did Russia steal the design of the YF-23 Black Widow II Fighter Aircraft (jet, Air Force)
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I just read about the F-35 JSF II having hot spots on the airframe and the new Engine and think that We made a huge mistake
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Production of Lockheed Martin Corp's F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, the costliest arms purchase in history, should be slowed because of the potential number of airframe cracks and "hot spots" turning up in testing and analysis, the Pentagon's F-35 program director said.
"The analyzed hot spots that have arisen in the last 12 months or so in the program have surprised us at the amount of change and at the cost," U.S. Navy Vice Admiral David Venlet, the program chief, said in an interview published Thursday.
"Most of them are little ones. But when you bundle them all up and package them, and look at where they are in the airplane and how hard they are to get at after you buy the jet, the cost burden of that is what sucks the wind out of your lungs," he said.
"I believe it's wise to sort of temper production for a while here, until we get some of these heavy years of learning under our belt and get that managed right," Venlet added.
The Pentagon program office confirmed the vice admiral's quotes on Friday. He spoke in an interview with AOL Defense, a web site aimed at the industry.
The Pentagon currently plans to buy more than 2,440 F-35 aircraft in three models, at a projected cost of $382.5 billion through 2035. It has been developed with eight foreign partners to replace at least 13 types of aircraft, including Lockheed's F-16, for 11 nations initially.
The Defense Department already has restructured the F-35 program twice in recent years, with the next production batch due to fall to 30 from a previously planned 42. Venlet did not say how much more he favored slowing output.
The program chief raised doubt about the acquisition strategy known as "concurrency," under which Lockheed builds production models even as flight testing continues with fixes to be incorporated later.
"Fundamentally, that was a miscalculation," Venlet told AOL Defense. He said more changes were required than had been hoped and new planes had to be torn apart for modifications to make sure they would last the full 8,000 flight hours planned.
Lockheed, the Pentagon's No. 1 contractor by sales, has projected the radar-evading F-35 would account for just over 20 percent of its revenue when it hits full production. It says it expects to sell about 750 aircraft to the co-development partners.
F-35 competitors include Saab's Gripen, the Dassault Rafale, Russia's MiG-35 and Sukhoi Su-35, and the Eurofighter Typhoon made by a consortium of British, German, Italian and Spanish companies
The plane is currently in early, low-rate production. It has been expected to ramp up to full output, with the concomitant economies of scale, by 2015 or 2016 once it gets a U.S. government go-ahead.
Lockheed said Friday that none of the required changes to the F-35 are safety issues, affect aircraft performance or go beyond "normal expectations."
"Going forward, the savings associated with building at increased production rates will continue to mitigate the diminishing concurrency costs," Michael Rein, a company spokesman, said by e-mail.
The cost to upgrade and maintain the aging aircraft that the F-35 is designed to replace should be factored into the equation, he added.
Separately, General Electric Co and Rolls Royce dropped their drive Friday to build an alternate engine for the F-35, giving up on what they had said could be a $100 billion market.
The decision "recognizes the continued uncertainty in the development and production schedules for the JSF program," the companies said in a joint statement. It was a boost for United Technologies Corp's Pratt & Whitney unit, maker of the engine used in the F-35's early production models.
House of Representatives' Armed Services Committee Chairman Howard McKeon, a second engine backer, voiced disappointment that "the uncertainty regarding the future of our military budget, and the Joint Strike Fighter program in particular," had ended what he considered a model for government-industry partnership to contain costs.
"But decisions that could cripple our national security and our economy are being made today that will be difficult, if not impossible, to undo tomorrow," the California Republican added in a statement.
He was referring to deep spending cuts mandated by a U.S. congressional "super committee" failure to strike a $1.2 trillion deficit reduction deal last month. That could force cuts totaling some $1 trillion from security
did Russia steal the design of the YF-23 Black Widow II Fighter Aircraft
The Russians have never had to steal any military secrets from us. They've always been able to find a greedy American with a secuirty clearance who'd sell them anything they wanted. The best Russian spies were always Americans.
As a result, we've done the R&D for lots of their stuff. All they had to do was copy it.
I'm puzzled. The two aircraft are very different. The Russian jet is a fairly common delta wing design unlike the YF-23.
