For the delectation of 'hanoijane' (whereyabin?)....
F-35: First-Ever Fixed Wing Full-Up System Level by Jeff Johnson and Timothy Staley | pp.28-31
"After 20 years of the live fire test law (10USC2366), nearly every type of aircraft has undergone testing, paving the way for programs to come. In spite of this long and impressive legacy of testing, the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) program still marks many firsts....
...The waiver limited full-up system-level (FUSL) testing to a single variant of the JSF and the Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics (OSD/AT&L) granted the waiver in June 2001. The waiver meant that though preceded by the F-22, the JSF will become the first fifth-generation fighter to undergo FUSL testing....
...The focus of the live fire test and evaluation (LFT&E) program is to address the components or systems that have the greatest areas of uncertainty or the greatest amount of risk. This uncertainty includes unique aspects of the design and features that have little or no previous test data available. No aspect of the JSF is more unique than the STOVL propulsion system....
...As a result, these components warrant live fire testing. Thus far, the program has tested the ballistic tolerance of the 3BSM, the shaft, and the clutch, with the lift fan testing to come....
...An interesting design feature of all three variants is the bifurcated inlet duct, which has inlet openings on both sides of the fuselage, merging to a single inlet path just in front of the engine. The two inlets surround a large fuel tank on the CTOL and CV variants. As a result, any ballistic damage to this area can lead to leakage down the inlet and into the engine....
...Perhaps the most significant design change affecting the program’s LFT&E relates to the fire suppression system. Several phases of testing were performed to determine the most lightweight and cost effective fire suppression system. The outcome of some of the testing, such as that performed by the 46th Test Wing at Wright-Patterson AFB (WPAFB), was quite spectacular. However, once again, weight constraints (among other factors) resulted in the removal of the fire suppression system (with the exception of fire detection) from the aircraft....
...The JSF is being assessed against a wide range of threats, from API and high-explosive incendiary (HEI) rounds to fragments from proximity-fuzed surface-to-air missiles (SAM) and man-portable air defense systems (MANPADS) The MANPADS analysis uses the new advanced diverging ray methodology (ADRAM) and a localized area is being assessed, taking into account the areas of the aircraft where an infrared (IR)-guided MANPAD is more likely to impact. This analysis allows for more reasonable trade studies with respect to these threats, and ensures the program gets the most “bang for the buck” with any vulnerability reduction features implemented in the design...."
http://www.bahdayton.com/surviac/asn..._Fall_2007.pdf (1.6Mb)
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F-35 Live Fire Test: Full-Up Systems Level Testing
"The Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) (F-35, Lightning II) Vulnerability and Live Fire Test Team will be conducting Full-Up System Level (FUSL) testing on the 1st JSF System Design and Development (SDD) aircraft (2AA:0001). The F-35 live fire test and evaluation (LFT&E) strategy is to conduct a comprehensive test and evaluation of the system-level vulnerability and lethality of all three F-35 variants against ballistic and advanced threats. The original LFT&E strategy for determining the system-level vulnerability for the F-35 family of aircraft was founded on the FUSL testing of an F-35 short takeoff and vertical landing (STOVL) variant. The approach for the remaining two variants was to leverage the high degree of commonality between the F-35 family of aircraft by conducting Full-Up testing of the variant unique features and component/system level tests. The waiver approving this live fire (LF) strategy was approved by the Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology, and Logistics (USD AT&L) on 25 October 2001."
http://www.bahdayton.com/surviac/asn...O_Spring10.pdf (3.3Mb)
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2011 DOTE Report page 5 of 14 pages | numbered page 29
"...Live Fire Testing
• FUSL testing conducted on the first flight test aircraft (CTOL aircraft AA-1) provided aircraft flight control, electrical, propulsion, and fuel system vulnerability data. Due to commonality of the three variants, these results are extendable to the STOVL and CV variants as well.
• Contractor Fuel System Simulator tests showed the On-Board Inert Gas Generation System (OBIGGS) performance to be inadequate to support the vulnerability reduction requirements of the aircraft. A two-phase redesign effort is underway to provide protection against threat-induced fuel tank explosion across the entire flight envelope. Engine test articles have been delivered and structural test articles have been identified."...
http://www.dote.osd.mil/pub/reports/...2011f35jsf.pdf (0.6Mb)
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Aircraft Survivability Journal - Spring 2012 Issue
Published by the Joint Aircraft Survivability Program Office
JSF FULL UP SYSTEM LEVEL TESTING F35 Flight Critical Systems Test Chuck Frankenberger
"...FCS Architecture : No cheap Kills [Flight Control System]
One of the newer technologies in the F35 is the Electrohydrostatic Actuators. These actuators contain a self-contained hydraulic system. There are two types of actuators on the aircraft: simplex and dual tandem. The dual actuators have redundancies built in, including dual communication and power paths. The dual actuators were ballistically tested and showed good tolerance to damage. The redundant systems are isolated, and damage on one side did not propagate to the other side....
...Conclusions
The FUSL testing conducted on AA-1 was very successful meeting all defined test objectives and success criteria. Addressing synergistic effects, the electrical power and flight control systems successfully isolated failures and protected the redundancies built into these systems, allowing continued safe flight. The VSN [Vehicle System Network] architecture is robust, providing multiple paths to transfer data. Testing highlighted that fire is a significant threat to flight critical systems.
The test team was able to verify that the actual ballistic damage response correlated very well to previous pilot in the loop simulator testing. Over the course of the test program, the LFT [Live Fire Test] team witnessed firsthand the robustness of the F35 flight critical systems, no cheap system kills."
http://www.bahdayton.com/surviac/asn...012_V9_web.pdf (2.1Mb)