F-35 Lightning II CTOL/STOVL

Google · Post by **Google** » Wed Dec 19, 2007 11:05 pm

Hello everyone. I don't know all of you, but I do know some of you. I was the night supervisor at AC from May 2006 to April 2007. I had to leave because I just couldn't deal with the management (or lack thereof) any more... Anyway, it was for the better. I was getting sidetracked in life. I had made the decision to make a career for myself at AC/Space Camp, but I'm glad a certain person made a certain decision that showed me I, nor one other loyal supervisor, was not appreciated there

.

So, now I'm a rocket scientist making a whole heck of a lot more $$$ and getting to work with the new JSF, F-35 Lightning II. Hence my post. I don't know how interested any of you are in the F-35, so I will only drop a line or two. If anyone wants to hear more, I will be glad to answer questions, as long as they don't violate clearance issues. I'll let you know if I can answer it, or if I have to kill you after I tell you

I have been traveling between Arnold AFB in Tennessee and Edwards AFB Flight Test Center for various testing projects for the F-35. It has had some set backs, but all-in-all, it is going to be an amazing fighter! There is still a lot of flight testing to be done over the next few years before it enters service. Some of the testing I've done has been classified as proprietary but I have searched it on the internet and have found it on many different sites.

Oh, well, I know I'm not the leak.

I will talk more about it if I see any interest.

I hope to hear from my friends I had to leave behind (Goldfish, Cornbread, Krispy, Klutz, Mouse, Dew, Tiller to name a few.) I do miss you all and I miss being there.

tennisrox014 · Post by **tennisrox014** » Thu Dec 20, 2007 12:24 am

hey!

Sorry for my absence everyone, but life is very busy at the moment! Anyways, I would be very interested to hear more about the JSF! I'm Navy ROTC, and will be comissioned in spring of 2010, and as of now, am in line to go pilot or NFO.

Trigger23 · Post by **Trigger23** » Thu Dec 20, 2007 7:40 am

wait a second! The F-35? I thought the latest fighter was the F-22 Raptor. Shows how much I know...

*EDIT* I googled it and it said that it was being developed in Australia or at least for the RAAF. Is that true? If it is, then why are you working on it?

tennisrox014 · Post by **tennisrox014** » Thu Dec 20, 2007 9:27 am

Ummm... I'm not sure where you got that info, but the JSF is being developed for the U.S... it may be sold to other countries as well, but it is definitely being developed for the U.S. Navy and Marine Corps... I think the Air Force might be getting it too, but I'm not sure that will end up happening since they just got the F-22. Someone here probably knows more than me on that subject.

Boomerang · Post by **Boomerang** » Thu Dec 20, 2007 1:07 pm

The F-35 is being developed for the Navy, Marine Corps, and Air Force with variations for each service. The FA-22 will replace the F-15 for the Air Force and the F-35 will replace the F-16 atleast thats the plan as i understand it. I have also heard other countries have placed orders for the F-35 so Australia is a possibility but it will be primarily a US Fighter craft. When you see pictures it looks remarkably similar to the FA-22 most likely its because both are built by Lockheed Martin however the FA-22 has 2 engines and the F-35 has one.

Post by **Vincent** » Thu Dec 20, 2007 5:13 pm

The JSF is actually (to some degree) an international project and it will be sold to other countries...

Google · Post by **Google** » Thu Dec 20, 2007 8:04 pm

So far everyone is correct about the F-35. It will be our newest fighter and, as Boomerang mentioned, it is being developed for the Navy, Marines, and Air Force. There are two versions, although only one is in the test phase so far. There will be a STOVL (Short Take-Off Vertical Landing) version for the Navy/Marines. It will be replacing the AV-8 Harrier for the US and, like the Harrier, is a joint venture between the US and Great Britain. GB already has orders for many of them.

The Air Force is ordering the CTOL (Conventional Take-Off and Landing) version. They are not interested in STOVL since the have nice long runways just about everywhere they need to go. The F-35 is a single engine, which is a variant of the Pratt & Whitney F119 engines used in the F-22. The F-35 is a lot smaller than the F-22. I have seen the two sitting next to each other and its similar in size-difference to the F-14 and F-16 sitting down at AC.

The STOVL nozzle rotates down to 90 degrees to produce lift in the rear, and doors just behind the cockpit open up to reveal what it called a Lift-Fan. This fan is actually powered by the main engine through an attached gearbox. Bleed air is taken from the main engine during hover in order to maneuver, sort of like the little puffers on the Harrier outside of Hab 3.

tennisrox014: Go Navy! I am ex-Navy, but my job then was shooting down aircraft.

That was fun! hehehe. Actually, I only got the chance to shoot down drones. Those are no fun because they are too easy.

I did get to manually fire the Phalanx, or CIWS (Close In Weapons System.) If you have never seen one of those before, look it up on the internet. We nicknamed it R2-D2 with a

... um, how can I put this nicely... [Moderator: You can't]. Anyway, stick with it. I wish you the best of luck, and I'm envious. I would love to have a chance to fly the F-35, but I guess I have to stick with being a propulsion engineer for it.

By the way, I talked to Austin Meyer the other day, some of you may remember him. He is the owner of X-Plane and created the new software for the AC sims. You may know this already, but he was designing a F-35 model for the sims. I played around with it just before I quit. He says that he has completed the model and it is available in X-Plane 9! and can be purchased at www.x-plane.com for $79. Kind of expensive, but I think I'm gonna try it out.

