Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II Joint Strike Fighter (JSF)

Generally spoken the "missing bulkhead" modifications seem to have been a mismanagement somewhere. That new stuff, not originally part of the design, may require a redesign isn't unusual. Apparently if the difference is that big, there must be a good reason for it. Typically you would try to respect the original design specifications, in terms of fit and form. But sometimes new technology dictates changes that lead to design changes on the airframe to make the new equipment fit.
 
Elysium said:
This kind of makes me think there was a missed opportunity to declare another competition, and allow some other competitor to at least bid against the F35 design, and see if they can address the basic shortcomings of the program, which afaict arelack of cooling and power, and internal volume - in a different airframe.

I'm sure the mandated level of capability would be much easier and cheaper to achieve if those things were available.
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The main problem of the F-35 is the contract design, all the technical and other problems them from it. The joint fighter programm schouldnt have existed from the start but putting all eggs in LM basket without any real possibility to get the eggs out of it is the problem. Look at the NGAD project and how any Airforce General who ever talked about it, starts with talking about IP and maintenance ownership.
 
Sferrin said:
I guess the same could be said of the F-14Ds, eh? They got new engines, new radars, completely new displays, got rid of the glove vanes, etc. etc.
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Forgive me, I might be a bit ignorant on the history of the F14, but I thought its biggest issue was the engines on the original F14A, which was remedied by the F14B? The F14 also experienced crucial technology shifts during its life, with computers and solid state radar going from a high-tech curiousity, to basically the expectation. Also, I might be making another blunder, but I just now realize how late the B-variant came, in 1987, so the F-14's reputation might not have been all that stellar during most of its Cold War life? In which it's similar to the F-35 I guess.
But we have to note these shortcomings didn't come without appropriate reaction from the military - the F18 has entered service before the F14B. So I guess there's some historical precedent to what I suggested being done and working out in the end.
 
Aegrotare said:
The main problem of the F-35 is the contract design, all the technical and other problems them from it. The joint fighter programm schouldnt have existed from the start but putting all eggs in LM basket without any real possibility to get the eggs out of it is the problem. Look at the NGAD project and how any Airforce General who ever talked about it, starts with talking about IP and maintenance ownership.
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I'm not sure how the existence of the F-35 prevented the emergence of the competitors. A bit of a political aside - I remember reading a US technical report about the Yak-141 - while they found the aircraft overall rather good, they noted certain shortcomings, and the report went on a similar political tangent, about how these were inevitable seeing how a centrally planned economy has no hopes of competing against the might of a free market one.
I am not sure how these very same people managed to get suckered into a monopoly contract not even a decade later.
 
Elysium said:
My personal somewhat uninformed opinion is that the between the new Block 4 and the F35 that was delivered initially, there is basically no commonality in terms of electronic systems (and possibly, likely others), it's like a brand new plane in the shape of the old one. I would even risk the assumption that one could pick some midpoint in the timeline and even that would hold true both between said midpoint and the initial version, and the midpoint and Block 4.
Which means LM managed to cram 2-3 generations of almost complete redesign (which might've been more costly and time consuming than going for a clean sheet one), into a plane that basically looks the same.
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While Blk 4 is a significant upgrade you are overstating the differences between the 3F and Blk 4. Yes a radar upgrade, common for aircraft in later life and happening on Eurofighter and happened on Rafale. Yes EW improvements primarily across more bands but also increased processing and same thing happened for most 4th gen aircraft. Engine improvements but no different to other airframes in US service, for example F-15 and F-16 moving from the -100 to the -200 and then -229 engines. EOTS upgrade is just a typical mid life improvement but still only improving an existing system.
AI is already being integrated into the system, see recent Fighter pilot podcast discussion, but flight systems such as sensor fusion and MADL are remaining the same.

End conclusion is it is a big upgrade but no more so than has happened on other airframes.
Elysium said:
At this point, the F-35 is only called the F-35 to save LM from the loss of face of writing the whole thing off, and appease international partners.
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Completely off, especially when production is essentially sold out for the next five years at 150 a year and the platform has strong sales potential for another 1000 jets globally.
Elysium said:
This kind of makes me think there was a missed opportunity to declare another competition, and allow some other competitor to at least bid against the F35 design, and see if they can address the basic shortcomings of the program, which afaict arelack of cooling and power, and internal volume - in a different airframe.
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Blk 4 is 16 billion. A new design is at a minimum 40 billion and a decade of testing plus production ramp up. Cooling and power are being addressed as they have been on other aircraft such as the F-15 and F-16. Both those airframes received higher capacity generators, reinforced power distribution systems, expanded heat exchanges etc. F-35 does not lack internal volume...
 
