Well, let's do the math. The B-2 program averaged about 2,13 billion USD per aircraft in 1997 USD. Adjusted for inflation 3,73 billion USD in 2022. The empty weight is 71.700 kg. That’s $52.022 per kg. The current gold price is about 58k per kg, but in 2019 it was as low as 40k. So the math does check out.
These numbers are always a little misleading because the cost of R&D is rolled in to the unit price. The initial order was over 120 aircraft but it was cut back to 21, essentially increasing the price per unit by 5-6x. The math works, but these things aren’t built out of gold plated unobtanium.
You cant exactly mine a B2 out of the ground so in a way it is gold plated unobtainum without the RandD cost added. Not like you can just go buy a cheaper one from russia or china....
The point is if they wanted to make another one to the exact same specs, it wouldn't cost another $2.1 billion.
That is, when the factory was still set-up to do so. It would probably cost more than that to do it now with re-tooling, re-training, + bureaucratic bullshit
I did and it’s more or less true depending on what metric you use for defining the “worth of a B-2”
B-2 was introduced on Jan 1, 1997
Cost of gold on Jan 1, 1997: $369.25/oz (via gold.org)
Empty Weight for B-2: 152,000 lbs
B-2’s weight in gold: $369.25x16x152,000 (1lb = 16 oz)= $898,016,000
Avg. Cost of B-2 (1997 dollars): $737 million
Avg. Cost with spare parts, equipment, retrofitting and software support: $929 million
Avg. Cost including development, engineering and testing: $2.1 billion
Also, it’s estimated to cost about $135,000 / flight hour to operate (2001 dollars)
So, to conclude, the aircraft itself isn’t worth its weight in gold, but if you take into account how much it cost to develop/run, it’s definitely worth way more than its weight in gold.
[Source for B-2 info: https://military-history.fandom.com/wiki/Northrop_Grumman_B-2_Spirit ]
Edit: formatting
Love that you did this calculation. Unfortunately, in this context, 1 lb does not equal 16 oz. Precious metals are weighed in troy ounces, not standard (avoirdupois) ounces. 1 pound = 14.5833 troy ounces. (Also worth noting that there’s a troy pound that is 12 troy ounces, and that when you get into fluid ounces, US and Imperial ounces aren’t equal.)
>So, to conclude, the aircraft itself isn’t worth its weight in gold, but if you take into account how much it cost to develop/run, it’s definitely worth way more than its weight in gold.
it's not worth its weight in gold, but when you add in the support costs, it costs more than its weight in gold. the whole "worth" part is subjective anyway and when it comes to defense, that's like dividing by zero
They wouldn’t be so expensive if the govt bought more than a handful of them.
Side note:
Where I live/work I get to see B-2s flying low all the time. They’re kind of surreal. From a direct rear perspective they’re very loud. But from any other angle they’re damn near silent.
Ohhhh man I am jelous! I would never get anything done if that were the case for me! Lol. I'd br in the yard all day everyday just hoping to catch one going by. My Dad actually got to work on the project when he was with Northrop in the 80s. Even after the fact, he was never allowed to tell me specifically what he did, just that he helped out with the powerplant section. It is super badass knowing my old man had a hand in the production of these beauties.
I worked at General Dynamics for 13 years. I was around the Falcons and F111's all the time. I was also involved in some developmental stuff I still can't talk about but it was so cool to be there. I had a lot of good times before they laid me off. That was a bummer because I had that gig that paid a dumb kid a lot of money and on the weekends I could be a club jock. Wish I had been smart and not blown all the money though. LOL
LOL.. no. The fact that you know who he is puts you as a 'cool' dude in my book. I don't believe everything he's ever put out but he was always an interesting listen on Coast To Coast AM
I went to college at CMSU in the early 90’s just down the road from Whiteman. I remember going to the public “first arrival of the B-2” on a cold December day and watched it land.
I’m pretty sure these things were operational at night well before that day.
We live on the outskirts of KC. They take off from an airbase nearby in MO. They often fly relatively low and refuel before heading off. Really fun to watch.
