• Thanks for stopping by. Logging in to a registered account will remove all generic ads. Please reach out with any questions or concerns.

F-35 Joint Strike Fighter (JSF)

  • Thread starter Thread starter Sharpey
  • Start date Start date
Like I'd ever do business with a company that was either horribly, horribly  incompetent in thier supply system or was simply lying through thier teeth...........


...and I will steal the same disclaimer Journeyman used.
 
I don't think we have to assume either incompetence or venality in this case.

I'm more inclined towards one of  Mr. Campbell's favourite aphorisms:"Events, dear boy, events".

Wartime is a lousy time to go shopping for war stuff.  Peacetime is a much more of a buyer's market.  And the best time to bomb up is right after a war.

The wartime premium has something to do with "profiteering" (as if that is a dirty word) but it has more to do with all available capacity being occupied by demand.  Think back to the MRAP programmes.  There was an imperative to buy protection of whatever form, at whatever price as soon as possible.  So the US Army and Marines were buying armoured trucks from anybody with competence that had an open production line.  Anywhere in the world.

The same situation applies to the aircraft industry.  If sensor production lines are fully engaged delivering sensors for UOR UAVs then the quoted price for a sensor is going to be high.  Conversely if suddenly the market for UAVs dries up and your sensors are no longer in demand then you will be inclined to keep your production lines open as long as possible at a more modest production rate. You will price accordingly.

Lockheed Martin MAY (emphasis on MAY as this is supposition) be looking at putting out 5 year contracts to purchase sufficient sensors to supply  their production lines for the next 20 years.  Warehousing costs money but sensors are relatively small and high value.  Similar thinking could be applied to the supply of engines. Other supplies, like strategic metals and materials, will be bought on the futures market.  Even money can be bought at discounted rates on the futures market if the timing is right.

All of these contribute to calculating the cost of any manufactured items, including fighters.

 
Haletown said:
"F-35 costs coming down

Lockheed Martin announced it has managed to reduce the cost of an F-35 in “combat configuration” by 50 per cent, through supply chain and production line streamlining."

lol

So they're like an internet provider that  can't adjust your bill until you tell them you're going to another provider then the guy you're talking to puts you on hold talks to his "supervisor" and presto you have a month credit.
 
I can't wait to hear the public at large being outrage that the 16 billion price tag associate with the project doesn't turn into a 8 billion dollar one with the 50% cheaper production cost. Will it wake up some people to what the numbers actually mean?
 
Wanted:  just to be sure, an outside review of the numbers in the Next Generation Fighter Capability (NGFC) Annual Update to Parliament:
.... DESCRIPTION OF REQUIREMENT

For the provision of an independent review of the project assumptions and costs included in the Department of National Defence's Next Generation Fighter Capability (NGFC) Annual Update to Parliament.

DURATION OF THE CONTRACT

The period of the Contract is from date of Contract to January 31, 2014 inclusive and Canada will have the irrevocable option to extend the term of the Contract by up to two (2) additional 1-year periods under the same conditions.

Note: The work to be performed will happen only for a specific amount of time (approximately 60 days) following the costing information from the Joint Strike Fighter Program Office (JSF) ....

According to attached, "Request For Proposal (RFP) documents will be e-mailed directly, from the contracting officer, to the Qualified Supply Arrangement Holders who are being invited to bid on this requirement."
 
CF-18 Life Extension?

This report is reproduced under the Fair Dealing provisions of the Copyright Act from iPolitics:

http://www.ipolitics.ca/2013/02/14/expert-panel-asks-military-how-extended-life-cf-18-might-stack-up-against-new-options/
Expert panel asks military how extended-life CF-18 might stack up against new options

By Colin Horgan

Feb 14, 2013

In a meeting earlier this month, the Independent Review Panel assembled to provide oversight of analysis carried out for the government’s next fighter jet purchase asked that when evaluating future options the military also consider the impact of extending the life of the CF-18s.

