Navy F-35C roadmap revealed

[Corsair1963]

Distilled. UI = unidentified in the article.

Transition appears pretty slow??? Wasn't the plan to acquire 20+ F-35C's each year??? This should be enough for 1.5-2 Squadrons per year.

Yeah, no kidding.

I wonder what the impact with be if/when the Marines changes the mix of Bs and Cs. They are suppose to stand up a second 25 ac squadron FRS of F-35Bs soon. If they change the mix to 50/50 might they need to stand up an FRS focused on the C? Or will they try to complete the B procurement in the short term and then increase the numbers of Cs procured?

Honestly, the USN maybe playing a little politics here. Just as they did when they proposed to retire the USS Harry S Truman earlier this year. Knowing full well the US Congress would never allow them to do it.


Issue for the Navy is it's budget is stretched to the limit with urgent ship building. Which, is why it's been difficult to buy enough the F-35C's annually. Also, why they likely pushed the USMC F-35C's forward...(different part of the budget)

[spazsinbad]

'weasel1962' said on previous page: "1. The USMC mix will not change (although they did add 13 Cs to 80 C for a total of 353 B&Cs)…." Methinks the ADD should be a MINUS? Latest SAR says: download/file.php?id=27020

F-35 Lightning II Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) Program (F-35)
19 Mar 2018 As of FY 2019 President's Budget - Defense Acquisition Management Information Retrieval (DAMIR)

"The current estimate for F-35 total procurement quantity increase from 2443 to 2456 has not changed from SAR 2016 to SAR 2017. This increase was the result of two changes: a USMC variant mixture change between the F-35B and F-35C (13 additional F-35Bs and 13 less F-35Cs), and the Department of Navy (DoN) decision to continue to procure a total of 340 F-35C aircraft. This results in a net increase of 13 F-35B aircraft. The increase is reflected in both the aircraft and engine subprogram and results in a change from 680 to 693 in the DoN Aircraft Procurement accounts. The USMC validated their requirement through the Marine Corps Requirements Oversight Council (MROC)." page 28

Source: download/file.php?id=27020

[Corsair1963]

Nothing is set in stone....

[weasel1962]

'weasel1962' said on previous page: "1. The USMC mix will not change (although they did add 13 Cs to 80 C for a total of 353 B&Cs)…." Methinks the ADD should be a MINUS? Latest SAR says: download/file.php?id=27020

F-35 Lightning II Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) Program (F-35)
19 Mar 2018 As of FY 2019 President's Budget - Defense Acquisition Management Information Retrieval (DAMIR)

"The current estimate for F-35 total procurement quantity increase from 2443 to 2456 has not changed from SAR 2016 to SAR 2017. This increase was the result of two changes: a USMC variant mixture change between the F-35B and F-35C (13 additional F-35Bs and 13 less F-35Cs), and the Department of Navy (DoN) decision to continue to procure a total of 340 F-35C aircraft. This results in a net increase of 13 F-35B aircraft. The increase is reflected in both the aircraft and engine subprogram and results in a change from 680 to 693 in the DoN Aircraft Procurement accounts. The USMC validated their requirement through the Marine Corps Requirements Oversight Council (MROC)." page 28

Source: download/file.php?id=27020

I stand corrected. It was 13 more Bs then.

[zrhmd11]

"will be assigned to CVW-17, which itself is currently attached to USS Theodore Roosevelt (CVN 71)."

CVW-17 is attached to USS Nimitz CVN 68; CVW-11 is attached to USS Theodore Roosevelt CVN 71.

[Corsair1963]

"will be assigned to CVW-17, which itself is currently attached to USS Theodore Roosevelt (CVN 71)."

CVW-17 is attached to USS Nimitz CVN 68; CVW-11 is attached to USS Theodore Roosevelt CVN 71.

Hopefully, a better source would surface in the near future to clarify the F-35C Road Map....

[spazsinbad]

Ford Aircraft Carriers Not Ready For F-35s, So Aging Vinson Gets The Call
05 Nov 2019 Paul McLeary

"The long road the F-35 took to finally being ready to deploy has forced the Navy's new $13 billion carrier class to leave the plane behind -- for now at least. [Long post - more at jump about 'LIGHTNING CARRIERS' again / FORD etc.]

WASHINGTON: The Navy is upgrading one of its oldest aircraft carriers to be the first to fly the service’s newest plane, the F-35C, giving it a capability the service’s brand-new $13 billion carrier, the delayed and trouble-prone USS Gerald R. Ford, won’t have for years once it deploys.

Navy officials say the Ford and its follow-on carrier, the USS John F. Kennedy, are not being built to carry F-35s, and will have to undergo upgrades years after they’ve deployed. The plan is in keeping with a complicated maintenance and upgrade schedule the service has devised to marry ships with the Joint Strike Fighter as both become available.

The plane couldn’t have been included in the designs for the first two of four planned Ford carriers, one Navy official told me, because the F-35C’s final form was still a work in progress when the final design for the Fords was wrapping up.

That means the 36-year old USS Carl Vinson, which started its build under the Nixon administration and launched in 1983, will be the F-35s first home at sea. The ship is currently undergoing a $34 million refit in Bremerton Wash. until July 2020, followed by a 2021 deployment.

While both Nimitz and Ford-class aircraft carriers can operate with F-35Cs aboard, Navy spokesman Capt. Danny Hernandez said in an email, there are modifications to both carrier classes that are required in order to use all the data and information the F-35s can push out and receive, along with the addition of “additional classified spaces, some robustness of the ship for unique F-35 requirements (e.g. jet blast deflectors, etc.), but are not fundamental redesigns of any major components of the ship.”

Tabbed as the Navy’s first deployable F-35 air wing, Lemoore, Ca.-based VFA-147 Argonauts to deploy with the Vinson in 2021, accompanied by the Navy’s first squadron of Osprey tiltrotors, the Titans of Fleet Logistics Multi-Mission Squadron 30....

...Not building in F-35 capability on the first two ships “has always been the plan,” Hernandez said, adding F-35 capabilities will be built into the next two Ford carriers; the USS Enterprise slated to deploy in 2028 and the yet-to-be-named CVN 81, which will go to sea in 2032...."

Photo: "An F-35C takes off from the USS Abraham Lincoln in 2018 during training." https://sites.breakingmedia.com/uploads ... 24x610.jpg

Source: https://breakingdefense.com/2019/11/for ... -the-call/

[Corsair1963]

What a bunch of BS as the modifications to operate the F-35C from the Nimitz and/or Ford Class are modest. While, the reason the F-35C isn't going to operate shortly from the USS Gerald R. Ford or USS John F. Kennedy. Is because neither will be ready for many years!


So, the plan from the start was to modify existing carriers as they come out of RCOH or other regular scheduled maintenance periods...

[weasel1962]

F-35s also needed for the ouija board. It probably takes substantial coordination with the suppliers to ensure that the right specs (esp color) are achieved, notwithstanding the production lead time.

[spazsinbad]

IF a nutty Ouija board just some extra nuts will do for the F-35C. IF a computer WEEJY then a press of a button will do.

[spazsinbad]

Just to flog the dead horse perhaps while 'weasel1962' distilled previous USN F-35C roadmap here: viewtopic.php?f=59&t=56181&p=427854&hilit=Distilled#p427854 my head hurts enough going over old PDF material to post this roadmap table from Dec 2019 AIR International magazine.