Originally Posted by
Engines
Etudiant,
I heard US Government types saying that what they really wanted to do was to award the airframe contract to LM, and the mission systems integration work to Boeing. However, the rules were 'only one winner'.
The other main cause for delays was LM's more or less complete failure to pay attention to airframe weight. This is a huge issue for a powered lift aircraft, where every pound literally counts. I saw first hand a series of poor decisions, driven by a belief within LM that the new computer CAD systems would 'take care of weight control', and that 'the correct aircraft weight would fall out of the design process'.
Engines
I can vouch for the first part of the quote - and it wasn't just the US Government types - it was a widely held view across the entire Government team......
On the second point I believe LM were sucked into complacency by their early programme experience with the CAD system. On the demonstrator they had made an allowance of several pounds for shim when mating the LM and BAe manufactured sections of the airframe. In the event they used less than one oz, with which they were highly delighted, probably leading to eyes off the ball.