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I mean I get the fully autonomous flight is interesting and should be pursued, buts laughable that this is billed as a cost savings. Of course flying a $2-3 mil

I mean I get the fully autonomous flight is interesting and should be pursued, buts laughable that this is billed as a cost savings. Of course flying a $2-3 million aircraft is going to be cheaper than flying a $100 million one, pilot cost is negligible in that equation

jdminhbg 3y ago
The two aren't independent, though. When you have to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars for humans to operate an airplane, you might as well get the most out of the fixed cost of the airplane to begin with. If you don't have to do that, you can build cheaper smaller airplanes to fly cargo on routes that wouldn't be economical at human operation scale.
JumpCrisscross 3y ago
> laughable that this is billed as a cost savings You can mass produce an autonomous fleet without consideration for a training pipeline. (You can also lose a lot of life-support systems, and engineer the plane to be more disposable in combat.)
- balderdash 3y ago
  Definitely true - but what is that in the context of a ~$100m c-130? 1-3%, not nothing, but you probably gain more with engine upgrade programs, adding blended winglets etc.
  - JumpCrisscross 3y ago
    > what is that in the context of a ~$100m c-130? 1-3% For the C-130, I’d guess 10%+ on operating costs based mostly on increased utilisation. For a new vehicle, support and redundancy alone should yield 10%+. Doubling or tripling production, based simply on better amortisation of development costs, zero learning curve assumed, another 20%+. Then add on reduced operating costs due to lack of pilot training and pay as well as higher utilisation.
euroderf 3y ago
In the long run the cost of unmanned vehicles will approach zero (plus cost of energy inputs), so let's hop on that cost reduction curve.
- balderdash 3y ago
  Again - this makes sense when you are talking about a ~$50/k a year driver driving a $50k car, a lot less when you are talking about $400k of pilot salaries when you are spending ~$12m a year operating a ~$100m c-130
  - euroderf 3y ago
    Altho in the military it's not just about the salaries. There's also a lot of resources devoted to training, plus considerations of manpool/manning.

jdminhbg 3y ago

The two aren't independent, though. When you have to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars for humans to operate an airplane, you might as well get the most out of the fixed cost of the airplane to begin with. If you don't have to do that, you can build cheaper smaller airplanes to fly cargo on routes that wouldn't be economical at human operation scale.

JumpCrisscross 3y ago

> laughable that this is billed as a cost savings You can mass produce an autonomous fleet without consideration for a training pipeline. (You can also lose a lot of life-support systems, and engineer the plane to be more disposable in combat.)

balderdash 3y ago
Definitely true - but what is that in the context of a ~$100m c-130? 1-3%, not nothing, but you probably gain more with engine upgrade programs, adding blended winglets etc.
- JumpCrisscross 3y ago
  > what is that in the context of a ~$100m c-130? 1-3% For the C-130, I’d guess 10%+ on operating costs based mostly on increased utilisation. For a new vehicle, support and redundancy alone should yield 10%+. Doubling or tripling production, based simply on better amortisation of development costs, zero learning curve assumed, another 20%+. Then add on reduced operating costs due to lack of pilot training and pay as well as higher utilisation.

euroderf 3y ago

In the long run the cost of unmanned vehicles will approach zero (plus cost of energy inputs), so let's hop on that cost reduction curve.

balderdash 3y ago
Again - this makes sense when you are talking about a ~$50/k a year driver driving a $50k car, a lot less when you are talking about $400k of pilot salaries when you are spending ~$12m a year operating a ~$100m c-130
- euroderf 3y ago
  Altho in the military it's not just about the salaries. There's also a lot of resources devoted to training, plus considerations of manpool/manning.