Lockheed's F-22 Raptor – a maintenance nightmare

[RPK]

Lockheed's F-22 Raptor – a maintenance nightmare

Defence Bureau
11 July 2009

With a whistleblower lawsuit against Lockheed Martin grabbing headlines for making the startling allegation that the US Air Force's top-of-the-line fighter, the F-22 Raptor, has been supplied defective stealth coatings, further information is now emerging from Pentagon sources that the F-22 programme is indeed the source of substantial worry for the defence establishment.

Internal documents, as well as Pentagon officials, reveal that Lockheed Martin's F-22 now requires more than 30 hours of maintenance for every hour that it spends in the skies. This adverse ratio effectively pushes its hourly cost of flying to more than $44,000, which easily outstrips the cost of keeping other fighters in the skies – those which the Raptor is meant to replace.

Seemingly lending credence to whistleblower ex-employee Darrol Olsen's claims, that the company knowingly used "coatings that Lockheed knew were defective," are reports that not only are these coatings susceptible to peeling off but also that they are vulnerable to rains and other abrasion. Olsen claims that Lockheed covered up its problem with defective coatings by applying 272kg (600lb) worth of extra layers.

Pentagon sources say that these problems have been bedevilling the aircraft since the mid-1990s. (See: Lawsuit claims Lockheed's F-22 Raptor has defective stealth coatings )

Local media reports reveal that even as most aircraft fleets become easier and less costly to repair as they mature, the reverse is the case with the F-22. On an average, the Defense Department acknowledged this week, just 55 per cent of the deployed F-22 fleet was available to fulfil stipulated missions in the period from October last year to this May.

The F-22 has never flown in combat missions over Iraq or Afghanistan

The Raptor has become a contentious issue between the US Congress and the Obama administration with defence secretary Robert Gates halting further production of the $138 million aircraft, beyond the stipulated 187.

This is far short of what the USAF and the contractors had anticipated.

Defense officials in the know have been quoted in the media as saying that the aircraft can just about manage 1.7 hours of hassle-free flying before contracting a 'critical' ailment other point out that the Cold War-era conceived fighter has, so far, cost an average of $350 million apiece and are just not a priority in an age of small wars and terrorist threats.

The massive maintenance bills are also draining away air force funds urgently required for other projects. Former top Pentagon weapons testing expert Thomas Christie (2001-2005) has been quoted as saying that the plane's huge costs has resulted in the Air Force lacking funds to modernize its other components adequately. He said the force has "embarked on what we used to call unilateral disarmament."

According to Pierre Sprey, one of the founding members of the so-called ''fighter mafia'' – the group that conceived America's most successful modern combat aircraft, the F-15, the F-16, and the A-10 - from the beginning, the Air Force designed the Raptor to be "too big to fail, that is, to be cancellation-proof." Prime contractor Lockheed farmed out more than 1,000 subcontracts to vendors in more than 40 US states, and Sprey points out that by the time skeptics "could point out the failed tests, the combat flaws, and the exploding costs, most Congressmen were already defending their subcontractors' " revenues.

Media reports quote John Hamre, Pentagon comptroller (1993-1997), as saying that the DoD approved the plane with a very low budget as it knew projecting the real costs would have bounced the project on Capitol Hill.

"We knew that the F-22 was going to cost more than the Air Force thought it was going to cost and we budgeted the lower number, and I was there," Hamre told the Senate Armed Services Committee in April.

"I'm not proud of it," Hamre is quoted as saying in a recent interview.

The aircraft has undergone a plethora of problems, in line with the radical nature of its design it must be said. For the USAF, the sad part is that the problems have failed to stabilise in spite of near six squadrons already deployed in active service.

With limited production commencing in 2001, the plane was "substantially behind its plan to achieve reliability goals," the GAO said in a report the following year. Structural problems compelled forced retrofits to the frame and changes in the fuel flow. Computer flaws, combined with defective software diagnostics, forced the frequent retesting of millions of lines of code, according to two Defence officials quoted in a local media report.
Stealth coating problems, which often require re-gluing small surfaces, as the coating peels off, take more than a day to dry. These facts have been culled from confidential data drawn from tests conducted by the Pentagon's independent Office of Operational Test and Evaluation between 2004 and 2008.

Over this four-year period, the Raptor's average maintenance time per hour of flight grew from 20 hours to 34. Stealth coatings alone accounted for more than half of the maintenance time, and more than half the hourly flying costs last year, according to the test and evaluation office.

