Northrop's F-35 Hits a Milestone
Northrop Grumman Corp. has begun to assemble the first F-35 Lightning II jet for the aircraft’s production phase, the defense giant said Tuesday.
Assembly work on the F-35 center fuselage began March 24 at Northrop’s Palmdale Manufacturing Center, with the loading of an all-composite air inlet duct into a special tooling structure called a jig.
The assembly of the center fuselage “is significant because it shows the F-35 program is successfully transitioning from the system development and demonstration phase into the production phase,” Janis Pamiljans Northrop’s F-35 program manager, said in a statement.
Northrop’s El Segundo-based Integrated Systems sector is responsible for developing and building the center fuselage.
The company employs about 425 people working on F-35 assembly in Palmdale.
Northrop employs another roughly 1,300, mostly engineers, in El Segundo to design and development the aircraft’s center fuselage. Also in El Segundo, Northrop workers fabricate composite air inlet and aft ducts for the center fuselage.
Final assembly of all F-35 jets is performed in Fort Worth, Texas, by Lockheed Martin Corp., the program’s prime contractor.
In 2001, Lockheed beat a Boeing Co.-led team for the lucrative contract expected to be worth more than $200 billion. When all anticipated domestic and international sales are factored, more than 4,000 F-35 jets are expected to roll off Lockheed’s assembly line, according to Northrop spokesman Brooks McKinney.
That means years of continuous work for many Northrop employees in Southern California.
Also known as the Joint Strike Fighter, or JSF, the F-35 is a versatile single-seat, stealthy, supersonic strike fighter capable of tactical bombing and air-to-air combat.
Read the full story in Wedesday's business section.