Aegrotare said:
The main problem of the F-35 is the contract design, all the technical and other problems them from it. The joint fighter programm schouldnt have existed from the start but putting all eggs in LM basket without any real possibility to get the eggs out of it is the problem. Look at the NGAD project and how any Airforce General who ever talked about it, starts with talking about IP and maintenance ownership.
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You can call that a program issue but the program was conceived with that intent due to issues with the existing programs of the day and the international scope. It is likely that NGAD will swing the pendulum the other way and the next program post that airframe will return towards the centre.
 
yeetmahboi said:
So why wasn't the APG-85 designed to fit into a common, or minimally modified mounting, and instead pursued this complication?
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If I have to guess, it is likely that USA military demand a radar with much better detection range => NG solution is a radar with higher quantity of T/R modules => they need the radar to be more slanted to accomodate the additional T/R modules. Another possibility is that they might make the radar steerable like CAPTOR or Irbis-e
 
Elysium said:
At this point, the F-35 is only called the F-35 to save LM from the loss of face of writing the whole thing off, and appease international partners.
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There are so many changes and upgrades from the Block-3F to the Block-4 that the Block-4 F-35A, F-35B, and F-35C should be re-designated* the F-35D, F-35E, and F-35F.

*I meant re-designated NOT redesigned (Bloody autocorrect).
 
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NMaude said:
There are so many changes and upgrades from the Block-3F to the Block-4 that the Block-4 F-35A, F-35B, and F-35C should be re-designated* the F-35D, F-35E, and F-35F.

*I meant re-designated NOT redesigned (Bloody autocorrect).
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Honestly, the variants probably should have been the F-35, F-36, and F-37 and then the Blocks would be letter variants and the lots would be block numbers.
 
Ozair said:
While Blk 4 is a significant upgrade you are overstating the differences between the 3F and Blk 4. Yes a radar upgrade, common for aircraft in later life and happening on Eurofighter and happened on Rafale. Yes EW improvements primarily across more bands but also increased processing and same thing happened for most 4th gen aircraft. Engine improvements but no different to other airframes in US service, for example F-15 and F-16 moving from the -100 to the -200 and then -229 engines. EOTS upgrade is just a typical mid life improvement but still only improving an existing system.
AI is already being integrated into the system, see recent Fighter pilot podcast discussion, but flight systems such as sensor fusion and MADL are remaining the same.

End conclusion is it is a big upgrade but no more so than has happened on other airframes.

Completely off, especially when production is essentially sold out for the next five years at 150 a year and the platform has strong sales potential for another 1000 jets globally.

Blk 4 is 16 billion. A new design is at a minimum 40 billion and a decade of testing plus production ramp up. Cooling and power are being addressed as they have been on other aircraft such as the F-15 and F-16. Both those airframes received higher capacity generators, reinforced power distribution systems, expanded heat exchanges etc. F-35 does not lack internal volume...
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First, curse LM for using the ABC designations for different variants of the same jets :D But seriously it makes historical comparisions to other US jets quite difficult, but I think its fair to say each 'block' roughly corresponds to a 'letter' variant of older jets.
Also I would like to get the 'orders' thing out of the way - for all its flaws, the F35 is the only 5th gen flying today available to Western partners, and while I think it still deserves quite a bit of flak, I would say the arguments of "*insert 4th gen plane* are just as advanced", put forward usually by European manufactuers, just dont hold water

With that said I think there are at least 3 different 'tech generations' which are basically completely incompatible: the initial-Block 2 version which was basically deemed not good enough to meet requirements, the Block 3 which is kind of what the plane is.
Afaik there is no stated compatibility or upgrade paths between the variants. I'm sure the APG-85 has different power, cooling requirements, different internal commlinks, probably requires updates to the central computer as well.

These changes always have knock on-effects, that's why the whole concept of blocks exist,

As for the need for a brand new airframe, I'm quite sure LM engineers favorite past-time is fitting increasing power, cooling requirements, and new hardware into existing space, aka Tetris from hell.

