The F-35 Lightning II : from concept to cockpit

In the years since the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter development program was awarded to Lockheed Martin, countless articles have appeared in the popular media discussing the merits and challenges of the program. F-35 information has also occasionally appeared in the scientific literature through AIAA or other technical venues. However, an integrated story of the F-35's technical development has heretofore never been presented in a single work.The purpose of The F-35 Lightning II: From Concept to Cockpit is to tell that story - a full spectrum history of the design, development and verification of the F-35 Lightning II as described by the engineers, scientists and managers who were intimately involved throughout the development program. The journey to achieve the F-35's extraordinary capability was long with untold challenges encountered on the path. The reader will find many of the key technical challenges, and the innovative solutions that resulted, discussed herein.The reader should realize this work is not intended as an overall assessment of the F-35 or the Joint Strike Fighter program. Rather, it is an engineering development story from the perspective of insiders, many of whom dedicated the best part of their career to F-35 and are justifiably very proud of their work.The book is based on eighteen technical papers presented in a two-day F-35 track at the 2018 AIAA Aviation Forum. The "From Concept to Cockpit" subtitle appropriately summarizes the contents, with the chapters grouped into three major sections.The first section, F-35 Program Overview, begins with an overall history of the program and further presents discussion of aircraft configuration design, weapons integration, key technologies brought into the program, and overviews of aircraft manufacturing and the flight test program.The second section, F-35 Air Vehicle Design, presents discussion of key aircraft systems, including airframe structure, flight controls, propulsion, subsystems and mission systems.The final section, F-35 Test and Verification, presents discussion of the flight and ground test programs undertaken to verify the F-35's airworthiness, flight performance and mission capability.The chapters are in a logical progression but are not interdependent, and so one may read the contents in any order without confusion. Foreword /Capt. Charles Thomas (Tom) Burbage --Preface /Jeffrey W. Hamstra --Chapter 1.F-35 program history : from JAST to IOC /Arthur E. Sheridan, Robert Burnes --Chapter 2.F-35 air vehicle configuration development /Mark A. Counts, Brian A. Kiger, John E. Foffschwelle, Adam M. Houtman, Greg Henderson --Chapter 3.F-35 air vehicle technology overview /Chris Wiegand, Bruce A. Bullick, Jeffrey A. Catt, Jeffrey W. Hamstra, Greg P. Walker, Steve Wurth --Chapter 4.F-35 digital threat and advanced manufacturing /Don A. Kinard --Chapter 5.F-35 weapons design integration /Douglas M. Hayward, Andrew K. Duff, Charles Wagner --Chapter 6.F-35 system development and demonstration flight testing at Edwards Air Force Base and Neval Air Station Patuxent River /Mary L. Hudson, Michael L. Glass, Lt Col Tucker "Cinco" Hamilton, Eric Somers, Robert C. Caldwell --Chapter 7.F-35 structural design, development, and verification /Robert M. Ellis, Philip C. Gross, Joseph B. Yates, John R. Casement, R.H.L. (Tad) Chichester, Kathryn Nesmith --Chapter 8.F-35 flight control law design, development, and verification /Jeffrey J. Harris, James Richard Stanford --Chapter 9.F-35 propulsion system integration, development, and verification /Steven P. Wurth, Mark S. Smith --Chapter 10.F-35 subsystems design, development, and verification /Drew Robbins, John Bobalik, David De Stena, Ken Plag, Keith Rail, Ken Wall --Chapter 11.f-35 mission systems design, development, and verification /Greg Lemons, Karen Carrington, Thomas Frey, John Ledyard --Chapter 12.F-35 information fusion /Thomas L. Frey, J. Chris Aguillar, Kent R. Engebretson, David K. Faulk, Layne G. Lenning --Chapter 13.F-35 carrier suitability testing /Toney Wilson --Chapter 14.F-35 aerodynamic performance verification /David G. Parsons, Austin G. Eckstein, Jeff J. Azevedo --Chapter 15.F-35 high angle of attack flight control development and flight test results /Daniel G. Canin, Jeffrey K. McConnell, Paul W. James --Chapter 16.F-35 weapons separation test and verification /Christopher F. Hetreed, Matthew D. Carroll, Joe E. Collard, Richard C. Snyder --Chapter 17.F-35 STOVL performance requirements verification /David G. Parsons, Daniel E. Levin, David J. Pateny, Peter N. Wilson, Michael R. Rask, Brad L. Morris --Chapter 18.F-35 Climatic chamber testing and system verification /Victorio J. Rodriguez, Billie Flynn, Marc G. Thompson, Steven Brelage In the years since the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter development program was awarded to Lockheed Martin, countless articles have appeared in the popular media discussing the merits and challenges of the program. F-35 information has also occasionally appeared in the scientific literature through AIAA or other technical venues. However, an integrated story of the F-35's technical development has heretofore never been presented in a single work. The purpose of The F-35 Lightning From Concept to Cockpit is to tell that story -- a full-spectrum history of the design, development and verification of the F-35 Lightning II as described by the engineers, scientists and managers who were intimately involved throughout the development program. The journey to achieve the F-35's extraordinary capability was long with untold challenges encountered on the path. The reader will find many of the key technical challenges, and the innovative solutions that resulted, discussed herein. The reader should realize this work is not intended as an overall assessment of the F-35 or the Joint Strike Fighter program. Rather, it is an engineering development story from the perspective of insiders, many of whom dedicated the best part of their career to F-35 and are justifiably very proud of their work. The book is based on eighteen technical papers presented in a two-day F-35 track at the 2018 AIAA Aviation Forum. The From Concept to Cockpit subtitle appropriately summarizes the contents, with the chapters grouped into three major F-35 Program Overview, which begins with an overall history of the program and further presents discussion of aircraft configuration design, weapons integration, key technologies brought into the program, and overviews of aircraft manufacturing and the flight test program. F-35 Air Vehicle Design, which presents discussion of key aircraft systems, including airframe structure, flight controls, propulsion, subsystems and mission systems. F-35 Test and Verification, which presents discussion of the flight and ground test programs undertaken to verify the F-35's airworthiness, flight performance and mission capability. The chapters are in a logical progression but are not interdependent, and so one may read the contents in any order without confusion. The purpose of The F-35 Lightning II: From Concept to Cockpit is to tellthe story of the F-35's technical development - a full spectrum history of the design, development and verification of the F-35 Lightning II as described by the engineers, scientists and managers who were intimately involved throughout the development program. The journey to achieve the F-35's extraordinary capability was long with untold challenges encountered on the path. The reader will find many of the key technical challenges, and the innovative solutions that resulted, discussed herein