F-35 Cancelled, then what ?
Ecce Homo! Loquitur...
What a surprise!!!!!!
Pentagon predicts F-35 program costs to jump by $27 billion: report | TheHill
The Pentagon’s F-35 fighter jet program, the most expensive program to date, is expected to jump by at least $27 billion in costs, Bloomberg reported.
The total acquisition cost for the Lockheed Martin-made F-35 is predicted to spike about 7 percent to at least $406.5 billion, according to a draft of the Selected Acquisition Report, to be submitted to Congress this week. The uptick follows several years of declining estimates. The report expected the current cost of $379 billion from a previous high of $398.5 billion in early 2014.
F-35 program spokesman Joe DellaVedova didn’t immediately respond to Bloomberg on the cost estimate increase. The Joint Strike Fighter program office typically waits until the report is formally released to Congress before commenting.
Delayed testing could be one reason for the increase. The Government Accountability Office (GAO) in April released a report that said “cascading F-35 testing delays” could add more than $1 billion to the cost of the program......
Pentagon predicts F-35 program costs to jump by $27 billion: report | TheHill
The Pentagon’s F-35 fighter jet program, the most expensive program to date, is expected to jump by at least $27 billion in costs, Bloomberg reported.
The total acquisition cost for the Lockheed Martin-made F-35 is predicted to spike about 7 percent to at least $406.5 billion, according to a draft of the Selected Acquisition Report, to be submitted to Congress this week. The uptick follows several years of declining estimates. The report expected the current cost of $379 billion from a previous high of $398.5 billion in early 2014.
F-35 program spokesman Joe DellaVedova didn’t immediately respond to Bloomberg on the cost estimate increase. The Joint Strike Fighter program office typically waits until the report is formally released to Congress before commenting.
Delayed testing could be one reason for the increase. The Government Accountability Office (GAO) in April released a report that said “cascading F-35 testing delays” could add more than $1 billion to the cost of the program......
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Some response here with USMC adding an extra 13 F-35Bs to total buy which is incorrectly recorded as extra F-35Cs in the SAR table seen here:
"...Some of the acquisition cost increases come from the Air Force’s decision to whack the size of its maximum annual purchase of F-35As from 80 per year down to 60, stretching the service’s planned purchases by six years. The Total Program Cost Estimate rose by $11 billion, a substantial portion of the $27.5 billion acquisition cost increase...." Marines Add 13 Bs To F-35 Buy; Acquisition Costs Rise « Breaking Defense - Defense industry news, analysis and commentary
Ecce Homo! Loquitur...
Which is how the spiral starts. The price goes up so they cut the numbers and stretch them out; which ruins the planned programme so the price doesn't come down for the next round; so the price goes up so they cut the numbers and stretch them out.....
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Don't know how bad a tailwind direction or strength is for a NO START F-35 but....
"...The pilot escaped from the aircraft but sustained burns to his head, neck and face...." F-35A engine fire at US Air Force base sparked by strong tailwinds
“[Integrated power pack] and engine start issues with a tailwind were known prior to the incident. However, the publications were written and communicated in such a way that the F-35A pilot community had only vague awareness of the issue. This vague awareness led to inadequate training for engine starts with a tailwind,” Col. Dale Hetke, the AIB’s president, wrote in his statement of opinion on the investigation.
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30 knot tailwind (if straight down the jet pipe) seems to me to be outrageous - turn the bastard into the wind youse lazy sods: 
https://www.flightglobal.com/news/ar...lwinds-439269/
https://www.flightglobal.com/news/ar...lwinds-439269/
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Tailwind Caused September F-35 Engine Fire 13 Jul 2017 Brian Everstine and John A. Tirpak
"...Because the fire spread with speed, the pilot had trouble following the checklist. For example, the pilot did not move the engine switch to “off” in accordance with the egress checklist. Within seconds, the fire reached the landing gear.
