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F-35 MROU sites selected

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posted on Dec, 18 2014 @ 09:02 PM
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Four locations for F-35 Maintenance, Repair, Overhaul and Upgrade operations have been selected. For European locations Italy and Turkey were chosen, while for the Asia-Pacific region, Australia and Japan were selected. Both Italy and Japan will have Final Assembly and Checkout (FACO) facilities, with the first aircraft completed in Italy to roll out in March. Interestingly the Japan facility will be built vertically and use an elevator system to move the airframes through the line.

In Europe, Italy will take on the maintenance of the airframes, while Turkey will take on the overhaul of the F135 engines. The UK will take any overflow maintenance. Meanwhile, Turkey will deal with the engines, with facilities built by 2018. By 2020, Norway and the Netherlands will assist with the F135 tear downs and overhauls. It's estimated that between 2018 and 2022 Italy will see 40-50 aircraft inductions.

In the Asia-Pacific region, maintenance will be split between North and South. Japan will take over the maintenance for the North, with Australia taking the South, and engine maintenance. The decision was made to split the maintenance due to the distances. Flying aircraft from Japan or Korea to Australia would require both alternate bases, and heavy tanker support. What could make this interesting is that Japan and Korea don't have the best relationship. Korea will have the option of going to either location for their heavy maintenance.


The US Defense Department has chosen Australia and Japan to shoulder heavy airframe and engine maintenance for the Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II in the Asia-Pacific region beginning in 2018.

The two nations will split responsibility for heavy airframe maintenance, overhaul, repair and upgrade (MORU) in the Pacific, with Japan covering the north of the region and Australia the south, says Lt Gen Christopher Bogdan, head of the Pentagon’s F-35 joint programme office (JPO).

Australia also will take charge of maintaining the Pratt & Whitney F135 engine and establish the necessary infrastructure to perform tear-down, rebuild and test those owned by Asian programme partners and foreign military sales customers. Japan will begin to take on some additional engine overhaul work by 2023.

www.flightglobal.com...


The US Defense Department has chosen the European nations to which it will assign heavy airframe and engine maintenance for the Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II.

By 2018 heavy airframe maintenance, overhaul, repair and upgrade (MORU) will be provided by Italy. The UK will pick up any additional work needed following a review that will take place about five years into the programme, says Lt. Gen Christopher Bogdan, head of the Pentagon’s F-35 joint programme office (JPO).

Turkey will take the lead on maintenance of the Pratt and Whitney F135 engine and establish the necessary infrastructure to perform tear-down, rebuild and test by 2018. Within two years of that deadline, Norway and the Netherlands are to have established the same capability.

“First was heavy airframe and heavy engine maintenance because infrastructure-wise and technology-wise, they take the longest to stand up,” Bogdan says.

www.flightglobal.com...



posted on Dec, 18 2014 @ 09:34 PM
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a reply to: Zaphod58

Why Italy ?

Not much faith in them after the NH90 helicopter and the Fyra train debacle.



posted on Dec, 18 2014 @ 09:36 PM
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a reply to: BornAgainAlien

Because they will have the FACO facility, which means most of the infrastructure is already in place. Both Italy and Japan already have major production facilities for aircraft, so it makes sense to put them there.



posted on Dec, 18 2014 @ 09:40 PM
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a reply to: Zaphod58

I think Lockheed Martin need to be all over them with supervision, they are not that well with those kinds things lots of times.



posted on Dec, 18 2014 @ 09:43 PM
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a reply to: BornAgainAlien

Lockheed Tech Reps will be there until the facilities are stood up and have experience under their belt. They're starting with assembling aircraft so that will help a lot with standing up the MRO facilities.



posted on Dec, 18 2014 @ 09:49 PM
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a reply to: Zaphod58

I have more faith in them than the Italians, however the Italians are able to make good sport cars, but the F-35 isn`t that fast.


I read they have to limed the night flights over here at one of the two bases which will have them due to the noise they make.



posted on Dec, 18 2014 @ 10:06 PM
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a reply to: BornAgainAlien

The noise levels are an issue that is going to have to be dealt with. The F135 is the most powerful engine ever put into a single engine aircraft, which means noise, and a lot of it.



posted on Dec, 18 2014 @ 10:08 PM
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a reply to: Zaphod58

About that relationship...

South Korea balks as U.S. picks Japan


WASHINGTON/SEOUL (Reuters) - South Korea said on Thursday it will not send its F-35 fleet to Japan for heavy airframe maintenance, one of the two Asian hubs chosen by the United States to service the Lockheed Martin Corp stealth fighter.


"There will never be a case where our fighter jets will be taken to Japan for maintenance," said an official at South Korea's arms procurement agency, the Defense Acquisition Program Administration.

"South Korea has the right to decide where to conduct maintenance for its F-35 jets, and it will decide whenever the need arises."


