Northrop Grumman Tests F-35 Weapons Loading
Northrop Grumman and its partners on Lockheed Martin's F-35
Joint Strike Fighter team recently continued laying critical
groundwork for the aircraft's operational effectiveness by
conducting a weapons-loading demonstration with military ordnance
crews from the United Kingdom. Involving operational users early in
the design of key aircraft components is unprecedented in military
aircraft programs.
Ordnance crews from the Royal Air Force and Navy loaded mockups
of several weapons into a full-scale mock-up of the F-35's internal
weapons bay and provided evaluations of the process to the F-35
design team. The demonstration - similar to a weapons-loading
exercise with US ordnance crews last December - was conducted March
23-25 in El Segundo at the headquarters of Northrop Grumman's
Integrated Systems sector.
The F-35 Joint Strike Fighter is a stealthy, supersonic aircraft
designed to replace a wide range of aging fighter and strike
aircraft for the Royal Air Force and Navy, US Air Force, Navy and
Marine Corps and allied defense forces worldwide.
"Allowing our UK users to provide feedback early in the
program will enable us to evaluate and refine the weapons bay
design to make sure it meets their needs," said Steve Briggs,
Northrop Grumman vice president and F-35 program manager.
"Traditionally, military aircraft programs have conducted
demonstrations like this after the first aircraft was built, which
limited opportunities for military personnel to provide meaningful
input.Interacting with operational users is another example of the
new standard the F-35 program has brought to the defense
industry."
"The demonstration proved a great success, giving the UK load
crew the opportunity to fully assess the baseline loading concept,"
said Mark Jones, UK Weapons Principal for the JSF Program Office.
He said the weapons-bay model is a key risk-reduction tool for the
program. he said. "The results from the demonstration
will help us in providing the warfighter with the optimum loading
solution."
The demonstrations will ensure the
F-35 weapons bay accommodates a variety of internally carried
ordnance and that ground crews can easily load it. The
weapons used included air-to-air missiles such as the AIM-120 and
AIM-132 air-to-air missiles, and "smart," GPS-guided munitions such
as 1000-lb., and 2000-lb., versions of the joint direct attack
munitions.
Northrop Grumman Integrated Systems is designing and integrating
the F-35 center fuselage section, including integration of the
subsystems; development of a substantial portion of F-35 mission
systems software; ground and flight test support; signature-and
low-observables development support, and modeling and simulation
activities support.
Northrop Grumman will assemble F-35 center fuselages at its
advanced manufacturing facility in Palmdale (CA) and then ship them
to Lockheed Martin Aeronautics in Fort Worth (TX) for final
assembly.