“It stands to reason that if the engine switch had been moved to off at the first indication of fire, fuel would have been shut off to the engine nearly immediately and the fire would not have burned as long,” the report states. The pilot was under duress, however, and sustained burns to his head, neck, face, and ears.
Following the AIB report, AETC implemented procedural fixes and checklist changes to prevent similar mishaps, including a 20-knot tailwind limit for the start of an F-35 engine...."
REPORT: http://www.airforcemag.com/AircraftA...UNTAINHOME.pdf (1.4Mb)
http://www.airforcemag.com/Features/...gine-Fire.aspx
“It stands to reason that if the engine switch had been moved to off at the first indication of fire, fuel would have been shut off to the engine nearly immediately and the fire would not have burned as long,” the report states. The pilot was under duress, however, and sustained burns to his head, neck, face, and ears.
Following the AIB report, AETC implemented procedural fixes and checklist changes to prevent similar mishaps, including a 20-knot tailwind limit for the start of an F-35 engine...."
REPORT: http://www.airforcemag.com/AircraftA...UNTAINHOME.pdf (1.4Mb)
http://www.airforcemag.com/Features/...gine-Fire.aspx
30 knot tailwind (if straight down the jet pipe) seems to me to be outrageous - turn the bastard into the wind youse lazy sods:
Back in the day of line ops on the GR1 with an inconvenient tailwind for start it was common practice to use a bin lid held near the jet pipe during the early part of the start....
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From the accident report/diagram the wind at 30 cannots was straight up the tail pipe whilst the Pilot Notes said there was an issue with windy up yur pipe starts but no mention of a windspeed limit - that is NOT helpful - NOW there is a limit of 20 cannots. I reckon some thoughtful appreciation of the prevailing weather / wind would have caused the aircraft to be parked arseabout. A handy 17 million dollar lesson methinks.
Just This Once wrote:
During my (very) brief time on the Buccaneer, having got behind the progress line due to weather, our course was ordered to fly one Saturday morning in November, the exercise being a 'high' level navex, then RTB.... The first crew off reported that the cloudbase was relatively low on take-off, but 'befehl ist befehl' in the eyes of the less-than-cuddly 237 OCU staff and off we all went in turn. On recovery it was hardly surprising that 2 out of the 3 of us didn't see the lights at the adjusted Decision Height we had to use, not actually having IRs on type. So we were diverted to Mildenhall, landing after 40 min IMC off another GCA. The 3rd crew went slightly below DH, saw the lights and landed for the customary bollocking.
At Mildenhall, a bus turned up with some annoyed 237 OCU pilots on board who'd been sent to ferry our 2 jets back. Starting was a bit of an issue as we'd been parked tail to wind, which by the time the ferry crews had arrived had picked up rather...
So the trick was to hold an intake blank behind the jet pipe, wait until LP rotation had stopped, then try a 'normal' start. Sounds good in theory, but as I watched this pantomime there was an almighty roar and a sheet of flame shot out of the starboard jet pipe, reaching back as far as the air brake petal....
But that didn't seem to worry the crew, who were soon on their way back to Honington. No idea what damage that might have done, or whether any comment was made after landing....
Back in the day of line ops on the GR1 with an inconvenient tailwind for start it was common practice to use a bin lid held near the jet pipe during the early part of the start....
At Mildenhall, a bus turned up with some annoyed 237 OCU pilots on board who'd been sent to ferry our 2 jets back. Starting was a bit of an issue as we'd been parked tail to wind, which by the time the ferry crews had arrived had picked up rather...
So the trick was to hold an intake blank behind the jet pipe, wait until LP rotation had stopped, then try a 'normal' start. Sounds good in theory, but as I watched this pantomime there was an almighty roar and a sheet of flame shot out of the starboard jet pipe, reaching back as far as the air brake petal....
But that didn't seem to worry the crew, who were soon on their way back to Honington. No idea what damage that might have done, or whether any comment was made after landing....
