USAF steps up campaign to speed JSF production rate

Service warns on future F-16, A-10 retirements, while Denmark completes MoU process

Denmark's signing of the Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) production, sustainment and follow-on development memorandum of understanding (MoU) on 27 February means all eight international partners in development of the Lockheed Martin F-35 have inked the framework agreement for the next phase of the programme.

Signing the MoU does not commit the partners to buying the aircraft, and the US Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps still face a struggle securing funding to ramp up F-35 production and bring down unit costs as quickly as possible.

With the first two production aircraft funded in fiscal year 2007, and 12 requested in the FY2008 budget, the focus is on increasing procurement in FY2009, now set at 16 aircraft, to drive down costs. "We need to get 2009 up some - it is not close to the two-times ramp we need," says a programme source.

The US Air Force is also concerned the 48-a-year procurement rate budgeted to be reached in FY2013 is not high enough to replace its Lockheed F-16s and Fairchild A-10s before their service lives expire. "If I don't buy about 80 JSFs a year I get to the point where I am drawing down the F-16s and A-10s, and 48 JSFs won't get me there," USAF chief of staff Gen Michael Moseley said last month.

Congress has meanwhile criticised the inclusion of three F-35s in the Pentagon's war-related FY2007 and FY2008 supplemental funding requests, arguing the early-production aircraft are not appropriate replacements for three F-16s lost in combat. But Moseley says they would help accelerate production, reduce cost and get aircraft into test and training. "We do not want to buy any more [Boeing] F-15s and F-16s," he says.

The first F-35 test aircraft, meanwhile, is expected to resume flying this week after scheduled inspections and software upgrades following completion of an initial seven flights during which the aircraft reached 23,000ft (7,000m), Mach 0.8 and 16º angle of attack.

Aircraft AA-1 is expected to start flying with the helmet-mounted display (HMD) as early as its next flight. The HMD is the primary flight display as the F-35 does not have a head-up display. The co-operative avionics testbed or CATBird, a modified Boeing 737, is also due to arrive at Fort Worth, Texas this week.

Source: Flight International