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As one of Connecticut’s biggest employers, the East Hartford-based company has been producing the engine used by Lockheed Martin’s F-35 aircraft since it was awarded the Pentagon contract more than two decades ago.
Lt. Gen. Michael Schmidt, JPO director, certified that Pratt is the sole company capable of doing the upgrade, as the current “sole designer, developer, manufacturer, and integrator of the F135 propulsion system and related equipment.”
Moving forward, leaders at the Pentagon would be wise to minimize unnecessary additional investments in the F-35 program — sticking to the most cost-effective and technologically compatible upgrades.
Americans should applaud the Air Force decision to simply upgrade the existing engine system, as well as the Senate Appropriations Committee which just recently voted not to fund the AETP engine in its version of the National Defense Authorization Act. This gives some hope that we'll see more program reviews that come to similar conclusions and result in wins for both taxpayers and the military.
An update known as the Engine Core Upgrade (ECU) has been developed to solve these issues but there are those in Washington who are opposed to the ECU and prefer instead to fund a project known as the Adaptive Engine Transition Program (AETP). This would mean entirely replacing the F-35 engine with a new one built from scratch in the middle of the program, which would cause several issues.
Originally produced in 2009, the F135 engine has exceeded nearly all engineering expectations. With increased thrust and thermal management capacity, adaptive controls, advanced materials, and design-for-sustainment modular architecture, the F135 engine is a testament to the military’s advanced technological innovation.
Congress may be “throwing money away” if it continues to fund the U.S. Air Force’s Adaptive Engine Transition Program (AETP) development without committing to re-engine the Lockheed Martin F-35, the service’s top official says.
Engine maker Pratt & Whitney (P&W) is moving forward with plans to upgrade power plants on the USA’s fleet of Lockheed Martin F-35 stealth fighters.
In March, following many years of deliberation and wildly expensive research, the Air Force finally decided that the F-35’s existing engine could be updated, through an approach called the Engine Core Upgrade (ECU). By sticking with that engine (known as the F-135), rather than demanding a completely new propulsion system, the Pentagon would avoid sticking taxpayers with an additional $6 billion tab.
Simply put, the FI35 ECU is the only option that gets us to Block 4 on schedule. It’s the only option that makes us ready for the fight by the end of the decade. The F135 ECU is the only option that makes sense.
The U.S. Air Force has chosen to upgrade the F-35’s original and current engine – the Pratt & Whitney F135 – rather than develop an entirely new one. That decision, now under debate in Congress, “signals that the Department of Defense is laser-focused on delivering National Defense Strategy priorities, while carefully managing costs,” said Jen Latka, Pratt & Whitney’s vice president for the F135 program.
Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall, in rolling out the service’s fiscal 2024 budget request earlier this month, decided not to proceed with replacing the F-35’s F135 powerplant with either the GE Aerospace XA100 or Pratt & Whitney XA101 that were developed as part of the multibillion-dollar AETP program, instead opting for the cheaper Pratt F135 engine core upgrade (ECU).
The U.S. Air Force will not go ahead with a full engine replacement for its Lockheed Martin F-35A, opting instead for a Pratt & Whitney plan to upgrade the core of the F135.
Perhaps the Air Force was feeling risk-averse as the F-35’s jet’s protracted developments stood as an example of how costs and delays can unexpectedly multiply when new technologies prove more difficult to integrate than anticipated. Moreover, lack of institutional interest—and thus funding—of AETP from the Marine Corps or Navy (which operate F-35Bs and Cs) meant the Air Force didn’t want to take on GE’s estimated $6 billion development cost alone.
The US Air Force (USAF) supports upgrading the propulsion system on its existing Lockheed Martin F-35A stealth fighters, rather than purchasing an entirely new adaptive engine for the jets. The decision, revealed by USAF secretary Frank Kendall on 13 March, comes as the Biden administration released its proposal for military spending in fiscal year 2024.
The Air Force is ditching its plans to develop a new engine for its F-35 fleet and will instead upgrade the existing Pratt & Whitney engines so the planes have enough power to use future weapons.
In a major victory for incumbent manufacturer Pratt & Whitney, the Air Force has decided not to pursue a new engine for the F-35A in its fiscal 2024 budget request. The new engine was simply too costly to develop, Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall said in a Friday budget briefing.
The Pentagon is abandoning its efforts to develop a next-generation adaptive engine for the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, according to Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall. Instead, Kendall said during a March 10 briefing on the fiscal 2024 budget, the military will stick with and upgrade the F-35’s current engine — a major win for F135 maker Pratt & Whitney.
The dispute is shaping up to be one of the biggest lobbying contests in Washington this year, when little aside from defense spending bills is expected to move through a bitterly divided Congress.
While the savings offered by Pratt & Whitney’s single development program are impressive, they’re marginal compared to lifecycle savings. Sustainment is a crucial piece of the debate over F-35 engines, but its implications extend beyond just the cost. Pratt & Whitney’s solution can potentially save the Pentagon tens of billions of dollars over the F135’s (and the F-35’s) lifecycle because it retains an infrastructure that has already been built and invested in—and when sustainment efforts are disrupted, disruption soon follows.
Raytheon Technologies hosted a supplier event on behalf of Pratt & Whitney, makers of the F135 engine, which powers the F-35 Lightning II. Approximately 80 attendees representing F135 U.S.-based suppliers from 24 states flew in for the one-day event on Capitol Hill to learn more about the F135’s Engine Core Upgrade (ECU), a critical effort to modernize the engine to meet the jet’s growing power needs.
The Raytheon Technologies companies say the Emergency Power and Cooling System (EPACS) with the F135 Engine Core Upgrade (ECU) will bring a 7% increase in range and thrust and twice as much cooling. The system is compatible with all F-35 variants and can reach technology readiness level six in 2023, meaning it is ready for a technology demonstration. The company claims it would provide about $40 billion in savings compared to replacing the aircraft’s entire engine.
The F135 engine core upgrade delivers the fastest, most cost efficient, lowest risk path to Block 4 capability for all global F-35 operators. It is the only F-35 propulsion option that is a 'drop in' solution for all variants, adding no weight and avoiding disruptive and costly air vehicle changes that would introduce additional costs, schedule delays, and technical risk.
Evolved from the F119 engine powering the F-22 Raptor, the F135 delivers a step change in capability and dependability for the warfighter at a great value to the taxpayer. Since 2009, P&W has reduced the average production cost of the F135 by more than 50%, and from a sustainment perspective, has identified opportunities to reduce the cost of the first scheduled maintenance visit by approximately 40%.
With more than 500,000 flight hours logged, the F135 has been proven in the field as the safest, most reliable fighter engine P&W has ever built in its 97-year history.