The Pentagon was puzzled by the problem of the technical characteristics of the engines of the fifth generation fighter F-35, which began to enter service with the US Air Force a few years ago. In this regard, American generals had to solve a difficult task.: carry out cheaper and faster modernization of existing power plants, or order the development and production of new generation engines. In the US, not everything is good with the military budget, because the Pentagon is still leaning towards the first option? Not enough and 800 over billions…
A former Air Force pilot and senior researcher at the Heritage Foundation strongly disagrees with this choice. (Heritage Foundation) John Venable. article, published in Breaking Defense, he gives his arguments and reasons for, Why You Shouldn't Upgrade Original Engines at Pratt & Whitney, it’s better to order the development of new aircraft power plants from the winner of the corresponding competition - Pratt Corporation or General Electric.
Venable talks about, that the power plant of a modern combat aircraft is a very complex device, the improvement of certain characteristics of which will necessarily worsen others.
Traction is at the top of the list, but the fuel demand of the engine, its ability to provide cooling and power to system components and its longevity define performance paradigms for a weapon system — the expert argues his position.
Here are some more of the arguments of the former military pilot in favor of developing a new power plant for the F-35 fighter.
Even after improving the traction characteristics of the F135 engine, with which all three modernized modifications of the fighter are now equipped, it will not be able to provide proper acceleration, what makes the F-35 too vulnerable. This problem is especially acute for the F-35C aircraft., which, as a result of improvements, received significantly larger dimensions and weight. Now him to speed off 0,8 mach up 1,2 Mach required whole 43 seconds, which is very critical in a real battle.
The increased size and weight of the aircraft, combined with increased aircraft cooling requirements, reduced the combat radius of all three options by about 15 percent below targets, initially provided for by flight programs.
The F135 engine has been designed with cooling capacity in mind. 15 kilowatt, but this demand has already doubled and amounts to approximately 30 kilowatt. By that time, when the F-35 Block version 4 will be fully deployed in 2028 year, aircraft subsystems for cooling will require a minimum 47 kilowatt, and quantity, required to meet subsequent power requirements, reaches 60 kilowatt.
As more bleed air is removed for cooling, the engine burns more fuel and heats up more, what was calculated. Higher fuel burn reduces F-35 range, and higher temperatures have already led to noticeably higher engine wear, failure rate and repair cycles F135.
All these shortcomings, says expert, missing from the new generation AETP adaptive engine, developed by Pratt and General Electric (GE). While Pratt's XA101 engine is still under development, GE's XA100 completes tests and proves, which improves fuel efficiency by 25 percent (increase flight range 30 percent) and increases traction 10-20 percent (provide acceleration to 20 percent more, than F135).
XA101 from Pratt also shows great promise, and there is every reason to believe, that at the end of its testing, the Air Force will have two excellent options for the next generation engine - Venable is sure.
It is not excluded, that the former pilot is simply lobbying for the interests of one of the companies, ready to compete for a contract to develop a new engine. What if a competitor wins?? Although, it is quite in the American rules of doing business to assume a cartel agreement and Venable's agreement with both corporations. By the way, AETP field engine estimates typically exceed 6 billions of dollars, expert says. While the modernization of the existing F135 is estimated at about 2 billion.
While, when the USA, probably, will outnumber their opponents, especially in combat in the Indo-Pacific, important, so that our aviators have the best fighters, that America can provide - Venable makes the last and most compelling argument. Author:Alexander Grigoriev Photos used:https://nara.getarchive.net/ru/media/an-f-35b
