I'm not interested in any more BUFF upgrades until they start making them like The Old Dog.........

I mean, who wouldn't want rear-firing air mines and a V-tail?????

Anyone know the oldest flying SN of the Buff? And/or most airframe hours? Can’t imagine there’s any other model that’s been in active duty as long.

I'm thinking reverse B-47 on the re-engine on the BUFF.

Two big diameters inboard and leave the twin originals outboard.
You've just doubled your outboard inventory.

Close. Oldest aircraft is a KC-135R, tail no. 57-1419, so it predates the B-52Hs by about 4 years.

BUFF?

Big Ugly F..? F..?

Fat Fudger

Flying Fudger

(Family versions)

Must be others . . .

Glad to see us getting some love finally. Too bad the re-engine program is already seeing delays meaning I might not get to fly a "new" BUFF after all. I am thinking my last sortie will be early this spring. Not a bad run '94 to '23, but not quite enough to get to fly with new engines.

To answer Arnie's question: All the B-52s we currently fly are 1960 and 1961 models with the last one delivered in 1965. The hours vary by plus/minus 1k hours, but the one I flew last month has 16k. The hours don't mean much. Our Phase and Depot level maintenance basically kick out a new jet, except the engines and a few pars we can't replace.

I really wanted to use the new RADAR, but I was luck in that the B-52 went through several upgrades in my tenure and we saw tons of combat.

T-38 started flying 1961, so some of them are older than the BUFFs.

And in their training role, some probably have more hours. They have been rewinged a couple of times by the time I flew them in 82

I believe the B-52 B model entered service in 1955. The ones still flying are the youngest ones as Aaron stated and they were obviously built later.

So there will still be BUFFs doing the dreaded 7 engine approach into Barksdale? Will miss the smoke trails which made them easy to find when flying into KDTN.

RAS

First T-38 flew in '59. I flew a '59 model at Holloman in the late 80's. Had around 13,000 hours which I though was a lot, but many are now well over 20,000 hrs. The earlier jets have been retired, and mostly on the flightline, at least at Sheppard, are mid-late 60's and early 70's tails. It is a tired fleet.

BUFFs are in the pattern every day at Barksdale. Fly in to KDTN and watch them. We have a new cafe which is really good. There is an aerobatic box over KDTN for the Red Bull team and they are out there most days.

The new engines will erase our standard grease streak in the sky. Fighters will have to look on RADAR to find us now. :-)

Gee, I thought this topic was for women members looking for new men…

We often talk about the average age of the GA fleet, or airline fleets, but isn't it interesting the average age of the aircraft owned by the largest, most expensive, Air Force in the world? Even the Navy doesn't keep ships as long as the Air Force does aircraft. Obviously new aircraft aren't cheap, but I'd be curious to compare the cost of maintaining and operating the old fleet versus the cost to buy new. Granted, the Air Force usually isn't happy just replacing a KC-135 or B-52, the replacement usually gets over-complicated, over-priced, and less functional (KC-46 program?).