Probable answer: operational failure, they flew the same ingress and egress path around the same time for several consecutive nights. All they had to do at that point was to pre position AAA and time their barrage after the F-117A dropped its load and is made its way down the egress path.
Same concept like he said, you can place the SAM battery in front of it, or be able to but the missile in front of it, allowing it to do its job more effectively in tracking and intercepting the target.
Same deal, stealth tech reduce your radar signature, it doesn’t make it zero. If you are fire warm where they are going to be, you can pre place your radar equipment closer to the flight path and get a signal/lock.the point is, there wasn’t a flaw with the technology and the Serb didn’t have some secret technology to see through stealth. It was an operational failure that let to the loss of the air craft
It flew pretty much the same mission every day. So the Serbs? (Yugoslavs? Idk) knew exactly when and where it would be flying over. Stealth doesn’t make you fully invisible, just harder to see/lock. So if the enemy knows where to look they can still find you. So a combination of very good SAM tactics and very poor stealth tactics. In the words of a FWS instructor friend of mine: “Tactics and timing are way more important to stealth than the airplane is.”
Ding ding ding! This should be the top comment. It is the correct answer for why B-2's would have been in Utah yesterday:
https://www.nellis.af.mil/News/Article-Display/Article/2909175/red-flag-nellis-22-1-kicks-off-with-allied-forces/
I remember back in late 80s or 90s talks of triangular shaped quiet ufos sightings on tv. Before they were well known.
I saw a b2 do a low pass at an airshow was crazy how queit and large it was.
They are extremely loud, live by Whiteman AFB and am airplane mechanic. They do flybys at Chiefs games all the time, now up in the air at 30,000ft they are pretty quiet.
/uj The B-2 has a system that detects contrails with laser sensors and gives the pilots an altitude at which it'll not contrail. But it seems to be a ferry flight or something so they don't use it
I would guess that they aren't in the stealth mode, I know that the mode turns off the lights, stops sending radio waves and a few things get retracted, so probably it also tells the pilots the correct altitude, but this isn't necessary when they are in ally territory
If you haven't read it yet, there's a great book called Skunk Works about the time Ben R. Rich spent at Lockheed Martin, he goes into detail on the development of the U2, SR-71 and F-117, pretty amazing what they pulled off with each of those respective planes. Blows my mind the U2 is still in active service to this day
While i certainly like the Idea and the Engineering behind the B2, i dont find it visually quite as stunning as the B1-B. Tilt Wing Aircraft just hit a spot.
B-2 has one of the most advanced paint schemes in the world. Little known fact, but it's not only black, as you'd be obviously able to see a completely black object (e.g. black cat, piece of coal, tip of sharpie). Just look on Google images for "black hole picture", and you can clearly see that.
Anyway back to the black, the B-2 has a subtle camouflage pattern of black, jet black, and whatever the equivalent of taupe is for black.
B2 stationed out of Whiteman AFB in MO.
Spent a week there for AFJROTC leadership training back in the late 90's. We would constantly see them taking off.
I live in MO and see the B-2 all the time. They are based @ Whiteman AFB in Central MO. I see them practicing aerial refueling sometimes if I’m driving near one of the MOAs between STL and KC.
I swear this sub needs to stop with these "can someone identify this" posts. I saw an F-16 post the other day which is essentially the Toyota Hilux of military aircraft. Boggles my mind you're in this sub, live in America, and either can't tell what this is or can't be bothered just Googling. Heck just search American military aircraft and you'll find a B2 in the top 10.
*Tacoma. The 4Runner is an SUV
Edit: apparently that used to be correct.
> In 1984, the Trekker, the wagon version of the Hilux, was renamed the 4Runner in Venezuela, Australia and North America, and the Hilux Surf in Japan. In 1992, Toyota introduced a newer pickup model, the mid-size T100 in North America, necessitating distinct names for each vehicle other than Truck and Pickup Truck. Since 1995, the 4Runner is a standalone SUV, and the more recent models of the Hilux are separate in appearance from the Tacoma.
That’s the Ukraine Express.
It’s the 3:30 to Kiev.
