I get the idea that the initial problem was that the landing gear was not indicating locked, meaning the over-center function was not taking place, leading to an unlocked landing gear situation.  Which is why the gear collapsed when hydraulic pressure bled off after engine shutdown, the nose gear collapsed.

Get back to even approaching a federal government of the size and scope we’re supposed to have and we could afford a fleet of 10,000.

You're looking at literally hundreds.

I'm tracking all the mishaps.  The USMC F-35B is a totally different bird when it comes to maintenance, from the actual depot-level maintainers I've spoken with.  It's more complex with the lift fan and routing of pipes and cables around the lift fan compartment.  Every mechanical system needs to be maintained, and will have different service lives in the various components.  You want to hear some insane stories from USMC maintainers?  Go talk to AV-8B mechanics, or Hornet mechanics.

At the end of the day, within the first few years (sometimes months) of the previous generation teen fighters, they had multiple total losses and fatalities.

Let's take the F-14A, for example.  Before we even hit the year 1980, there were 21 total losses from crashes, many of those for unknown reasons.

F-14A losses

Now let's look at the F-15A/B in just the 1970s....17 total losses with at least 4 fatalities.

It will take some more time to count up all the F-16 losses, but there was one in 1975, 2 in 1979, 7 in 1980, 15 in 1981, 15 in 1982......  The F-16 entered service 17AUG1978.  That includes international partners who were flying it up to that time.

The F/A-18 has suffered from many crashes and fatalities as well.

The F-22A, even with much fewer numbers than the F-35 fleet, has had several total losses and fatalities.

The F-35 has had one engine fire, one exhaust nozzle fire from accumulated fuel, and other less serious incidents that have not resulted in total losses or worse.

The F-35A first flew 12 years ago in 2006.

The F-35B first flew in 2008, 10 years ago.

The F-35C first flew in 2010, 8 years ago.

By this time in the F-14A, F-15A/B, and F-16A/B history, we had at least 77 total losses, with numerous fatalities.  That doesn't include the F/A-18 losses, which I can't find good references for at the moment.

Correction:  By 1985 in all 3 of the first teen fighters (not including F/A-18), we had 105 total losses of aircraft, and many fatalities, including lost people at sea to this day.

But the F-35 is a steaming pile of garbage, a failure, etc.  Just on reliability and lack of accidents alone, it is revolutionary.

I wonder if the gear needed to be pinned while the PTMS/AUX HYD was still up and running?

It probably would have helped, if the malfunction didn't prevent it from being pinned.  But in an emergency landing, the engines are shut off as soon as the plane stops rolling.  And this sort of thing can happen as a result.

I watched a C-141 come in for an emergency landing with a bad left main landing gear and when they got stopped the crew shut down the engines just like the checklist called out, and then the left main landing gear collapsed.

It happens to about every aircraft design when the landing gear malfunctions and the over center locks don't engage.

Nothing a couple billion can't fix.

Too bad a Taliban wasn’t under there or it could claim it’s great at CAS

Gotta cite?

And everyone in MX gets to go pee in a cup.....

I don't remember exactly what the problem/fix for the F-22 NLG problem was, but I do know it was NOT because someone forgot to pin the NLG. The gear collapsed during engine shutdown the two times I know about it happening.

The NLG doesn't get pinned until after engine shutdown since it isn't safe to go into the NLG area with the engines running.

I'm betting the F-35 NLG area is also a danger zone you stay out of with the engine running too.

Some F-35s aren't combat ready and may never be.

Oh, they could be made combat ready.  But not for free.

My opinion:  Use them for training. They can be upgraded later for a full combat rating if the need arises.

The in flight emergency was....a rain storm in the area?

Literaly every DOT&E annual report.

OSD tells it like it is. No LM straight up lying press release horseshit on the f35.

We can do that
@USMARINE1108

My mis-recollection.  I thought there were some IFEs where the APU needed to be running while the NLG was pinned.

Brought to you by the lowest bidder.

Your numbers are way off, and no such thing is found in any DOT&E report.

Here's how we can tell your 250 number is simply incorrect.

As of 02JUL2018, at least 302 F-35s have rolled off the production lines.

