F-35 Cancelled, then what ?

[NITRO104]

JSFfan, my figures show JSF WS yearly cost increase of 5-7% on top of a 2% yearly inflation for the 5 years prior to Bogdan's arrival.
With a constant inflation rate, it's absolutely irrelevant in what year dollars it has been expressed because the relative difference adjusted by inflation always remains the same, so yes, it'd help if you knew what you're talking about.

Are you saying that each and every Sweetman's 'figures skewing' article is broken and so you can't link a SINGLE example?

[LowObservable]

APA clowns Sweetman nonsense cant remmeber were i red it mate

signed

JSFfan/Jackster/Jack412 (his mark)

[Just This Once...]

So in the dim and distant past (2012) Sweetman blogs that the B will cost about $138M in 2018.

Skip forward to Sep 2013 and the Pentagon forecasts $139M reducing to $134M.

Well at least everyone is in the same ballpark.

[JSFfan]

APA clowns Sweetman nonsense cant remmeber were i red it mate
signed JSFfan/Jackster/Jack412 (his mark)

LO, I read it on Avweek, NITRO104 asked about articles. Unfortunately it seems avweek has taken most of them down.

now as you may know, there is a rumour around that you are sweetman that I don't subscribe to. It would be too sad if sweetman deprived of writing his f-35 nonsenses on avweek, would come to the forums


re spaz's link.. sweetman likes to mix up urf apuc etc to give an apple orange, he bulled about the price of a f-22 to the f-35, but interestingly put the fa-18 at a similar price which is in contrast to his fa-18 is so much cheaper stories

If all goes perfectly according to plan, an F-35A delivered eleven years hence, at full rate, will have an APUC tag of $89 million. A Super Hornet today is $81 million, and it's a 50 percent larger airplane than an F-16.

What about the frugal, do-more-with-less Marines? At full rate, the F-35B costs $138 million in 2018, versus $117 million for the F-35C. That’s nearly 80 percent of the price of the last batch of F-22s – you remember, that extravagantly expensive toy for the white-scarf air force – but coming off a 110-per-year line. What would have been the F-22 price at 40 per year, rather than 20?

[kbrockman]

Correct me if I'm wrong but IOC did indeed slip to 2019 if they followed the OTE schedule like initially planned.
It's only because the MARINES opted to declare IOC themselves, a prerogative every service has, that we are maybe going to see an IOC as early as 2015.
I don't know if the USAF has done the same with their 2016 plan but I clearly remember GEN Bogdan commenting on the 2015 MARINES date.
Looking at all that needs to be done and tested ,2019 seems very likely which is why the NAVY sticks with it , it seems.

[NITRO104]

sweetman bulled about the price of a f-22 to the f-35

JSFfan, last F22 batch came at $138m total flyaway cost in '09 dollars.
The latest SAR predicts Navy's JSF total flyaway cost in FY18 to be $105m, in '12 dollars.
Add to F22's cost 3 years of inflation and you're at 7x% difference, which is what Sweetman generally said and that's only a flyaway cost.
When it comes to cost you need to pay just to put the aircraft on tarmac (a WS cost) but still not operate it, the difference is probably even worse.
F22 WS cost in '09 was $151m.
By comparison, F35B's WS cost in '17 (got no data for '18, comptroller's site being weird so I can't get Navy's FY14 budget) is $189m and F35C's WS cost is $173m per plane, again in '12 dollars.

So now explain how did Sweetman talk bull, regarding F22/F35 costs and where did he mix URF, NRF, whateveRF?

[Courtney Mil]

Loads of good words and bluff there, thanks. The bluster and provarication in the answers so far does not fill me with a warm fuzzy feeling. Just the feeling that I'm looking at fuzzy thinking.

Let me break my question down into bite sized chunks for the hard of thinking. By the figures that are being used now, including all the cost reductions and excluding the "one offs" for infrastructure and support equipment and million pound helmets:

What will each B-Model airframe cost as delivered from LM?

What will one B-Model engine cost (just so we can fly the thing)?

What can we expect to have to pay to bring these block aircraft up to spec?

I can add those up, but feel free to do it for me.

Thanks.

[JSFfan]

Wouldn't you want to work out the UK price?

[SpazSinbad]

USAF View of F-35 Good Bits

One day somebody somewhere will buy some F-35Bs and weeze'll all know eh. In the meantime....

F-35: New fighter creates new culture for 21st Century and beyond 24 Sep 2013 (by Rich Lamance) Courtesy of Air Force News Service

"..."Most pilots come from the F-16, F-15 and A-10 legacy aircraft. Sensors on the front of the F-35 allow us to have that 360-degree awareness. That was the big leap forward. Computer technology that is 30 years or more advanced than the legacy aircraft is what makes the F-35 so advanced."

Lt. Col. Anthony Pelkington is the 33rd FW chief of safety and was one of the first of the legacy pilots selected for the F-35 program. He said that for pilots transitioning from those legacy systems, the F-35 is a huge deal.

"For 10 years in the F-16, I dealt with essentially monochrome cathode ray displays - approximately 6 inch square - and I've got two of them. Now I move up to a contiguous 8 x 20- inch color display that is a huge step forward for the pilot's situational awareness. Plus, there's a lot more capability in the display itself.

"In the F-16, I had a radar display with a selectable, like turning pages in a book, something that would show my ordnances like I had a stick figure map with monochrome lines on a black background. It would try to give us a semblance of where we were to maybe a weapons system. But I had to choose. Every one of those displays was limited to the confines of that small 6-inch to 8-inch screen.

"In the F-35, we now have this massive amount of screen real estate. I can now see multiple sensors at once, which is great because I don't have to pick and choose. I don't have to take away my situational awareness with what the radar is telling me in terms of traffic to bring up situational awareness and what the target pod looks like. It's all there available for me."

Pelkington added that one of the best aspects of the fifth generation fighter is its ability to communicate with all aspects of the aircraft, as well as customize information to fit each pilot's needs. "The displays talk to each other, the sensors talk to each other, and a lot of information is displayed in sensible formats with other sensors in one combined picture. Now I can bring up large formats on displays so I can see things easier - I can even bring up many formats if I want with a different orientation on how the displays will look. Whatever I want to do to aid my situational awareness I can do and the reality, as a pilot, is that I can customize that setup quite easily to a format that best suits how a pilot understands."...

..."One of the biggest differences the F-35 helmet has over the others is that the new helmet encompasses multiple gadgets such as night vision goggles, and for that function you would have to modify the pilot's flying helmet and add the components on there," said Baskin. "With the F-35, it's all encompassed in the helmet. The cameras on the jet work in sync with the helmet and whatever the jet picks up visually will be displayed on the visor in the helmet."

From a pilot's point of view, Renbarger agrees that the nicest part of the new helmet is that everything is self-contained. "The best thing about the F-35 helmet is that it has a big visor with a big display, and we can display a night vision camera visual on the visor and then a distributor aperture system that is basically a set of cameras that are all over the airplane and work in the infrared spectrum. That can be displayed on our visor as well.

"When we get our helmet fit, there is actually a complicated scan process that takes an image of our heads and provides a laser cut-out foam insert for the helmet that is molded to our heads. Then there's ear cups that close the helmet around our head and a custom nape strap in the back that basically locks the helmet down on our heads. There's very little, if any, motion in the helmet when we move our head around. Very well balanced, a very well fit and it feels great wearing the helmet. It's very specific to each individual pilot."...

...He said that for pilots, training in the F-35 simulator is by far, the best there is. "I've flown in F-16 simulators and F-22 simulators and the F-35 simulator is truly state-of-the-art. They've got the best visuals, full dome coverage, 360-degree views, target set build-up, they have runways and very much replicates flying the airplane. I haven't heard one pilot say it wasn't the best simulator they've ever been in short of flying the airplane."

Renbarger added that because the F-35 is a single-seat plane, the first time a pilot flies the F-35, he's by himself, making the simulator even more critical. "The operational flight software that runs the airplane - that same software is in the simulator," said Renbarger. "In other aircraft I have flown, there have been differences between the simulator and the airplane. This is as close as I've ever seen between the simulator and airplane. Exact same cockpit. The cockpit sits on a rail and you sit in the cockpit and it drives forward and raises up inside the dome and the screens you see are the exact same screens you see on the jet."..."

F-35: New fighter creates new culture for 21st Century and beyond > U.S. Air Force > Article Display

[Courtney Mil]

Originally Posted by JSFfan

Wouldn't you want to work out the UK price?

I think you understand the question. Some numbers would have been a better answer than a smart-arse dodging of the issue.

[glad rag]

This is a bit like the climate change scientific [???] evidence that is constantly manipulated by the interested parties...it's all BS to cover up a salary creation scene for the chosen few.....

[NITRO104]

JSFfan, what freakin' APUC??
Who's talking about APUC, anywhere??
SAR doesn't and neither does the Congressional FY budgetary documentation, which are about the only documents providing these figures.
And who cares what F22 cost in 2005, when the last F22 batch to which Sweetman refered, was in 2009??
JSFfan, I've responded directly to what you quoted as Sweetman's 'figure skewing' (quoted below) and showed that he was NOT 'figure skewing', but compared apples to apples, so download the latest SAR and USAF comptroller's report for FY2009 (link provided in previous post) and crosscheck them yourself. It's not my problem you apparently don't understand what's written there, but if you wanna call people clowns better make sure you don't wear a clown hat yourself first.

Originally Posted by JSFfan

What about the frugal, do-more-with-less Marines? At full rate, the F-35B costs $138 million in 2018, versus $117 million for the F-35C. That’s nearly 80 percent of the price of the last batch of F-22s – you remember, that extravagantly expensive toy for the white-scarf air force – but coming off a 110-per-year line. What would have been the F-22 price at 40 per year, rather than 20?

About this (supposedly quoting Sweetman);

F-35A delivered eleven years hence, at full rate, will have an APUC tag of $89 million [he doesn't say what f-35 year $] and was 80% of the f-22

Pardon my French, but are you stupid??
Sweetman referred to FY18 F35B/C cost being nearly 80% of the last batch (FY09) F22 cost, not to F35A $89m APUC and there's no this quotation of yours anywhere in the text, so you just made it up.
JSFfan, according to USAF FY14 budgetary documentation the actual WS cost for the F35A in FY18 which is the year in which the FRP is supposed to start, will be over $107m per plane in '13 dollars! and APUC includes on top of WS cost spare parts and consumables, so Sweetman actually predicted over $18m per plane smaller cost than it stands today, which isn't strange if you consider the tempo in which the program runs.

Anyway, what else is there?
Let's clear all of this and be done with it.

[JSFfan]

now I did ask you to check before you type and make yourself look stupid
spaz's link JSF - SAR Discloses Another Three-Year Slip
the APUC is in the SAR, perhaps in your haste to post, you didn't read it properly

CM I'd look up the sar, the contracts make no sense to me to get a unit price.
the easiest way is to take off the said 4% reduction for this year to last years price

[NITRO104]

JSFfan, the figure '80' appears only two times in the text you linked.
First time referring to FRP and the second time as I've already explained.
I know you got nothing better to do but troll this forum, but now I belive it's enough, so I'm gonna ask again, where does the "F-35A delivered eleven years hence, at full rate, will have an APUC tag of $89 million [he doesn't say what f-35 year $] and was 80% of the f-22" come from, because it surely doesn't come from the blog post you just linked?
So, in case you don't understand my question let me rephrase.
Where did you see Sweetman linking F35A's APUC with F22's cost via 80% difference?

