Another look at DND's faulty cost estimates with the F-35

Back so long ago in 2010, the DND was confident of their position of replacing the CF-18 Hornets with a great and risky unknown F-35. This is possible when you bury figures and use talking points from the seller of the aircraft.

Consider this collection of bizarre thinking:

Defence Minister Peter MacKay last month told the House of Commons defence committee that the air force expected to spend $250 million a year — or about $5 billion over 20 years — on the maintenance deal. That's lower than some of the federal government's initial projections, and is what the air force currently spends to keep the existing fleet of CF-18s in the air.

Officials within the department say they expect to achieve savings because the stealth fighters' support arrangement will see all countries pool spare parts.

"We hope it is more efficient because you can leverage the global supply chain of 3,000 fighters in nine countries," said the official.

"Instead of (us) having to buy 10 sets of extra sets of spare landing gear, (we) can have one set and the global pool has nine and (we) get when (we) need it, but if (we) never need it (we) don't actually have to buy it."

What 3000 fighters?

What nine countries?

Unfortunately, the F-35 is so immature that few know what parts on it will break and at what intervals.

Cost per hour for the F-35 is unlikely to be that of a classic Hornet. They are around $18,000 per flying hour give or take. The F-35 (according to U.S. Navy figures and others) is about $30,000 per flying hour. Probably even more.

At $30,000 per flying hour, MacKay's figures give us about 128 hours per F-35 per year. This is unrealistic. A pilot probably needs 180 flying hours per year as a minimum. Simulators can only do so much. The F-35 (if its capability is to be believed) will be flying longer missions than a Hornet. So add some more there.

Then, all that, only gets you one pilot per jet.

Why are higher pilot numbers to airframes needed? Because of fatigue of sustained flying ops in wartime. Even to sustain real-world operations for a few days requires 2 pilots per jet. 3 per jet for a long war would be better.

Canada has trouble meeting its one pilot per jet numbers. So, maybe, if one wants to park those gold-plated and defective F-35s alot, 128 hours per jet might happen. This cascades. Because with such an overly expensive capability, even if you have a proper number of pilots, the taxpayer can't afford to train two pilots per jet let alone one.

Yes it should be written. 2 pilots per each jet. 2 pilots x 180 hours per year = 360 hours per jet per year.

Oh, and $65M, $70M or $75M to procure each jet has zero hope of ever happening.

The DND really goofed the CF-18 replacement.

All the sudden, anything else for a CF-18 replacement is starting to look good.

Canada can't afford 65 F-35s

The Canadian DND is still in trouble with their F-35 cost figures.

I have provided some assumptions below that indicate Canada can never afford 65 F-35s. The government has already stated they want to keep within the $16B budget. So, with that, how many F-35s can they afford?

One of the key assumptions is that the aircraft becomes a combat capable system. With all the troubles, we don't know.

It is foolish to buy anything before a low-rate-initial production batch 9 aircraft. If there are no other technical show stoppers (unlikely given the history of the program), a concerned buyer wants the final Block 3f software and all the bugs and major technical problems worked out. LRIP-9 is about as early a buy as you want to go.

If Canada doesn't fly the jet much, they might be able to park all 65. They won't have a combat capability of worth though.

The flying hours I have shown below are scary. 180 hours a year per airframe only gets you one pilot per jet with minimum qualifications and recurrent training. This is not a reasonable combat deterrent unless all your air wars are 1 sortie per F-35.

The chart does not show extra things like facilities and some other needed accessories. For example: those AIM-120D AMRAAM air-to-air missiles at $2.5M each.

The DND still has a lot more work to do in order to prove this massive military acquisition to the taxpayer.

(click image to make larger)

Canada's F-35s-- $17.5B over 30 years (cost per flying hour)

Interesting how puff pieces by copy/paste reporters come up with the occasional useful piece of information:

The Pentagon estimates it will cost about $30,000 per hour to operate the F-35, in large part due to the cost of fuel.

Although, given all the unreliable systems, if most of that is fuel, I expect the cost per flying hour to be much more. But let us explore their claim.

65 aircraft: 300 flight hours per year; $30,000 per flight hour; 30 years.

$17.5B

That is a lot more than what the DND stated for lifetime costs.