The F-35 Lightning: Jack of All Trades, or Master of None?

hello every welcome to another mega projects video this was all about the f-35 lightning long requested and oh my god the finances in this one are just insane so let's just jump into it this is a long one [Music] it's proven to be one of the most expensive and controversial projects of our time the f-35 lining initially intended as a means of cutting the costs and improving the efficiency of any modern military's arsenal has now become the symbol of the bloated military industrial complex on one side there are those who point to the success of the engineering goals and the value of the advancements in both airplane design and computer capability on the other side those who point to the rising development costs missed deadlines had called into question the need for such a destructive aircraft in our enlightened age enlightened age on our mega projects video today we're going to cover the development the design and of course the controversies surrounding the f-35 lightning the joint strike fighter or jsf program was the amalgamation of two aircraft development programs the common affordable lightweight fighter or calf program and the joint advanced strike fighter technology jast program following their integration the program was renamed to the joint strike fighter this new contract called for a state of the art jet that would be capable of replacing the f-16 a-10 f-a-18 super hornet and the av-8b harrier the theory was that by rolling all of these different aircraft into one they could cut out many of the costs associated with operating a fleet of assorted jets that could be purchased as a one-size-fits-all alternative to purchasing an entire fleet of jets each with a single operating purpose and their own personal training requirement this meant that you just pay for one training program and there'd be lots of other streamlining and economies of scale but let's see how that went when this program was announced in 1993 it quickly became known that it was going to be one of if not the most lucrative contract of the century many of america's biggest military contractors participated in the first round of entries for this jet eventually these were whittled down to just two manufacturers boeing and lockheed martin both were given 750 million dollars in order to produce a prototype jet that they would submit to a panel for analysis and testing the two companies were told that they were not allowed to exceed this pay limit during their initial development due to concerns that the companies would bankrupt themselves if they were allowed to overspend on development which gives you just a bit of an idea how lucrative this contract was going to be these are giant giant companies eight years of development later and the two airplane manufacturers were ready to submit their jets boeing had produced the x-32 and lockheed martin submitted the x-35 both had taken different approaches to their methods of achieving vertical takeoff and landing boeing used a similar method to the existing harrier jet which if you're curious about how that engine worked out recommend that you take a look at our entire video about the harrier jet where we go into detail about the inner workings of the pegasus engine however in october of 2001 lockheed martin won out with their use of a shaft driven lift fan design which has proven to be vastly more capable than boeing's submission in almost every area including being the first aircraft in history to be capable of vetol and supersonic flight some might also say that the a32 lasts because well it looks really stupid and it does [Music] now the way that we'd normally try to structure the development parts of one of these videos is by describing the developments in chronological order however this being such a new technology with a lot of classified information surrounding it we have to infer a lot of the timings and the various developments that went on etc all that is to say is that while we always try to bring you the facts here on megaprojects we've had to take just a little bit of artistic license with some of the events and upgrades made to the jet over time so with that out of the way let's get into development or a best guess at development for lockheed martin this was the contract they'd been waiting for and that was because the engineers at the lockheed martin skunk works had already begun working on their shaft-driven lift fan engine format about 15 years prior to the announcement of the contract they were certain that once the av-8b harrier had run its course they would be in a prime position to snap up the contract for its replacement and that's exactly what happened after receiving the jsf contract lockheed martin began further development upon their jet the x-35 was designed to be a proof of concept with regard to its flying and takeoff capabilities their aim now was to take it from that experimental format to a fully capable combat vehicle this would involve making space within the aircraft for mission avionics the weapons bay and the extensive computer systems that be added with these kind of adjustments it is often a matter of fine lines adding and removing seemingly insignificant amounts of material so as to maintain balance all over the aircraft often these adjustments take the form of only a few centimeters of material being added or removed but there can be hundreds and maybe even thousands of these tiny little adjustments taking place over time after two years of development the engineers at the lockheed skunk works have managed to get the jet into the precise shape that they wanted however it also cost them about a thousand kilos that's about 2 200 pounds of added weight to the aircraft with the majority of the weight and alterations coming from the expansion of its weapons bay this added weight had rendered the aircraft incapable of all three vertical takeoff criteria so in order to get the weight down they sent in the swap team we're not even joking here they formed something called the stovl weight attack team who were tasked with cutting off the excess weight from the jet following this aggressive diet the jet lost 1 400 kilograms 3 000 pounds and was beginning to take its final form it was at this point that the decision was made to create three separate specialized