Somebody's got their knickers in a twist. South Korea plans to have their jets serviced in Australia which is eight times farther away than Japan. It's probably the radiation, it has a negative strategic outcome.




Not to mention,


In 2014 the GAO found that the F-35 fleet would have operating costs 79% higher than the aircraft it replaced.

What do you think, money well spent? How do you justify the cost and beg the world for peace at the same time?



posted on Dec, 18 2014 @ 10:11 PM
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a reply to: eisegesis

Japan and Korea have had a horrible relationship for a long time. Both sides were absolutely brutal to each other for many years, and through many wars. The only reason they get along at all is because the US is a buffer between them and China is a bigger threat than anyone else in the area.

There is much to the F-35 that is not publicly acknowledged that makes it a very valuable aircraft. I wish they would explain all the things behind it that make it both necessary, and an amazing aircraft so people could understand why it's such an incredible leap forward.
edit on 12/18/2014 by Zaphod58 because: (no reason given)



posted on Dec, 18 2014 @ 10:18 PM
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a reply to: Zaphod58

I`m going to hear them for sure being only 10 miles away from an important training area and flying over regularly.



posted on Dec, 18 2014 @ 10:23 PM
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a reply to: Zaphod58

But at an incredible leap in cost as well. Do you think these enhancements could really justify bankrupting a nation? 1.5 trillion over 55 years doesn't really have a nice ring to it.

GAO Draft Slams F-35 On ‘Unaffordable’ Costs: $8.8B Over Legacy Fighters


The estimated gap between the F-35 sustainment costs and those of the F/A-18, F-15, F-16 and the Harrier fleets as measured in 2010 is impressive, about $8.8 billion, an increase of 79 percent. That estimate comes from the Pentagon’s authoritative Cost Assessment and Program Evaluation (CAPE) office, the GAO draft report says. The draft says that costs for the legacy fleet were about $11 billion a year in 2010. Based on CAPE’s estimate, the F-35’s annual costs will be $19.9 billion in 2012 dollars.



posted on Dec, 18 2014 @ 10:33 PM
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a reply to: eisegesis

Yes. We're getting into a world where legacy fighters CAN NOT survive. Not will have a hard time, not will give as good as they get. Legacy fighters WILL NOT survive in another 10 years. They have reached the point of diminishing returns on upgrades. The technology going into the F-35 simply will not go into a legacy fighter. They don't have the power required to run it, even if they could fit it into the airframe somewhere.

We're not talking about a fighter having a slightly better radar, or slightly better avionics, we're talking leaps ahead compared to an F-15, which at one point was the most advanced fighter out there as far as situational awareness for the pilot. The F-35 pilot will practically know what the opposing pilots had for breakfast that morning. Its stealth will be on par, if not slightly better than the F-22, which means survivability. Networking for the F-35 will be better than anyone could ever have imagined even 10 years ago. Some of the classified aspects will double or even triple lethality over legacy airframes.

We're getting to the point where even if you ignore the age and problems the legacy fighters have now, their survivability will be measured in minutes in a major fight against a parity or even near parity opponent.



posted on Dec, 18 2014 @ 11:10 PM
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a reply to: Zaphod58


We're getting into a world where legacy fighters CAN NOT survive. Not will have a hard time, not will give as good as they get. Legacy fighters WILL NOT survive in another 10 years. They have reached the point of diminishing returns on upgrades.

Not counting the F-15. The F-35 will be replacing the F-16 and the F/A-18. Most of the F-15 varients will last a couple more decades but will ultimately be replaced by the F-35 as a substitute.

Link


The Air Force is in the early phases of a fleet-wide technological upgrade to the F-15 fighter jet to keep it in the air through 2035 and beyond, service officials said.


And it looks like radar would be on par as well, unless it was classified of course.


Air Force leaders want to upgrade the fighters with the latest radars, electronics and sensors in order to keep them viable should the U.S. face a more advanced military than Iraq and Afghanistan.

“We’re trying to make the entire fleet more capable for the future environment,” said Ottati.


179 out of 248 F-15 C/D's will be modified. Here is more specific info about the upgrades...


The upgrades for the F-15 C/D fleet include the installation of the APG-63(V)3 Active Electronically-Scanned Array, or AESA radar. Unlike existing mechanically-scanned arrays which passively scan and receive signals, the AESA radar is able to transmit and electromagnetic signal or ping. This allows for more precise and accurate radar, threat detection and targeting technology, including the ability to track more than one target simultaneously.


The F-15 E also has an ongoing radar modernization program which is installing an APG-82(V)1 AESA radar on board the aircraft. Thus far, eight of these new radars have been installed since 2010 and the service plans to outfit 217 F-15Es with them.


The entire fleet of F-15s is slated to receive mission computer upgrades in the cockpit through an effort the Air Force called Advanced Display Computer Processor II. The technology, slated to implement over the next several years, will bring much greater processing capability to the aircraft compared to existing systems, Ottati explained.


