New day; different fibs.
Take this Paris Airshow blurb from 2007. Even the test pilot gets in on the con.
"The aircraft has flown nineteen times since its maiden flight on December 15 last year, and chief test pilot Jon Beesley has praised “the maturity of this highly integrated aircraft”, adding:“When it’s time to fly it is always ready and takes minimal time to get off the chocks. The Lightning II flies just as our engineers predicted, and I continue to be impressed by this marvellous airplane’s performance and handling characteristics.”
The aircraft has been flying with its innovative new helmet-mounted display system since April 4, and Beesley was very impressed by the helmet, which exhibited no latency or stability problems, and that worked so well that he “forgot he was wearing it”.
The author of the article makes the important points about the holes in the story. For instance, that there are no mission systems on the aircraft at the time and it (AA-1) was not production representative.
Interesting about the handling and performance of the aircraft when the flight envelop had not been fully explored.
"But there is another side to this particular coin. The only flying F-35A (AA-1) is unrepresentative of the planned production configuration. It lacks sensors, and is currently limited to just 3.8g, with an absolute limit of 4.5g."
A few years later the helmet would be mentioned as a major issue with the program. It did not work to expectations and LM had to look for a new vendor. I guess that can actually happen when you put mission systems on a production representative aircraft.
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