http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wI0CQJoCAis


This is the JSF aircraft BF-01.

This was about 40 knots, working up to the complete vertical landing, then the checks really start coming.

Pretty cool. Did a lot of assembly work on that plane, like mating the center, wing, and aft fuselages together, mounting many skins and components, and installed the landing gear.

Nice to see it perform so well.

 

Is that a speed brake on top or does he have the canopy open?

 

It's the inlet for the lift fan. Directly below, under the plane you can see the two exhaust doors for the lift fan.

 

The aircraft has a fan in the forward fuselage that opens for low speed flight. What you are seeing is the top cover open, which does look like an open canopy when it is flying toward the camera.

 

Its still no Harrier hehe. Pretty cool.

 

It's better than the Harrier. There is no comparison.

 

Trust me I know, I hate those pieces of crap. WAY to much saftey wire!

 

Better look at the doors in flight.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jpEcOVyZv5A

 

lol Old school. There is some on this plane, but not much. Mostly some hydraulic fittings.

 

Another one for good measure.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EgT_POKZylE

 

Same way with F/A-18 engines which is what I mainly worked on. Mostly had self locking nuts, only thing really safety wired on them were the boroscope plugs. I hated getting sent over to the harrier shop to help em out. Only so many times you can get jabbed by wire before you get pissed off

 

I hate safety wire. Spent a lot of years building F-16 center fuselage components and there's plenty of it on them. That stuff grabs everything. I hated jabbing myself with it. Good thing it's only a memory now.

 

That's awesome.

 

I know what VTOL stands for and I'm guessing STOVL means short take off verticle landing??? So is that basically just an electric fan that lifts the front end?

 

Correct, and yes the fan lifts the front. There are roll posts on the wings for stabilization.