While the Air Force claims that the F-22 cost $44,259 per flying hour in 2008, the Office of the Secretary of Defense said the figure was $49,808.

The F-15, the F-22's predecessor, has a fleet average cost of $30,818.

Sprey has also claimed that he was informed by engineers who have worked on the aircraft that because of Lockheed's use of hundreds of subcontractors, quality control was so poor that workers had to create a "shim line" at the Georgia plant where they retooled badly designed or poorly manufactured components.

"Each plane wound up with all these hand-fitted parts that caused huge fits in maintenance," Sprey said. "They were not interchangeable." Lockheed denies such claims, however, and says "our supplier base is the best in the industry."

The plane's famed 'gold canopy' a million-dollar, radar-absorbing cause of envy for other fighter pilots has also caused problems. A stuck hatch imprisoned a pilot for hours in 2006 and, to date, engineers have been unable to extend the canopy's lifespan beyond about 18 months of flying time.

Ex-Pentagon official Ahern and Air Force Gen CD Moore, have both confirmed that canopy visibility has been declining more rapidly than envisaged, forcing $120,000 of repairs at 331 hours of average flying time, instead of the stipulated 800 hours.

The plane's first operational flight test in September 2004 saw it meet two of 22 key requirements and display a total of 351 deficiencies. In 2006, it fully met five, and in 2008 when the sixth squadron was fully deployed, the Raptor had fully met seven key requirements.

Pentagon officials stress that the F-22s are on track to meet all its key performance parameters by next year.

 

[Mig-29]

Looks like all is not well with F-22 raptor , however i am sure all this small technical malfunction is initial hiccups and as US air force gains more experience with the aircraft the maintenance period as well as the turn around time can be decreased.

 

[RPK]

Lawsuit claims Lockheed's F-22 Raptor has defective stealth coatings


The controversial F-22 Raptor stealth fighter programme of the United States Air Force has flown into fresh controversy with a whistleblower lawsuit by an engineer formerly employed by Lockheed Martin, maker of the stealth jet, alleging that the company had provided the fighter with "defective" stealth coatings. The programme has already been scrapped by defence secretary Robert Gates, but is facing rearguard action from members of the US Congress who are insisting on reinstating the programme fearing job losses in their constituencies.

Gates has received firm backing from the Obama administration, which has threatened to veto the defence bill as approved by the Congress, which includes provisions for extra production of the controversial aircraft even after it reaches the approved production figure of 187.

Now the freshly revived three-year old lawsuit by ex-employee Darrol Olsen is all set to add fresh fuel to the fire.

Though no reports have ever surfaced in the public domain about problems relating to stealth features of the fighter, it has been known that maintenance of the aircraft is indeed an issue, with the stealth coating also having safety related problems. In March 2008, a Raptor sustained a million dollar damage after a small strip of stealth coating inside the engine nacelle came unstuck and was ingested by the fan blades of the P&W F119 engine.

According to a lawsuit, filed in US District Court in California, Darrol O Olsen states that between 1995 and 1999 the company knowingly used "coatings that Lockheed knew were defective". He claims Lockheed covered up its problem with defective coatings by applying 272kg (600lb) worth of extra layers.

By way of credentials, Olsen points out that he was "one of the top... low observables engineers in the stealth technology industry", having worked on the original F-117 stealth fighter and at Northrop on the B-2 stealth bomber before joining Lockheed's F-22 team.

According to Olsen, the low-quality stealth coatings have not only adversely affected radar and infrared visibility of the F-22, but have also become a major safety hazard for the F-22 as in the above-mentioned incident when a Raptor engine was heavily damaged.

Olsen also claims that "third-party reports" indicate that the Raptor's stealth protection "has not been remedied through the present date". He says that Lockheed "continued to misrepresent the problems with the F-22's coatings through at least October 2004 and likely to the present date".

Olsen has asked that he be reinstated with back-pay plus interest since being fired by Lockheed more than a decade ago. He is also asking the court to order Lockheed to pay the US government $50 million for each of the 183 F-22s currently ordered, that being the amount roughly equal to the cost of the allegedly compromised stealth technology on each jet.

The F-22 Raptor currently costs $138 million per jet.

In response to Olsen's allegations, Lockheed has said: "While we are aware of the Olsen lawsuit, the corporation has not yet been served in this matter. We deny Mr Olsen's allegations and will vigorously defend this matter if and when it is served."

