Parts Problems Slow F-35 Production; CAPE Says Flying Costs Target Not Likely

https://breakingdefense.com/2019/05/parts-problems-slow-f-35-production-cape-says-flying-costs-target-not-likely/?_ga=2.82707542.1560116963.1556707351-1385115421.1501579770

Parts Problems Slow F-35 Production; CAPE Says Flying Costs Target Not Likely

By Colin Clark
on May 02, 2019 at 6:11 PM

WASHINGTON: With all the big problems the F-35 has faced — cracked bulkheads, lousy software, ALIS and being 50 percent over budget and very, very late — whoever thought that Lockheed Martin and Pratt and Whitney would be called on the carpet for being too slow to issue purchase orders and buy parts.

But F-35 Program Executive Officer Vice Adm. Mat Winter today told the HASC tactical air and land subcommittee that both companies were guilty of just that, adding that this had helped lead to a shortage of an average of 600 parts each month, causing production line slowdowns and cost increases.

Winter told lawmakers he was “hitting a stagnant plateau with Lockheed Martin because they are 600 parts a month behind on average — 600 parts not on the production line when I need them.” Complicating that, he said, is that he needs parts “to fix the airplanes” now that there are more than 400 deployed.

I asked Lockheed for a response. F-35 spokesman Michael Friedman says in an email that the “production line is currently seeing about 96% parts availability and Lockheed Martin is taking aggressive action to build supply chain capacity, reduce supply chain costs and improve part availability both in production and sustainment.” The company is taking a myriad of actions to tighten things up: “supply chain competitions, restructure supplier contracts, build supply chain capacity, pre-fund parts ahead of contract awards, synchronize spare buys, improve parts reliability and maintainability, implement advanced analytics tools, accelerate modifications to earlier aircraft, and support the stand-up of government-led regional warehouses and repair depots.” But the 600 missing parts each month isn’t really addressed in that statement, is it?

On top of those issues, Winter said that workers with certain production skills are being drawn away from military to civilian sector, but he didn’t offer any details.

Oh, and the Pentagon’s top program analyst, the head of CAPE, said there’s no way the F-35 will get its costs down to $25,000 per flying hour by 2025, which is the program’s target.

The current cost per flying hour is $44,000, Winter said, adding that “we are targeting $34,000 in 2024.” A few minutes later, the head of the Pentagon’s powerful Cost Assessment and Program Evaluation (CAPE) office, Robert Daigle, asked lawmakers if he could address those targets. He said CAPE’s estimate was about $36,000 in 2024, pretty close to Winter’s estimate. But, he added, “the department doesn’t see a path” to get to $25,000 by 2025. In fact, their estimate is that flying costs will start to increase again by then because more aircraft will be in need of expensive major depot work.

What does Lockheed say? “We are taking action to deliver on the $25,000 Cost Per Flight Hour (CPFH) goal by 2025 – and see a path to achieving this target,” F-35 spokesman Friedman says. “We’ve reduced the Lockheed Martin-portion of F-35 CPFH by about 15 percent since 2015. Lockheed Martin represents less than half of total O&S costs, and we are partnering with our customers to further reduce costs across the enterprise to meet these joint goals.”

Of course, this all needs to be seen in light of last week’s report by the Government Accountability Office on F-35 readiness rates being hurt by parts problems.
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