Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II Joint Strike Fighter (JSF)

Fluff said:
sferrin said:
Why wouldn't it register somewhere as a giant obstruction when they powered up the fan? I mean you'd think the pilot would be able to tell when the fan was engaged, but before brake release.
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its a rolling take off, do they only power the fan as they get moving? I think they reported that he tried to abort but ran out of room, so presumably he had some warnings come up. Probably going to be a few instructions rewritten after this.
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The fan is engaged and turning before STO is initiated, but fan IGVs are set to minimal thrust - indeed the core nozzle may be deflected downwards to keep weight on nosewheel and assure steering (on a moving deck for instance).

If the fan cover was left on, the simple fix is to attach a mirror to the inlet door, like the ones in an Airbus overhead bin. But that can't be checked on the walkaround because the inlet door opening is part of the transition sequence initiated by the pilot, with the engine running.
 
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Ainen said:
https://twitter.com/x/status/1465670971243876355
View: https://twitter.com/TheDEWLine/status/1465670971243876355

FFcb-jYXoA8Rg8d


FFcb-j8WQAYnjDL

Photo source: Steve Trimble

Something on something.
Not sure if it's a EW pod(shape?) and that's definitely not an F-35 (and frankly speaking seems a bit too well-made to be a "generic 5th gen fighter")

But for lack of a better idea, let it be in the F-35 topic for now.
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Any mention of the under wing root conformal pods in those pics?
 
SteveO said:
Ainen said:
https://twitter.com/x/status/1465670971243876355
View: https://twitter.com/TheDEWLine/status/1465670971243876355

FFcb-jYXoA8Rg8d


FFcb-j8WQAYnjDL

Photo source: Steve Trimble

Something on something.
Not sure if it's a EW pod(shape?) and that's definitely not an F-35 (and frankly speaking seems a bit too well-made to be a "generic 5th gen fighter")

But for lack of a better idea, let it be in the F-35 topic for now.
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Any mention of the under wing root conformal pods in those pics?
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I think it's just a fairly low fidelity model. Trimble has followed up, BTW. Raytheon says the pod is just an artist's concept, not a model of any specific system or proposal.
 
LowObservable said:

The fan is engaged and turning before STO is initiated, but fan IGVs are set to minimal thrust - indeed the core nozzle may be deflected downwards to keep weight on nosewheel and assure steering (on a moving deck for instance).

If the fan cover was left on, the simple fix is to attach a mirror to the inlet door, like the ones in an Airbus overhead bin. But that can't be checked on the walkaround because the inlet door opening is part of the transition sequence initiated by the pilot, with the engine running.
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From some reports it seems more like one of the intake covers was left inside the truncking where the S-duct meant it couldn't be seen during walk around inspection. From what I hear the ground crew sometimes would fold them double and use them as kneepads when inspecting the intakes.

The other version also circulating is that it was loose on the deck and got sucked it after wond caught it.

Both of those seem a lot more plausible that forgetting an entire fan cover in place. Something that would have been visible from Flyco at the very least. But as all this talk currently is - its speculation. Hopefully we find out some day what actually happened.
 
Having looked at a few pictures, I'm wondering if when on the flight deck, they dont use the covers, hardly any pictures show them, even when lashed down. Where as when in the hangar, the normal intake covers and pitot covers are visible. Covers on deck would be a nightmare, blowing off, blowing away etc. So my suspicion goes back to the jet coming out of the hangar and someone didnt remove something. Time will tell.
 
nationalinterest.org

The F-35 Strengthens Its Role in Missile Defense

By developing the F-35 for missile defense, the Pentagon is expanding the mission envelope and operational functionality of the aircraft in less recognized areas that often linger beneath the radar clutter associated with budget, cost, and sustainment concerns.
nationalinterest.org nationalinterest.org

mdp_expanded_battlespace_figure2-png.21975
 
Flyaway said:
ukdefencejournal.org.uk

Crashed British F-35B found on sea bed

The Ministry of Defence now knows the location of the F-35B that crashed on take-off from HMS Queen Elizabeth.
ukdefencejournal.org.uk ukdefencejournal.org.uk
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It's in the interests of the Americans to help the RN salvage the wreck as the last thing they want is for the Russian navy to successfully salvage an intact F-35B to examine.
 