formats of the aircraft the f-35a b and c one for each branch of the armed forces pay for army beat the boats and c can't think of something for air force only joking these actually denoted the three separate specializations that each format had f35a would be the lightest of the three variants and was specifically designed for air force use because they would have access to air force-based runways there would be no need for the jet's beethole capability and they'd only be capable of conventional takeoff and landing this also made it the lightest of the three variants and the most agile capable of handling nine g's that's nine times the bull of gravity during a sharp turn the f-35b would be designed for versatile use between any of the three services and it would be the only one of the three variants capable of vertical takeoff and landing this would make it a good vehicle for forward operating bases that are close to the front lines and might not have a paved runway the f-35c would be designed for use on naval carriers the design would be specially modified to be able to take the high forces associated with the catapult-assisted take-offs and the arrested recoveries required for aircraft carrier operations this variant would also have larger wings than either of the two other variants drastically improving the stability of the aircraft at lower speeds that are required for landing on an aircraft carrier later development added integrated folding wing tips to assist with the storage of the jets in the limited space under the carrier deck finally there was the engine which had been the subject of constant research tweaking and improvement throughout the entire six-year development process during the competition phase the vehicle that boeing had pitched had used affected thrust engines if you recall this was the same engine format that was in the barrier jet this technology was well understood and would be a safe bet as it was known to be reliable and relatively cheap however it was also inefficient and it was believed that it was already reaching the upper limits of its performance lockheed martin on the other hand had submitted a shaft-driven lift fan design the decision to go with an unproven technology was a serious gamble really expensive gamble but it did seem to pay off as it was already exceeding the capability of the vector thrust engines so yes this technology worked in an experimental aircraft but once all the armaments combat computers and avionics had been put into the jet not to mention the significant amount of weight they would carry as well well there was a risk that the engine was not going to be able to perform and so lockheed martin put a significant amount of research into perfecting this new jet technology in order to ensure that it could reliably operate in a swath of different conditions so all of that being said you might now be wondering but what is a shaft driven lift fan and how is it different to what the harrier had been using to which we'd say well thanks for asking the question because that's the next part of the video the shaft driven lift fan or sdlf design is pretty simple in theory as we've said in our previous vitol videos the key difference between a regular jet engine and a veto jet engine is that ability to produce thrust in both the horizontal direction and the vertical one what's more it needs to be able to produce enough downward thrust that can lift the entire weight of the plane off the ground in the case of the f-35 the sdlf configuration uses two separate engines rather than the conventional single engine that the harrier had used and this is one of the coolest parts about this jet seeing footage of it entering into its sv toll mode looks more like something out of a sci-fi movie the process of transitioning to vtol mode is a particularly complicated one almost entirely controlled by the jets onboard computers and the engine's full authority digital engine control software in a compartment behind the pilot is a lift fan which during normal flight is disconnected from the larger engine system when switching to vtol mode a clutch in the gearbox engages connecting the two separate parts of the engine system and activates the lift fan it's at this point that the doors in the fuselage above and below the lift fan open up at the same time as all of that the other half of the engine starts making its own modifications in a truly mind-boggling display of engineering an assembly called the three-bearing swivel duct enacts what can only be described as a scene from transformers beginning with two doors directly beneath the primary engine exhaust port opening up this swivel duct system can be used to adjust the engine exhaust anywhere within 105 degrees of continuous range from straight back to directly downwards after all of these transformations have taken place the sum total of the engine's vertical thrust is around 40 000 pounds or just under 55 000 newtons this is what makes the sdlf design such an excellent alternative to the harrier's engine design where the harrier's vectored thrust engines lost a great deal of energy in the process of diverting the flow of air downwards this more efficient method cuts down the amount of fuel and energy needed to create an equivalent amount of thrust all that is to say despite the f-35 having a less powerful engine than the harrier it can still outperform and outmaneuver it in almost all situations and the stats coming back from lockheed back this theory up despite the f-35 being more than twice the weight of the harrier and having only 75 of the harrier's engine power it is capable of carrying 11 tons more upon takeoff than the harrier's maximum takeoff weight while maintaining the ability to reach the speed of sound a feat that the harrier was never able to achieve so returning to the f-35s development story we now find ourselves nearing the completion of the first development phase the years 2006 and the f-35 is about to be revealed to the world with lockheed martin wrapping up their initial development phase all that was left to do was give this jet a name and what they landed on was the f-35 lightning 2 in honor of lockheed's world war ii era plane the p-38 lightning finally after years of development the jet was ready for public view however this was only the first test flight of the jets