Up at Hill AFB, they have over 40 and are receiving 1-2 per month.  They got the 39th in July.  They'll have 3 Squadrons for a total of 72 for the 388th Tactical Fighter Wing.  These are all combat-coded F-35As, and they have already done deployments to Japan and Red Flag with the first squadron.  They're doing live weapons practice on a regular basis, including aerial gunnery training last week.

USMC has at least 38 F-35Bs, with VMFA-121 as a forward-deployed squadron and VMFA-211 at Yuma with combat-coded B models.  They have 16 bird squadrons vs 12 like in the USAF.

Australia has 6 F-35As delivered, 3 of which were combat-coded 3F models as of April.

Israel has 12 delivered, 9 that are combat-coded and have already seen combat in at least 2 different mini campaigns already.

The Italian Air Force has 9 operational F-35As.

Italian Navy has 1 F-35B delivered.

Royal Netherlands AF has 2 F-35As for testing/pilot conversion, 8 on order, with 27 more planned.

Norway has 7 operational F-35As in the US for training, 3 delivered to Norway, and 45 more planned.

The UK RAF and RN have 15 F-35Bs, with 9 already in the UK.

South Korea has 1 delivered just within the past month.

US Navy has 12 SDD F-35Cs being used for fleet integration and training, with 260 planned.

So the claim that out of 302 F-35s, only 250 aren't combat-coded would mean some math is all jacked up on someone's end.

302 - 40 (USAF Hill AFB) = 262

262- 32 (USMC VMFA-121 + VMFA-211) = 230

230 - 9 (Israeli AF combat-blooded) = 221

221 - 3 (Australian Air Force) = 218

A lot of the birds, like this one at Eglin that will be brought back to flying status, are specifically being used for ongoing weapons test & evaluation/integration (this will continue throughout the F-35's life span, just like every other combat aircraft in the US).  Eglin is one of the main USAF weapons test centers, along with White Sands, NWTC China Lake, and some others.  We have a vast infrastructure of weapons testing across the services, and those units need actual aircraft to do the testing so that combat-coded aircraft can get the upgrades as new weapons are introduced.

Others, like the squadrons at Luke AFB, are being used for initial pilot conversion training into the F-35A, to include a lot of our foreign partners like the Brits, Norwegians, Japanese, South Koreans, and Dutch.

Whenever I see someone talk about combat-coded vs initial SDD and training birds, I honestly wonder if they've ever looked at any other fighter program in US history, especially the previous generation.  This is how it has always been done.  You crank out your LRIP birds for ODT&E, conversion training, and send the first operational squadron birds to the depot-level maintenance facility (Hill AFB-just like they did with the F-16A back in 1978/79) so any fleet feedback that goes into subsequent production blocks can be upgraded into the first squadrons where the facilities are.

Some birds are also dedicated to ground training as well.  I remember seeing an F-4 that was delivered direct from the factory to an aircraft sheet metal repair school,  never to fly again, but to be damaged and repaired over and over again by airframe techs in training until it was hauled off to the boneyard.

Maintainers need to go hands on to learn their jobs properly.   It makes a lot more sense for them to have a permanently available airframe (or several) than to try to teach them on whatever random aircraft happens to be at the base and broken at the moment.

If this happened to Russia or China, this would be 100% proof that their military and planes are bad in general . At least to didn’t break down and have to get pulled out of the middle of the ocean, or crash into a commercial vessel like the navy’s crap

Maybe John McCain should be given a chance to fly some F35s before he goes

That's the idea already

I just finally got a new chair this week!  Typing up around my chin was getting old.

The front fell off and he didnt have the shoulder thing that goes up

No it would be one more piece of evidence to add to the mountain though

So, I guess I must have speculated correctly, that there is an overcentering locking strut in the gear assembly.  Nice to know that I have enough mechanical engineering knowledge to have guessed that.

Now,  because I'm interested,  in the case of gear that's held up only by hydraulic or pneumatic pressure from an engine driven pump,  how quickly would that gear collapse after engine shutdown?

Here's what it looks like in the F-16:

This total landing gear failure or failure to deploy landing gear only ended up skid-marking down the runway with the centerline tank, and scratching one of the fins on an AIM-9M.  Crazy-no damage to the plane.

By jove I think you've got it.  When I was stationed there, with the alert Phantoms, Eglin had one of the nicest gold courses of any airbase around.  Of course the Navy and Marines play golf also.  Problem is the Navy's balls always sink, and the Marine balls get blown up.