sferrin said:
GTX said:
www.portsmouth.co.uk

Navy in race against time with Russians to recover crashed F-35 from sea bed

RECOVERY teams hunting for an F-35 which crashed moments after taking off from HMS Queen Elizabeth have found the wreckage of the stealth jet, MPs have been told.
www.portsmouth.co.uk www.portsmouth.co.uk
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Uhm, why couldn't we just park an SSN or destroyer in the area and not let the Russians (or Chinese) near it? It's not like it's their property.
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The CV would have had an escort, which I assume has stayed in the area, lots of ships in the med, on ship tracker....
 
Fluff said:
sferrin said:
GTX said:
www.portsmouth.co.uk

Navy in race against time with Russians to recover crashed F-35 from sea bed

RECOVERY teams hunting for an F-35 which crashed moments after taking off from HMS Queen Elizabeth have found the wreckage of the stealth jet, MPs have been told.
www.portsmouth.co.uk www.portsmouth.co.uk
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Uhm, why couldn't we just park an SSN or destroyer in the area and not let the Russians (or Chinese) near it? It's not like it's their property.
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The CV would have had an escort, which I assume has stayed in the area, lots of ships in the med, on ship tracker....
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An interesting point however the wreck is in international water IIRC so that might be problematic.
 
NMaude said:
Fluff said:
sferrin said:
GTX said:
www.portsmouth.co.uk

Navy in race against time with Russians to recover crashed F-35 from sea bed

RECOVERY teams hunting for an F-35 which crashed moments after taking off from HMS Queen Elizabeth have found the wreckage of the stealth jet, MPs have been told.
www.portsmouth.co.uk www.portsmouth.co.uk
Click to expand...
Uhm, why couldn't we just park an SSN or destroyer in the area and not let the Russians (or Chinese) near it? It's not like it's their property.
Click to expand...
The CV would have had an escort, which I assume has stayed in the area, lots of ships in the med, on ship tracker....
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An interesting point however the wreck is in international water IIRC so that might be problematic.
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I'm not an expert on salvage law, but I imagine the RN ship will tell any callers that the aircraft is not abandoned, and if they attempt to access it we will fire on our aircraft. Of course the russians will be sniffing around, but I doubt they can get there quicker than Nato can, from Italy, and would hope a suitable ship was dispatched immediately after the accident.
 
www.defensenews.com

Lockheed unveils pared-down F-35 trainer with same software capability but a 90% reduced footprint

Lockheed Martin spent its own money developing this LITE trainer over the last 18 months after hearing signals from F-35 customers that they needed more training capacity for less cost.
www.defensenews.com www.defensenews.com

The company unveiled the F-35 Mission Rehearsal Trainer Lightning Integrated Training Environment, or MRT LITE simulator.

Etz said the F-35 Full Mission Simulator, which is set up in a dome with 360-degree visuals for a full cockpit experience, is the most widely used F-35 training system, with more than 100 trainers delivered across the globe.

MRT LITE runs the same software in a pared-down footprint — 90% less hardware, the company noted, with eight MRT LITEs fitting within the allotted space of a full mission simulator.

The LITE version has three screens for forward-looking views only, “but there’s a need for more capacity at a number of those [global training] sites. So based on that need, we decided to go ahead and embark some internal investments to shrink the footprint associated with the full-mission sim and created a device, a family of devices, that will provide capacity at fixed sites,” Etz said.
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bring_it_on said:
Are those sales or deliveries for the other four fighters?
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I believe those are production numbers, so pretty apples to apples.

More interesting is the number of flight hours per aircraft… ~175 hours/year since Jan 2021.

This is still a tad low compared to other fighter fleets (the Rafale is around 235 hrs/year and I believe the Super Hornet is up there too actually the USN Super Hornet fleet is also averaging ~175 hours/year. However the legacy USN/USMC Hornet and Growler fleets both fly ~275 hours/year, as do USAF F-15Es).
 
