[quote][b][url=/v3/forum/%C3%A9tats-unis-31/topic/croyez-vous-au-programme-jsf-144/?post=41251#post-41251]tmor[/url] a dit le 06/08/2008 à 13:24 :[/b]

[url=http://www.aviationweek.com/aw/generic/story_generic.jsp?channel=dti&id=news/DTIJSF.xml&headline=JSF%20Office%20Makes%20Buyers%20an%20Offer%20They%20Cannot%20Refuse]Aviation Week,[/url] un article amusant.

[quote]Within a year, Lockheed Martin’s Joint Strike Fighter team expects to make firm offers to its eight partner nations: the U.K., Italy, Australia, Canada, the Netherlands, Norway, Denmark and Turkey. In exchange for a commitment by all eight to aircraft numbers and delivery dates, they will get a firm price, several years before that would normally be possible under U.S. procurement rules.

The move is necessary because competitors are offering fixed prices, and because some partners need many of their aircraft from early production batches, which normally carry a high price.

[b]Those commitments will be backed up by sanctions. “Partners who do not buy according to the program of record will cover the costs incurred by other partners,” says the Program Office director, Maj. Gen. Charles Davis.[/b]

Davis says the final price is the subject of intense discussions within the team, but numbers in the [b]$58-63-million realm—flyaway prices in current dollars[/b]—have been mentioned. [b]Given that total acquisition unit costs in export sales tend to be about twice the flyaway cost, this places the JSF unit cost close to that of Typhoon.[/b]

The partners should be clear about what they are getting for the money. At the inception of the JSF program, in 1995, then-project director George Muellner described the aircraft as [b]“70% air-to-ground, 30% air-to-air.”[/b]

The F-35 [b]is not optimized for air-to-air combat. JSF is neither fast nor agile enough to choose whether to shoot or scoot against an adversary like the Su-30.[/b] It either carries a maximum of four AIM-120 missiles—the capability is little publicized, although Davis confirms that it will be part of the systems development and demonstration program—or operates with compromised stealth. (A reduced-signature pylon for the outboard wing stations, designed to carry AIM-9X or Asraam missiles, is being developed.) Success in air combat depends on stealth, but although the F-35 should detect targets at long range before being detected, [b]it will have to close to shorter distances to achieve an acceptable kill probability with the AIM-120C7, particularly against an agile target using jamming and decoys[/b]. The U.S. acknowledged this by developing[b] the AIM-120D, designed to be compatible with new active electronically scanned array radars, but it will not be available for export in the foreseeable future.[/b]

[b]Moreover, there is no longer any serious doubt that not all F-35s will be equal in stealth[/b]. Asked earlier this year to confirm that all would have the same signatures, George Standridge, Lockheed Martin’s vice president for business development, responded: “That is a matter for the U.S. government. I cannot and will not answer that question.”

The partner countries so far show signs of being able to live with the aircraft’s performance and the stealth capabilities they have been offered. The main exceptions are the U.K. and Italy, which will use the Typhoon as their primary air-to-air fighter.

Another major advantage of the JSF is the potential for spreading through-life upgrade and support costs over a large fleet of aircraft. This depends, however, on keeping numbers at their planned level, including 730 aircraft for partner nations, which means overcoming three obstacles.

The first is direct competition. Norway and Denmark are evaluating the JSF against other aircraft, mainly Saab’s Gripen Next Generation (NG). In May, the Netherlands government, under pressure from its Labor coalition partner, agreed to carry out a final assessment of other aircraft, including Gripen NG, Typhoon and Rafale, before making a commitment. Canada also intends to conduct a competition.

The second is budget concerns in the U.K. and Italy, where JSF procurement will be weighed against the final batch of Typhoon fighters unless money can be found for both types.

Third, U.S. numbers are shaky. Senior Air Force officers have stated that the service can afford only 48 JSFs per year rather than the 80 that the current program envisions, unless it gets more topline funding in the defense budget. The Navy and Marine Corps told the Government Accountability Office that they expect to buy 35 JSFs per year, versus 50 in the current plan. Davis says the JSF office “is waiting for the POM (program objective memorandum) process to see those numbers get adjusted.”

[b]Technical risk is another factor. Later this year, the project office is expected to confirm a slip of 9-12 months in the completion of operational testing, with a consequent increase in development costs.[/b]

Davis minimizes its impact, saying it reflects the fact that early low-rate initial production (LRIP) batches have been reduced in size (12 aircraft on contract in 2008, for instance, versus 18 envisioned earlier), and observing that it is “at the discretion of the combatant commander” when to declare initial operational capability. Davis makes much of the flight of the first F-35B, on June 11, within the schedule planned in August 2006. “People said the program couldn’t make it, but this shows that we’re capable of performing to schedule.”

[b]More important, though, is the Stovl (short takeoff and vertical landing) testing of the F-35B, which is, by Davis’s count, three months behind schedule[/b]. In the first quarter of 2009, the F-35B will start a series of 20 sorties at Fort Worth, Tex., in which the jet progressively slows down, leading to a slow landing. BF-1 will then be ferried to the Navy’s flight-test center at Patuxent River, Md., for tests leading to a vertical landing. [b]The time­scale for that is not certain, but a vertical landing doesn’t look likely until well into the second quarter.[/b]

The U.K. has voiced concerns about vertical landings. Added to F-35B testing under a U.K. initiative is a new flight mode, shipboard rolling vertical landing (SRVL), in which the aircraft approaches the ship with about 60 kt. airspeed and 25 kt. wind-over-deck—the maximum design speed of the Royal Navy’s new carriers (see story, p. 51)—for a 35-kt. relative deck speed. Davis characterizes SRVL as a means to improve hot-day performance. The U.K. National Audit Office, in a November 2007 report, linked the move to SRVL to “weight challenges and propulsion integration issues.”

SRVL trials were carried out in May 2007, using the fly-by-wire Harrier operated by Qinetiq on the French carrier Charles de Gaulle. Challenges include the fact that the aircraft has to stop using wheelbrakes alone—37,000 lb. of aircraft at 35 kt. represents a lot of energy—on a deck that will likely be wet. A classic “bolter” will not be possible because power has to be reduced on touchdown to put the airplane’s weight on its wheels.

Vertical landing tests depend on the successful resolution of problems with the low-pressure turbine of the F135 engine, whose unusually large blades are designed to deliver power to the lift fan. A number of changes have been implemented, and tests continue to pin down the exact combination of circumstances where failures occur.

Two milestones are coming up: further analysis should lead to a limited clearance of the existing engine for inflight vectoring in October; and a modified, fully cleared engine should be ready to fly by late 2008.

The other main challenge in the JSF program will be ramping-up LRIP. Davis told an Aviation Week conference in early 2008 that he was “worried about getting the manufacturing lines down the learning curves.” Some problems stem from the weight-reduction redesign in 2004-05—the wing, for example, is harder than expected to assemble. These issues have to be sorted out by 2010: in 2011, production starts a steep acceleration, from 47 aircraft ordered in 2011 to 205 in 2014.

If the JSF program succeeds in locking up its international partners, the project could be within reach of its goal of an F-16-like, mid-four-digit production run and a near-monopoly of the fighter business outside Russia and China. The only other Western program with a long-term future will be whichever team wins India’s 126-aircraft order. But if JSF falls short of its goals—as almost every major military aircraft program has in the past 25 years—it will throw the re-equipment plans of a dozen air arms into disarray.[/quote]
Pas mal, non ?  :lol:[/quote]