All we had to contend with at Eglin was the gators.

"Watcha been doing today, Taco?"

"Uh, just flying' as usual, a little ACM....Well I brought it back."





Front fell off:




"Hey Pete.  Is there supposed to be a Sidewinder in our truck?, because we have a Sidewinder in our truck now."

While we're talking about mishaps ^^^^^^^^

Sound like an ETAR to me.  Print the post out and put it in the Ks.

That retread account there did better under his last username. lol

I like the F35.

I'm sure we'll continue to have problems come up, and I'm sure we'll fix them.

Seems just how stuff works when you're pushing through to the next great thing.

Eventually, mark my words it'll be 2028 and some piece of shit socialist will shut it down and we'll wish we had more.  Because they will be awesome.

Class A mishap

VMFA-211 is currently deployed on the USS Essex.  Reports are conflicted, but it seems to be either replacing the Wasp (with VMFA-121) or taking its MEU to Syria.

At least he had a sig 320 that the airforce has made sure can be carried with a round in the chamber while ejecting in case he really needed to shoot gators as he parachuted down.  I say "slightly" in jest.

Is this the version with all the optics down there under the nose?

Isn’t the sensor array that it is sitting on  machined out of a SINGLE, perfect Germanium Crystal ?

That was the Marines, they were F-35B's.
That's not a deployment that's a DET.
It was a test to see how the Marines working on the aircraft without contractors or direct factory support would work out.
It was also a test for the ship, ships systems and the supply system to see how that would work out.
That why they test the aircraft before they actually deploy them for real.
To find out what's fucked up, what needs to be fixed and what can be gaffed off.

Are the C variants on any carriers yet or are we still testing them?

Am I in before @LRRPF52 sucking the F-35 off as the best plane evar! Lol

Edit: Nope. I'm not. Lol

The first Navy squadron is undergoing transition right now.
VFA-47 has been in transition since March of this year.
They are on schedule to become the first certified Navy F-35C operational squadron in October of this year.
They will be receiving aircraft from the factory and from VFA-125.
By Feb of 2019, once full capability has been demonstrated, and all other IOC criteria have been met, the Navy is scheduled to declare that the F-35C has achieved Initial Operational Capability.

The F-35C is fully carrier qualified as an aircraft, both of the Navy's F-35C training commands, VFA-125 and VFA-101 carrier qualified back in March of this year on board the USS Abraham Lincoln.

The next F-18 squadron to transition to the F-35C has not yet been selected.

VFA-147 is scheduled to make it's maiden deployment in 2021 on board the USS Carl Vinson.

The next step in the introduction of the F-35C to the fleet is to stand up a new joint strike fighter wing — based in Lemoore — that will debut in the near future.
That command’s mission will be to focus on building the Navy’s JSF capabilities and managing the transition of the squadrons that will be switching to the Navy’s newest fighter jet.

Awesome! Thanks.

Crazy how long these things take.

All 3 variants have the same Electro-Optical Targeting System under the nose, which is the next generation of EO guts and gears evolved from previous generation EO targeting/laser spot tracker pods.

The EOTS is integrated with the Distributed Aperture System, which is 360° IR/MWIR, so that no matter where you look, you have a very high resolution IR picture of everything around you.  You can then zoom into that picture with the EOTS from under the nose.

This works for both Air-to-Air, as well as Air-to-Ground, simultaneously.

If you ever see video of what it looks like in the Helmet, there are Target Designate boxes or triangles on targets both in the air and ground, which the pilot can then zoom in on without ever taking his hands off the Throttle and Stick.

Am I in before ignoramuses who equate mishaps with full condemnation of a program?

Nope, that already happened on page 1.

As I said, in terms of safety and mishaps, the F-35 program is revolutionary.

None of the other teen fighters came even close to 140,000 fleet hrs without lawn darts and fatalities, and there is far more pressure on JSF than all of the teen fighter programs combined.

F-16 fleet status as of August, 2018:

Scrapped: 105
Write-off: 601 (an average write off rate of 15 per year)
Preserved: 146
Stored: 666
instructional: 105
On order: 0
Active: 2952

Changes '17/'18:
Fleet adds: 7
Fleet drop: 28

Here's what a scrapped F-16 pile looks like:



Here are what write-offs look like:



Here are some stored F-16s: