Ngj program

Expected completion will be in December Jonathan Williams, VX test pilot, says the new pod imposed negligible handling issues with the Growler. The technology can also be scaled to other missions and platforms.

The company will also deliver 14 aero-mechanical pods for airworthiness certification. Under the contract modification, Raytheon will perform work in Mississippi, Texas, California, Massachusetts, and Indiana. Estimated completion date is in December NGJ-LB is an external radar and communications jamming pod that is carried underneath an aircraft and is part of a larger series of weapon systems contracts that are planned to ultimately replace the aging ALQ Tactical Jamming System currently used on Boeing EAG Growlers.

Work by both companies is scheduled to be completed in June next year. The broader aim is to develop a more cost effective AEA system with better performance against advanced threats through expanded broadband capability for greater threat coverage. Industry partners are aiming to reach initial operating capability for the new pods in The contract is in support of the engineering and manufacturing development phase of the NGJ program, a pod-based tactical jammer that replaces the plus-year ALQ jammer system on the EAG aircraft.

Raytheon will also manufacture 14 NGJ aero-mechanical test pods, which will be used to verify aircraft flying qualities and pod safe separation from the host aircraft; provide equipment needed for system integration laboratories; and mature manufacturing processes.

During the EMD phase, the pod will undergo further development prior to a system-level critical design review in early- to mid and then eventual production. Diamond offers x higher heat conductivity, allowing a 3x increase in transistor power density without frying the circuit. Data was obtained using a 0. Which is actually a review for , plus time to compile and publish. System development beyond the Technology Demonstration phase is expected to begin in Q2 Note that if the Navy gets 22 more EAGs in Fy , it will also have to order another 22 mid-band pods, and the same will be true for Increment 2 low-band and Increment 3 high-band pods as well.

The US military slowly files its budget documents, detailing planned spending from FY — See the article budget and timeline charts for revised details. Although Raytheon has a long history of innovation in military electronics and guided missiles, it traditionally has been regarded as a subcontractor rather than a top-level system integrator. They could still find that Raytheon offered the best value, and uphold the contract. All of this is pretty much standard procedure.

The protester raised various other protest allegations which were denied. The GAO legal decision takes no position on the relative merits of these proposals, as assessments of merit are reserved for the agency. Rather, the decision is based on a review of the evaluation materials, the proposals, and the arguments raised by all of the parties during the course of the protest.

This GAO decision was delayed by 2 weeks because of the government shutdown in October. A redacted version of the decision will be made available publicly after the interested parties have chimed in. Electronic systems have become very flexible, and those capabilities are now extending to jammers.

In many cases, the cost of adding them is limited to software development, and in some cases no work is needed. EA-6B Prowlers were used to jam cell phone frequencies in Iraq, for instance, blocking remotely-detonated land mines while flying overwatch for Army convoys. The problem gets bigger when one considers that the mainstreaming of AESA radars is introducing very flexible base hardware for other systems.

So the duplication will be coming from both directions, and is inherent to the systems themselves. There is one small section on the importance of an open systems approach, but even that addresses physical transfer to other platforms, rather than developing new capabilities that are portable across platforms, having common libraries of threat systems and waveforms, etc. There was probably a time when GAO could have written a report about computer hardware purchases, asking for studies to ensure that they avoided duplication of secondary tasks.

With the benefit of hindsight, we can all see that as lunacy. First, it would have strangled the Personal Computing revolution, missing the operational issue of having flexible assets on hand to perform a growing number of needed tasks, and the managerial issue of using less expensive assets to free up more expensive ones.

On the procurement side, it would have utterly missed the real procurement issues of compatibility and standards in networking and in software capability development, as well as the secondary issue of overall system security.

Similar trends are at work in the Airborne Electronic Attack space, raising similar issues — but the GAO stuck to its explicit task, and missed them. Until then, the standard approach is to freeze contract spending until the protest is decided. Boeing in St. As noted earlier q. Work will be performed in St. Louis, MO, and is expected to be complete in October The month TD phase is the next step in bringing mature components together into testable subsystems that meet requirements, as well as developing a preliminary design for the new jamming pods.

Work will be performed in El Segundo, CA Wayne, IN The TD contract will provide Raytheon will opportunities to integrate and leverage all of these components, and more. Low-Rate Initial Production would start in under current plans, and the Navy intends to begin fielding the new pods in The Exelis team also proved the effectiveness of its power generation and control systems.

ITT had been teamed with Boeing, but that team broke apart by mutual agreement at the end of the Technology Maturation phase q. Their work included mission and operational analysis and trades, preliminary design of the pod and Ram Air Turbine, many hours of computational fluid dynamics CFD analysis, multiple design refinements, construction of the prototype pod, and wind tunnel verification.

The firm says that all test objectives were successfully met, and that the demonstrated power generation performance exceeded initial estimates. The TD phase will include: 1 Technology Readiness Assessments to confirm Technology Readiness Level 6 prototype demonstration in an operational environment status for critical Increment 1 technologies; 2 System Designs to a Preliminary Design Review PDR to establish the functional and allocated baselines for Increment 1; and 3 Refining technical trade space including those to improve affordability, system efficiency, and host platform compatibility.

The EAGs used for testing may need some modifications, in order to make proper use of the new gear. NAVAIR moved away from their original desire for a single pod, and acknowledged that the initial EAG deployment will be a 2-pod solution, focused on the mid-band range where most of the threats are. The USN has a relatively new low-band jammer, whose planned upgrades can keep it relevant.

