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Reviving F-22 Raptor production a ‘non-starter’

Blue Marlin

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Reviving F-22 Raptor production a ‘non-starter’
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The secretary of the air force has become the latest official to douse hopes of restarting Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptor production, which was capped at 187 aircraft and closed in 2011.

The tooling and equipment needed to produce the twin-engine air-superiority fighter, which was barred from export because of its sophistication, remain in storage along with video instructions for various assembly processes.

This equipment will aid in the remanufacture of spare parts for the aircraft and its two Pratt & Whitney F119 engines, but some Raptor advocates want to see the assembly lines in Marietta, Georgia and Fort Worth, Texas reborn. This was done for improved versions of the Lockheed U-2 and Rockwell B-1.

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Lockheed Martin

That idea is “pretty much a non-starter,” service secretary Deborah Lee James said when asked about the prospect of resuming serial F-22 production at a recent CSIS event in Washington DC.

“If you were to ask [air force chief of staff Gen Mark Welsh] or any of the uniformed officers in the air force, they would probably tell you they would love to have more F-22s.

“The original plan was to have quite a few more additional F-22s, and it was a regrettable set of circumstances – a combination of budget overruns and taking way longer than originally projected – that actually caused what became an early termination for the F-22 programme.”

Optimised for air-to-air combat in a Cold War fight against Russia, the original requirement was for 750 aircraft. That number later dropped to 339, and then 187 plus eight test aircraft.

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Lockheed Martin

Some retired and serving USAF officials have called ending F-22 production “the biggest mistake ever,” particularly as the aircraft sees combat action in Syria, and as Russia and China finalise development of competing fifth-generation combat jets. Former presidential hopeful Mitt Romney even pledged to restart F-22 production during his 2012 campaign.

Air Combat Command chief Gen Herbert “Hawk” Carlisle said in September that he “dreams” about the day F-22 assembly resumes, but admits it’s an expensive proposition. In 2010, a RAND study commissioned by air force placed the cost at $17 billion (2008 dollars) for 75 more aircraft.

“The very prospect of re-opening that [F-22 line] is pretty much a non-starter,” says James. “We’ve got what we’ve got. We’ve got the F-35 coming, approaching initial operating capability. It’s not the same, but they will complement one another and we’ll have to go forward as is.”

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First F-22 Raptor, tail number 91-4001, undergoes testing at Edwards AFB in California

https://www.flightglobal.com/news/articles/reviving-f-22-raptor-production-a-non-starter-421019/
 
Lets turn this into a F22 fanboy thread. Lets assume that the Raptor is brought back into production, what additional hardware would you want to add on it, besides the EOTS system?
 
just want to say three word regarding this jet
1 perfection
2 beauty
3 died young
 
Lets turn this into a F22 fanboy thread. Lets assume that the Raptor is brought back into production, what additional hardware would you want to add on it, besides the EOTS system?

A dual seat version? Better cockpit layout and MFDs? Not much I can think of. The damn machine is way ahead of its time.
 
USAF is fully vested in F-35 program. Practically all the money will be going there for the next few years. Unless the USAF wants more F-22s, or there are plans to sell it overseas, we won't be seeing anymore.
 
we need a fighter-bomber in the class of the F-111 than more F-22s, let's upgrade our F-22s so they will have kill ratio of 6 to 1 against Pak-FA and J-20.


we need to make our current fleet of F-22s more efficient. I believe the available rate is 60% need that to be 80%, and for every 1 flying hour it needs 40 hours of maintenance on the ground, let's halve that to 20 hours.



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need to study a modern FB-111H type fighter bomber.
 
A dual seat version? Better cockpit layout and MFDs? Not much I can think of. The damn machine is way ahead of its time.

This is a good point. You don't create an aircraft more powerful or capable than it needs to be top achieve its goal. With the issues the Russians are having with the Pak 50 it's likely there will be no non-USA 5th generation jet in any great numbers. So why would you waste billions when 4.5 generation jets that are much cheaper can do the same job for less money? France has the right idea.

The next generation of jets will be interesting though, by that time China might be able to field its own jet and force the USA to produce 6th generation fighters in large numbers.
 
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