"The Pentagon's $399 Billion Plane to Nowhere" Topic

"Burying bad news before a long holiday weekend, the Pentagon announced just before 9 p.m. on July 3 that the entire F-35 Joint Strike Fighter fleet was being grounded after a June 23 runway fire at Eglin Air Force Base in Florida.

The grounding could not have come at a worse time, especially for the Marine Corps, which had lots of splashy events planned this month for its variant of the next-generation plane, whose costs have soared to an estimated $112 USD million per aircraft.

Effectively saying that the most expensive warplane in American history is too dangerous to fly is a huge public relations blow for the Pentagon, which has been under fire for years for allowing the plane's costs to increase even as its delivery time continued to slide right. The plane's prime contractor, Lockheed Martin, could also take a hit to its bottom line if the F-35 isn't cleared to fly to the United Kingdom for a pair of high-profile international air shows packed with potential customers. One thing the grounding won't do, however, is derail the F-35, a juggernaut of a program that apparently has enough political top cover to withstand any storm…"

Full article here
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Amicalement
Armand

The B17 was grounded after aileron lock problem-killed the crew.
Pricetags and problems are always there.

Name a plane that didn't have issues.

The Spitfire.

"Name a plane that didn't have issues."

I do not think that is the point here. The fact is the F-35 has become a white elephant and the continued cost overruns and delays are particularly galling given the current need to rein in spending and to reflect if this is really the best way to spend our military dollars. I say this not only because of the recent book "Grounded: The case for abolishing the United States Air Force" by Robert M. Farley, and realize Mr. Farley has an agenda, but given the current level of technology in warfare are we not sinking a ton of money into a weapon system that is in effect becoming obsolescent? Drones are cheaper to produce are proving to be as effective if not more so in the current missions air power is being used for. The argument of being able to project long range power, the main argument for a separate air force is often conducted by the Navy with Tomahawk missiles and other "smart" ordinance. And again the ground support missions that air power provides are better handled by aircraft that are slower than fighter jets and use a well-established older technology that is not prone to all the problems. Again take a look at drones or the old reliable A-10 Warthog.

I am open to well informed discussion on this issue sans any political trappings. Pragmatically and practically is it perhaps time to pull the plug on this one? Sadly projects like the F-35 take on a life of their own and are hard to kill once they begin.

The F35 is no more prone to problems than any other brand-new, bleeding-edge aircraft.

The Spitfire took a year and a half for the small-factory contractors to figure out how to build the (complex) wing structure.

The Merlin engine was particularly problematic early in it's life:

Early production Merlins were also unreliable: Common problems were cylinder head cracking, coolant leaks, and excessive wear to the camshafts and crankshaft main bearings.

And it's engine troubles that have grounded the F35.

This is all typical teething issues for any new high-performance aircraft! But when the media doesn't bother to do the research to show that troubles are common, well, what you get is sensationalistic pieces like this that don't even acknowledge that troubles happen to EVERY new vehicle.

As far as cancelling the F35? Can the US afford to wait another 20 years to develop the replacement?

Yes

I remember the F-22 being sledged with same allegations. Eventually it will be in service and people will hail whatever replacement is planned as garbage.

Now it's the ultimate jet fighter though it's operational career will probably be limited to intercepting Russian Tu-95s snooping around, a role that the F-4 could do just as easily. :P

The sheer numbers of Spitfires lost to accidents would suggest otherwise, Zargon.

Wonderful… Another idiot article written by someone who has no idea how hi-tech aircraft are developed, or, does know, but has an agenda to promote. Perfectly useless…