Going quick now. One to go and then its up to Italy to deliver the remaining.
Wonder if the quality of the jets in Italy are equivalent? Remember something long time ago with the Starfighters that the ones build in Italy tend to perish at a higher frequency. Time will tell.
wweasel wrote:any ideas about US Serialnumbers F-003, F-004 RNethAF?
A photo published recently on Twitter shows 5302 on the right hand nose wheel door of F-003, suggesting that F-003 to F-008 are 17-5302 to 17-5307 (and F-009 + F-010 could be 17-5308 and 5309?). Which makes sense since the RNoAF jets run until 17-5301.
If this is true than something might get a little clearer in the total FY setup of LRIP XI.
BTW, it's not the Norwegians ending on 5301. Norway has 5288 till 5293.
As you know we were also surprised with the Norwegians starting at 5288, which doesn't add up with USAF having 53 jets in LRIP XI. USAF started with 17-5237 and thus not having enough 'serial' room for 53 jets. But the question of the Congressional Aid Package also still remains to fit into this. Could it just be that this CAP is integrated in LRIP XI? As far as I know only 10 F-35C were initially foreseen in LRIP XI as just 18 F-35B's. So what's the difference? Exactly, the 3 A's, 6 B's and 4 C's of the CAP. So time will tell but it might just be that the CAP jets are inserted into LRIP XI and added at the end of the package with a separate set of FY allocations.
As far as serials are concerned. If the Dutch start at 5302 and the Norwegians end at 5293, that leaves an 8 airframe gap. Presume these are the Aussi's than. This whole package could (and I reinstate this is just forward thinking and not confirmed in any way) give this as setup:
To complete this. Since Turkey-South Korea-Israel-Japan total for serials 17-5310 till 17-5333 we will see if 17-5334 materializes as a USAF jet. Than we will know about the CAP.
Another question. LRIP XI jets are cranking out now. Anyone has some info on the last LRIP X jet that still has to be seen being the last Israeli jet of LRIP X?
Hans, typo from my part in setting up the list. Sorry about that.
Your LRIP X data is correct. So F-35B LRIP XI will start from BF-71 as you stated and F-35C will start from CF-36 as you also stated.
Israeli LRIP XI jets are indeed AS-16/21. Wow, I really messed up things last night .
So the only LRIP X jet we are still missing is Israeli AS-15.
AS-015 may be the special F-35I test aircraft announched in may 2017
''In May 2017, it emerged that Lockheed was specially building a one-off sub-variant of the F-35I "Adir" – meaning "mighty one" in Hebrew – for Israel and expected to deliver it by 2020. The plane would act as a testbed for the country’s planned, but unspecified modifications.''
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