June 15, 2020 | International, Aerospace

Production of one of the F-35′s most anticipated bombs has been on hold for almost a year

WASHINGTON — Deliveries of a new precision-guided bomb under development by Raytheon for the F-35 and other fighter jets have been at a standstill for about a year as the company struggles to correct a technical problem involving a key component.

A fix for the issue, which brought production of the Small Diameter Bomb II to a halt in July 2019, could be approved by the government as soon as July, said Air Force spokesman Capt. Jake Bailey in response to questions by Defense News.

However, a June report by the Government Accountability Office pointed out that continued technical issues have already caused a delay in fielding the munition, with Raytheon forced to redesign a key component and retrofit all 598 bombs already delivered to the Air Force and Navy.

The Small Diameter Bomb II — also known as the GBU-53 StormBreaker — was designed with a tri-mode seeker that includes a millimeter wave radar, imaging infrared and semi-active laser that allow the weapon to engage targets in all weather conditions and environments where visibility is obscured by dust and debris.

The Air Force and Navy plan to integrate SDB II with a range of fighter aircraft including the F-15, F/A-18 Super Hornet and F-35 joint strike fighter, but the munition has been mired in development for more than a decade.

This latest stoppage in production was prompted by internal audits by Raytheon, which found that the clips used to hold the bomb's fins in place “suffered vibration fatigue over long flight hours,” Bailey said. The clips serve “as the backup fin storage device” used to keep the fins in place in case other components fail, noted Bailey, who added that there have been no incidents during tests involving the SDB II fins inadvertently deploying.

However, the GAO wrote that the premature deployment of the fins, which help guide the bomb in flight, could damage the weapon as well as cause a safety hazard for the aircraft carrying it.

“While this problem could affect all aircraft carrying the bomb, officials said the greatest impact is to the F-35, because the bomb is carried in the aircraft's internal weapons bay and could cause serious damage if the fins deploy while the bomb is in the bay,” the GAO stated.

Raytheon declined to comment on this story, directing questions to the Air Force.

Raytheon plans on mitigating the issue with a newly designed clip that reduces the vibration of the fins, and will completely pay for developing the fix and retrofitting it on the bombs that have already been delivered, the GAO said. The Air Force confirmed that testing of the new device has already been completed and is going through final reviews.

But while Raytheon and the Air Force had hoped to restart production in April, travel restrictions caused by the ongoing global COVID-19 pandemic contributed to further delays. The government now hopes to approve the fix in July, after which production will restart and the retrofit process for existing bombs will begin.

“The fin clip failure is the sole reason production was partially halted; once final government approval is obtained, ‘all up round' production can resume,” Bailey said, using a phrase that describes a fully assembled weapon. The Air Force estimates that retrofits will be completed by August, as Raytheon's supplier has already begun manufacturing the replacement component, which are easily installed on the outside of the weapon.

“Until production resumes, the total Lot 3 deliveries remain at 204 of the 312 assets on contract,” Bailey said.

All this puts initial operational capability at least a year later than the service's original timeline, which predicted IOC would occur in September 2019. The Air Force declined to name a current estimate for when IOC would be achieved, but said it would happen after a separate milestone known as the “initial fielding decision,” which involves the approval of the head of Air Combat Command and is set for the third quarter of 2020.

The issue with SDB II's fins is just one of several technical problems with which Raytheon is grappling. The program completed operational tests in 2019, but hardware and software changes are needed after 11 failures were reported. Two hardware fixes have already been put in place, and eight failures were related to software problems that will be addressed in future updates, the GAO said.

The sole outstanding issue involves an anomaly with SDB II's guidance system. Fixing it could require Raytheon to redesign the component and conduct retrofits on all bombs already delivered, according to GAO.

A review board of the problem is in the “final stages of analysis,” Bailey said. The Air Force and Raytheon plan to establish whether a replacement component is necessary no later than June 30.

Although the weapon has not even been officially fielded, some components are already becoming obsolete. A Raytheon subcontractor that makes circuit cards used in the guidance system is expected to stop producing those components years sooner than anticipated.

As a result, that the Defense Department may have to order all circuit cards needed for the program of record before December, according to the GAO.

