An F-35 Lightning II maneuvers overhead during its first flight at Eglin Air Force Base, April 23. The jet is a fifth generation, single engine, stealth capable strike fighter and can perform close air support, tactical bombing and air defense missions. If you've been paying attention to the battle for US air dominance, you might be, like me, a little wary of the comparisons and the rhetoric. Since there are numbers flying all over the place with regards to cost (mostly from PR firms), I thought we ought to take a look at what the REAL cost of an F-35 is...and we'll look at it in the same terms that the DoD/USAF use to evaluate the bids. First, we need to talk in terms of 2010 dollars. We’re talking about what is known as the Unit Recurring Fly Away cost (URF) for a conventional take-off and landing (CTOL) variant (the type the Air Force is buying). In 2010 terms, it will cost about $65 million dollars. Whoa, wait a minute, you say, I’ve seen costs as high as $110 million a copy! I’m sure you have. But they don’t reflect the URF. Instead they may reflect the Total Ownership Cost (TOC) - the cost of everything necessary to operate the aircraft over the span of its service life - or any of a number of other costs used in the project for various purposes, but it won’t reflect the one we should be most concerned with, the URF. Confused yet? Think of buying a new car. You go in, look at the sticker price and ask the sales person, “how much will it cost me to drive this car off the lot?” He or she is going to give you a cost at or near the sticker price. You’re going to negotiate it down and, if you strike a deal, you’ll drive it off the lot for that negotiated price. That’s the URF in a nutshell. With me so far? But does that cost reflect the TOC? Of course not. Gas and oil. Extra cost. Maintenance. Extra cost. Extended warranty. Extra cost. Parts. Extra cost. Labor. Extra cost. New tires. Extra cost. Etc. In fact, if you take all of those costs associated with owning, driving and maintaining the car over the years you own it you’ll find that TOC to be significantly higher than the cost to drive it off the lot (URF). Of course that’s the case for any fighter aircraft. However, in the media, the price you see applied to the F-35 may reflect the higher TOC and not the URF. When such a cost basis is used without identifying it, you end up comparing apples and pomegranates. The TOC is not what it will cost to fly the plane off the lot. As an example, imagine the original cost of the B-52. Now imagine – with the aircraft having been in constant service for 50 years or more – the total cost of ownership. The difference is going be huge. We could easily see a difference of several hundred million dollars per aircraft between URF and TOC as fuel, maintenance, upgrades, modifications, parts, labor, crew costs, and basing costs are all added to the aircraft’s original price, correct? Imagine seeing the TOC for a B-52 represented as the URF. You’d say “no way, we can’t afford it”. So, given that understanding, what will it cost us to fly the aircraft off the dealer’s lot (URF)? Again, in 2010 dollars, assuming all the aircraft originally contracted for are bought (2,443) and production can begin in a timely manner, a CTOL variant F-35 is going to cost $60 million to fly away. The Marine variant, the STOVL (Short Take Off Vertical Landing) will be in the $75 million range and the CV version (more robust frame/undercarriage built for carrier operations) for the Navy in the $70ish million range. I briefly talked about other versions of cost associated with this or any other defense project. They are only meaningful within the government/defense procurement community and are used in reporting and monitoring each program within that community. They have no real relevance to the URF but are sometimes quoted in the media as reflecting that price. They provide another example of the wildly divergent costs we see. As an example, one cost used is APUC or Average Process Unit Cost. Essentially they take the URF and add some other costs to it (see chart) to arrive at that cost. There’s another called PAUC or Program Acquisition Unit Cost. Again, in the case of PAUC, URF has some selected costs added to it to arrive atthe particular cost. They’re not costs we should be concerned with as they deal more with program costs over the life of the aircraft (as well as some R &D costs) than the eventual cost per plane to fly away. If you see a cost of $93 million per copy floating around out there, for instance, it is likely the PAUC cost as reflected in the chart. Again, that’s not the cost per plane to fly it away (URF). Finally, just because it is interesting, let’s talk about something else associated with cost and also not properly compared. So, I think we can agree that we can fly an Air Force F-35 CTOL away for about $65 million (2010 dollars). But I can fly a 4th generation fighter away for, say, $50 million – why not build a whole bunch of those for less money? Two reasons – they’re significantly inferior in technology and not very stealthy at all. And that $50 million really doesn’t reflect the true cost – not if you want to do anything with the aircraft other than just fly it around. The F-35 as delivered is mission capable. That means it comes with everything already on board to fly missions in combat. It’s combat ready. The 4th generation fighter? Extra cost is required to make it combat ready. You get a...
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Posted
May 11 2011, 01:39 AM
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BLACKFIVE