Graham Warwick/WASHINGTON DC
The Joint Strike Fighter programme is coming under threat from three sides. The engineers' strike at Boeing is pushing back the X-32 concept demonstrator's (CD) first flight; the General Accounting Office is calling for development delays and a Department of Defense acquisition strategy review looks likely to scrap the "winner-takes-all" approach.
USAir Force acquisition chief Darleen Druyun says the Boeing and Lockheed Martin conventional take-off and landing demonstrators are predicted to fly in "June/July", but Boeing insiders say the first flight of its X-32A was slipping daily because of the strike.
Druyun says both teams' short take-off and vertical landing (STOVL) JSF concept demonstrators are now expected to fly "at the end of November or early in December" because of propulsion system integration delays.
The DoD still plans to release the request for proposals for engineering and manufacturing development (EMD) in September, she says, with responses due by the end of November.
Druyun says there is margin in the schedule to accommodate the slip in STOVL flight testing, as award of the EMD contract is not planned until "May/June" 2001.
The schedule could change, however, as a result of the strategy review to be completed by the end of this month. She says: "We want a healthy industrial base for the future, particularly in fighters."
The team has been examining the industrial base issues raised by the strategy and reviewing options. Although Boeing and Lockheed Martin continue to support the winner-takes-all approach, industry sources say the strategy is bottom of the DoD's list of options.
A change in acquisition strategy could require the Pentagon to give the teams more time to prepare EMD proposals. This would play into the GAO's hands as it wants schedule changes to reduce risks.
In a draft report to Congress, the GAO argues the maturity levels of critical JSF technologies are too low to enter EMD, and risk-reduction efforts should continue .
Druyun says the GAO criticises the ability to integrate critical technologies in the JSF. "But that is not our task [in the CD phase]," she says. "Our task is to work on technologies to get them down to low or medium risk."
• Druyun says the Boeing strike had put at risk the USAF's ability to meet a Congressional requirement that sensor-fusion software must fly in the Lockheed Martin/Boeing F-22 before December.
The Block 3.0 avionics software development schedule is "at risk", she says. Congress has made F-22 low-rate production approval contingent on flight demonstration of sensor fusion in the fighter this year.
Druyun says the USAF may ask Congress to accept a certification from the Secretary of Defense that sufficient progress has been made to allow production to begin.
Source: Flight International
