Lockheed sees serious F-35 sustainment problems

originally posted by: OccamsRazor04
a reply to: rickymouse

Look into the recent 1 on 1 testing where the F-35 basically went undefeated against numerous fighters.

Using test procedures specially designed to show an advantage of the F35s. Yes,. that is true. They can make anything look superior if they design the tests to take advantages of it's special properties.

The F35 is not a bad plane, but it has had a lot of flaws which have grounded it from being used. Also the pricetag is important. I think that the plane should have been tested a little more and had it's flaws fixed before being released.

a reply to: rickymouse

These were not test scenarios. One of them was a multinational exercise. You don't stack the deck to make your new toy look good in those. The point of them is to teach your allies their strengths and weaknesses and let them learn to work with them.

The F-22 against the Typhoon revealed a few weaknesses for the F-22 and forced the pilots to develop new tactics.

Show me a plane that hasn't had its problems during development. I'll wait. That's why it's called development. They find the problems and fix them.

As for the price, the F-35A was cheaper than a Block 60 F-16 in the last LRIP.

originally posted by: Zaphod58
a reply to: rickymouse

These were not test scenarios. One of them was a multinational exercise. You don't stack the deck to make your new toy look good in those. The point of them is to teach your allies their strengths and weaknesses and let them learn to work with them.

The F-22 against the Typhoon revealed a few weaknesses for the F-22 and forced the pilots to develop new tactics.

Show me a plane that hasn't had its problems during development. I'll wait. That's why it's called development. They find the problems and fix them.

As for the price, the F-35A was cheaper than a Block 60 F-16 in the last LRIP.

I wasn't paying attention with the other planes, I just started getting interested in the last three years in this kind of technology, reading your posts is what got me doing checking on how things are. I read that some pilots refused to fly these planes a while back because of some problem they had, a problem that they had a hard time fixing. I don't know if that air thing is even fixed.

How do you compare the problems and early part failure with other fighters? Is this one more or less of a problem overall. I trust your opinion because you get into this and know a lot.

a reply to: rickymouse

No, they refused to fly the F-22 and T-45. They were suffering severe hypoxia like events. A number of aircraft have experienced them, with the F-35 seeing by far the fewest over the last 10 years, and the F-18 the most.

The F-35 is the most complex fighter built to date, with a ridiculous coding requirement. They were smart to roll out the software a little at a time, but stupid to go the concurrency route. It's been worse than other development programs, but when you look at what's involved and the complexity of it, it also could have been a lot worse.

a reply to: rickymouse

Feel free to read up.

www.abovetopsecret.com...

theaviationist.com...

a reply to: Zaphod58

Too bad this is happening. I hope we won't need these jets for their intended purpose.

Heads should roll.

a reply to: seasonal

Thanks to the F-35, and other projects, there's a major overhaul in the procurement process going on. There are more fixed price contracts being awarded that limit the risk to the Pentagon.

I said this elsewhere but working on Typhoon was no different.

The contracts were let in the 1980's/90's and had a clause that the all manufacturers could meet maximum production requirements of about 200 aircraft a year. Of course to do this, BAE and prtners had to invest in test kits, tooling and rigs at the suppliers.

Problem was, the technology between those development to production contract was 20 years old when we hit 2000 levels and the CRT head down displays were now LCD but noone paid to upgrade the test sets. Add to that a requirement to cut costs year on year, any supplier asking for $200k to upgrade 3 test sets to allow them to make 200 units per year were told no, just upgrade one.

Come deployment, out std up team of procurement signing spares contract for the RAF were told that there was no spare capacity on the build lines, Tranche 2 was ramping up and everything was utilized.

We were asked, 15 years after the original contracts to go and test the suppliers ability to meet the contracted 200 a year and not one of them could do it. Now what do you do, take the supplier to court, make them invest in meeting the demand sending them bankrupt so you have no parts??

Got to realise that defence procurement which is a matter of national security needs to have the politics taken out of it, 5% profit only, all risk borne by the purchaser, open book all the way. You dont get anything for nothing and cutting corners means there is always a loser, and that loser will always be the buyer.

Should also consider 0% tax on Mil Contracts, its paying peter to pay paul, treat is as national security, not business.

Call me if you want a sucessful procurement process.

originally posted by: Zaphod58
a reply to: 727Sky

It HAS been a screwed up program. What I hate is the people that believe every bad thing about it and refuse to believe that they've improved things pretty significantly since it started. It's still not straightened out nearly as much as it needs to be, as this shows, but it's nowhere near as bad as it was in the early years.

This vid Ouotes Mat Winter (program manager for the Navy's F-35) says there may be 108 F-35s (block 2B) that will not be combat ready and will probably end up as a 21 billion dollar spare parts bin after paying 40 billion for the early aircraft..

Maybe you know or have heard about this continuing mess; acquisition malpractice due to politics ? Anyway names are named and some of the mods that are required before combat ready. Cheaper to buy new... good gosh !
108 US F-35s Won’t Be Combat Capable : Won't Have a Chance in Real Combat youtu.be...

a reply to: 727Sky

And what makes you think that every type of aircraft didn't do the same thing? For example, the thirty-one F-22s that are still Block 20 and require over a billion dollars in upgrades to bring them to combat status? That's 31 of 187 aircraft, that's not 31 outside of the 187 that were bought. There are almost always aircraft built early on in production that won't ever be combat coded without significant upgrades.