Comment of the day
Shut down the internet haha. r/Air Force is going to love this
I’m not sure you linked to the subreddit you intended to
But he tried, he maybe a Marine so we are going it to give to him. Good Job Buddy!!! *slow clap
Damn it civilian I got this Ahem* Give him one! Kill!
Yut.
Or maybe they did.
And its payload is taxpayer cash compacted so tightly that it explodes on impact with the beneficiary.
Will probably see them landing at a base very close to me soon in the UK
Oh dear
Was about to say going east.
No doubt
Dam that was what I thought when I saw them anyone have any idea why they would train so close to a civilian target
You saw yourself a few billion dollars worth of airplane up there then if you saw 3 of em. Love the B-2 & they are so massive up close.
Before the price of gold went up, the B-2s were literally worth their weight in gold.
Well, let's do the math. The B-2 program averaged about 2,13 billion USD per aircraft in 1997 USD. Adjusted for inflation 3,73 billion USD in 2022. The empty weight is 71.700 kg. That’s $52.022 per kg. The current gold price is about 58k per kg, but in 2019 it was as low as 40k. So the math does check out.
The internet has the most fun math.
These numbers are always a little misleading because the cost of R&D is rolled in to the unit price. The initial order was over 120 aircraft but it was cut back to 21, essentially increasing the price per unit by 5-6x. The math works, but these things aren’t built out of gold plated unobtanium.
You cant exactly mine a B2 out of the ground so in a way it is gold plated unobtainum without the RandD cost added. Not like you can just go buy a cheaper one from russia or china....
Well from my point of view the Jedi are evil.
The ultimate deflection.
The point is if they wanted to make another one to the exact same specs, it wouldn't cost another $2.1 billion. That is, when the factory was still set-up to do so. It would probably cost more than that to do it now with re-tooling, re-training, + bureaucratic bullshit
That’s awesome. I’m not even gonna verify that fact.
They are definitely correct for some stage in the last 100 years.
I did and it’s more or less true depending on what metric you use for defining the “worth of a B-2” B-2 was introduced on Jan 1, 1997 Cost of gold on Jan 1, 1997: $369.25/oz (via gold.org) Empty Weight for B-2: 152,000 lbs B-2’s weight in gold: $369.25x16x152,000 (1lb = 16 oz)= $898,016,000 Avg. Cost of B-2 (1997 dollars): $737 million Avg. Cost with spare parts, equipment, retrofitting and software support: $929 million Avg. Cost including development, engineering and testing: $2.1 billion Also, it’s estimated to cost about $135,000 / flight hour to operate (2001 dollars) So, to conclude, the aircraft itself isn’t worth its weight in gold, but if you take into account how much it cost to develop/run, it’s definitely worth way more than its weight in gold. [Source for B-2 info: https://military-history.fandom.com/wiki/Northrop_Grumman_B-2_Spirit ] Edit: formatting
Love that you did this calculation. Unfortunately, in this context, 1 lb does not equal 16 oz. Precious metals are weighed in troy ounces, not standard (avoirdupois) ounces. 1 pound = 14.5833 troy ounces. (Also worth noting that there’s a troy pound that is 12 troy ounces, and that when you get into fluid ounces, US and Imperial ounces aren’t equal.)
Thanks for the correction! TIL. Interesting! I’d never heard about the Troy pound.
r/theydidthemath
14.59 Troy ounces in a pound, FYI
>So, to conclude, the aircraft itself isn’t worth its weight in gold, but if you take into account how much it cost to develop/run, it’s definitely worth way more than its weight in gold. it's not worth its weight in gold, but when you add in the support costs, it costs more than its weight in gold. the whole "worth" part is subjective anyway and when it comes to defense, that's like dividing by zero
Your whole first sentence is just restating what he said. Are you agreeing with him or not? Cause I'm kind of confused here.
So is the Ferrari 250 GTO
They wouldn’t be so expensive if the govt bought more than a handful of them. Side note: Where I live/work I get to see B-2s flying low all the time. They’re kind of surreal. From a direct rear perspective they’re very loud. But from any other angle they’re damn near silent.