Imagine the following hypothetical scenario:
Info comes down the grapevine that the upcoming Chinese radar for the J-20 is 20% more powerful than what the F35 currently has, and they'd need at least 30% to maintain an edge. The sensible thing would be to put in a 30% more powerful heat exchanger, but even with tech advances, such a generator would be 15% bigger, and there's no space.

After long and tortous wailing, they decide to redesign the neighboring components to make more space for the new cooler, make them a bit more efficient etc. The whole process of a single component upgrade turns into a huge and painful redesign, only feasible as part of a larger effort.

The things you mentioned being the same, like MADL or them doing the same things, is like saying you can swap parts between your mid 2010s PC and your current brand new one, because both can connect to Wifi and run Windows.

Keep in mind, that this program (not preliminary studies, but the full F-35 program) has been going on for 20 years.
 
Not James Stockdale said:
Honestly, the variants probably should have been the F-35, F-36, and F-37 and then the Blocks would be letter variants and the lots would be block numbers.
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They have overall the same airframe (But with role specific differences), same engine and the same avionics (And other internal systems) also there are no doubt bureaucratic reasons as to why this isn't done.
 
True NMaude, it would have been dificult for the USAF/US Navy and USMC to have called their specific fighters F-35, F-36 and F-37 it is better of sticking with the F-35A/B/C models it would be less cumbersome in that respect.
 
Elysium said:
First, curse LM for using the ABC designations for different variants of the same jets :D But seriously it makes historical comparisions to other US jets quite difficult, but I think its fair to say each 'block' roughly corresponds to a 'letter' variant of older jets.
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I don't get the fascination with the designations but I disagree, the letter variants are different to the Blk variants.

F-18E/F has gone through three Blks with upgrades such as radar happening between them but with no change of letter.
Elysium said:
With that said I think there are at least 3 different 'tech generations' which are basically completely incompatible: the initial-Block 2 version which was basically deemed not good enough to meet requirements, the Block 3 which is kind of what the plane is.
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No, the build was never planned that way. Early blocks were never combat capable or planned to be. Wiki has a reasonable explanation of it.
The aircraft's software was developed as six releases, or Blocks, for SDD. The first two Blocks, 1A and 1B, readied the F-35 for initial pilot training and multi-level security. Block 2A improved the training capabilities, while 2B was the first combat-ready release planned for the USMC's Initial Operating Capability (IOC). Block 3i retains the capabilities of 2B while having new Technology Refresh 2 (TR-2) hardware and was planned for the USAF's IOC. The final release for SDD, Block 3F, would have full flight envelope and all baseline combat capabilities. Alongside software releases, each block also incorporates avionics hardware updates and air vehicle improvements from flight and structural testing. In what is known as "concurrency", some low rate initial production (LRIP) aircraft lots would be delivered in early Block configurations and eventually upgraded to Block 3F once development is complete.
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The F-16A had blocks 1,5,10,15,20 while the F-16C has blocks 30, 50, 70 (with associated numbers for different engine...). Blk 1 had approx 100 aircraft, blk 5 approx 200 aircraft and blk 10 approx 300 aircraft. All were classed as combat capable and all were capable and were upgraded to Blk 10 standard.

So the USAF never operated F-35 Blk 1 or 2 variants and they were never deemed combat capable by them. USAF airframes were upgraded from Blk 3i to Blk 3F standard and could be upgraded to Blk 4 if the USAF chose to.

Elysium said:
Afaik there is no stated compatibility or upgrade paths between the variants.
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Yes aircraft can be upgraded to newer blks. At some point it might not be worth it financially but the ability remains. Users like the RAF and the RAAF will upgrade all their fleets to later standards in place of buying new build aircraft.
Elysium said:
I'm sure the APG-85 has different power, cooling requirements, different internal commlinks, probably requires updates to the central computer as well.
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Of course it does but that is no different to any other aircraft that has had radar upgrades.

Elysium said:
As for the need for a brand new airframe, I'm quite sure LM engineers favorite past-time is fitting increasing power, cooling requirements, and new hardware into existing space, aka Tetris from hell.

