Alliant Techsystems (ATK) will continue building skins and start supplying inlet ducts for the Lockheed Martin F-35 Joint Strike Fighter under two new contracts valued at $250 million.
Worth $240 million, the first deal involves providing composite skins for the F-35's upper and lower wing-box and engine nacelles. The agreement includes 390 aircraft ordered during low rate initial production lots four to eight.
Meanwhile, Lockheed's centre fuselage supplier, Northrop Grumman, has selected ATK to begin supplying composite inlet ducts for F-35s under a $10 million contract. Follow-on orders for full-rate production, beginning in 2016, could be worth $40 million more.
The Lockheed-led industry team is building hundreds of F-35s even as the flight-test phase continues through 2016.
The programme includes three variants, including the conventional take-off and landing F-35A for the US Air Force, short take-off and vertical landing F-35B for the US Marine Corps and the F-35C carrier variant for the US Navy.
ATK's contract for composite skins applies only to the F-35A and F-35B models. Chief executive Mark De Young says the JSF programme is a "cornerstone of ATK's growth strategy" in the aerospace business.
Source: Flight International