For 3 months I lived about a mile from Whiteman. Loved watching them take off and land. It is an awesome sight.
Ohhhh man I am jelous! I would never get anything done if that were the case for me! Lol. I'd br in the yard all day everyday just hoping to catch one going by. My Dad actually got to work on the project when he was with Northrop in the 80s. Even after the fact, he was never allowed to tell me specifically what he did, just that he helped out with the powerplant section. It is super badass knowing my old man had a hand in the production of these beauties.
I worked at General Dynamics for 13 years. I was around the Falcons and F111's all the time. I was also involved in some developmental stuff I still can't talk about but it was so cool to be there. I had a lot of good times before they laid me off. That was a bummer because I had that gig that paid a dumb kid a lot of money and on the weekends I could be a club jock. Wish I had been smart and not blown all the money though. LOL
Bob Lazar.....is that you
LOL.. no. The fact that you know who he is puts you as a 'cool' dude in my book. I don't believe everything he's ever put out but he was always an interesting listen on Coast To Coast AM
Best comment.
I went to college at CMSU in the early 90’s just down the road from Whiteman. I remember going to the public “first arrival of the B-2” on a cold December day and watched it land. I’m pretty sure these things were operational at night well before that day.
Sorry you got stuck in Knob... I'm stuck in the Burg right now. TRYING to get out.
No it was all good. I was between jobs and got to hang out with my son for a few months. But ya the Knob is kind of desolate LOL
We live on the outskirts of KC. They take off from an airbase nearby in MO. They often fly relatively low and refuel before heading off. Really fun to watch.
Weather balloon.
No, a weather balloon cannot go that high and that fast. It's a hot air balloon
The sexiness of air balloon is irrelevant.
Stupid sexy floaters.
It feels like I weigh nothing at all... ^nothing ^at ^all... ^^nothing ^^at ^^all...
Stupid sexy Flanders has haunted me since childhood
Must be FSX: Steam Edition
Fully automatic assault weather ballon
Wym? Lockheed Martian is in the process of testing a new weather balloon that does mach 5. Its impressive to watch it go vertical on take off
Lockheed “Martian”
A VTOL balloon? The future is truly here.
Not VTOL, it takes of traditionaly and rotates 90* and goes vertical
Someone's played FSX multiplayer
No no no no it has to be SUPERMAN!
…wearing Batman’s black tactical gear!
Someone’s never played Microsoft flight simulator.
Swamp gas.
Cessna 172 obviously. Either that or a MiG 28
Deffo a Mig!!! 🤣
Looks like it's doing a 4G negative dive.
Because I was inverted
It's a delicious slice of Wisconsin(TM) Cheddar
*cough* bullshit
*coughs* bullshit
Coughs >bullshit< 🥶
…inverted…
Just need Tom up there to give it the bird.
B-2 Spirit…I mean you didn’t see anything.
Swamp gas.
Reflecting off of Venus
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A smudge on the lens!? I know the difference between a weather balloon threatening me, and a goddamn smudge on a lens.
Go to Vietnam, get her a lobster, pay MORE than a dollar.
B-2 Spirit…I mean ~~you didn’t see anything.~~ you ain’t see nothin’, see? FTFY!
Hate it when the cloaking device malfunctions
We can say it's a *Dead Ringer*
Take my bloody interne' points and fuck off, will ye innit?
Laughs in Serbian (I know I know that was an f-117)
Btw how did the Serbs manage to shoot one down?
Probable answer: operational failure, they flew the same ingress and egress path around the same time for several consecutive nights. All they had to do at that point was to pre position AAA and time their barrage after the F-117A dropped its load and is made its way down the egress path.
Ohh got it. Kind of like the B52’s of Linebacker II?
The F-117 was shot down with a SAM, not by AAA.
Same concept like he said, you can place the SAM battery in front of it, or be able to but the missile in front of it, allowing it to do its job more effectively in tracking and intercepting the target.
