Posted on 01/20/2013 1:04:14 PM PST by spetznaz
It's considered to be the world's most sophisticated superfighter jet, but Britain's new £150million combat aircraft has been banned from flying in bad weather for fears it could explode.
Engineers working on the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter have found the jet's fuel tank could explode if hit by lightning.
According to reports, the aircraft, which is hoped to enter service for both the RAF and the Royal Navy in five years' time, has also been made more vulnerable to enemy attack than the aircraft it is set to replace, after its weight was reduced in an attempt to increase fuel efficiency.
(Excerpt) Read more at dailymail.co.uk ...
- until a device in the fuel tank is redesigned, test-flying within 25 miles of thunderstorms is 'not permitted'.
- a fault in the design of the fuel tank which means it is unable to rapidly descend to low altitude.
- a handful of cracks discovered during examinations by the United States Air Force and the aircraft's manufacturer Lockheed Martin.
- The report states: 'All of these discoveries will require mitigation plans and may include redesigning parts and additional weight.'
>>The F-35 may eventually prove all skeptics wrong, but the bad news keeps on coming. <<
The F-35 is a camel: a mouse built by government committee.
And as you said: just when it could not possible get worse, it gets worse.
The F-22 WAS a pretty good aircraft ....
Yeah, but that production line is kaput.
Until the chinese and the russians and pretty soon the japanese/koreans caught up, and the remaining, flying F22’s are given to the muslim brotherhood.
“The F-22 WAS a pretty good aircraft ....”
I remember reading in Aviation Week in the ‘80’s that in the 2020’s each fighter jet would cost hundreds of millions. Well, the F-22 is 361 million a copy. That’s the purchase price. Maintaining them for 30 years will greatly increase that cost. We obviously need fighter aircraft. But maybe, just maybe, we’re going about it all wrong. Perhaps they should be a combination of Artificial Intelligence and remote control. That ought to cut the cost and the risk in half. Maybe they should be bought in a multi-year contract that’s funded for the entire contract rather than one year at a time so Congress can get lobbyist funds for their campaigns. Perhaps we should get the military out of the day-to-day engineering as they change what they want moment to moment. Or, never define what they want, as in the case of FCS. Maybe we need to incentivize companies differently. FCS was incentivized based on how much they spent. If their spend plan stayed on target they got extra money. The program’s design fell behind, but, they certainly spent the money on time.
Was it made in china?
Not to worry ... with sequestration pretty much everyone involved with the F-35 will be looking for another job. Taxes will go up, our military will the logistical nightmare of supporting far more specialty aircraft than necessary, and we will grow more incapable of defending our nation.
But - at least we aren’t entirely racist - we have a half-black president.
Just great. A flying Chevy Volt.
Plus very different intended roles. The F-22 was the replacement for the F-15. The F-35 is a plane that is supposed to do every thing the F-16, F/A-18 and the Harrier do.
I wonder what color he will be after the first nuke hits DC...
Fuel Efficiency = Range. It’s range as designed is extremely poor, so they’re desperate to do anything to increase the range.
Just update the Geneva Conventions to allow combat only on sunny days. Problem solved.
Sounds like the Fisker Karma
http://updates.jalopnik.com/post/34669789863/more-than-a-dozen-fisker-karma-hybrids-caught-fire-and
I’m thinking more of a flying Ford Pinto!
(Can’t find an animated gif of an exploding Pinto.)
Agreed. Range isn’t great but there we have it. We have put all our chips on this jet so one way or the other we are going to have to make it work for us.
Let’s see how its doing in ten years.
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