no fly by night

[billyo]

i see the M.O.D. HAS 7 new HELICOPTERS which they paid half a billon £ for , in a hanger for 7 years , they say they were not fit for purpose , but now will fitted e'm out to the old mark 2 standard as the mark three is sh## and we send men to war without the rigth gear, give someone the sack minister please

 

[Shytalkz]

Nothing changes. It never will, either, regardless of the flavour of government: those in charge have never had armed forces experience these days.

 

[JohnD]

you don't need armed forces experience to order a helicopter

what you do need to do is to establish the requirements correctly, from the people who know, and not keep changing your mind about what you want.

And if you want something that works, order it standard build instead of asking for lots of untried innovations.

 

[Shytalkz]

It's not to do with the machinery as such, more to do with the budgets provided for the AF; and to understand what is required in monetary terms and for what, experience would be a good start.

 

[JohnD]

Most large projects (especially government ones) fail because the "customer" doesn't know what they want, and keeps changing the requirement. This causes time and cost to increase indefinitely. They can only stop increasing after the requirements stop changing.

Asking for untried innovations means that time and cost are unknown.

 

[Shytalkz]

That's mainly because the procurement process is so long and drawn-out and technical issues move along at a rapid pace, the goalposts can't help but move, but that's not the fault of the end user.

 

[Softus]

I agree with JohnD (having seen some relevant contracts from the inside).

I also agree with Shytalkz, because the customer is in a land made of chocolate, therefore can't help themselves, so I believe the onus is on the supplier to make crystal clear the budget and schedule cost of all requested changes.

 

[tim west]

Don't the services test the aforementioned equipment on a trial basis before buying?

 

[Shytalkz]

Conveyor belts, that's what's needed.

 

[JohnD]

but taking delivery of the original spec would have meant you could have equipment delivered ten years earlier, at lower cost, and have the use of it for ten years...

instead of having nothing because the order keeps changing.

Imagine you ordered a new bathroom for £10,000. Just as the plumber has fitted the new bath and was screwing the gold-plated taps into place, you tell him to take the bath away and get a jacuzzi instead.

Some time later, after he has bought the jacuzzi and rerun the pipes, you tell him you've changed your mind about the tiles and want black marble instead.

he fits the new tiles and you tell him you've decided you want stainless pipe instead of copper, so he hacks out all the walls to change the pipes.

He fits the new stainless pipes and you tell him you've decided on underfloor heating so he has to pull up the floor and wreck the new maple flooring you asked for.

He fits the underfloor heating and new flooring and you tell him you've decided on a wet-room.

Your notional as-now-planned bathroom is much nicer than the one you had originally planned

Six months later, you stink because you haven't had a single bath or shower yet, but you've run up costs of £50,000

In those wasted six months new technology has invented an ultra-sonic hot-air drier for the bidet, so you revise your plan again and budget an extra £5,000. You tell people the change is essential because technology has moved on.

And you still haven't got a functioning bathroom.

Your plumber has made a fortune and your wife is blaming him for being slow and expensive.

Your Project Manager has resigned and gone to live in a cave.

 

[Shytalkz]

You do have a point

 

[Softus]

The bathroom analogy isn't reasonable, because those things are luxury items, whereas (for the Air Force) a helicopter is an essential.

The problem is of having to second-guess the technology that any warring opponent might be using, and where to draw the line in compromising between state-of-the-art and get-it-working-right-here-right-now.

 

[Bilioustrumpstaine]

I think that the bathroom analogy is about 100% right.

MOD spend too long deciding what to buy and testing kit, just get on with it.

Wasting £500 million pounds is scandalous.

 

[JohnD]

if they've been paid for 7 years ago, and been no use since then, the line was not drawn correctly.

Anything that doesn't get delivered because you keep changing your mind is useless. If you've spent 20 years talking about it, thinking about, working about it and spending money on it, and it still isn't delivered, it's worse than useless. You would be better off if you'd stayed in bed.

Something that gets delivered but isn't quite to your heart's desire isn't useless. If it gets delivered quickly because you haven't kept changing your mind the early delivery makes it even better.

 

[Shytalkz]

The problem is a lack of funding for what the AF really want/need. Hence the cobbling together with string and black nasty approach that so often happens with kit.