I don't know quite how to approach this one. So when in doubt run full speed ahead.
ARES ran a story about the F-35's being grounded and
GAVE in my opinion, the impression that the generators/back up generators failed on the airplane...
Ole Bill likes to dance on the head of a pin when making some of his statements so pay close attention.
Luckily a commenter on the blog gave me food for thought...
Hang
on a second, here - many of the comments on this article seem to be
assuming that the dual generator is intended to be a redundant design.
Is that accurate? A closer reading on some of the news reports from the
program suggest that it's more like 2 generators ganged up to provide
the desired electrical output, with the integrated power pack providing
the back-up system. This doesn't mitigate the fact that there was a
generator failure due to a simple maintenance issue, but it's a far cry
from asserting that LockMart is so foolish as to allow primary and
backup of a critical system to be taken out by a single event.
Atomic Walrus is exactly right.
This is one of Sweetmans statements found on line 3...
I
think that what is interesting about this thread is how pro-JSF people
can't accept a very straightforward observation: that if you have two
widgets that are there to provide redundancy in a flight-critical
function, and one failure (technical or human+technical) takes both of
them out, you have an issue that bears further investigation.
Now when I say pay attention...thats what I mean!
Bill DID NOT say that the generators involved were there to provide backup emergency power. Quite honestly when I first read Atomic Walrus's statement I was high and to the right ... when I finally caught on to the wordsmithing going on... I was still high and to the right.
This one neat, tidy, simple---heck even elegant statement was constructed in such a way as to have a casual reader believe that the primary and backup generators had failed and that the airplane was mere seconds away from falling out of the sky.
That wasn't the case and the issue was quickly solved and resolved.
The entire point is this--
PAY CAREFUL ATTENTION TO ANY DEBATE INVOLVING THE JSF. FOR THOSE THAT ARE IN THE ANTI-JSF CAMP THIS IS A WIN AT ANY COST ENDEAVOUR!
Even the neutral (at least I think he is...he hasn't exactly stated a position and I have yet to detect one in his writing) Graham Warwick made a curious statement in the comments section...
If
I can be permitted to comment on my own post...this will not be news to
ardent JSF watchers who caught the story by Steve Trimble of
Flightglobal which appeared - briefly - earlier this week.
When
it did, my colleague Bill Sweetman made the very valid point that a
single maintenance action resulting in the failure of both engine-driven
generators must call into question the redundancy of the system, which
mounts both generators on a single line-replaceable unit.
But the redundancy of the system isn't in the dual generators...its in the back up to those generators....
Want a balanced reporting of this story? Lets check out our friends at
F-16.net...
The grounding appears to have occurred because of the potential for loss of control posed by such a combination.
Unlike previous fighter jets, the F-35's flight control surfaces are
controlled by electro-hydrostatic actuators. If they don't have power
then the pilot can lose control. In this case, the back-up power system —
the Integrated Power Package which also serves as the starter and air
conditioner — kicked in as designed, allowing the pilot to return to
base.
Again...pay careful attention when reading news on the F-35.
UPDATE:
Commenter BowlWeavel said it best...
All I can say is wow
listen to some of you people
Do you
have any idea how many different ways there are to wreck an aircraft
and/or kill someone with a maintenance error or by failing to follow
proper procedures?
give it a rest already
this wasn't the problem you hoped it was