and it would not truly be ready for combat for another 10 years not that this would stop lockheed martin from taking orders for the jet between the years of 2006 and 2011 each variant of the f-35 was rigorously flight tested highlighting some serious design flaws which caused further delays to a deadline that was already months behind during this testing period they were also focusing on organizing the jets production line in preparation for the completion of flight testing once the f-35 was revealed to the world there was an initial positive reaction among those who take interest in such things this was going to be the next generation of jet technology what is known as the fifth generation fighter jet few jets currently fall into this category currently there are only four jets in active service that come under this banner but these are at the bleeding edge of jet technology and the f-35 is certainly no exception the jet lockheed martin had come up with was a multi-role combat aircraft capable of vetol and supersonic flight it could be used as an air superiority machine and as a strike fighter it was capable of being used for electronic warfare intelligence gathering surveillance and reconnaissance missions in short they'd achieved every goal that they'd set out to and it had cost billions and it was going to cost even more in the coming years remember early on in the video when we said that the jsf program originated from several development programs remember how one of them was called the common affordable lightweight fighter program yes so we're pretty sure they meant the affordable part of that in a sarcastic jokey kind of way because the program has cost upwards of 400 billion dollars as of october 2020 and that still isn't the end of the spending estimates put the program's lifetime cost at some 1.72 trillion dollars just let that sink in for a moment 1.727 trillion dollars with a t so a little bit of context here you know the international space station often called the most expensive object in existence valued at about 150 billion so you could buy 11 of them for the cost of the f-35 program and you'd still have 75 billion left over we could say that that many dollar bills laid out on the ground would cover the surface area of the earth one and a half times over and that would just be a fun representation of just how much money was spent on this program but it would also be misleading you see the issue with these kind of statistics is that while they aren't incorrect they certainly don't give a good representation of the truth that number 1.727 trillion is often touted by those who wish to detract from the program to emphasize just how out of control military spending has gotten it's also a high estimate from a third-party source while it's difficult to pinpoint precisely how much the program will cost in its entirety it will lie somewhere between 1.1 and 1.727 trillion now those are still absolutely astronomically high numbers i don't think anyone is going to dispute that however they don't account for the hundreds of billions that will be made from selling this jet to foreign militaries this year value of orders is already in the billions of dollars and this is only going to rise over the coming decades at some point there's going to be a tipping point where the orders coming in will outweigh the costs and it will become profitable enough to begin paying back the large investment that the u.s and participating countries have provided however the issue with that conservative statistic of 1.1 trillion is not accounting for the fact that even though the u.s paid for the jets to be developed they will also have to pay for the jets when adding them to their military arsenal not to mention the required infrastructure pilot training and other such costs all of which will be on the military's bill and therefore cost the u.s taxpayer more now some argue that that money could have been better spent on infrastructure projects researching renewable energy or other such worthy causes however the main point we want to emphasize here isn't whether or not this was a good use of money the point of this was just how easy it is to manipulate facts and statistics just to make a point in reality this topic does have its faults and its positives this project alone has pushed the capability of computers well beyond what we thought possible in areas such as material engineering spacecraft design the medical field you name it the research that has come from this project will assist mankind for decades to come on the other hand it has brought out some of humanity's worst traits greed warmongering and tribalism to name a few it's pretty much an unspoken agreement that companies like lockheed martin don't optimize the company's structure so that projects like this can be artificially extended thus making them far more money than if they've done it on time and on budget or in their own words like many high technology programs before it reaching that capability has put the program above its original budget and behind the plan's schedule what lockheed martin had produced was nothing short of mind-boggling in its capabilities they had effectively taken a stealth bomber fighter jet ground support vehicle reconnaissance aircraft a supercomputer and an information relay station crammed it all into a jet and made it travel faster than the speed of sound the three jet variants have a length of 15.7 meters the a and b variants of a wingspan of 10.7 meters and the c has a wingspan of 13.1 meters all three jets stand somewhere around four and a half meters tall and have an empty weight between thirteen thousand one hundred and fifty kilograms and fifteen thousand seven hundred kilograms each has a maximum payload between six thousand to eight thousand kilograms depending on the variance and the maximum range is typically one thousand two hundred nautical miles or about two thousand two hundred kilometers they can also comfortably climb to 15 000 meters that's about 50 000 feet but those numbers are what really makes this jet so remarkable what brings this jet above pretty much any other jets out there is its avionics and its computer systems and like we said before this thing is pretty much a supercomputer with wings there are a suite of sensors and avionics aboard these jets obviously this