That timeline has now been extended to January 2022, “which provides ample time for program office action before the new deadline,” Bailey said.

Despite the bomb's ongoing problems, Raytheon continues to rake in contracts for the program. In February, the Defense Department awarded a $15 million increase to a previous SDB II contract for additional technical support. In September, the company received a $200 million contract for lifecycle support during the bomb's engineering and manufacturing development phase.

According to a Raytheon news release, the Navy recently completed the first guided release of SDB II from a F/A-18E/F Super Hornet.

https://www.defensenews.com/air/2020/06/12/production-of-one-of-the-f-35s-most-anticipated-bombs-has-been-on-hold-for-almost-a-year

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December 6, 2019 | International, Aerospace

Six small simulation companies rack up $1M contracts after ‘Shark Tank’-style pitches to US Air Force
ORLANDO, Fla. — On Wednesday, six small businesses pitched U.S. Air Force acquisition leaders on unique training and simulation technologies, each walking away with a $1 million contract in as little as 20 minutes. The inaugural Simulators Pitch Day at the Interservice/Industry, Training, Simulation and Education Conference was the third “Shark Tank”-style event held by the service in the hopes of broadening its industrial base to include small companies, startups and other firms that don't typically work with the government. “I thought what they presented was awesome. But actually I felt a sense of accomplishment, which is something that we sometimes don't feel in acquisitions because it often takes forever to get something done,” said Col. Phillip Carpenter, the Air Force's senior materiel leader for the simulators program office. During a Thursday event that allowed the six companies to take a victory lap by pitching their products to an audience of Air Force and industry officials attending the conference, Carpenter recounted how he felt presenting each company with funding meant to help further develop their products. “The looks on their faces — I know the feelings that they felt about the opportunity to participate with us in our mission. In 25 years of doing acquisitions it was probably one of the greatest feelings I've ever had,” he said. Although the Air Force didn't limit the types of technologies that companies could pitch, it sought out several specific technologies including high-end weather effects for gaming environments, high-fidelity simulators that could be deployed to austere locations, cloud-based simulators and artificial intelligence-aided instruction tools. In the end, Perceptronics Solutions, Information Systems Laboratories, DTI, PlaneEnglish, Take Flight and King Crow Studios were chosen to present 10-minute proposals during a closed-door session with Air Force acquisition officials. The technologies presented by the companies covered a wide variety of niche gaps in the simulation industry. DTI pitched a stereoscopic 3D display that doesn't require specialized 3D glasses — something the company believes might one day be a useful upgrade for the remote vision system used by KC-46 boom operators. Plane English proposed an aviation radio simulation for aircrews to familiarize themselves with radio chatter. The other pitches were: Take Flight Interactive's virtual flight instructor. Perceptronics' assessment tool called Train DX, which brings together instructor evaluations, biometrics and data from simulators and other training tools to create a “report card.” King Crow Studios' virtual reality trainer to teach advanced tactics to pilots. Information Systems Laboratories' plug-and-play “sidecar” for flight simulators that better imitates the effects of radar and electronic warfare systems. “I want to let some of the small companies that might be in the room know that if you're thinking about doing Pitch Day next year, it really wasn't that terrifying,” said Greg Carter, vice president of Information Systems Laboratories. “I really didn't sleep the night before,” he said, joking that he had nightmares where Carpenter transformed into Shark Tank host Mark Cuban. “[After winning], I slept much better.” https://www.defensenews.com/digital-show-dailies/itsec/2019/12/05/six-small-simulation-companies-rack-up-1m-contracts-after-shark-tank-style-pitches-to-us-air-force
May 3, 2023 | International, Aerospace

Estonia has signed a contract with Israel Aerospace Industries to acquire long-range loitering munitions
The procurement of long-range loitering munitions aims to strengthen Estonia's defenCe capability by significantly increasing its indirect fire capabilities.
September 19, 2018 | International, Aerospace

