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Comment by aurailious | Hacker News Reader

This program is going to end up like the M-16. Even after its flaws are fixed the reputation isn't going to be shaken off. People still see the M-16 as unreliable even as its the most common form factor used by militaries today. Ironically the AK-47 wasn't as reliable in its initial iterations and now its simplicity is its only major advantage today.

Currently a lot of the flaws of the F-35 program have been fixed. Even the cost per fighter is reasonable now, its approaching a sub $100M cost per aircraft. Its a much better plane than its contemporaries, and its costs are in the same category.

Designing an advanced fighter aircraft in the 21st century is hard and expensive. Designing one to do 3 roles and built in the thousands is even harder. But its easier and cheaper than the alternatives. The F-35 is going to end up being a good aircraft and will fulfill what it was designed to do.

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> The F-35 is going to end up being a good aircraft and will fulfill what it was designed to do.

Before it's outclassed by something that didn't take so many decades to get to the field in usable form?

You mean like the PAK-FA? Or maybe the F-35 successor?

What other modern plane development programs don't actually take decades?

Include Boeing and Airbus planes into that too. Include helicopters. All of it is a time consuming and expensive thing to do. We are not riveting metal together and putting piston engines in fighters anymore.

Just FYSA, PAK-FA program was cancelled a few months ago.

Oh I am aware. PAK-FA, a program that started in 2000 because the previous program for the Mig 1.44 that start in 1979 was delayed so often. And now we have the Mikoyan LMFS a program based on the Mig 1.44.

I have high confidence that the Russians will manage to eventually make a 5th gen fighter using a legacy of nearly 50 years of development. But no, the JSF program is the one that is heavily delayed.

Yeah, the F-35 is delayed. Originally, Initial Operational Capability declarations for the services was supposed to be in 2010. Now it's 2018 and while the USAF and USMC declared IOC for their variants, the Navy still has not.

Sorry, I don't follow miltech stuff very closely. Which of its alternatives have cost more than $1.5 trillion?

Sorry, but why are you asking?

Each F-35 costs about $100M now. When you want to compare the entire project scope, you should also account for how many planes have been planned to build. Because that $1.5T number includes purchases and lifetime expenses. About 3000 planes and decades of use.

Strictly measuring the R&D places the program at $50B. A price tag that includes making virtually 3 kinds of planes for more than a dozen operators.

So when you say its cost $1.5T, then try to point to alternatives, I'd have to ask, which other alternative planes have had 3000 constructed and then operated over the course of its life in the past 2 decades? What exactly are you trying to compare that $1.5T number to?

Do you want to compare this to the Rafale, of which there are only 150?

To use a metaphor:

I went out and bought 10 bags of apples for $100, but that guy only needed to spend $10 for his bag of oranges.

The most current lot was $89M per aircraft.

True, but that's only for the F-35A. The other two variants are more expensive per copy due to their lower production numbers.

Which isn't too much more expensive than a brand new F-16.

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