F-15s are also getting a next-generation electronic warfare suite called Eagle Passive/Active Warning Survivability System, or EPAWSS, Ottati added. The idea with EPAWSS is to provide a fifth-generation electronic warfare capability to a fourth-generation fighter such as the F-15.

So what makes them different than the F-35 is what we don't fully know or understand yet. Unless you happen to be one of those people who know things?




edit on 18-12-2014 by eisegesis because: (no reason given)



posted on Dec, 18 2014 @ 11:30 PM
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a reply to: eisegesis

I didn't say they COULDN'T upgrade them, I said they've reached the point of diminishing returns. They can upgrade the systems that are already on the aircraft, but they can't add totally new systems that weren't already there, that are power intensive, and mean that they will be able to survive in a combat zone with new weapons flying.

Have you looked at the other problems the F-15 has? A radar upgrade isn't going to make it more survivable in a fight, or put it anywhere near the F-35 sensor wise. An F-15 flying straight and level on a ferry flight recently, going to the facility for a radar upgrade, being flown by a highly experienced pilot, went from normal flight, to a smoking crater so fast that the pilot didn't even have time to eject. They're limited to around 7 Gs, and barely over Mach 1, because the structure is under so much stress, and the longerons weren't built right in so many of them, from the start.

But even with new built F-15s (let's go hypothetical and say the F-15 doesn't have any problems at all structurally), they're looking at new missiles (both air to air, and surface to air) using both LPI radars (which means the pilot won't see it coming until less than 15 miles out), and multiple sensors, including optical sensors, that will be almost impossible to jam, short of burning them out with a laser countermeasure. About the only countermeasure capable of defeating several of the new missiles that are in development aren't going to be as effective on an F-15, compared to an F-35 or F-22. Add a laser countermeasure to an F-15, and you lose something to provide the power for it.

Ok, they're getting a new EW suite, and computers. Great! That means that they might last 10 minutes, instead of 2. You have to know that there's a missile coming at you to be able to jam it, and the new missiles will have almost nothing emitted that the TEWS and sensors on an F-15 will be able to detect until it's far too late to do anything about it. They can't upgrade an F-15 where it really matters, and that's in sensors capable of detecting LPI radars, and optically tracked missiles. An F-35 will come with both networked sensors, and self controlled sensors capable of doing both. Add in the stuff that I can't talk about, and you will expand the sensor envelope tenfold over anything an F-15 could do.



posted on Dec, 19 2014 @ 08:14 AM
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sorry to chip in here, but does that mean if that infrastructure collapses, the most modern aircraft in the world cannot fly, and that a bunch of old prop-driven fighters will rule the sky?

I have seen that before. I worked in military communications, more specifically, HF communications. When satellite comms and Cell phones came in, everybody predicted the end of HF, and armies all over the world started phasing HF comms out. It took just one or 2 natural disasters to take out a whole country's infrastructure, to have them all crawling back to have HF back as standby. After the 2004 tsunami in Thailand, the onliest means of communication some communities had, was HF communications.

So, it is nice and good to have all these modern and vastly superior weaponry, but all you need to do is to take out the infrastructure, and then all that advanced tech is less that useless.



posted on Dec, 19 2014 @ 08:43 AM
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a reply to: Hellhound604

The Marines are planning to forward deploy the F-35B similar to the RAF deployment plan for the Harrier. That means operating outside the FOBs, dispersed away from their infrastructure.

Some infrastructure is necessary but it doesn't require a massive amount of support.



posted on Dec, 19 2014 @ 06:24 PM
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a reply to: Zaphod58

Out of curiosity, couldn't the "stuff" you can't talk about be retrofitted as well? If it's sensor based, a module can't be created to supplement an old system?Does it strictly come down to power consumption? I admit, I'm not as knowledgeable, but interested in the discussion for what it's worth.



posted on Dec, 19 2014 @ 06:34 PM
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a reply to: eisegesis

I think doing so would be like trying to turn your 1970 corvette into a 2015 corvette. You would have to re-engineer the entire thing and dump huge amounts of money into doing it that would make it prohibitive and not worth the time. It's not a simple plug and play type of thing.



posted on Dec, 19 2014 @ 06:42 PM
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a reply to: eisegesis

No. They don't have the capacity or the power to run them. Not to mention integration would be a huge problem. You'd have to make structural changes for them to be truly effective. Any pod would not only be severely limited it would take the place of weapons.



posted on Dec, 19 2014 @ 07:35 PM
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Zaph is right about the power. The F-35 is on the edge of its power already. It uses a ton of power to make everything work. Even compared to the F-22 the JSF is truly remarkable. People may complain about this or that. Even talking about how unstealthy it is. But do they really know what they are talking about? Let's just say the future of this jet is going to be great. It's a growing phase of this jet, costs have already started declining. The engine bugs are really getting worked out and avionics is doing great. The main thing lacking is software, which is constantly getting updated.




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