When was f 22 raptor made

By April , Boeing had delivered 61 sets of wings and 66 aft fuselages as well as a number of integrated avionics flight-test packages and updates to Lockheed Martin. The F entered service in , and it won the prestigious Collier Trophy for , but in the years to come it was surrounded by controversy about costs and its suitability in a post—Cold War environment.

After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the next generation of Soviet fighters the aircraft had been intended to dominate in aerial combat never materialized. The U. Department of Defense announced the decision to end F production at aircraft in April The Air Force received the last F in F Raptor Designed to preserve air dominance, the F Raptor is known for its stealth, agility and lethality, with the ability to target air and ground-based threats.

Boeing History Products F Raptor. Historical Snapshot. F Raptor chief test pilot Paul Metz stated that the Raptor has a top speed greater than 1, mph Mach 2. With its performance and technology, the F Raptor is more than a match for any other fighter aircraft, including the exclusive technology demonstrator Su Terminator. Interestingly, a scenario depicted by RAND described a situation where a Raptor could be splashed by a group of Su when the Sukhoi's downed the Raptor's tanker support.

This study was later proved to be highly inaccurate, due to the Raptor's clear performance advantage, and the Raptor solidified itself as one of the deadliest air dominance fighters in the world today. However, its closest match, the Russian Su , though is not as stealthy as the Raptor and its radar is less powerful, however it is more economically efficient and requires significantly less maintenance.

The F is an expensive super fighter and the number one in air to air role. Military Wiki Explore. Popular pages. Raaen, Jr. The F experienced several technical problems including: manufacturing problems with titanium castings, delamination of longerons, structural weaknesses in aft fuselage, anomalies in brakes, inertial reference system and environmental control system, nagging fuel leaks, problems with engine low pressure turbine blades, high pressure turbine blades, and engine combustors, and problems with excessive engine vibration.

The Air Force reported that as of mid there were 97 issues limiting aircraft operations and 68 issues limiting ground maintenance. Based on Air Force acquisition reports, the F, even without further cost growth, was projected to cost three times as much as the aircraft it replaced the F To finance such an expensive program, DoD's modernization plan requires unprecedented levels of spending on tactical aircraft over the next 20 years.

In fact, DoD's tactical aircraft modernization plan required twice the historical percentage of procurement dollars to buy roughly half the number of aircraft. At the end of the Cold War, the House Appropriations Committee recommended termination of the F then called the Advanced Tactical Fighter based in part on concerns over cost growth and unrealistic budgeting. Independent cost estimates developed within the Pentagon, the Congressional Budget Office, and the General Accounting Office all indicated that the Air Force production cost estimates were excessively optimistic.

By mid the program had completed only five percent of the required testing. The advanced sensors and avionics perhaps the highest risk elements of the program had not been tested on the F at all. Yet the FY00 budget proposed production funding for six aircraft. The unit cost of these initial aircraft increased 40 percent between and According to program officials, these contracts focused on activities preliminary to building actual aircraft, such as buying components, vendor start-up and other procurement costs.

Despite several delays, by the end of the year the program had completed eight of the criteria, to include: critical design review for the avionics Block 3.

Also completed were flight testing high angle of attack with weapons bay doors open, demonstrating missile separation for the AIM-9 and AIM, initiating fatigue testing, and completing static structural tests. A TAC was a measure that takes the jet engine from one power setting to another and then back to the original setting. On 5 January the program passed another milestone, with the first flight of an F Raptor equipped with combat-capable avionics with Block 3.

The remaining two criteria to be completed included first flight of Raptor and initiating radar cross-section flight testing. On 5 February Air Force officials announced the completion of the final two requirements, first flight of Raptor and initiating radar cross section testing, which cleared the way for an F production decision. Technical issues were not the biggest challenge for the F program, affordability was and continued to be the primary factor. There were three key elements in cost containment.

First, production cost reduction goals for future lots were established. Second, an incentive program was developed that returned a portion of the cost savings to the primes and suppliers.

Third, an investment pool was created to implement cost savings initiatives. Establishing affordability goals for future lots was the first step. For production Lot 2, a group of major suppliers would be involved in goal-setting using the Lot 1 negotiated values as a starting point.

In parallel with setting those goals, a partnership agreement between the government, primes, and suppliers would be established to ensure the parties agree to the concept of operations. Expansion to the rest of the supplier base was planned to occur by Lot 3.

For suppliers, four levels of incentives would be established related to cost performance. The rephasing was not expected to impact the F achieving initial operational capability in The F program received temporary "bridge" funding from the government in early January to keep development and production operations going until a new Defense Acquisition Board DAB decision to put the F into low-rate initial production LRIP was reached.

The purpose of the bridge funding was to keep the supplier base intact and the program on schedule. Assembly of the first operational F Raptor fighter began in March Assembly of the mid-fuselage for Raptor , as this F was designated, would take approximately 11 months.

Once completed, it was delivered to Lockheed Martin Aeronautics' Marietta, Georgia, facility, where the aircraft's forward fuselage, wings, aft fuselage, and vertical and horizontal tails were attached and its F engines was installed. Reaching the IOC milestone culminated a collaborative effort between various Air Force organizations and the service's industry partners over 25 years. The first combat-ready Raptors were assigned to the 27th Fighter Squadron, one of three squadrons assigned to the 1st Fighter Wing.

The 27th FS combat deployment capability with the FA is a ship deployable package designed to execute air-to-air and air-to-ground missions. On 15 May , George Little, acting assistant secretary of defense for public affairs, said that Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta had ordered the Air Force to take additional steps to mitigate risks to F pilots and expedite the installation of an automatic backup oxygen system in all of the planes. In addition, effective immediately, all F flights were to remain near potential landing locations to enable quick recovery and landing should a pilot encounter unanticipated physiological conditions during flight.

Beginning in , F pilots began experiencing hypoxia-like symptoms when flying the aircraft. Subsequent attempts by the primary contractor Lockheed-Martin to fix to the problem were unsuccessful, and a supplementary filter reportedly introduced carbon particles into the oxygen system.