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What a surprise!!!!!!
Pentagon predicts F-35 program costs to jump by $27 billion: report | TheHill
The Pentagon’s F-35 fighter jet program, the most expensive program to date, is expected to jump by at least $27 billion in costs, Bloomberg reported.
The total acquisition cost for the Lockheed Martin-made F-35 is predicted to spike about 7 percent to at least $406.5 billion, according to a draft of the Selected Acquisition Report, to be submitted to Congress this week. The uptick follows several years of declining estimates. The report expected the current cost of $379 billion from a previous high of $398.5 billion in early 2014.
F-35 program spokesman Joe DellaVedova didn’t immediately respond to Bloomberg on the cost estimate increase. The Joint Strike Fighter program office typically waits until the report is formally released to Congress before commenting.
Delayed testing could be one reason for the increase. The Government Accountability Office (GAO) in April released a report that said “cascading F-35 testing delays” could add more than $1 billion to the cost of the program......
Pentagon predicts F-35 program costs to jump by $27 billion: report | TheHill
The Pentagon’s F-35 fighter jet program, the most expensive program to date, is expected to jump by at least $27 billion in costs, Bloomberg reported.
The total acquisition cost for the Lockheed Martin-made F-35 is predicted to spike about 7 percent to at least $406.5 billion, according to a draft of the Selected Acquisition Report, to be submitted to Congress this week. The uptick follows several years of declining estimates. The report expected the current cost of $379 billion from a previous high of $398.5 billion in early 2014.
F-35 program spokesman Joe DellaVedova didn’t immediately respond to Bloomberg on the cost estimate increase. The Joint Strike Fighter program office typically waits until the report is formally released to Congress before commenting.
Delayed testing could be one reason for the increase. The Government Accountability Office (GAO) in April released a report that said “cascading F-35 testing delays” could add more than $1 billion to the cost of the program......
Funny how someone has signed off IOT with "testing" incomplete...
Wonder how the ballistic/hydrostatic testing is going to go
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Ecce Homo! Loquitur...
The Times devotes its front page, and a large number of articles inside, trashing the UK F-35B programme today. Behind a paywall, but I include the last to give a taste. Looks like someone in the MOD wants to wield a large axe.
Britain spends billions on flawed fighter jets
Jets are overbudget, unreliable and vulnerable to cyberattacks.
Upgrades and extras push up flyaway costs
If this were a car...... you wouldn't buy it
F-35: Behind the story
Malfunctioning £309,000 helmet left pilot floundering in darkness
The glossy promotional video for the F-35 fighter jet’s £309,000 helmet promises flawless night vision, maximum comfort and a unique 360-degree perspective that lets pilots “see” through the plane. Actual footage of the Generation III helmet display from an exercise shows the reality: a pilot putting himself in danger because the night vision malfunctioned. The test pilot tried to land on an aircraft carrier at night — the same manoeuvre expected of British pilots when they test-fly the jets from the first of two carriers next year.
The night-vision helmet display during the carrier landing approach
“He’s looking down at the right, trying to establish where he is,” Lieutenant-Colonel Tom Fields, the exercise evaluator, notes in a video of the exercise. “His words after [he landed]: ‘Control, you are going to have to give me a compelling reason to do that again.’ ”
Nick Bartlett, a flying qualities engineer, said that as soon as the pilot took off he knew “this is not good. It was almost like a fog for him. At that point I became uncomfortable.” Erik Gutekunst, a colleague, said: “Any time I start talking about it I get heebie-jeebies. It became very clear that the picture he was working with was unsatisfactory for doing any sort of operation within the vicinity of the ship.” Lieutenant-Colonel Fields summed it up. “We got lucky. There’s no way around it.”
Until recently, the F-35’s helmet was so heavy that lighter pilots were banned from wearing it in case they broke their necks on ejection. A “lite” version required the cockpit to be redesigned to have somewhere to put a spare visor, a report for the Pentagon noted.