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An extensive read full of complementary information:
(notice the JSE (simulator) usage details)

www.airforcemag.com

Can a Service Contract Save the F-35? | Air & Space Forces Magazine

Chronically high operating costs might be tamed with a new deal. A new sustainment contract between the F-35 Joint Program Office (JPO) and Lockheed Martin, inked in September, will give the company a chance to bring down operating costs over the next three years.
www.airforcemag.com www.airforcemag.com
 
H_K said:
bring_it_on said:
Are those sales or deliveries for the other four fighters?
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I believe those are production numbers, so pretty apples to apples.

More interesting is the number of flight hours per aircraft… ~175 hours/year since Jan 2021.

This is still a tad low compared to other fighter fleets (the Rafale is around 235 hrs/year and I believe the Super Hornet is up there too actually the USN Super Hornet fleet is also averaging ~175 hours/year. However the legacy USN/USMC Hornet and Growler fleets both fly ~275 hours/year, as do USAF F-15Es).
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How do we determine from this data how many hours the operational fleet got? The 730+ number is in agregate and includes the test, training, and non combat coded fleets as well.
 
bring_it_on said:
How do we determine from this data how many hours the operational fleet got? The 730+ number is in agregate and includes the test, training, and non combat coded fleets as well.
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The flight hours I quoted for the other fleets also included non-frontline aircraft such as test, training, maintenance/storage etc. Maybe the F-35 fleet has more aircraft grounded for some reason or other (eg. upgrades, maintenance)… that might be one explanation for the rather low tempo.
 
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TomcatViP said:
The Rafale is also well under 200hr per year as it was posted months ago in a brief excerpt here.
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Thanks for the links, as I was scratching my head because this statement is completely untrue… and the links don’t back-up this claim.

There are several sources for Rafale flight hours. The best IMHO is Safran’s reports on M88 engine hours… from 700,000hrs in Oct 2019 to 900,000hrs in Nov 2021. That’s 200,000 engine hours in 2 years, ie. 50,000 flight hours / year. Divide by global fleet size (approx. 212 Rafales over this time period) = 235 hrs/year.

French officials also quote fleetwide hours for the 143 French Rafales that translate to 225hrs/year… @Deltafan had a good post about this: https://www.secretprojects.co.uk/threads/dassault-rafale-news-only.17813/post-443322

Anyway even the Rafale’s 235 hours/year isn’t that high compared to USAF/USN legacy fleets… so the main point is that the F-35 still has room to go.
 
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Fluff said:
and would hope a suitable ship was dispatched immediately after the accident.
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Sounds like it would need to be a commercial charter. Both the USNS Grasp and USNS Salvor are a long, long way away. It's quite easy to see on AIS sites where the incident happened though....
 
As per Gen. Kelly they are really looking at a sweet spot of about 200 hours / year for the fighter pilots in terms of training. That is assume on average across all fleets and only for US. I don't think we have annual hours for all F-35 users to be able to nail down what the USAF squadrons are getting based on the total data.
 
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@H_K : French Rafale have to fly a maximum of 360hr every two years per contract (see 2nd link). Nobody is gona give the Fr AF free flights beyond that number.
But all this is old talks ;)
 
TomcatViP said:
@H_K : French Rafale have to fly a maximum of 360hr every two years per contract (see 2nd link). Nobody is gona give the Fr AF free flights beyond that number.
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You’re quoting yourself rather than actual sources, so that is simply untrue and I will leave it at that… I’ve repeatedly quoted multiple official sources on this matter. Plus we should stop polluting this thread. ;-)
 
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Surprised Finland was offered it.

The F-35 was extensively tested for cold temperatures in the lab and also in Alaska; I remember reading about it when the same concerns were raised for the Canadian offer.
 
That is good to hear that it was tested in the lab and in Alaska.Also, what variant will Finland be getting A or B?
 
Norwegian aircraft plus an entire wings worth of F-35A's in Alaska, not to mention that it now has an excellent chance in getting selected (again) in Canada as well. It has undergone cold weather testing to the satisfaction of users who fully intend on using it in such environments over its 3-4 decade service life.
 

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