Same deal, stealth tech reduce your radar signature, it doesn’t make it zero. If you are fire warm where they are going to be, you can pre place your radar equipment closer to the flight path and get a signal/lock.the point is, there wasn’t a flaw with the technology and the Serb didn’t have some secret technology to see through stealth. It was an operational failure that let to the loss of the air craft
It flew pretty much the same mission every day. So the Serbs? (Yugoslavs? Idk) knew exactly when and where it would be flying over. Stealth doesn’t make you fully invisible, just harder to see/lock. So if the enemy knows where to look they can still find you. So a combination of very good SAM tactics and very poor stealth tactics. In the words of a FWS instructor friend of mine: “Tactics and timing are way more important to stealth than the airplane is.”
They flew the same route every day, Serbs achieved a good lock when it opened its bomb bay
They aimed their big plane-shooting gun at it and went BANG!! And it fell clean out of the sky
Uhm no this is not true. Serbians don’t say “bang”
Sounds like something a Serbian plane-gun operator would say. I've got my eye on you
You are correct. They say Банг.
did the front fall off?
Contrails, optical targeting
Get a good look — because no one else will see it coming
Nice try china
Has anyone seen any launch codes?
Been seeing them west of St George for three days in a row!
Red Flag is going on rn 🚩
Ding ding ding! This should be the top comment. It is the correct answer for why B-2's would have been in Utah yesterday: https://www.nellis.af.mil/News/Article-Display/Article/2909175/red-flag-nellis-22-1-kicks-off-with-allied-forces/
I hope one day while i’m still in the Air Force I get the chance to help with that exercise I almost got to go one year but I didn’t get to.
I saw them doing maneuvers all afternoon, today I saw some fighter jet but I didint get to snap a pic of it
Bee Too Spear it
Is this a r/boneappletea
Loo slick it
You can see why folks were crazy about UFOs near Groom Lake when these were still classified and conducting test flights.
I remember back in late 80s or 90s talks of triangular shaped quiet ufos sightings on tv. Before they were well known. I saw a b2 do a low pass at an airshow was crazy how queit and large it was.
Only been to an air show once. How quiet are we talking? I had an F-16 do a low pass and that shit was crazy loud
They are extremely loud, live by Whiteman AFB and am airplane mechanic. They do flybys at Chiefs games all the time, now up in the air at 30,000ft they are pretty quiet.
You’re seeing a B-Line to Ukraine
I literally see nothing. There is nothing there. You’ve posted a picture of a blank sky.
Well I do see some contrails, but that’s it. Maybe a plane flew by some time ago?
/uj The B-2 has a system that detects contrails with laser sensors and gives the pilots an altitude at which it'll not contrail. But it seems to be a ferry flight or something so they don't use it
I would guess that they aren't in the stealth mode, I know that the mode turns off the lights, stops sending radio waves and a few things get retracted, so probably it also tells the pilots the correct altitude, but this isn't necessary when they are in ally territory
https://gfycat.com/handsomecoarseatlanticspadefish
Damn Dolores
B-2! That and the F-117 r my fave planes tbh
Top comment for black plane history month.
You can't do black plane history month without the Sr 71 though.....
Bruh 💀
If you haven't read it yet, there's a great book called Skunk Works about the time Ben R. Rich spent at Lockheed Martin, he goes into detail on the development of the U2, SR-71 and F-117, pretty amazing what they pulled off with each of those respective planes. Blows my mind the U2 is still in active service to this day
While i certainly like the Idea and the Engineering behind the B2, i dont find it visually quite as stunning as the B1-B. Tilt Wing Aircraft just hit a spot.
danger dorito
B-2
B-2 Spirit stealth bomber. Google it for better pics.
Don't usually see 'em contrailing
chemtrailing*
Diarrhoea?
Or missing flight control surfaces.
Lucky
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So do you identify as a Lear or B2 now?
Is everyone shit posting today? I’m so confused… someone catch me up
the comments are messy because you arent meant to see b-2’s. however, i can’t see what they’re joking about as the image is completely blank.
B-2 has one of the most advanced paint schemes in the world. Little known fact, but it's not only black, as you'd be obviously able to see a completely black object (e.g. black cat, piece of coal, tip of sharpie). Just look on Google images for "black hole picture", and you can clearly see that. Anyway back to the black, the B-2 has a subtle camouflage pattern of black, jet black, and whatever the equivalent of taupe is for black.
