F-35 Grounded

All new airframes have problems. The only reason this is news is because each plane costs well over $100 million a pop I do believe.
 
Eh, I love to pour some hate on crooked Lockeed-Martin, but in this case it's just not widely-known what happened yet. Could be that some reservoir was inadvertently over/under-filled, a tool was left in the plane, some part failed after prior mishandling, or it actually could be a compromised design.

At $100 million+ per example (plus the pilot) and before going in front of large crowds of people, it seems like the prudent thing to do is minimize the opportunities for *whatever* happened to happen again by stopping activity and investigating, then find a fix (or at least until L-M bean counters can determine an opportunity cost for the odds of it happening again…).
 
Grounding a fleet that isn't even operational isn't really a big deal. If something happens and they're suspicious of the root cause, they'll ground the fleet til they find out. Just recently a few Herks had bleed air ducts failing in the cabin (eep), so they grounded the fleet until they fixed the bad ducting on all the airplanes.
 
War profiteering, aaaand happy birthday America!
Although war profiteering can be expected, I care even less for it in peace time.
Oh right terrorists, be scared, be very afraid America, buy another jet.
 
Fixed the bad ducting, or capped the cockpit pack? It has been a pretty miserable summer up front. ;)
 
Should've just made Strike Raptors and done away with the VTOL requirement. Would of saved on R & D and the price would've went down as well since more examples would have been bought.
 
Yes, but the Navy's Army's Air Force (sorry bunk) needs the capability to relive Henderson Field. So we have the B-model.
 
Minuteman said:
Yes, but the Navy's Army's Air Force (sorry bunk) needs the capability to relive Henderson Field. So we have the B-model.
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The VTOL requirement still seems kind of silly to me. Considering the current range of USAF assets and the huge limitations in payload and fuel that VTOL requires, it doesn't make much sense to require a stealth aircraft to be placed in the field near the front lines. Seems like a case of "we don't want the Air Force to do all the flying".
 
bunk22 said:
How do you know it's a piece of garbage? Are you on the production team?
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Nope. But it lacks the range, payload and maneuverability of nearly every thing we currently have in service. When one of the nations top fighter designers comes out and says "it's a turkey," I tend to listen to the experts, and do a little digging.
 
It is the next generation fighter. It has limitations, but it is far from a piece of garbage.

Ask those who have flown it...they all universally sing its praises. Time will eventually tell, but I am willing to bet that when all this political BS passes, everything will be ops normal. Yes, acquisition needs to get fixed, but we needed a new strike fighter and that was the system that we were working with. Most of the things wrong with it can be chocked up to normal developmental delays and politics.
 
NewYorkophile said:
The VTOL requirement still seems kind of silly to me. Considering the current range of USAF assets and the huge limitations in payload and fuel that VTOL requires, it doesn't make much sense to require a stealth aircraft to be placed in the field near the front lines. Seems like a case of "we don't want the Air Force to do all the flying".
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It's written in our national defense policy that we have that capability. It is costly, but if the next big war happens, that piece of the puzzle is huge. Marines on the ground want/need that support. It isn't just FOBs that it operates from. It mainly operates from ships.

I know that DOD seems highly bloated and wasteful, and in some respects it is. Getting a next generation fighter to our operators is not. Look at countries like China and see the capabilities they are spending money on. We can either keep up or accept that we are going to be a second rate world power in a few decades.
 
e6bflyer said:
It is the next generation fighter. It has limitations, but it is far from a piece of garbage.

Ask those who have flown it...they all universally sing its praises. Time will eventually tell, but I am willing to bet that when all this political BS passes, everything will be ops normal. Yes, acquisition needs to get fixed, but we needed a new strike fighter and that was the system that we were working with. Most of the things wrong with it can be chocked up to normal developmental delays and politics.
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Singing praises?!? While they do say the technology makes it easy to fly, that's pretty much where it stops. Everything I've read about it is completely opposite. Sure, you can literally push a button, and the thing will bring itself into a hover. But ask it to turn with anything, and you are hosed. Ask it to loiter, and you had better have a tanker nearby. Ask it to drop bombs, and plan on making multiple trips.
 
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