Lockheed Developing Unmanned F-35 Jet

• duotiga83

  18 Aug 06, 16:57

  WASHINGTON — Lockheed Martin Corp. has designed ways to convert its new F-35 Joint Strike Fighter into a combat drone as part of a broad push into robot technologies, company officials said Tuesday.
  
  Lockheed hopes to become as famous for its drones as Northrop Grumman Corp. and privately held General Atomics Aeronautical Systems Inc., the companies behind the well-known Global Hawk and Predator unmanned aerial vehicles. At a Washington press briefing, Lockheed executives regaled reporters with the company's range of related research.
  
  "We're in the business and we probably have been less aggressive than we should have been," said Richard O'Lear, vice president for unmanned aerial systems.
  
  In recent years, Lockheed has devoted 30 percent to 40 percent of its aeronautics investment to unmanned systems, said Frank Mauro, Lockheed vice president for advanced systems development. He said the company now is making up for its previous single-minded focus on the F-35 program, a $276 billion initiative to replace thousands of aging fighters around the world.
  
  The sensors developed for the Joint Strike Fighter have a range of potential drone applications, he said. Also, the company's Skunk Works unit has been working over the past two years to design an F-35 that doesn't need a pilot.
  
  This work isn't part of Lockheed's fighter development contract, Mauro said, but the company now has a blueprint in case the Pentagon comes calling.
  
  Lockheed expects an unmanned F-35 would cost roughly the same as a standard plane with a pilot, he said.
  
  The company has envisioned that two piloted fighters could be accompanied by four unmanned fighters without the full suite of high-tech sensors.
  
  "Those are basically external bomb carriers," Mauro said.
  
  http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/ap/fn/4119143.html
• duotiga83

  18 Aug 06, 17:02

  from http://www.f-16.net/news_article1924.html
  
  Unmanned F-35 in the works
  August 16, 2006 (by Jeff Hollenbeck) - Like Lockheed's U-2G program which extended the U-2 reconnaisance aircraft's capabilities to carrier operations, Lockheed Martin is looking to expand the possiblilities for its newest aircraft - the F-35 Lightning II.
  
  The number you specified is not a valid photo With today's fly-by-wire technology, pilots essentially tell the aircraft's computers what they want the aircraft to do through the throttle, stick, and rudder, but the computers decide which control surfaces to move and how much. First seen in production on the F-16, fly-by-wire is now incorporated on virtually all new fighter and attack aircraft in some way. The Lockheed F-35 Lightning II is no exception with a full fly-by-wire flight control system.
  
  With computers moving the control surfaces, an unmanned version of the F-35 seems a natural fit. In a briefing by Lockheed Vice President Frank Mauro, it was announced that an autonomous version of the F-35 has been in planning for two years according to an article in the Washington Post. According to Mr. Mauro, the concept is to build F-35s which could be either operated as either manned or unmanned aircraft to enhance the flexibility with which the aircraft could be employed.
  
  Other published articles indicate that the unmanned F-35 project has been funded in house and developed independently of the U.S. military requirements for the aircraft, giving Lockheed an upper hand if any customer country requested such a capability. While there have been no public announcements of actual integration of unmanned capability into any of the F-35 test aircraft, the plans have been made.
  
  The possible employment scenarios for unmanned aircraft continue to grow. Some see unmanned F-35s operating as extensions of manned aircraft with the unmanned aircraft carrying more ordinance to the target with several "drones" flying alongside each manned fighter. Such tactics would increase the flexibility of the unmanned aircraft and would conceivably increase the survivablilty of pilots in the manned aircraft by allowing the use of the unmanned aircraft as armed reconnaisance assets which would share sensor information by datalink. Others see unmanned aircraft flying their missions on autopilot from takeoff to landing.
  
  Lockheed Martin recently unveiled another unmanned aircraft - the "Polecat." Built by Lockheed's famed "Skunk Works," the polecat "was specifically designed to verify three things: new, cost effective rapid prototyping and manufacturing techniques of composite materials; projected aerodynamic performance required for sustained high altitude operations; and flight autonomy attributes" according to Lockheed executive Frank Cappuccio in a Lockheed press release.
  
  The F-35 Lightning II is set to replace several aircraft in the near future including the F-16 and AV-8B Harrier for the United States and allied nations around the globe.
• tankee1981

  18 Aug 06, 17:08

  Since Singapore is a member of the JSF programme, there is a high chance that we will be getting F-35 in the future. So any chance we will be getting the unmanned variant?