Forum: Program and politics

"The U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee on Tuesday questioned the quality of production on the Lockheed Martin Corp F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, citing a "potentially serious issue" with its electronic warfare capability."

The quality issues precede the current labor action at LM.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/06/ ... 3520120606

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maus92 wrote:

"The U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee on Tuesday questioned the quality of production on the Lockheed Martin Corp F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, citing a "potentially serious issue" with its electronic warfare capability."

The quality issues precede the current labor action at LM.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/06/ ... 3520120606

Let me see hmmm..... LM mngmt. is driving down costs and negotiating a labor contract with the union. Suddenly, the Senate has quality issues because......must be the union is not getting a better end of the negotiations deal. Oh yeah, those "scab" workers are producing inferior quality work, as leaked to the Senate. The only quality issue is the "interim" workers are not efficient or effective at "taking the union coffee-break" Laughing

Look at the McMembers of the SASC and you'll see where this report is coming from. McCain and McCaskill.

Lightndattic wrote:

Look at the McMembers of the SASC and you'll see where this report is coming from. McCain and McCaskill.

And it's Reuters reporting on it.

"...but union officials have questioned whether the quality of production -- already an issue -- would be maintained by workers with less experience on the complex weapons system."

Or put more simply, the striking union workers were doing a lousy job before they went on strike. But rather than admit their members were a problem, union officials had to turn that around with "questions" about whether the scabs can do the job. Not evidence, questions. And Reuters of course gave them an uncritical forum in which to do it.

Reuters is famous for running "Pallywood" productions as news. Completely staged events, staged right in front of reporters, and running them as if they were real. They've also been caught running photos they've doctored, staging anonymous man in the street interviews, etc. In short, they're a far left propaganda outlet, not a news service.

Lockheed F-35 scrap rate at 16 percent - Pentagon

"WASHINGTON, June 8 (Reuters) - The rate of scrap, rework and repair on production of Lockheed Martin Corp's F-35 fighter jet is currently around 16 percent, higher than on other military aircraft programs at similar stages of production, the Pentagon said on Friday.

Both the Pentagon's F-35 program office and Lockheed Martin Corp "recognize this is an area that needs improvement, and are working together to achieve world-class levels of quality," said Navy Commander Kyra Hawn, a spokeswoman for the program office."

"The Senate committee noted in a report accompanying its fiscal 2013 budget bill that a potentially serious issue had been discovered with an aperture on the aircraft that was critical to its electronic warfare capability.

The committee said the full extent of the problem was not known, but it underscored the need for the Pentagon and Lockheed to "rigorously manage production quality," it said.

Sources familiar with the program said the issue centered on the placement of a sensor at the tip of the plane's wing and was a design matter and nothing to do with production quality.

They said the previous placement had reduced the sensitivity of a small part of the electronic warfare sensor, but affected only jets in the first three production batches and had already been resolved in jets now under production.

Retrofits would be done as needed, but only a small number of aircraft would be affected, the sources added."

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/06/ ... O520120608

Who's willing to bet that Reuters got their technical information from APA or worse??

southernphantom wrote:

Who's willing to bet that Reuters got their technical information from APA or worse??

Looks like it's from disgruntled union members.

Doesn’t matter about the “source” … just another nail in the coffin. Just like Dracula… if the F-35 can overcome the negative stints in the lime light, the jet may be able to achieve badass status. But in the interim, it’s just another PIG!

Don't say that around Kopp...He loves his F-111s aka "pigs."

Is the 16% re-work number just referring to the necessary fixes for the earlier LRIP jets or is this 'new' re-work?

VarkVet wrote:

.. ("if") the F-35 can overcome the negative stints..!

Hark! He's starting to come around! Smile

maus92 wrote:

Lockheed F-35 scrap rate at 16 percent - Pentagon
....the issue centered on the placement of a sensor at the tip of the plane's wing and was a design matter and nothing to do with production quality.

They said the previous placement had reduced the sensitivity of a small part of the electronic warfare sensor, but affected only jets in the first three production batches and had already been resolved in jets now under production.

Retrofits would be done as needed, but only a small number of aircraft would be affected, the sources added."
..

LRIP 1,2,3 (31) a/c, but only two ( AF-17&18 ) are flying the OT tailcode for the 85th TES at Edwards, maybe? Two is a small number! Smile

, but...so is 31 out of 2 or 3,000. Wink

Forum: Program and politics

F-35 production quality worries SASC