Page 3 - Nellis AFB Bullseye 7-31-15

BULLSEYE
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Raptor pilots reach 1,000 flight hours in F-22
Majs. Ethan Waitte and Thomas Borrego, 422nd Test and Evaluation Squadron
pilots, stand with Lt. Col. Matt Allen, 422nd TES F-22 Raptor test director, after
returning from a training sortie at Nellis Air Force Base, Nev., July 27. Waitte
and Borrego flew as wingmen throughout the sortie, during which they both
simultaneously reached the 1,000 flight hour milestone in the F-22.
EDWARDS, from page 1 ________
The tricky part about this test phase is
that the gun will never operationally fire
on the ground. To conduct the test, they
have to use software to bypass interlocks
to make the aircraft think it’s in the air.
“As an Air Force pilot, it’s going to be
one more thing that I can select to either
strafe air-to-ground targets or shoot as
an air-to-air weapon,” said Maj. Andrew
Rollins, the 461st Flight Test Squadron
assistant director of operations and the
test pilot on the project.
While deployed, Rollins said he “used
a gun often.” He also said it’s particularly
useful in an air-to-ground role when en-
emy targets are in a close proximity to
friendlies and dropping a bomb is not
prudent.
“The GAU-22/A uses a 25 mm shell,
which is significantly more powerful than
what I’ve been used to in legacy aircraft,
(like) the F-16 (Fighting Falcon), F-15E
(Strike Eagle) (and) F-15C (Eagle)-- all those
aircraft use a 20 mm shell,” Rollins said.
Integrating a weapon into the aircraft
is not in itself unique, but what does make
this project special is that it’s being inte-
grated into a stealth platform. In legacy
aircraft, the gun fires through a hole in
the outer molding. In this case, to keep
the jet hidden from radar signatures, the
gun will be kept behind closed doors until
the trigger is engaged.
The ground tests are designed to an-
swer questions like: does the gun door
open correctly? Does the gun spin up and
down correctly? Does the air flow through
the vent, and is it adequate to clear the
flammable gasses?
News
RED FLAG, from page 1 _______
U.S. Air Force photo by Senior Airman Joshua Kleinholz will drive integration with the air effort,”
said Lutmer. “We expect aircrews and SOF
to learn a lot about each other’s capabilities
and requirements for integrating these
capabilities to effectively support the mis-
sion. This will be the most robust SOF play
at Red Flag in a long time.”
Although individual participants gain
a bevy of experience throughout the ex-
ercises, teamwork and integration is the
key component that makes Red Flag a
success for everyone involved.
“One of the key benefits of Red Flag
is getting to plan with a diverse set of
units all in the same building. While
the team will be very similar in combat,
all the planners will not be in the same
place,” said Lutmer. “The lessons that
are learned at Red Flag will need to be
applied in combat when geographic
separation will make communication
and coordination more difficult. Ad-
ditionally, air power is a product of
multi-service, multi-(mission design
series), and multi-domain integrated
warfighting. Red Flag 15-3 was able to
bring together U.S. Air Force, Navy and
Marine Corps assets from the air, space,
and cyberspace domains.”
Lockheed Martin photograph by Darin Russell
An F-35A Lightning II, tail number AF-2, fires a burst of rounds down range at the Edwards
Gun Harmonizing Range on Edwards Air Force Base, Calif., July 17. The F-35 Joint Strike
Fighter Integrated Test Force is in the process of testing the F-35A Lightning II’s newest
munitions asset; a four-barrel Gatling gun that fires 25 mm rounds, known as the GAU-22/A.
Prior to testing the integration of the “(AF-2) is the only aircraft in the world
GAU-22/A into the F-35A, the gun itself that can get us this data,” Rollins said. “It’s
was tested as a standalone. It was also been highly instrumented in order to get
flown during test points without firing to us the information we need to proceed to
ensure that the flight envelope would not the next test point and ultimately to get
overstress the gun mounts. Preparing for the gun to its full envelope.”
the ground gun fire tests in the aircraft
took roughly six months. As the test conductor, Krogstad and
her team are monitoring the gun’s perfor-
The testing airframe, tail number mance and ensuring all the systems work
AF-2, is a highly modified flight sciences as designed. She is especially concerned
aircraft, and underwent four months of with making sure the jet can withstand
instrumentation modifications and had the loads of a firing gun, and that the
a line production gun installed for this gun operates as expected. Since AF-2 is
project. a flight sciences aircraft, it does not have
all the missionized systems of full-line
Tiffany Krogstad, the Lockheed Mar- production aircraft. The gun will be
tin AF-2 flight test engineer, said that the further tested with a line production jet
AF-2 is normally a “scientist aircraft” sometime next year for full integration.
executing loads and buffet testing.
3July 31, 2015
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Maj. Joe Haggerty, 414th CTS Red
Flag 15-3 team chief, also understands
that Airmen working with sister ser-
vice members and allied countries
benefit from the training here.
“For Red Flag, this is some of the
Air Force crew’s first-hand exposure
working with other units,” said Hag-
gerty. “Working face-to-face with
other units benefits the training Air-
men receive here.”
Lutmer said Red Flag, which is
celebrating its 40th anniversary this
year, will continue to provide partici-
pants the highest level of warfighter
training.
“Red Flag continues to evolve to
provide our Air Force, sister services,
and allies the highest level of training
possible,” said Lutmer. “We are trying
to stay one step ahead of the adversary
so that our forces are ready to solve
any problem thrown at them. While
home station training produces opera-
tors skilled in their particular areas, it
is critical to bring the team together to
practice and learn integrated fighting.
Today’s threats demand that our mili-
tary be able to integrate capabilities
across services, domains and nations
to be successful.”
“When we hand (the gun) off to the
next aircraft to test full integration with
the full avionics and mission systems
capabilities, we’ll rest easy knowing that
we did what we could to make sure that
their test won’t have those issues,” Krog-
stad said.
Rollins on the other hand is looking at
it from a test pilot’s perspective, evaluating
the gun’s effects on the aircraft’s handling
qualities.
“By the time we get airborne, we’re
hoping that our extensive preparation
during planning, ground tests and air-
borne tests will eliminate every variable
except for those associated with flight,
since flying will be the most demanding
phase of this testing,” Rollins said. “While
we’ll be targeting very specific objectives,
the pilot will also be observing more
qualitative effects such as muzzle flash,
human factors and flying qualities.”
During the airborne tests, they will
watch for the potential effects of having
the gun mounted internally, like vibra-
tions, acoustics and airflow.
To evaluate the gun’s performance, the
test team is made up of personnel from
the Air Force, Lockheed Martin, Pratt &
Whitney and Northrop Grumman.
“Like any of the testing Edwards AFB
does, we are managing all of the risk
involved with this test,” Rollins said.
“When we sign it off and go hand it to
the warfighter, they can go out and pull
the trigger throughout the entire gun
envelope and know that the aircraft is
going to function properly. It’s not going
to flameout, it’s not going to overheat,
it’s not going to over G, and it’s going to
hit the target.”