BAE Systems said on Dec. 12 that its AN/ASQ-239 electronic warfare (EW) system for Block IV of the Lockheed Martin
[LMT] F-35 is to feature immediate detection of threat pulses.
“Block 4 AN/ASQ-239 is designed to detect every relevant threat pulse as soon as it happens,” Lisa Aucoin, BAE Systems’ vice president of F-35 solutions, said in a statement. “We’re focused on delivering unprecedented situational awareness that enables rapid responses to multiple simultaneous threats.”
The AN/ASQ-239 passively detects threat signals to maintain the F-35’s stealth, the company has said. BAE Systems said that the AN/ASQ-239’s “’staring’ sensors are embedded throughout the aircraft, allowing immediate detection of electromagnetic signals, giving pilots critical situational awareness and allowing them to act first.”
“By delivering long-range, all-aspect (360-degree) broad-spectrum EW capabilities, the F-35’s EW system also increases the probability of signal intercept,” the company said.
In April, BAE Systems said that it had received a $491 million subcontract from Lockheed Martin to build AN/ASQ-239s for Block 4 F-35s in Lot 17 (Defense Daily, Apr. 3).
BAE Systems said that future deliveries of the Block 4 AN/ASQ-239 in Lot 17 will add to 1,200 of the EW systems that the company has delivered thus far for the F-35. The company builds the AN/ASQ-239 in Nashua and Manchester, N.H.
F-35 program officials have described TR-3 as the computer “backbone” for Block 4, which is to have 88 unique features and integrate 16 new weapons on the F-35, which became operational in July 2015.
The U.S. Air Force plans to buy 1,763 of the aircraft, the Marine Corps 420, and the Navy 273.
In September, Lockheed Martin said that it expects to deliver the first TR-3 F-35 between April and June next year whereas the military had expected that delivery between December this year and April next year (Defense Daily, Sept. 6).
Rep. Donald Norcross (D-N.J.), the ranking member of the House Armed Services Committee’s tactical air and land forces panel, said in a Dec. 12 subcommittee hearing on the F-35 that the first TR-3 F-35 delivery between next April and June would mean “an almost 18-month delay and almost $1 billion of cost overruns.”
Air Force Lt. Gen. Michael Schmidt, the program executive officer for the F-35, testified on Dec. 12 that laboratories have not performed well in evaluating how TR-3 will perform in flight.
“Our labs are not properly representing the [F-35] flight environment, and there’s way too much discovery happening in flight test,” Schmidt said in response to a question from Rep. Rob Wittman (R-Va.), the chairman of the panel, on what the main problems with TR-3 on-time delivery have been. “In this program, concurrency has been an issue, but especially when we introduce concurrency in the form of hardware in this program, we have a history of not being able to, in a timely manner, deliver hardware fully integrated from a software aspect into the program. We are better on the tactical applications side, but when we introduce hardware into a lot in this program and not have the full engineering rigor to identify what the work scope is to deliver within that specific lot, we run into problems in this program.”
“In the near term, relative to the [TR-3] stability issues that we’re seeing, we are working through them,” Schmidt said. “I wish I had all of the solutions in place that proved to me that when I do something in the lab, it’s gonna show up that way in the air. We have a number of fixes addressing the stability challenges. We will get to a stable, capable, maintainable [TR-3] airplane here. The data tells me it will be in the middle of the spring…but I don’t have a super solid, ‘I can guarantee you this date.'”