Bombers, fighters and tankers unite: Will the Air Force rebuild composite wings to fight near-peer foes?
By: Kyle Rempfer The Air Force has spent the past few years gearing up for a near-peer fight against adversaries with high-end air forces that match their own. While new doctrines and technologies occupy much of the planning for such a shift, another type of preparation is needed: reorganizing wings and squadrons. One possibility on the table is a return to composite wings. In the early 1990s, the Air Force organized the 366th Fighter Wing out of Mountain Home Air Force Base, Idaho, into the service's premier “air intervention” composite wing. For roughly a decade, the wing flew fighters, bombers and tankers with the goal of meeting the challenges of a post-Cold War world order — where conflict could arrive anywhere, anytime. “They were ready to pack up and go fight as a unified team,” Lt. Gen. Mark Kelly, commander of 12th Air Force, told a crowd of Air Force leaders Monday at the 2018 Air, Space and Cyber Conference in Washington, D.C. “But that was disbanded, and part of it came down to money," Kelly said. "The cost per flying hour of trying to sustain the small-fleet dynamics there didn't look great on spreadsheets.” But Kelly argues that financial assessment was faulty. The quality of the training airmen were getting was being compared to the day-to-day operations at other bases around the Air Force. In reality, it was more comparable to the day-to-day training at Red Flag — a two-week, advanced air combat training exercise still held several times a year in Nevada and Alaska. “Frankly, the training they were getting compared more to Red Flag daily ops," Kelly said. “And that would be a good problem to have and a good construct to be able to build.” The Air Force is rethinking how it constructs wings and squadrons, as well as how it deploys airmen, as it shifts to better align with the 2018 National Defense Strategy, according to Kelly. As it stands, “airmen only come together to fight at the line of scrimmage," Kelly said. For instance, before airmen arrive at a forward base to fight against insurgents in Afghanistan, they may have a unified command at the squadron level, but a unified command at the wing level is severely lacking. Additionally, airmen preparing to deploy today benefit from a surplus of “spin-up" time. They know when their unit is scheduled to deploy and have the luxury of training to meet that challenge well in advance. “That's a luxury that we cannot rely on in great power competition,” Kelly said. Organizing some aircraft and airmen into composite wings could provide the training and deployment structure necessary for fights against modern militaries, Kelly said. The composite wing concept was heavily pushed in 1991 by then Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Merrill McPeak, according to his biography on the Defense Department's website. McPeak wanted to organize wings by their mission-set, not aircraft type. According to his “air intervention” doctrine, a wing deploying for a near-peer fight should have all the aircraft and airmen it needs to accomplish its mission with limited, or possibly no, outside support. This meant one wing could potentially operate electronic warfare aircraft for the suppression of enemy air defenses, bombers to lay waste to enemy fortifications, fighters to engage in air-to-air combat, and tankers to refuel them all. After the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, however, the old composite squadron idea was mostly discarded. The 366th Fighter Wing was restored to fly F-16Js, and the consolidation of the Air Force's KC-135 and B-1 forces led to the reallocation of the wing's bombers and tankers to McConnell AFB, Kansas, and Ellsworth AFB, South Dakota, according to Mountain Home's website. But composite wings, and the idea of sustainable fights with more or less autonomous Air Force commanders, is back in vogue. Funding was one of the biggest challenges to composite wings back in the day, but the reasons for that unit structure are better appreciated now as concerns about China and Russia preoccupy defense planners. To fuel a restructuring, steady funding will be key, according to Kelly. He projected the Air Force's shift to great power competition will continue to be a focus of the defense budget into 2021 and 2022. But regardless of the funds Congress ultimately appropriates for the Air Force in the coming years, restructuring for a near-peer fight needs to happen, Kelly said. “This has to happen regardless of if we have the force we have today with only one more airman, or the force we need with tens of thousands more airmen," he added. https://www.airforcetimes.com/news/your-air-force/2018/09/18/bombers-fighters-and-tankers-unite-will-the-air-force-rebuild-composite-wings-to-fight-near-peer-foes

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Production of one of the F-35′s most anticipated bombs has been on hold for almost a year

On the same subject

Estonia has signed a contract with Israel Aerospace Industries to acquire long-range loitering munitions The procurement of long-range loitering munitions aims to strengthen Estonia's defenCe capability by significantly increasing its indirect fire capabilities.

Estonia has signed a contract with Israel Aerospace Industries to acquire long-range loitering munitions
The procurement of long-range loitering munitions aims to strengthen Estonia's defenCe capability by significantly increasing its indirect fire capabilities.