Simviation Forum - The Army's Apache attack-helicopter had a bad war.

Jan 9^th, 2006 at 11:09am

Theis Offline
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http://www.slate.com/id/2081906/
Interesting read.

Cheers Theis

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Reply #1 - Jan 9^th, 2006 at 11:17am

Hagar Offline
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This only goes to confirm what I've always thought. Attack helicopters like the Apache might look menacing & I certainly wouldn't fancy being confronted by one. The truth is that any helicopter is too vulnerable to ground fire to be fully effective. IMHO of course.

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Reply #2 - Jan 9^th, 2006 at 11:21am

Ivan Offline
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It burns it's own tail off. Any AH64 that did see action in the gulf in 1991 should have the whole tailboom checked.
US pilots think the Mi-24 is better at altitude. Which helps in Afghanistan as they are operating close to max ceiling
MTBF of the first ones was barely 2 hours... but still enough to meet the contract terms
The thing is used for jobs it has never been designed for. There was never a real flying tank (like Mi-24 and Mi-28) on the NATO side.

Anyway that article is a 'set up the army against the airforce' kind of thing... Not exactly what you need when you are out there fighting

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Reply #3 - Jan 9^th, 2006 at 6:35pm

SilverFox441 Offline
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WOW!

What an article without content.

1. The Apache was tried in the scout role and then reverted to it's designed role of Air Cav. Stunning, who'd have thunk it?

2. Apaches worked in the designated CAS role...again who knew?

3. Apaches flew with top cover from USAF fixed wing assets...like they're supposed to.

4. Apache flew CAS and got shot up and RTB'd...ummm...actually that was one of the design criteria.

The writer doesn't like Apache and wrote a pile of rubbish.

Ivan, most of what you wrote is propaganda.

1. Apache does not burn it's tail off. The efflux from the black hole coolant system is barely above ambient temperatures.

2. Mi-24 does have a greater payload fraction under hot-high-and heavy operations. It doesn't matter as neither helo has to fight under those conditions.

3. The 2 hour figure you refer to is not MTBF. The 2 hour figure is a measure of the time before a mafunction occurs. The failure was required to be a non-catastrophic item...not a MTBF type of issue.

4. You're right that the Apahce isn't a flying tank...it's a flying tank killer. That applies equally well if you take it as a tank killer that flies, or a killer of flying tanks.

Steve (Silver Fox) Daly

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Reply #4 - Jan 9^th, 2006 at 7:06pm

RitterKreuz Offline
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a lot of it has to do with the terrain of the battle field, IMHO the apache was designed for pop-up style attacks while using rolling hills with heavy forrests as cover. Im not too sure but there isnt much in the way of rolling alpine hills in bagdad!

i dont understand what happened to the flying armadas of 100 200 or even 300 bombers going in to WIN the freakin war. that would be a sight to see - 250 ship formation of B-52s dropping a full load at once. given the civil casualties would be appauling.

but if you carpet bomb a division of tanks, APCs and infinantry moving through the desert with a couple hundred B-52s you wouldnt even have to bother cleaning anything up! screw these choppers, choppers are a good quick in/quick out tool for medivac or recon. if i were a general over in open desert warfare i wouldnt count on them for anything more than that. perhaps some ambush/interdiction if the terrain was right.

Patton and rommel proved that open desert warfare is best left to artillary, infantry and fast moving tanks with close air support.

a chopper in the wrong terrain can prove an easy target in most cases.

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Reply #5 - Jan 9^th, 2006 at 7:38pm

Hagar Offline
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Quote:

i dont understand what happened to the flying armadas of 100 200 or even 300 bombers going in to WIN the freakin war.

I don't see how blanket bombing would help in this situation.

"............ 33 Apache helicopters were ordered to move out ahead of the 3rd Infantry Division and to attack an Iraqi Republican Guard regiment in the suburbs of Karbala. Meeting heavy fire from small arms and shoulder-mounted rocket-propelled grenades,"

You might as well use one bomber & nuke the complete suburb. As you rightly pointed out, the civilian casualties would be appalling.

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Reply #6 - Jan 9^th, 2006 at 8:43pm

RitterKreuz Offline
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blanket bombing is fun, youre bound to hit something! LMAO

blanket bombing a city in this situation wouldnt be helpful, but doing so to an open desert division would be

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Reply #7 - Jan 9^th, 2006 at 8:56pm

Hagar Offline
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Quote:

blanket bombing a city in this situation wouldnt be helpful, but doing so to an open desert division would be

I think it was proved during WWII that tactical interdiction fighter-bombers armed with rockets like the P-47 & Typhoon are the best tank busters. Even so the losses from ground fire were terrible. The modern equivalent is the A-10.