Notes from the January 10 meeting posted online show the panel — made up for four independent reviewers assembled as part of the government’s seven-point plan to reset the fighter jet procurement — overlooked a rating system developed by the military to measure the performance of each jet under consideration to replace Canada’s ageing fleet of CF-18s.

According to the summary online, that rating system would be “applied to measures of performance and measures of effectiveness” for each plane. Once that’s done, “an overall capability rating would be developed for each fighter aircraft to respond to the mission scenarios outlined in the Canada First Defence Strategy.”

But at the same time, the panel asked representatives from the Air Force and the Department of National Defence to consider an extended-life CF-18’s capabilities as well — that it be “included as an option when assessing fighter aircraft against each mission” in order to measure how it might perform under the same criteria.

The Air Force and National Defence told the panel they would report back with “draft results” of the capability assessment at a future meeting. The panel met again on January 29, but a summary of that meeting has not yet been made available.

Following a scathing report form the auditor general last spring, the government released a seven-point action plan that included an options analysis portion with measures to evaluate other possible fighters besides the F-35 that might be available to Canada to replace its fleet of CF-18 fighters.

© 2013 iPolitics Inc.


The PWGSC report on 10 Jan 13 discussions of the Independent Review Panel's Evaluation of Options is here. The panel members are listed, with bios, here.

In the wake of the shipbuilding plan, Prime Minister Harper seems to have more faith in independent panels than he does in line department civil servants and military officers.

 
E.R. Campbell said:
CF-18 Life Extension?

This report is reproduced under the Fair Dealing provisions of the Copyright Act from iPolitics:

http://www.ipolitics.ca/2013/02/14/expert-panel-asks-military-how-extended-life-cf-18-might-stack-up-against-new-options/

The PWGSC report on 10 Jan 13 discussions of the Independent Review Panel's Evaluation of Options is here. The panel members are listed, with bios, here.

In the wake of the shipbuilding plan, Prime Minister Harper seems to have more faith in independent panels than he does in line department civil servants and military officers.

I'm liking where this might be heading.

Panel is asked by the Government to compare the F-35 to other available aircraft.
Panel convenes and asks vendors to supply info for the comparison
RCAF pipes up and says it already has a comparison completed.  Panel is welcome to verify work.
Panel asks RCAF how CF-188 stacks up against its own comparison standards.
RCAF says it will get back to the panel.

When that work (adding the CF-188) to the comparison sheet is completed the Government and the Public will have a firm basis of comparison - a standard - a benchmark if you will - against which the contenders can be compared.

The RCAF and DND will end up looking fairly rational in their decision making.

At the same time there is an issue to be addressed.

A few months ago I asked the DND for records under the ATIF on the cost of operating the CF-188s, the bases they operate from and the tankers that fuel them.  They came back with a proposal for a $500 search and would only be able to supply some of the records going back some of the time.  At about the same time the KPMG report came out so I declined to send them my $500.  My curiousity isn't that great.

Now, I don't think my question was unreasonable.  I believe that in an organisation that is promoting life-cycle planning (not life-cycle budgeting or life-cycle purchasing but life-cycle planning) it might be possible that an entity replacing an existing fleet with a new fleet might have engaged in some data-mining to determine its current costs and capabilities.  I was anticipating that my request might evince the response of an existing report.  Instead I was to be offered many sheets of data from many sources and that data incomplete.

Perhaps the problem with this whole issue can be traced back to accounting practices.  It has become common knowledge that the cost of providing air cover to Canada is equivalent to providing a national broadcast service to Canada.  Perhaps it would be useful if the budget for that air cover capabilty were tracked as an entity rather than as a series of isolated but interconnected purchases.

If that capability budget had been available from the get go then the ever-expanding F35 budget fiasco (6 to 9 to 16 to 25 to 42 BCAD) need never have happened.  It would have been clear from the outset that the cost was 1 BCAD per year regardless of whether F35s or CF-188s or Rafales were being used.
 
