2019 F-35 News and Discussion

By: SpudmanWP - 8th July 2019 at 19:09 Permalink - Edited 8th July 2019 at 19:14

US Air Force's acquisition chief talks {ALIS,} new B-52 engines and the future of battle management

Can you provide an update on Mad Hatter, the Air Force's project to use agile software development to try to fix some of the problems with the F-35's logistics system? You said in February that several improvements were to be fielded to the Autonomic Logistics Information System within weeks.

Mad Hatter is doing great. I have to give the team an A+ on being able to get started and start pulling apart the problems that our maintainers had.

They already deployed several apps that are helping maintainers. They fixed problems with the electronic equipment logs that were showing false positives, so those have been fixed, and the maintainers get to focus on things that are actually broken, not things that are reported as broken.

They fixed the scheduler, which had mismatches between the flight line system and ALIS, and they are currently working on things that are going to help maintainers do their own workflow on the flight line. There is a lot more to go for them. They're putting Wi-Fi out on the line so that you can touch ALIS at the flight line, which currently you can't. Maintainers have to go do their maintenance and then come back and enter data in the subsequent systems, and it doesn't make sense to create data once and then replicate it again.

We want maintainers to be able to have ALIS in a protected, secure Wi-Fi network at the flight lines; that data is instantly uploaded. We've got work to go to get the accreditation done so that we could reach all the way back into the standard operating unit that touches Lockheed Martin. But we got a great partnership with Lockheed. They've been with us every step of the way.

What happens next?

I don't have the answer yet, but one of the things that I think we should consider is the next variant of ALIS to be delivered. That's 3.6. It's currently going through negotiation and we're approaching it as traditional ALIS, but if we believe in agile development, eventually we need to pull a development module of ALIS out of the traditional and put it into the Mad Hatter process. [Version] 3.6 is a candidate for that. If it's not 3.6, is it 3.7 or 3.8?

The discussions we're having now is about where's the chalk line that we switch to the new methodology. We have to have enough development teams to do it and support the level and scope of the software, but I think we're ready. We've got the team in the Air Force. We have 800 people in Kessel Run, [the Air Force's software development team], that are currently doing amazing work for us.

With agile software development, you want to have exposure with the user. Once those apps were deployed, what was the feedback like? Did users want to see additional fixes, or were the apps coming out well already?

When final deployment was done, it was software as the users wanted. The users are involved from the beginning. Step one is the coders leaving their coding shop and going out to the flight line in Nellis [Air Force Base, Nevada], and sitting down, walking through how ALIS works and how the rest of the maintenance planning tools work. Understanding the pain points: What do you not like? What takes up your time? What do you want to change? Storyboarding that out to understand how it might be fixed, turning that into a development back log; so what am I going to attack and when? And then having the user touch products before they become final.

What the Mad Hatter team does is continues to iterate during design so that by the time you deploy, it's in the image of what the operators have requested, not in the image of what the developers expected they wanted, and that's the secret to 'agile".

https://www.defensenews.com/digital-...le-management/

By: SpudmanWP - 17th July 2019 at 00:14 Permalink

The F-22 & F-35 will miss the 80% MC Rate mandate by FY2019, F-16 & F-18 should make it.

The F-35 issue is specifically tied to the canopy and it's related part shortage.

Prepared Q&A for confirmation session in the Senate.

Q: In September 2018, then-Secretary of Defense Mattis ordered the Air Force and Navy to increase mission capable rates for the F-35, F-22, F-16, and F-18 inventories to above 80 percent by the end of September 2019. In addition, Secretary Mattis directed the Military Services to achieve demonstrable reductions in operating and maintenance costs on all four platforms, beginning in FY 2019.

What progress has the Department made in increasing mission capable rates and decreasing costs for all four platforms?

The Air Force has improved mission-capable rates for the F-16 fleet by increasing parts supplies and adding maintenance shifts, and is expected to meet the 80 percent goal. The F-22 fleet is still challenged by the lack of low-observable maintenance capacity, exacerbated by the extreme damage at Tyndall Air Force Base from the effects of Hurricane Michael. Although F-22 mission-capable rates are improving, the fleet is not expected to achieve the 80 percent goal this year. Improving mission capable rates for both fleets required additional funding investment for this fiscal year. The Navy is on track to meet its FY19 goal of 80 percent mission capable F/A-18 E/F and EA-18G by September 2019. Aircrew qualifications (flight hour execution) hit a high for FY19 in May. To meet the 80% goal and readiness recovery objectives, the Navy has taken the following actions: established Maintenance Operations Center (MOC) to coordinate maintenance activities and optimize resources; instituted Organizational-level and Depot-level (Fleet Readiness Center) reforms improving the processes for 150-Day and 80-Day periodic inspections; improved maintenance squadron manning (fit, fill, and experience level) and improved processes for component production; instituted supply chain reform eliminating issues driven by fragmentation of data across multiple sources/functions; and coordinated deployment of engineering and supply chain resources to address top-degraders.

The F-35 fleet is not expected to make the 80 percent goal. Transparency (canopy) supply shortages continue to be the main obstacle to achieving this. We are seeking additional sources to fix unserviceable canopies.

Q: If confirmed, specifically what would you do to expedite progress toward achieving the goals set by Secretary Mattis?

I understand the Air Force is examining and investing in a number of commercial best practices, such as conditions-based maintenance, to increase mission capability rates, improve readiness, and reduce sustainment costs across all aircraft fleets. If confirmed, I intend to press for higher mission

https://www.armed-services.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/Esper_APQs_07-16-19.pdf

By: SpudmanWP - 21st July 2019 at 18:54 Permalink

MC Rates, parts, and availability are all tied to the early LRIP F-35s. Thank God they will all be upgraded to Block 3F by September of next year.

Attachments

By: SpudmanWP - 21st July 2019 at 23:12 Permalink

Not sure, but F-35s that travel overseas have been posting >80%.

By: SpudmanWP - 21st July 2019 at 23:28 Permalink

Exactly. The chart I linked to brakes down the plan by LRIPs a bit.

By: SpudmanWP - 22nd July 2019 at 02:50 Permalink

It will mean 10 less F-35s for about 10 years.

I don't think it will be anything noticeable and may even lead to more competition with the subs as Turkey's contracts are given to other Partner nations. It will be hard to calculate as more FMS customers are brought online and Congress keeps adding more annual airframes over and above the request.