnel to choose from and can make better use of them when you understand the different strength's and weaknesses of each individual . As for the numbers, the significant problems tend to happen randomly and are seldom a fleet wide issue so an issue in an aircraft in a small fleet takes out a higher percentage of that fleet.

 

[old faithful]

If you had 40 pairs of shoes, and the soles of two fell off, you might look at the the other 38 pairs of shoes.
If you had 8 pairs of shoes, and they were all perfect, you could then say, " You must be doing something wrong with your shoes....our shoes are fine" that is essentially what Ngati is saying.

 

[Armchair]

To put old faithful’s argument another way: assume an aircraft either performs with acceptable reliability with probability r or exhibits a serious fault (probability 1 - r). The probability that a fleet gets by without the fault ever being encountered (and all aircraft perform with acceptable reliability) = 1 - r ** n ( r raised to the power of n, the number of aircraft flown by the service).

if r is .98 and n is 8 then the probability of encountering the fault is .15
if r is .98 and n is 40 then the probability of encountering the fault is .55

if we use old faithful‘s implied reliability rate of r = .95 (2 of 40 soles falling off shoes) then the chance of encountering the fault is about .33 for 8 and .87 for 40 aircraft.

If the fault is one that grounds a fleet (noting Rob c’s reservation on that point that significant problems affect individual aircraft) then 40 aircraft becomes zero aircraft more often than 8 aircraft becomes zero (and availability rates decline in the larger fleet).

 

[ADMk2]

The ADF MRH90 problems are nothing to do with NZ. That's an ADF inflicted problem. If it hadn't gone rip, shit and bust on the program, then the outcomes could've been different, plus the fact that they didn't bother ordering spares at the time of acquisition. Many similarities to the Tiger program. As far as operating costs go it's expensive and all the Kiwi authorities acknowledge that. Just because the ADF couldn't get all of its shit in the one sock, doesn't mean that the NZDF are as incompetent.

First of all, NZDF hardly have a spotless record with telling the exact truth about their flight operations with NH-90. Their recent FOI ‘cost per flight hour’ nonsense is a case in point.

Secondly, the ADF NH-90 fleet and it is ADF because 2 services operated them here, not just Army, lead the world in flight hours for the NH-90 helicopter. We have flown far more hours on the type than any other user in the world and that includes France and Germany. This is despite the astronomical support issues Airbus has which is widely recognised, even by themselves at times. If that is the alleged ‘incompetence’ you’re referring to I’m not sure what that says about the other users...

Our fleet is 6x larger than RNZAF’s so their ‘problems’ are miniscule mathematically speaking in comparison to the ADF’s. For every 1 part RNZAF required, ADF required 6.

AAVn operated the aircraft in substantially different environments than the RNZAF do and for longer duration. AAVn operate routinely in ‘brown out’ dusty conditions in Northern Australia, RNZAF doesn’t. AAVn operate far more capability at sea than RNZAF can even generate and our commitment in the demanding special operations space was greater than the entire RNZAF fleet.

Take a long look at these differences and perhaps you might find the difference between the 3 operators…

I’m going to go away and try and ponder why, if this incompetence is so obvious, it doesn’t seem to affect the Australian Army / Navy Airbus EC-135, CH-47F or MH-60R fleets in the same way…