As for Olsen's career, he began his Lockheed career in 1979 at the famed Skunk Works, where he worked on developing new composite materials for the F-117. He worked fully on Northrop's B-2 flight test programme from 1990 before joining Lockheed's materials and processes engineering group in Marietta, Georgia, in 1995 to work on the low observables system for the F-22.

In 1998, Olsen says, he refused to participate in an award ceremony which sought to falsely honour his team for solving problems that he knew were yet to be resolved. He was fired for "failure to follow instructions" in 1999, the lawsuit says.

Olsen says he believes the problems have never been fully addressed.

The F-22 Raptor programme has always the been the source of much debate and controversy and now Olsen's lawsuit only serves to further question the justification for the whole F-22 programme.

If Olsen's allegations are true, then the question arises as to why the USAF has kept mum about the matter, for by now it would be fully aware of the shortcomings of the aircraft, if any?

It may be pointed out that John Young, the previous undersecretary of defence for acquisition, technology and logistics, told reporters in November last year, that he was concerned about the F-22's stealth, or low observable (LO), maintenance requirements.

"I would highlight in general the maintenance on the airplane is too high," Young said. "They're struggling with some of the LO and other issues, and there's clearly work that needs to be done there to make that airplane both capable and affordable to operate."

 

[RPK]

Nothing stealthy about "Save the F-22 Raptor" campaign new

Boeing and Lockheed Martin have mounted a publicity campaign aimed at keeping the sophisticated, but very expensive, F-22 Raptor fighter programme alive By Rajiv Singh

Worried about the possibility of the sophisticated, but horribly expensive, F-22 Raptor fighter programme being on the chopping block of the new Obama administration, Boeing and Lockheed Martin have mounted a publicity campaign aimed at keeping the programme alive. Joining the campaign are US lawmakers who have already written letters to the new president asking him to secure the future of the F-22 production line in Marietta, Georgia.


image credit: USAF
The programme supports 1,200 Boeing jobs which would fade away over three years if current funding wasn't supplemented.

Though Lockheed Martin is the prime contractor, the wings and aft fuselage are made by Boeing. It also integrates avionics and software into the aircraft. An end to production would likely affect Boeing's legacy of building high-technology military aircraft.

Though acknowledged as the most capable fighter aircraft in the world, the hugely expensive, $153 million F-22 fighter is judged to be soaking up money badly needed elsewhere. The Bush administration tried to bring an end to the programme but found itself overruled by Congress and the US Air Force, which asked for more of the aircraft.

Originally seeking a force level of 750, the USAF now is hoping for a fleet of 243, according to Boeing spokesman Doug Cantwell. So far, 187 aircraft have been funded and 134 produced. At stake is immediate funding of another 20, which will bring the total number of aircraft funded up to 203, Cantwell said.

The US Air Force continues to argue that it will require more of the aircraft to handle future threats such as the SA-20 and S-300/400 advanced air defence systems being sought by potential adversaries.

Focusing their campaign on policymakers in Washington, DC, the firms are taking out print ads in policy journals, radio spots and even billboards, Cantwell said.

US lawmakers have already made their move by writing to the new president asking him to secure the future of the F-22 programme. These include Sens. Saxby Chambliss (R-GA) and Patty Murray (D-WA) have written to Obama requesting funding for production citing a flyaway cost reduction of 35 per cent. They also said the end of the fighter's production could further drain the US economy in the midst of a recession.

A letter along similar lines is being circulated among House members and is said to have at least 150 signatures.

A decision has to be arrived at by early March to avoid closures in the production line.

In their letter, the senators claim the F-22 "provides over $12 billion of economic activity to the national economy."

The F-22 programme is estimated to cost $64.5 billion, including research and development.

Along with other pressing issues designed to give any president a headache, the F-22 is also being regarded as one of the initial lot of military procurement issues that Obama will have to face as president.

It will be his call if scarce government resources, especially in a recession, can be allocated to such a programme.

The aircraft has recently been targeted by the New York Times which said the government could save $3 billion a year by terminating the Raptor. The NYT also targeted other high-tech weapons systems such as the Zumwalt-class destroyer, the Virginia Class sub and the V-22 Osprey. It has argued that these resources should be put into more ground troops, more shallow-draft Navy ships, and supplies for the National Guard.

The Boeing-Lockheed Martin campaign has also factored in the recession, saying that the programme employs 25,000 people in 44 states, with more than twice that working for suppliers.

An article supporting the F-22 published by the conservative Lexington Institute contends that upward of 100,000 jobs are supported by the F-22 programme.