Well, more to come. I may not log on again before Christmas. Going to visit family for the holidays, so Merry Christmas to all, and have a Happy New Year!

tennisrox014 · Post by **tennisrox014** » Thu Dec 20, 2007 9:43 pm

tennisrox014: Go Navy! I am ex-Navy, but my job then was shooting down aircraft. That was fun! hehehe. Actually, I only got the chance to shoot down drones. Those are no fun because they are too easy. I did get to manually fire the Phalanx, or CIWS (Close In Weapons System.) If you have never seen one of those before, look it up on the internet. We nicknamed it R2-D2 with a ... um, how can I put this nicely... [Moderator: You can't]. Anyway, stick with it. I wish you the best of luck, and I'm envious. I would love to have a chance to fly the F-35, but I guess I have to stick with being a propulsion engineer for it.

Go Navy!
Of course I know of the CIWS! Its funny because in my Naval Science course last semester, our instructor actually refered to it as you did above. haha
Thanks, hopefully I'll have the opportunity to fly it someday. Keep up the good work!

gt0163c · Post by **gt0163c** » Tue Dec 25, 2007 10:52 pm

Before anyone asks, I also work on the F-35 program. With the exception of five months in 2001/2002, I've worked on the JSF program for the past 9.5 years (it was X-35 when I hired on).

Google wrote:So far everyone is correct about the F-35. It will be our newest fighter and, as Boomerang mentioned, it is being developed for the Navy, Marines, and Air Force. There are two versions, although only one is in the test phase so far.

Almost.
There are three variants of the F-35. The "A" variant is the Air Force Version. The "B" is the Marine variant, the aircraft that has the STOVL capability. The "C" is the Navy variant, capable of taking off from and landing on aircraft carriers. The easy way to remember which variant is which is thinking that the variant name represents the specific aircraft landing surface: Airfield, Beach and Carrier.

Currently there is one aircraft in active flight test, that is the first A aircraft (designated AA-1). The second aircraft (designated B-1) is a B variant. It rolled out last week and has entered the test program, although it will be a number of months before it flies.

About the different countries being involved. There are currently a number of countries which are partnered with the US to design and build this aircraft. I think we're up to 16 partner nations, but I could have that number a little off. Partner countries have not agreed to order aircraft, but they have expressed interest and are helping to provide funding in return for some input into the design of the aircraft. England is our only "Level I" partner. They're providing a high level of financing and have a number of their engineers (from BAE Systems, formerly British Aerospace) working alongside the US engineers. There are a number of "Level II" partners including Italy and, I believe Holland. They provide a lower level of funding and have less input into design decisions, however some of their engineers are working with Lockheed (through Alenia and Fokker, respectively). And there are a larger number of "Level III" partners. I do believe Australia is a partner country, but I'm unsure whether they are Level II or Level III.

Google wrote:The STOVL nozzle rotates down to 90 degrees to produce lift in the rear, and doors just behind the cockpit open up to reveal what it called a Lift-Fan. This fan is actually powered by the main engine through an attached gearbox. Bleed air is taken from the main engine during hover in order to maneuver, sort of like the little puffers on the Harrier outside of Hab 3.

Just to add a bit.
The lift fan is powered by a drive shaft that runs off the main engine. The shaft is attached to the engine via the gear box. And, if you think about this for a minute, it means that not only is there a huge hole the runs all the way through the aircraft from top to bottom (that's where the lift fan sits. It's a fuel tank in the other variants.) But there's also a big, fast turning hunk of metal that runs almost half the length of the aircraft (I don't know exactly what's in there in the other variants. I'm sure that fuel tanks take up some of the room and probably things that got rerouted due to the larger landing gear in the Navy variant.). And that's not something that's been done before in a fighter aircraft. Another thing that's very cool about this aircraft.

Spyder · Post by **Spyder** » Thu Dec 27, 2007 12:30 am

This is interesting stuff, even for a proud member of the US "Chair Force". I think a lot of us AC junkies are also jet junkies, so its always good to hear about this kind of stuff! THANKS!

1MileCrash · Post by **1MileCrash** » Tue Jan 08, 2008 6:05 pm

when will the F-35 come into service with it's first active wing and when will it be fully in operation. along the same lines when will the F-16, F-19, and harrier be retired?

i guess all the same questions regarding the F-22 and the F-15 if you have that info.

Spyder · Post by **Spyder** » Wed Jan 09, 2008 1:52 am

1MileCrash wrote:along the same lines when will the F-16, F-19, and harrier be retired?

do you mean the F-18?

Boomerang · Post by **Boomerang** » Wed Jan 09, 2008 1:27 pm

I don;t know exact dates on any of these howevetired at all yet FA-18 is scheduled to be retired at all yet The hornet is still relatively new compared to the F-15 and F-14 and even F-16 it didnt come online till the late 70's. Plus the new Super Hornet is an incredible fighter attack plane.

As for the FA-22 and the Eagle the raptor squadrins are already coming online as we speak. The Eagle is definately on the way out. I liv near Langley AFB and for years we saw almost F-15's exclusively. We had 3 squadrons of them here as part of the 1st fighter wing. Now 2 of those squadrons are raptors and one is in transition.