Forum: F-35 Lightning II

G'day to all:
The most recent issue of the codeone magazine, has an article about the new helmet for the F-35 pilots. It includes the attached photo of an impecably dressed pilot wearing flightgear I have not seen before. can anyone provide information as to what type of ensemble this is.

Until recently it appears the pilots were wearing UK fabricated flightgear such as what appears to be an mK31 life preserver jacket.

Regards

F-16.net Sponsor

FUTURE Flight Suit info here:

AirForce Times wrote:

Air Force fields special flight suit for JSF

By Bruce Rolfsen - Staff writer
Posted : Tuesday May 5, 2009 18:25:55 EDT

[...]

Officially called the “JSF light-weight coverall,” the flight suit has been tested by designer RFD Beaufort but isn’t being worn yet by the Air Force’s handful of Joint Strike Fighter pilots, Limrick said. No date has been set for when the pilots will get the flight suit.

[...]

The flight suit is made of an improved fire-resistant fabric developed by Dupont, Limrick said. “Nomex Comfort” feels better against the skin than DuPont’s commonly used Nomex III fabric because it is made of smaller, finer filaments.

The finer filaments produce a trio of improvements:

* More of the fabric touches the skin to wick away sweat and moisture.

* Smaller threads create a smoother fabric that doesn’t run against skin, similar to why a bed sheet with high thread count is smoother than a sheet with a low thread count.

* The finer threads are more tightly woven together, making the fabric more durable. The material is less likely to pull apart at the seams or pill in areas that are rubbed against such as elbows. Airmen wearing flight suits often complain about pilling and unsightly seams.

[...]

Source: http://www.airforcetimes.com/news/2009/ ... t_050109w/

Air Force fields special flight suit for JSF By Bruce Rolfsen - Staff writer Posted : Tuesday May 5, 2009 18:25:55 EDT

"Pilots flying the F-35 Lightning II are getting their own flight suit, a more comfortable one that will protect their arms if they have to eject from the stealth fighter.

The sage-green flight suit looks like the one now worn by thousands of other airmen except for no line-cutter pocket on the left leg and the addition of a removable fabric cord attached to each upper sleeve, said Cheryl Limrick, a spokeswoman for the Joint Strike Fighter program office in Arlington, Va.

Officially called the “JSF light-weight coverall,” the flight suit has been tested by designer RFD Beaufort but isn’t being worn yet by the Air Force’s handful of Joint Strike Fighter pilots, Limrick said. No date has been set for when the pilots will get the flight suit."
___________________

Martin-Baker make Ejection Seat so they have a say in Safety Equipment:

http://www.jsf.org.uk/JSF-UK-Industry-T ... Baker.aspx
&
http://www.martin-baker.co.uk/Products/ ... --JSF.aspx
_________________

GENTEX JSF Oxy Mask Info PDF: http://ps.imirage.com/psgentexpub/(S(p3 ... -Feb05.pdf (1Mb)

Found a related article here;

http://www.strategypage.com/htmw/htairfo/20090506.aspx

pecial Flight Suits For The F-35
May 6, 2009: The U.S. Air Force is providing pilots of its new F-35 fighter with a custom flight suit, to deal with a potential problem pilots might encounter when ejecting. The “JSF light-weight coverall” is similar to the standard flight suit, worn by all air force pilots, except that it has provision for a removable fabric cord on the upper sleeve. These cords are only worn when the pilot is seated in the ejection seat, and attach to the centerline harness buckle on the ejection seat. The “JSF light-weight coverall” also removes a small pocket from the left leg of the flight suit.

When the pilot pulls the ejection seat handle (between his legs), the cords keep his arms close to the centerline of the ejection seat. The ejection seat is rocket propelled, and leaves the cockpit at high speed, and the design of the F-35 cockpit creates the possibility that the pilots arms could be injured (by debris or parts of the cockpit) if they were not kept together during ejection. This is apparently considered more of a problem in the F-35 than in other aircraft.

Ejection seat system costs between $200,00-300,000. Most ejection seats weigh about half a ton, and are complex bits of technology. Ejection seats became essential as military aircraft became so fast, that a pilot could not safely climb out of the cockpit and jump. With the higher speed, there was the danger of hitting the tail. Also, escaping pilots were often injured or stunned, and unable to get out quickly enough.

The first ejection seat design was developed in Germany, where the seats were first installed in their He 219 night fighters, in 1943. These used compressed air to propel the seat out of the aircraft. A year later, rocket propelled seats were installed in the He-162 jet fighter. By the end of the war, all of Germanys jets were equipped with rocket propelled ejection seats. While the Swedish firm SAAB had also developed a rocket propelled ejection seat, it was British firm Martin-Baker that jumped in and created a design that quickly filled the needs of most Western air forces.

The U.S. Air Force insisted on an American made ejection system, but the U.S. Navy stayed with Martin-Baker, because the American ejection seat did not function as well at very low altitudes (where a lot of naval aviators have to eject during carrier operations). Martin-Baker supplies about two-thirds of the ejection seats for Western fighter aircraft. The Soviet Union produced their own ejection seats. Over 10,000 aircrew have successfully used ejection seats since World War II.

ACES 5 Ejection Seat is being funded as a competitor to Martin-Baker ejection seat for JSF also:

http://www.goodrich.com/portal/goodrich ... ebsite.pdf (180Kbs)

See ELP blog here also: http://ericpalmer.wordpress.com/2009/10 ... on-system/

Great read, thank's!

B. Bolsøy
Oslo

Holy crap; the helmets are full carbon fiber. I bet they don't weigh more than a pound or three... good to know when you're pulling 9G+.

Then again, they apparently cost $100K.

And the checkerboard effect looks pretty wicked too, IMHO. Cool

With all the extra stuff bolted to it, the final weight may be close to an unloaded 55P. Not for certain, tho.

And did anyone else catch the typo in the Gen I/Gen II comparison pic? Whistle

[quote="banken"]Holy crap; the helmets are full carbon fiber.quote]

I dislike the use of carbon fiber in cockpit applications. Airborne strands, freed by maintenance and flexion, tend to find their way onto circuits and cause shorts given their light weight and high conductivity. I've witnessed this occur several times in general aviation. Also, CF fractures with edges sharp as razors. Hopefully these issues have been addressed with this helmet and its maintenance. It appears to be an amazing bit of kit.

v^2

Does anyone have any links or additonal information that describing components such as survival vest, life preserver, g-suit, boots etc.

regards

F16VIPER

8Mb .FLV video at: http://www.clipser.com/watch_video/757403 shows first flight with a second or so of the test pilot with his flight gear. No help yet in getting today's flight gear. Googling is one way to find this stuff but it takes time.

That one looks like the RAF flightgear set including the Beaufort MK31 life preserver.

Correct I guess (I have no idea) Beaufort is featuring in a lot of what I'm finding on the net but whether it is useful or not I have no idea. One example is this page: http://www.defence.gov.au/dmo/news/onta ... 06/nb7.cfm

The photo is from that page (cropped heavily). The Beaufort website has internal documents that I cannot reach here:
http://www.survitecgroup.com/intranet/a ... lletin=731

Another example of G-suit combo in 4 VIEWS here: http://www.f-16.net/gallery_item105697.html

Flight Gear development mentioned in this article (common UK design across variants): http://www.codeonemagazine.com/archives ... index.html

One more link that has a video of the Gen 1 helmet.

http://lukeforward.com/f-35/

Regards

'This transmission is coming to you...' Good video. Thanks.

Forum: F-35 Lightning II

Flightgear worn by Lightning drivers