Other problems are more serious. Gun strafing symbols, which line up targets for the pilot, were “currently operationally unusable and potentially unsafe”, according to the December 2016 report. The night-vision technology was less accurate than in older aircraft, making identification of targets “more difficult if not impossible”. “Green glow” — a leakage of light around the edge of the display — was improved from previous models but was “still a concern”.
In 2015 a separate report into a dogfight test between an F-35 and an older F-15 aircraft noted that the pilot’s helmet kept smacking into the canopy when he tried to turn around. “The helmet was too large . . . to adequately see behind the aircraft,” the report said.
The helmet is still in development, and many bugs will be ironed out. But countries including Britain are purchasing the F-35 today, meaning that they could face higher bills to upgrade the helmet as solutions are discovered.
Planes too heavy to land
Of all the problems faced by the F-35 Lightning fighter-bomber, being too heavy might prove one of the most costly (Alexi Mostrous writes).
Buried in a US defence report is a passage that will worry taxpayers handing over about £150 million per jet. A key performance requirement for the F-35B is that it can use thrusters “to safely conduct a vertical landing” — on land or on aircraft carriers. The report found that when early versions were upgraded, they would be over the weight permitted for a safe landing. Britain bought four of the 14 aircraft affected, records suggest. The report estimates further upgrades, to bring the aircraft up to its full potential, would push it over an even stricter “structural limit”. Without the upgrade the aircraft will miss out on future software and hardware updates. This could mean that Britain paid millions of pounds for redundant aircraft.......
Britain spends billions on flawed fighter jets
Jets are overbudget, unreliable and vulnerable to cyberattacks.
Upgrades and extras push up flyaway costs
If this were a car...... you wouldn't buy it
F-35: Behind the story
Malfunctioning £309,000 helmet left pilot floundering in darkness
The glossy promotional video for the F-35 fighter jet’s £309,000 helmet promises flawless night vision, maximum comfort and a unique 360-degree perspective that lets pilots “see” through the plane. Actual footage of the Generation III helmet display from an exercise shows the reality: a pilot putting himself in danger because the night vision malfunctioned. The test pilot tried to land on an aircraft carrier at night — the same manoeuvre expected of British pilots when they test-fly the jets from the first of two carriers next year.
The night-vision helmet display during the carrier landing approach
“He’s looking down at the right, trying to establish where he is,” Lieutenant-Colonel Tom Fields, the exercise evaluator, notes in a video of the exercise. “His words after [he landed]: ‘Control, you are going to have to give me a compelling reason to do that again.’ ”
Nick Bartlett, a flying qualities engineer, said that as soon as the pilot took off he knew “this is not good. It was almost like a fog for him. At that point I became uncomfortable.” Erik Gutekunst, a colleague, said: “Any time I start talking about it I get heebie-jeebies. It became very clear that the picture he was working with was unsatisfactory for doing any sort of operation within the vicinity of the ship.” Lieutenant-Colonel Fields summed it up. “We got lucky. There’s no way around it.”
Until recently, the F-35’s helmet was so heavy that lighter pilots were banned from wearing it in case they broke their necks on ejection. A “lite” version required the cockpit to be redesigned to have somewhere to put a spare visor, a report for the Pentagon noted.
Other problems are more serious. Gun strafing symbols, which line up targets for the pilot, were “currently operationally unusable and potentially unsafe”, according to the December 2016 report. The night-vision technology was less accurate than in older aircraft, making identification of targets “more difficult if not impossible”. “Green glow” — a leakage of light around the edge of the display — was improved from previous models but was “still a concern”.
In 2015 a separate report into a dogfight test between an F-35 and an older F-15 aircraft noted that the pilot’s helmet kept smacking into the canopy when he tried to turn around. “The helmet was too large . . . to adequately see behind the aircraft,” the report said.
The helmet is still in development, and many bugs will be ironed out. But countries including Britain are purchasing the F-35 today, meaning that they could face higher bills to upgrade the helmet as solutions are discovered.
Planes too heavy to land
Of all the problems faced by the F-35 Lightning fighter-bomber, being too heavy might prove one of the most costly (Alexi Mostrous writes).
Buried in a US defence report is a passage that will worry taxpayers handing over about £150 million per jet. A key performance requirement for the F-35B is that it can use thrusters “to safely conduct a vertical landing” — on land or on aircraft carriers. The report found that when early versions were upgraded, they would be over the weight permitted for a safe landing. Britain bought four of the 14 aircraft affected, records suggest. The report estimates further upgrades, to bring the aircraft up to its full potential, would push it over an even stricter “structural limit”. Without the upgrade the aircraft will miss out on future software and hardware updates. This could mean that Britain paid millions of pounds for redundant aircraft.......
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Can't read the links above but appropo 'night vision' the guys & gals must be ****tin bricks. Twas thus ever.
https://fightersweep.com/8267/pictur...trike-fighter/
https://i0.wp.com/fightersweep.com/w...-refueling.jpg
https://fightersweep.com/8267/pictur...trike-fighter/
https://i0.wp.com/fightersweep.com/w...-refueling.jpg
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that Times article brought back memories of the TSR-2 and F-111K debacles - state of the art aircraft, late, technical issues and over budget in parlous economic times - and with a possible Labour Govt waiting in the wings.....................
If it becomes a UK political football all bets are off
If it becomes a UK political football all bets are off
Re “you are going to have to give me a compelling reason to do that again.”
I recall similar words being uttered by a very pale and sweaty Harrier test pilot in the late 70s, who had just completed the first night evaluation of a vertical shipborne landing. The ship was of course ‘HMS’ Bedford (Sam Kidd), a very realistic 2x4 and chickenwire night-lighting mockup of an aircraft carrier, on an otherwise completely blacked out airfield.
Yet x years later, a developed system, aircraft and ship, was ‘at war’; and now with further development is the norm for such operations.
Development flying entails the rule of war - ‘no plan survives contact with the enemy’; with time and financial wriggle room things get sorted. However, there is increasing evidence that the F35 has little wriggle room, weak funding, and is rapidly running out of time as military strategy changes.
Another rule of war involves adaptability, agility, and flexibility; yet many modern aircraft programmes suffer increasing complexity, proportional to Moore’s law - because we can do it, not always because we need it, breeding ‘tight coupling’ where any small change involves many other interactions, cost, time, …
Thinks, why was I always duty pilot in the tower for the difficult flight tests - also the day that the Harrier nose leg oleo failed on a ski jump takeoff; … (‘I know nothing, I come from Barcelona’), a harbinger of doom.
I recall similar words being uttered by a very pale and sweaty Harrier test pilot in the late 70s, who had just completed the first night evaluation of a vertical shipborne landing. The ship was of course ‘HMS’ Bedford (Sam Kidd), a very realistic 2x4 and chickenwire night-lighting mockup of an aircraft carrier, on an otherwise completely blacked out airfield.
Yet x years later, a developed system, aircraft and ship, was ‘at war’; and now with further development is the norm for such operations.
Development flying entails the rule of war - ‘no plan survives contact with the enemy’; with time and financial wriggle room things get sorted. However, there is increasing evidence that the F35 has little wriggle room, weak funding, and is rapidly running out of time as military strategy changes.
Another rule of war involves adaptability, agility, and flexibility; yet many modern aircraft programmes suffer increasing complexity, proportional to Moore’s law - because we can do it, not always because we need it, breeding ‘tight coupling’ where any small change involves many other interactions, cost, time, …
Thinks, why was I always duty pilot in the tower for the difficult flight tests - also the day that the Harrier nose leg oleo failed on a ski jump takeoff; … (‘I know nothing, I come from Barcelona’), a harbinger of doom.