[Courtney Mil]

JSFfan,

If you run back to page 95 and spend a few minutes reading through it, you will eventually come to your post number 1894 (the year coke bottles appeared) where you were very happy to come up with all sorts of figures. Do just read the entire page for the context, please. Elsewhere, you have quoted unit prices to prove what great value F-35 will be. Since then, you have told us about numerous cost reductions. Does your repeated flim-flam (word I heard and Army chap use once) mean you don't know, or that it is not determined?

At a time when we're talking about significant orders and production runs, surely someone should know what it costs?

[LowObservable]

This obsessional campaign to impugn someone's professional competence, combined with a complete failure to cite any evidence, or indeed to read a sentence or two accurately, is getting very tedious.

[SpazSinbad]

BRONCOs Busted

Back at these posts on this thread were [some] mentions of the BRONCO:

http://www.pprune.org/military-aircr...co#post7902366

http://www.pprune.org/military-aircr...co#post7731503
etc...

Here is anotherie....

Combat Dragon II OV-10G+ Bronco Demonstration Program Ends 25 Sep 2013 Robert F. Dorr

"Combat Dragon II program funding expires. The Combat Dragon II program ends September 30.

U.S. special operations forces have been demonstrating two North American OV-10G+ Bronco light combat aircraft in Combat Dragon II, also called a Limited Objective Evaluation (LOE), since 2012.
Now, the money has run out.

To those who support the program and want small, nimble warplanes operating over the battlefield in wars like the one in Afghanistan, the expiration of funding for Combat Dragon II marks a sad moment.
Attempts in recent years to put a light attack aircraft into the field have yet to produce a single operational aircraft — although one is coming.

LAS Remains Funded
The U.S. Air Force‘s Light Air Support (LAS) in which the Sierra Nevada Corporation/Embraer A-29B Super Tucano will equip the Afghanistan air arm, is still funded despite the budget crisis in Washington. A source told Defense Media Network an A-29B assembly plant in Jacksonville, Fla. will begin production of the “Super-T” by the end of the calendar year.

Beechcraft says there is a robust world market for a light attack plane like its AT-6. The company recently carried out a ceremonial first flight of a third AT-6 airframe built in Wichita, Kan. However, Beechcraft is facing financial issues and has no realistic prospect of selling an operational AT-6 to U.S. forces. The company has not identified an international launch customer it expects, but speculation is focused on Mexico as the possible first buyer of the AT-6.

Sources close to the Combat Dragon II program say it taught valuable lessons. Conceived as a four-plane demonstration under fire in the war zone in Afghanistan, it devolved into a demonstration of the two Broncos within the continental United States. The Broncos participated in numerous realistic military exercises and used various types of sensors and ordnance.

The two Broncos were on loan to the U.S. Navy from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and will be disarmed and returned to NASA."

Combat Dragon II OV-10G+ Bronco Demonstration Program Ends | Defense Media Network

[NITRO104]

Originally Posted by LowObservable

This obsessional campaign to impugn someone's professional competence, combined with a complete failure to cite any evidence, or indeed to read a sentence or two accurately, is getting very tedious.

Indeed and now he deleted 2 of his incriminating posts, in what I suppose is to be an attempt to cover up this whole mess he got himself into.
It's ok to disagree with someone and even get into a heated debate, but to outright lie and attribute non-existing stuff to a man with a real name over and over again, is just beyond contempt.
Doesn't this forum stipulate some kind of administrative measure for such behavior?

[Snafu351]

JSFfullo****e (JSFfos) and his alter ego JackJack have long plagued forums with bridge dwelling behaviour, generally lacking any substance whatsoever.
The best response is too completely ignore him. He soon goes away to find a forum where he does get a bite or, in an attempt to get attention, his trolling hits heights which result in him getting banned.
Thanks to all those others engaging in reasoned discussion and sharing of interesting information.

[Just This Once...]

Never understood why JSFfan has not attracted formal moderator action. Indeed, weak moderation has enabled individuals such as this to drag the military aircrew forum in all sorts of undesirable directions. As this individual is not military, nor aircrew, not a backroom boy or even respectful of those who are I am not sure what the forum gains by his presence.