Imagine the following hypothetical scenario:
Info comes down the grapevine that the upcoming Chinese radar for the J-20 is 20% more powerful than what the F35 currently has, and they'd need at least 30% to maintain an edge. The sensible thing would be to put in a 30% more powerful heat exchanger, but even with tech advances, such a generator would be 15% bigger, and there's no space.

After long and tortous wailing, they decide to redesign the neighboring components to make more space for the new cooler, make them a bit more efficient etc. The whole process of a single component upgrade turns into a huge and painful redesign, only feasible as part of a larger effort.
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Why do we need to create fictional scenarios? The F-35 is working through a power and cooling system upgrade right now and the system proposed by RTX fits into the same footprint as the current system.
Elysium said:
The things you mentioned being the same, like MADL or them doing the same things, is like saying you can swap parts between your mid 2010s PC and your current brand new one, because both can connect to Wifi and run Windows.
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Are you familiar with military equipment? This is common across all platforms.
Elysium said:
Keep in mind, that this program (not preliminary studies, but the full F-35 program) has been going on for 20 years.
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So, the F-16 program has been going for almost 60 years.

Can I suggest if you don't undertand the program, and by your statements that appears that is the case, then it might be worth doing some research instead of shooting from the hip and missing the target repeatedly.
 
NMaude said:
If start at the F-16's very first flight (Albeit accidental) in 1974 that's 52 years not nearly 60 years.
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F-16 was the result of the LWF which released an RFP in 1972 and emerged from the F-XX or ADP but you are quibbling the point.
 
Will the block 4 be available to all current F-35 customers and future potential customers (considering that block 4 is the latest configuration at the time the contract is signed)?
 
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Null said:
comments?
View attachment 802242
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Keygen music rocking military hangars would be a funny twist.
Jokes aside, assuming successful jailbreak, 5th gen fighters are in effect flying EW suits. EW suits without timely analysis and updates are dead weight.
Also, leaving aside kill switch talks, what's a certainty is that there is self-bricking in case of unauthorized access/meddling; this is not an uncommon service "problem" clients come with to OEM (understandably humiliating and damaging conversation). It certainly isn't impossible to work around, but at minimum you'd need access and time to do that.
 
Spook said:
Will the block 4 be available to all current F-35 customers and future potential customers (considering that block 4 is the latest configuration at the time the contract is signed)?
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Yes. Finland for example is purchasing Blk 4 aircraft and is not a partner on the program, just an FMS customer. Existing operators will also be able to upgrade their 3F jets to Blk 4 configuration.
 
https://www.reuters.com/business/ae...ghter-program-falters-sources-say-2026-02-19/
Germany is considering ordering more U.S.-made F-35 fighter jets, two sources told Reuters, a move that would deepen Berlin's reliance on American military technology as its joint next-generation fighter program with France falters.
One source said Berlin was in negotiations that could lead to the purchase of over 35 additional jets. Germany purchased 35 of the aircraft in 2022 which are due to begin delivery later this year.
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If all the potential F-35 purchases and existing orders come to fruition, Germany would have around 85 F-35s. But the sources cautioned the outcome was still uncertain.
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An interesting development raprtor82 Germany buying more F-35s and potentially having around 85 of the fighters on strength.
 
FighterJock said:
An interesting development raprtor82 Germany buying more F-35s and potentially having around 85 of the fighters on strength.
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How do you arrive at 85? 35+35 would be 70 in my books? "Over 35" leaves ofcourse room. Should be noted that the official position is "no plans, no political decision". Ofcourse that doesn't mean anything.
 
Damn it, thanks Scorpion82, so Germany is as yet undecided as to whether to go for the extra F-35As. But I think that they should.
 
As hinted before: an F-35G... That will be successful in Belgium, Netherland Denmark, Norway, etc... to end-up being, in its best version, Italianized.

Aaahh History is playing fool with us (again) as soon as Politics and top CEO gets caricatural.
 
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Halcyon66 said:
What could possibly go wrong.........................

Regards,
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The theory behind it could help immensely with identifying and collating frequency hopping emissions. Numerical analysis is precisely the kind of thing AI should be good at. This is going to be the norm in every major military going forward.

Yes - you could have a situation where something gets mistaken for a potential target, but that can't just happen once or happen briefly. It has to continually occur over an extended length of time for a system (and then the pilot) to give final engagement authority.

As with any other piece of software, it depends on use case and implementation.
 

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