is some of the areas that the military are tightest-lipped about although some of the ones we know about are the an apg-81 active electronically scanned array radar the anas-q-239 barracuda electronics warfare system the ana-aq-40 electro-optical targeting system and the an asq 242 communication navigational identification suite so what does all of that mean i hear you asking well we've got absolutely no idea but what we do know is that because of these sensors and a very cool helmet the pilot can now literally see through the fuselage of the jet seriously the pilot has a pair of glasses in their helmet that when activated create not only a heads-up display but a real-time ar environment that allows the pilot to see threats in any direction night vision included of course and allows for identifying threats that otherwise would be invisible to the pilot because of things like clouds and the fuselage of the jet getting in the way the helmets alone by the way price tag of 400 000 this jet also has a voice recognition system so an f-35 pilot can ask the jet to do key tasks like adding milk to the shopping list or asking how many miles they are from the sun it also does military stuff as well we think but you got to fill in the gaps when it's all classified there are about 101 more examples of these kind of groundbreaking technologies packed within the jet alone not to mention the advancements in materials production engine design and efficiency and aerodynamics the list really does go on many of them having applications outside of the military by this point pretty much all the research has now become focused on perfecting the computer systems both in the software and hardware departments this is one of the main aspects of the jet that has justified the ever rising cost and the retreating deadline the design of the software within the jet allows for it to be updated and upgraded pretty much like your smartphone with lockheed martin producing regular updates to the jet software it will be able to remain at the cutting edge of jet technology for much longer than jets could have in previous generations however it goes further than that thanks to the unparalleled connection between the hardware within the jet and the software in particular the interaction between the software and the jets engine further updates to the software will be able to improve the jets handling maneuvering efficiency and even engine efficiency and top speed now we should also add that thanks to the secretive nature of the project some of that is fact-based speculation based upon what we already know of the jet and the inner workings of the technology which is well intentionally sparse as for the cost well they are not cheap as of 2019 the average cost one of these jets was 108 million dollars with various discounts for participating countries based on their contribution to the project although it is not precisely known what these discounts are one thing is for sure though no matter how you spin the numbers on this project it will never actually turn a profit but this was never the expectation going in however by this point with public opinion becoming more and more negative on this project the us government is starting to tighten the purse strings and put pressure on lockheed martin to reduce their current overspending and then you gotta wonder why they were doing that in the first place so we left off in october 2011 with the end of intensive testing and the first jets almost ready for use the u.s was the first to begin flight training and implementation within their various branches of the military beginning in early 2012. some raised safety concerns over the jet being implemented so early in the testing phases however the military pressed on in 2018 the u.s marine corps became the first of the us military branches to clear the f-35s for combat using f-35bs from the amphibious assault ship the uss essex and carrying out their first combat strike mission in september of that same year against a taliban target however the u.s was not actually the first to use the f-35 in a combat mission or at least they don't claim to be you can never know with those kinds of things that honor has been claimed by the israeli defense force who conducted two airstrikes using f-35as in the middle east details of this engagement are sparse however they've been confirmed by israeli officials including the u.s a total of 14 nations are currently in the process of ordering or are already in use of the f-35 eight of which were participating program partners these being the us the uk italy the netherlands australia norway denmark canada with the remaining six being foreign military sales including israel japan south korea poland belgium and singapore various other nations such as switzerland are looking into buying several of these jets however there have been no confirmations out of yet with the service record of the f-35 being so short there's not a great deal of information with regard to any recent operations thanks to the secrecy of any military that uses them we do know that the jet is capable of air-to-air combat otherwise known as dog fighting however there are so far no reports of any air-to-air altercations involving an f-35 but what would happen in the event of a dog fight between an f-35 and another jet well it is believed that the f-35 would win against almost any jet save for the f-22 raptor which is said to have superior maneuverability to the f-35 although many of the test pilots that have become familiar with the f-35 dispute this the f-22 was the newest jet in america's fleet prior to the implementation of the f-35 and it was designed to be used solely as an air superiority machine whereas the f-35 was intended as a multi-role vehicle so the jury is out on who would win however as the f-22 is in the sole use of the u.s and the u.s will only sell the f-35 to nations that it has a good relationship with so we're gonna be waiting a while before we find out who would win that fight and i really hope you enjoyed today's video if you did please do hit that thumbs up button below don't forget to subscribe and as always thank you for watching you

Channel: Megaprojects

Views: 911,946

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Id: QKR-YAQqFsI

Length: 22min 40sec (1360 seconds)

Published: Wed Aug 11 2021