Pentagon suspends F-35 flights
By ANDREA SHALAL-ESA, Reuters
http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/World/2013/02/22/20600956.html

WASHINGTON - The Pentagon on Friday suspended the flights of all 51 F-35 fighter planes after a routine inspection revealed a crack on a turbine blade in the jet engine of an F-35 test aircraft in California.

It was the second grounding of the warplane in two months and marked another setback for the $396 billion F-35 Joint Strike Fighter program, the Pentagon’s biggest weapons program. The program has already been restructured three times in recent years and may face further cutbacks if Congress does not avert major budget reductions due to take effect on March 1.

The F-35 program office said it was too early to know if this was a fleet-wide issue, but it was suspending all flights until an investigation was completed. A total of 51 F-35 jets were affected, including 17 that are being used for testing and 34 in use for training in Florida and Arizona.

It said it was working closely with Pratt & Whitney, the United Technologies Corp unit that builds the engine, and Lockheed Martin Corp, the prime contractor for the radar-evading warplane, to ensure the integrity of the engine and return the F-35 fleet to flight as soon as possible.
 
Well a Cracked blade is nothing new for aircraft, because it's the F-35 is the only reason i've seen this hit national news in my opinion. More then likely the thing just sucked in a rock which caused the crack. Now if they need to do fleet wide modifications thats an issue. Also whats with this 51 aircraft? since when did we break away from a couple prototypes and once it was proven we mass produce. No wonder costs are going up Lockheed is making mods as they go during testing.
 
Crack is in a low pressure blade so very unlikely caused by FOD.  Would  have to get through a lot of engine bits first.

I'd bet on a manufacturing cause . . . We'll know very soon.
 
http://news.yahoo.com/pentagon-f-35-program-chief-lashes-lockheed-pratt-090507792--finance.html

AVALON, Australia (Reuters) - The Pentagon program chief for the F-35 warplane slammed its commercial partners Lockheed Martin and Pratt & Whitney on Wednesday, accusing them of trying to "squeeze every nickel" out of the U.S. government and failing to see the long-term benefits of the project.
 
Haletown said:
Crack is in a low pressure blade so very unlikely caused by FOD.  Would  have to get through a lot of engine bits first.

I'd bet on a manufacturing cause . . . We'll know very soon.

Shortly is correct, they seem to have pinpointed the cause as a "separation of a grain boundary in one of the blades" due to abnormal high temperatures in a test.  All aircraft are reported to be clear to resume full testing. Here's the BBC article: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-21625417
 
Well this should get the FMECA  boys & girls all excited

Or what passes for excitement in the ILS world.  :nod:
 
By the way, did any of you folks see this on Wednesday's The National:  http://www.cbc.ca/player/News/ID/2339344612/ ?
 
Fred Herriot said:
By the way, did any of you folks see this on Wednesday's The National:  http://www.cbc.ca/player/News/ID/2339344612/ ?

Yeah, I wish I didn't. Basically CBC will give hearing to anybody who has anything bad to say about the F-35, but then passes Boeing F/A-18E claims completely uncritically. $55 million is not what an F/A-18E costs; its actually closer to $90 million (US navy pays $83 million for a reoccurring flyaway.)
 
Fred Herriot said:
By the way, did any of you folks see this on Wednesday's The National:  http://www.cbc.ca/player/News/ID/2339344612/ ?

Just watched it . . .  Torturing a story that badly is something the CBC seems very good at. 

Let's at least hope they got Boeing to buy some ad time in return.
 
RCAF  F-35 porn.

http://theaviationist.com/2013/03/03/jsf-canada-artwork/#.UTNvnoy9KSM

Even has the fake cockpit  . . .  Very nice.
 
The Royal Australian Air Force F/A-18F Super Hornet :

http://www.airforce.gov.au/Technology/Aircraft/FA-18F_Super_Hornet/?RAAF-4dRvdvKuGAokY31UEml0P+KGoMiO8n/o

Some great eye candy on the Video.
 
Back
Top