The article you posted discusses the costs of the YF-23.
So, could you point out the connection? I'm not seeing it.
I'd agree with Joe, I don't see how that could be considered stealing a design when they are completely different. If that is a stolen design they're doing it wrong.
Man the F-35 was not the best choice to be the only 5th Gen fighter when the F-22A would of been cheaper with even with upgrades.
An Export version of the F-22A would of been perfect for the JSF project I mean why don't we just say the F-35 JSF II has serious airframe cracks should the JSF countries have a Stop Gap plane Because Canada will have Our old CF-18's past their operating limits and 2016-2018.
For Canada the block 51/52 F-16 would not meet our needs We would need to Orde F/A-18A Super hornets or F-15 with AESA and other upgrades and
At the beginning of November 2011 The Canadian Press made public the results of access-to-information request responses it had received on the procurement. Defence department documents indicated that the 65 aircraft to be ordered represent the absolute minimum number for the role and that no planning was done for replacement aircraft for the inevitable attrition losses due to accidents.
An Air Force Association of Canada source said that this was done to minimize the total purchase price. The reports also noted that current delivery plans indicate that the F-35s would be delivered at the same time that the CF-18s are to be retired, leaving no room for further schedule delays Chief of Defence Staff General Walter Natynczyk confirmed on 3 November 2011 in addressing the House of Commons' Defence Committee that 65 is the "bare minimum number" of aircraft needed.
The government expressed no concern about potential delays, now indicating earliest deliveries in 2018 and last aircraft not delivered until 2022, two years after the CF-18 is to be retired. Government officials confirmed that these delays have been accounted for, although retired Lieutenant General George MacDonald, currently a consultant who has worked for Lockheed Martin said, "this delay eats most of that up. So the risk is still not great for Canada. But it's tighter. The schedule doesn't have the flexibility it used to have."
In mid-November it was revealed the first dozen or so F-35s won't be equipped with Blue Force Tracking, software that allows the stealth fighters to communicate with ground forces (a feature designed to prevent incidents of friendly fire), or the Link 16 that helps the fighters communicate with older aircraft. The software isn't expected to be added until an upgrade program is introduced in 2019 – three years after the Royal Canadian Air Force begins taking delivery.
The Russians have never had to steal any military secrets from us. They've always been able to find a greedy American with a secuirty clearance who'd sell them anything they wanted. The best Russian spies were always Americans.
As a result, we've done the R&D for lots of their stuff. All they had to do was copy it.
Or read about it and get the specs from various magazines.
He then responded to others questioning how two very different looking designs could be the result one stolen from the other with more stuff about F-35 that had nothing to do with original thread or comments.
I just read about the F-35 JSF II having hot spots on the airframe and the new Engine and think that We made a huge mistake
The JSF's issues, which are similar to the F-22 debacle, stem from the fact the aircraft design process is ultimately subbed out by the initial contractor to a hundred different companies, each who make one tiny element of the aircraft, all insisting on using as much proprietary hardware as possible to keep their segment of the defense market, with mediocre at best documentation. Much of the cost overruns on large ticket defense items like jets occur when the initial contractor has to go back and fix all the inconsistencies. Given the complexity of modern fighter jets it's inevitable some major defect is overlooked in this phase of the design process.
Here's a map which shows how many individual subcontractors for the F-35 project alone are in each state and their total cost to the program:
Man the F-35 was not the best choice to be the only 5th Gen fighter when the F-22A would of been cheaper with even with upgrades.
Except the F-22 can't pass the international date line without the avionics completely taking a dump and a slight drizzle defeats the radar-deflecting skin. It's just as much a mess as the JSF.
Impressive post. It's nice to have someone who actually knows what they're talking about post here.
Would Boeing have taken a different approach? They had a delta wing fighter that they proposed but ultimately lost out on. I think PBS had a Nova show done on it.
In the commercial aviation world, typically Airbus has farmed out the design whereas Boeing traditionally would design everything, then sub out the manufacture of some parts (like wings to a Japanese company). They tried to go more the Airbus way with the Dreamliner, but they seemed to have paid with delays and costs of fitting everything together.
I'll be interested to hear your thoughts.
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did Russia steal the design of the YF-23 Black Widow II Fighter Aircraft