Ultimately, NGJ will add high-band jamming capability, and probably low-band as well. Planned F integration costs also showed very high numbers, and those costs have led the Navy to focus on the EAG.

Green says that focus could remain until the end of the s. The other important piece of information is that the Navy has dropped supersonic carriage requirements. The performance read: fuel and range penalty was too great, which means the Next-Generation Jammer will probably be limited to the same Mach 0. Flight Global. Work will continue until April , and contracts include:. See also ITT release. Boeing will concentrate its efforts on integration of the jammer on the EAG Growler electronic attack aircraft.

It extends work for 1 year, to April Tests included Digital Beam-Forming for broadband electronically steerable antenna arrays, performance of the Gallium-Nitride based Mid-Band and High-Band Power Amplifiers, and the required packaging and cooling. ITT Exelis. In addition to generating figures for drag, the tests also ensure that airflow projections for the proposed ram air power turbine check out.

Raytheon touts successful tests of a critical power generation subsystem within their jammer design, during a series of sea and altitude level wind tunnel tests at Arnold AFB in Tullahoma, TN.

The tests involved full power generation, transient load switching and effective thermal control of the unit in operationally relevant environmental conditions. The added funds will take the initial concepts to the next stage as concept demonstrators, and also refine some of the critical technologies that the contractors are proposing to use.

High-power jamming demands lots of electrical power, so power generation will be an important technical challenge. The contracts will run until April See also Raytheon release NC Cobham also brings about 20 years of experience in providing high-power broadband transmitter sub-systems and electronic warfare microwave electronics to the US Navy.

BAE Systems. The 4 winners were:. ITT Corp. Northrop Grumman Systems Corp. NGC release. Raytheon Co. Work is expected to be complete in July These contracts were solicited under an electronic Broad Agency Announcement, and 4 offers were received.

See also Flight Global. Presentation by Elbit Senior Director, Mr. Uri Shatit. DID's daily email newsletter keeps you abreast of contract developments, pictures, and data, put in the context of their underlying political, business, and technical drivers. Defense program acquisition news, budget data, market briefings. Contact Editorial. Free Email Newsletter quick daily updates. Email Address Password Remember me Forgot your password? Not yet a subscriber? Find out what you have been missing.

Share on Facebook. Share on Twitter. Share on LinkedIn. Try this quick tour to discover our time-saving article tools. Latest update [? See article. Keep reading for the whole story with recent events put in context. EAG Growler click to view full. EAG systems click to view full. ECH Compass Call click to view full.

Engines - Aircraft. Equipment - Other. Heavy Bombers. Protective Systems - Aircraft. Specialty Aircraft. Electronics - General. Control Systems. IT - Cyber-Security. IT - General. Engineering Vehicles. Other Equipment - Land. Soldier's Gear. Support Equipment. Engineer Units. Power Projection. Public Relations. Signals Intercept, Cryptography, etc. NGJ-LB will utilize the latest digital and software-based technologies that will address advanced and emerging threats in the lower frequency bands of the electromagnetic spectrum.

Department of Defense and the Australian Ministry of Defence. The EAG aircraft is a carrier-based aircraft that performs full-spectrum electronic surveillance and electronic attacks against enemy threat radar and communications networks. The EAG currently utilizes the ALQ tactical jamming system, which provides very low, low, medium, and high radio frequency band radar and communication jamming capability for the aircraft.

The ALQ jamming system consists of pods that can be carried at various stations under the wing and under the centerline station of the aircraft, also known as weapon station 6. The Navy issued the BAA on November 16, , for the award of one or more contracts to develop a prototype low band jammer to replace the aging ALQ low band jammer currently used on the EAG aircraft and enhance the performance provided by the jamming system.

The proposed low band jammer, like the current ALQ jammer, will be housed in a pod attached at weapon station 6 on the underbelly of the EAG aircraft. Raytheon currently had a contract with the Navy to produce a mid band jammer that replaces the current ALQ mid band jammer, and which will be housed in a pod under each wing of the EAG aircraft. The BAA explained that the agency was seeking to increase its knowledge and understanding of existing technologies supporting a low band jammer where "significant size, weight, power and cooling [] constraints exist.

Offerors were required to propose a low band pod that did not exceed the maximum volume for station 6 of the EAG aircraft and would not create aircraft inlet distortion. With respect to weight, the BAA stated that "[the low band jammer system] shall weigh less than or equal to TBD [to be determined]. The BAA also required offerors to demonstrate that their proposed pod installed on an EAG aircraft would meet a mission radius threshold of at least nautical miles NM.

The Navy received multiple proposals, including one from Raytheon. The evaluators concluded that the larger size increased the risk that the pod concept would not obtain a flight clearance and thus require redesign of the pod structure and power generation systems. The evaluators further concluded that the redesign would decrease power generation, and increase the time for the low band jammer to achieve operational capability.

The evaluators concluded that the increased drag would further reduce EAG flight performance and decrease mission radius. The evaluators concluded that the plan appeared optimistic based on the substantiation Raytheon provided with its proposal. Based on these concerns, the evaluation board recommended that the Navy not award a contract to Raytheon.

In this regard, Raytheon argues the evaluators unreasonably assigned risk for its pod size without considering the fact that a gallon fuel tank has already received flight clearance at station 6 despite the fact it exceeds the EAG outer mold line store volume.

Raytheon also argued that the Navy unreasonably overstated the risk of engine inlet distortion resulting from exceeding the station 6 size limitation. In this regard, the Navy noted that the goals document stated that the pod "shall not exceed the EAG Station 6 maximum store volume.