MOBILITY ENGINEERING Produced by SAE Media Group
MOBILITY ENGINEERING
Magazines
Magazine cover

Current Issue

Archives

Magazine cover

Current Issue

Archives

Magazine cover

Current Issue

Archives

Magazine cover

Current Issue

Archives

T-X Competition to End in September with Selection of New USAF Trainer Aircraft

Officials will soon award a 350-unit contract to one of three competing aircraft teams.

The Lockheed Martin/KAI T-50A aircraft configuration is based on South Korea’s FA-50, which is currently in production. The FA-50, the most advanced fighter version of the T-50, incorporates air-to-air and air-to-ground weapons, along with an avionics suite that contains an electronic warfare suite, a multi-mode radar, and an advanced data-link. (Image source: Lockheed Martin)

According to officials, the U.S. Air Force  (USAF) will select a new trainer aircraft by September 30 – before the end of the 2018 fiscal year. The aircraft will be one of the three remaining next-gen trainer candidates from the USAF’s ongoing T-X competition, either the clean-sheet T-X  from Boeing  and Saab  , the T-50A  from Lockheed Martin  and Korea Aerospace Industries, Ltd.  (KAI), or the T-100  from Leonardo DRS  .

Boeing touts that their clean-sheet T-X offering is the only aircraft that is more than 90 percent made in U.S. and “100 percent made for the USAF.” Boeing and Saab have manufactured two completely operational units. (Image source: Boeing)

The USAF will replace its aging fleet of Northrop T-38 Talon  supersonic jet trainers with 350 new aircraft from the T-X competition, spending approximately $16 billion to acquire and maintain the new trainers over the course of their service life – one of the largest USAF contracts in recent times.

The seasoned T-38 has been in use since 1961, training nearly 50,000 pilots who would later fly aircraft like the Boeing B-52 Stratofortress  , Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird  , McDonell Douglass F-15 Eagle  , and Fairchild Republic A-10 Thunderbolt II  . However, as the USAF transitions employs more and more cutting-edge technologies, a next-gen trainer is needed to better facilitate fifth-gen fighter aircraft pilot training for the Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptor  and F-35 Lighting II  .

Leonardo recently established plans to manufacture the T-100 in U.S. in a new manufacturing facility in Tuskegee, Ala. The T-100 is based on the Alenia Aermacchi M-346 Master and has won four out of the five international trainer contests it has been submitted into. (Image source: Leonardo DRS)

The winning T-X aircraft will serve as a platform to acclimate pilots to aircraft with extreme agility, full-sensor fusion, integrated avionics, supercruise, and consolidated and integrated battlespace management technologies.

Industry analysts currently favor the Lockheed/KAI T-50A – based on KAI’s T-50 trainer used by South Korea’s Republic of Korea Air Force and co-developed by Lockheed Martin, manufacturer of the F-22 and F-35; and the Boeing/Saab T-X – which, as a completely new design – benefited from additional development time due to the T-X competition’s repeatedly protracted award announcement.

While speculation has floated that the T-X award announcement would occur during the Air Force Association  ’s Air, Space & Cyber (ASC) Conference from Sept. 17-19, those close to the program hinted at a decision coming through the following week of Sept. 24.

William Kucinski  is content editor at SAE International, Aerospace Products Group in Warrendale, Pa. Previously, he worked as a writer at the NASA Safety Center in Cleveland, Ohio and was responsible for writing the agency’s System Failure Case Studies. His interests include 'literally anything that has to do with space,' past and present military aircraft, and propulsion technology. And also sportscars.

Contact him regarding any article or collaboration ideas by e-mail at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

Topics:
Aircraft Aircraft Automotive Aviation Fixed-wing aircraft Military aircraft Pistons Vehicles

More From SAE Media Group

    Transcript

    00:00:02 [Music] are likely to on Planet Eric ticket a cup [Applause] this airplane is absolutely what we need just flew an hour mission went out did the embedded training where we were able to simulate an air-to-air engagement with five bandits of which none of them were actually airborne and get the

    00:00:44 results on a radar along with the targeting pod and all of this is simulated so there are no costs than any of those but they were absolutely perfect and they are the kind of things that we need to do in iff today [Music] the t-50 with its simulator training with its ability to link to ground-based trainers with its live virtual

    00:01:20 constructive training excels all other trainers on the market the heart of this training has got to be the ground-based training system I think it's the heart of the whole system we just flew with the distributed training for one hour the person in the in the simulator we can talk to them while we were airborne we had five bogeys to shoot down we also had ground targets it's all simulated

    00:01:50 that's all very advanced when we graduate a pilot out of iff to go to f-35 or f-22 he's already experienced radars he's already experienced targeting pods air to ground he's already experienced air refueling and in addition to that he's been pulling G's and airman ooh marine environments so he is exactly ready to go to that f-35 or the f-22 and we don't

    00:02:20 have to teach them all from day one so we can save all sorts of time and all sorts of money and more importantly wear and tear on the 5th gen aircraft that we need to last as long as we can possibly get in July it's roll rates its maneuverability its feel in the air to me translates directly one for one with what students will feel when they move

    00:02:46 into the single-seat f-22 or the single-seat up 35 this is an easier plane to fly it's an easier plane to land so we can take a lot of those hours and put them in a simulator and get a really advanced student graduate ready to go into the IFF and follow-on into a 15 fighter which is the future [Music] I truly believe as students experience

    00:03:15 the total t-50 training system not just the airplane but the ground-based training system including the simulators that we have that actually linked up with airplanes in the air they're going to begin to experience what it's like to operate in a net-centric environment in fighters we always talked about force multipliers to me this training system becomes a training multiplier

    00:03:39 there is no comparison as to the way we're going to train compared to the way we train today this is their this is what the Air Force needs to do the mission for the 21st century of training fight [Applause] and I can miss our plucky - one owed wonderful judge to one base outsider

    Top Stories

    INSIDERDefense

    Feature Image F-35 Proves Nuke Drop Performance in Stockpile Flight Testing

    INSIDERMaterials

    Feature Image Using Ultrabright X-Rays to Test Materials for Ultrafast Aircraft

    INSIDERManufacturing & Prototyping

    Feature Image Stevens Researchers Test Morkovin's Hypothesis for Major Hypersonic Flight...

    INSIDERManufacturing & Prototyping

    Feature Image New 3D-Printable Nanocomposite Prevents Overheating in Military Electronics

    INSIDERRF & Microwave Electronics

    Feature Image L3Harris Starts Low Rate Production Of New F-16 Viper Shield

    INSIDERRF & Microwave Electronics

    Feature Image F-22 Pilot Controls Drone With Tablet

    Webcasts