The full Pentagon recruitment announcement is as follows:
“Boeing Co., St. Louis, Missouri received an indefinite delivery / indefinite quantity contract of $ 22,890,000,000 (FA8634-20-D-2704). The first delivery order was awarded as an indefinite contract stock with full value not to exceed, including options, $ 1,192,215,413. It is a cost plus fixed rate effort, cost plus incentive, fixed price incentive rate, firm fixed price effort for the F-System 15EX. This delivery order (FA8634-20 -F-0022) provides design, development, integration, manufacturing, testing, verification, certification, delivery, maintenance and modification of F-15EX aircraft, as well as spare parts, support equipment, training materials, technical data and technical support. Work will be performed in St. Louis, Missouri, and at Eglin Air Force Base, Florida, and is expected to be completed on December 31, 2023. This award is the result of an acquisition of sources: research funds, development, testing and evaluation for the fiscal year 2020 in the amount of $ 248,224,746; and aircraft acquisition funds for fiscal year 2020 in the amount of $ 53,000,000 are being obligated at the time of the award. The Air Force Lifecycle Management Center, Wright-Patterson AFB, Ohio, is the hiring activity. “
Congress approved the funding of a total of eight F-15EXs in the defense budget for fiscal year 2020. The plane seen in the image the Air Force has now released shows it bears serial number 20-0001, which indicating that it is the first aircraft that the service has purchased in this current fiscal cycle. A second example is also under construction, according to Boeing.
The Air Force has requested money to purchase an additional 12 aircraft in fiscal year 2021 and expects to purchase a total of 76 F-15EXs during the five-year Future Years Defense Program. The entire F-15EX service fleet could eventually comprise 144 jets.
The Pentagon’s hiring notice does not specifically mention the acquisition of engines for any of these aircraft. On June 30, the Air Force awarded a separate contract to General Electric for an unspecified number of F110-GE-129 engines to power at least part of the initial batch of F-15EX, citing “unusual and compelling urgency.”
The Air Force had planned to power all of its F-15EXs with F110-GE-129, but is now preparing to hold an open competition to select an engine type after it became clear that Pratt & Whitney would protest any source awards. unique to General Energy. Pratt & Whitney is expected to present its F100-PW-229 engine as an alternative. You can read more about the issues surrounding the selection of the F-15EX’s engines in this recent War zone piece.
“The F-15EX is the most economical and immediate way to upgrade capacity and upgrade capabilities provided by our former F-15C / D fleets,” said General Mike Holmes, head of the Air Combat Command, also said. “The F-15EX is ready to fight as soon as it gets off the line.”
“When they are delivered, we expect the bases currently operating the F-15 to transition to the new EX platform in a matter of months versus years,” he added.
“The pilots and mechanics currently operating the F-15 anticipate the transition to the F-15EX in a matter of days rather than years,” Boeing said in its press release.
The first eight F-15EX aircraft will be based at Eglin Air Force Base in Florida, and will initially support test efforts. Delivery of the first two aircraft is scheduled for the second quarter of fiscal year 2021, which begins January 1, 2021. The remaining six aircraft are scheduled to arrive in fiscal year 2023. The Air Force is using the Basis Process Strategic to determine field locations for subsequent aircraft batches.
“We are able to deliver two aircraft by the end of 2020 assuming a timely contract award,” said Prat Kumar, Boeing’s vice president and program manager for F-15, in December. While the defense budget for fiscal year 2020 had provided the Air Force with the funding it had sought for the first F-15EXs, the subsequent Appropriations Act passed by Congress stipulated that the service could only obtain two prototypes of F- 15EX plus long-term elements associated with the remaining six fighters until a report detailing their acquisition, test and evaluation, logistics and post-production strategies has been submitted to the House and Senate defense committees, along with estimates of costs and hours.
“The F-15EX is the most advanced version of the F-15 ever built, due in large part to its digital backbone,” Lori Schneider, Boeing’s F-15EX Program Manager, said in a statement on the award of the new contract. “Its unmatched range, price, and cargo capacity make the F-15EX an attractive choice for the United States Air Force.”
A key difference between F-15EXs and older F-15C / Ds that are slated to replace lies in the architecture of the Open Mission Systems (WHO). The OMS architecture will allow the rapid insertion of the latest aircraft technologies. The F-15EX will also have fly-by-wire flight controls, a new electronic warfare system, advanced cockpit systems, and the latest mission systems and software capabilities available to legacy F-15s. You can read more about the F-15EX and its capabilities in the past. War zone pieces.
“The F-15EX’s digital backbone, open mission systems, and generous payload capacity fit well with our vision for a future network-enabled war,” said Will Roper, deputy secretary of the Air Force Acquisition, Technology. and logistics. “Continuous updating of systems and how they share data through the Joint Force is critical to defeating advanced threats. F-15EX is designed to evolve from day one. “
In addition to simply being a replacement for existing Air Force F-15C / Ds, the F-15EX will also be able to act as a weapons truck and be able to carry the type of large hypersonic weapons that are under development, but that doesn’t fit within from a bay of fifth generation combat weapons. This is something that Boeing specifically highlighted in its press release on the new Air Force contract. “The F-15EX carries more weapons than any other fighter in its class and can launch hypersonic weapons up to 22 feet long and weighing up to 7,000 pounds,” the statement said.
With a strong emphasis on its WHO architecture, the Pentagon is also using the F-15EX as a “pioneering” program for its “DevSecOps Initiative, which aims to develop secure, flexible and agile software,” Boeing said.
In all, the F-15EXs, the first two that Boeing is building now, promise to bring impressive new capabilities to the Air Force in the coming years.
NOTE: There is conflicting information as to whether the photo at the top of this story is actually from an F-15EX. the St. Louis Post-Dispatch It has the same photograph in its report with the following caption: “F-15EX decals taped to the F-15QA4 jet in Building 67, Final Assembly_St. Louis, MO. The purpose of the photo is to show the aircraft readiness to our customer from the USAF (F- Award of contract 15EX). Series MSF20-0024 “.
However, an official Boeing Tweet presents this image and also says “We have already started construction of the first two # F15EX aircraft.” Also, the official Air Force news about the new contract includes this photo, but it doesn’t say one way or the other if it shows an F-15EX.
We have contacted Boeing for clarification.
NOTE 2: Boeing has confirmed that The war zone This image shows the F-15EX-1, the first F-15EX for the U.S. Air Force, under construction.
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