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Reply #8 - Jan 9^th, 2006 at 11:21pm

RichieB16 Offline
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I don't know about all of this. My understanding is that attack helicopters like the Apache are extremely effective in their duty. Like any low flying aircraft, they are going to take damage during their mission. But, from the front they are very narrow and deliver a tremendous amout of firepower. They are quite vulnerable from the side (which is why they attack in formation so someone is attacking while another is turning).

To me, you have to expect a lot of damage and losses with aircraft like this.

Maybe I'm a little quick to defend them-but I have always heard good things about attack helicopters. My father served in Vietnam and one of his duties was as a Crew Chief and machine gunner on UH-1B Huey and AH-1 Cobra gunships. He has always told me stories of taking a lot of damage but dishing out just as much. He said it was part of the deal when you fly low and slow like helicopters do. But, they did cause a lot of damage.

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Reply #9 - Jan 10^th, 2006 at 2:50am

C Offline
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Quote:

The writer doesn't like Apache and wrote a pile of rubbish.

Quite the impression I got from the article...

Quote:

Apache flew CAS and got shot up and RTB'd...ummm...actually that was one of the design criteria.

Pretty much.

Quote:

Ivan, most of what you wrote is propaganda.

Lol.

We know Ivan likes his Russian aeroplanes...

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Reply #10 - Jan 10^th, 2006 at 6:15am

Hagar Offline
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Quote:

My understanding is that attack helicopters like the Apache are extremely effective in their duty. Like any low flying aircraft, they are going to take damage during their mission. But, from the front they are very narrow and deliver a tremendous amout of firepower. They are quite vulnerable from the side (which is why they attack in formation so someone is attacking while another is turning).

The Apache might look menacing but in the end it's still a helicopter with a complex rotor system & all those whirling bits. I suspect that a few well placed shots in the right place (the rotor or the tail rotor), even from a machine gun could bring any low-flying helicopter down.

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Reply #11 - Jan 10^th, 2006 at 8:33am

Ivan Offline
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Quote:

Ivan, most of what you wrote is propaganda.

1. Apache does not burn it's tail off. The efflux from the black hole coolant system is barely above ambient temperatures.

The missiles it fires do. That's the reason they didn't fly in Bosnia. The one that crashed there had critical tail damage leftover from it's previous outing in 1991. After that investigation they grounded all of them and put some extra deflector plates on the rocket racks.

Quote:

2. Mi-24 does have a greater payload fraction under hot-high-and heavy operations. It doesn't matter as neither helo has to fight under those conditions.

Afghanistan, summer, 50C at least and the lowest altitude there is some 2000 meters. Blackhawks need extra pre-pitch blades there, and chinooks were flown in by Mi-26 helicopters.
Mi-24 on paper was never intended to be used there but as it was designed just like the Il-2 was (field mods becoming production standards) it ended up as a good hot-and-high helo with loads of excess power.

As we are talking attack helos: payload = combat effectiveness.
The AH-64 can't field reload, and AFAIK hasn't factory installed dual controls either

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Reply #12 - Jan 10^th, 2006 at 12:38pm

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Ivan, Ivan, Ivan....

The AH-64 has been capable of field reloading from the very first prototype...it was part of the very concept to use FARPS (Forward Arming and Refueling Points).

Every Apache has dual controls installed from the factory...and always has had them.

The problem you describe with the missile motors damaging the tail was limited to a specific series of missile motors, which have since been redesigned.

Apache wasn't grounded due to the missile fuel question, it was stress corrosion in the tails, since inspected and repaired. At about the same time there was a similar issue with the tail rotor swash plates, also nor repaired.

These type of small problems are quite common in helicopters...after all the Mi-24 Hind used to cut it's own tail off if manuevering hard.

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Reply #13 - Jan 10^th, 2006 at 12:49pm

Hagar Offline
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Quote:

These type of small problems are quite common in helicopters...after all the Mi-24 Hind used to cut it's own tail off if manuevering hard.

Indeed. I don't know if that was ever sorted out.

Quote:

The problem you describe with the missile motors damaging the tail was limited to a specific series of missile motors, which have since been redesigned.

The British Army Air Corps suffered serious delays in introducing the Apache into regular service. These were caused by several factors including the above problem. This led to something like 60 helicopters sitting in the hangar waiting for various problems to be fixed & crews trained to fly them. I think this has recently been overcome & the Apache is finally entering service several years late.
http://portal.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2002/03/25/napac25.xml

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Reply #14 - Jan 10^th, 2006 at 1:02pm

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I have to go with Ivan here. Soviet designs would have come in more practical in the second Gulf War.

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