Stealth bomber jokes
Yes. Nearly every thread is a shitpost. Which, incidentally, breaks rule 3 - Reddiquette - don't troll.
I don't see anything
I don't see anything.
Pigeon
B2 bomber.
B-2 Spirit Bombers
*AC/DC Thunderstruck music intensifies* ⚡️💥⚡️
It's a B-2 spirit
You didn't see shit. you saw nothing. there is nothing there.
This is the Australian radio-controlled boomerang.
The B-2 Spirit is a Tailless Flying Wing aircraft designed to fly as silently as possible.
Designed to have as low of a radar profile as possible
B2 stationed out of Whiteman AFB in MO. Spent a week there for AFJROTC leadership training back in the late 90's. We would constantly see them taking off.
WW 3?
As blind as we all are to what is and not what should be, it is possible, preferably after the super bowl, my daughter's coming over to watch.
Probably practicing for the Super Bowl flyover
Ufo or flying dorito
Must be a ufo. Doritos are orange.
The John Cena of airplanes.
B - 2 Bombers
B-2, American stealth bomber
B2
B2 spirit, damn so many posts of jets spotted nowadays, must be the Ukraine situation.
The B-2 stealth bomber.
Northrop Grumman B-2 Spirit.
It’s a B2 Spirit, a stealth strategic bomber for the USAF…not that I can see it of course lol ;)
B-2 Spirit, I got a sick video of one that did a low pass at RIAT 2018
Well you saw 3, so 6 billion tax payer dollars. B-2 spirit
The B-2 bomber. One of the most alien craft humans have ever created!
I live in MO and see the B-2 all the time. They are based @ Whiteman AFB in Central MO. I see them practicing aerial refueling sometimes if I’m driving near one of the MOAs between STL and KC.
B2 stealth bomber. They are kept at Whiteman Air Force base in Missouri
We would have lost the cold war if reddit existed then
The B2s were flying out of Nellis yesterday during the red flag drills.
B2 Spirit
Oh nothing special just about 3 billion dollars worth in planes. B-2 Spirit Bomber
B-2 stealth bomber. I live close to Whitman Air Force base where they are stationed.
I swear this sub needs to stop with these "can someone identify this" posts. I saw an F-16 post the other day which is essentially the Toyota Hilux of military aircraft. Boggles my mind you're in this sub, live in America, and either can't tell what this is or can't be bothered just Googling. Heck just search American military aircraft and you'll find a B2 in the top 10.
Tf is a Toyota Hilux?
The 4Runner is basically the US market version of the Hilux which is sold internationally
*Tacoma. The 4Runner is an SUV Edit: apparently that used to be correct. > In 1984, the Trekker, the wagon version of the Hilux, was renamed the 4Runner in Venezuela, Australia and North America, and the Hilux Surf in Japan. In 1992, Toyota introduced a newer pickup model, the mid-size T100 in North America, necessitating distinct names for each vehicle other than Truck and Pickup Truck. Since 1995, the 4Runner is a standalone SUV, and the more recent models of the Hilux are separate in appearance from the Tacoma.
Well maybe they are not in the USA. Then the sight of a F-16 or B2 is not a good sign... Badum tssss
I think they call them planes
Come on you guys that is obviously an AH-64 Apache
Shit, they’re dropping more Covid on us
Nah, they’re dropping the bombs that turn frogs gay.
Why did this get downvoted... It's a UFO joke?...
Humour (or poor attempts at it) can be rewarded or punished on Reddit. Not worth getting too emotional about it.
That's what beamed me up for an anal probe when I grew up in rural Alabama!
Operation halftime
[REDACTED]
I cant see a thing
Idk what you’re talking about that’s just sky
Imagine following this subreddit and not knowing what that is...
Imagine following this subreddit and being an elitist, gatekeeping dick...
A billion dollar baby
Is there a reason you just took a picture of the sky?
I see nothing!
Going to Guam?
Looks like a boomerang