Just a few years ago the B-1 bomber was taking huge criticism for only being able to deliver 51 percent MC rate. The fact of the matter was that the pauper USAF was only funding 49 percent of the aircraft systems required maintenance plan to keep it healthy. Dedicated maintenance personnel squeezed out an additional 2 percent through just plain hard work.
Looking at recent history of the F-22 shows a different story than that painted by the Post. Around the 2005-6, the F-22 upgrade schedule was on track. This effort was thrown into disarray when the needs of the Afghanistan and Iraq war—at over $10-13 billion per month— pulled scheduled funds from the F-22 program.
The F-22 reached initial operating capability (IOC) in 2005. In the years 2006-2008, maintenance metrics from real live USAF squadrons came in. This is where real life at the squadron level validates (or disproves) the optimistic planning from previous years of aircraft development. What was shown is that the aircraft was spending a lot of time at the unit level in the low observable (L.O.) maintenance hanger. Consider that the aircraft was designed to be maintenance friendly where only 5 percent of maintenance actions required refurbishment of the low observable components on the F-22. In the end it wasn’t any kind of disaster but a learning curve. It took a while for airmen and NCO’s —the enlisted maintenance force that makes or breaks a flying unit—to get maintenance experience on this new kind of aircraft That process includes everything from training, keeping methods that work, throwing out ones that don’t and filtering all of that into a reliable form of tribal knowledge.
Fast forward to where in one deployment, an F-22 unit put up all of their scheduled missions (350 sorties) for a stunning 100 percent MC rate. This means that the F-22 community has risen to the challenge and put up MC rates that match or exceed current “legacy” aircraft in deployments. Of course none of this was mentioned in the Washington Post article.
More? Maintenance Supers (the lead maintenance NCO in a unit) will tell you a lot of things that are hassle-free with the jet. For example the Pratt and Whitney F-119 motors don’t require a lot of extra work. Still More? The F-22 community has won sustainment awards for its maintenance processes. Of interest is that the methods of logistics and sustainment used in the program are a baseline for the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter. While the F-35 has a long way to go to prove itself, it is designed so that only 1-2 percent of maintenance processes require L.O. refurbishment. No matter. When the F-22 is out of production, guess what the yellow journalism crowd will pick on next?
http://www.f-16.net/news_article3621.html
Obama lost Georgia by 5.2% to McCain. He lost Texas by 11.7%. Need I say more?
The people working on building these planes are proud, patriotic Americans - just the kind of people who the Obamas most despise. What do they care that such people will lose their jobs?
Good post, thanks!