Just found it...

Here :-
http://www.aviationnow.com/avnow/new...s/vic05034.xml

"F/A-22's Software Stability 'No Longer An Issue,' USAF Says
By Marc Selinger
05/03/2004 10:47:29 AM


U.S. Air Force officials are declaring victory in their battle to fix
a major technical problem with the F/A-22 Raptor: avionics software
instability.

"Software stability [is] no longer an issue," the Air Force said in a
graphic displayed at an April 30 press briefing.

Air Force acquisition chief Marvin Sambur told reporters that the
Lockheed Martin-built F/A-22 is achieving an average of 10.8 hours
between avionics software problems, more than double the five-hour
requirement that Congress said the program must meet before it could
begin its initial operational test and evaluation (IOT&E).

A complete restart of the avionics system, which occurred an average
of every 1.4 hours a little over a year ago, has not happened in over
1,000 flight hours.

"That's pretty impressive," Sambur said.

The software improvements helped clear the way for the F/A-22 to begin
IOT&E April 29 at Edwards Air Force Base, Calif. (DAILY, April 30).
The test phase is expected to last until mid-September and pave the
way for a decision in January 2005 on whether to shift from low-rate
to full-rate production.

IOT&E is expected to be more rigorous than testing to date. For
instance, besides countering larger groups of legacy fighters, as was
done in pre-IOT&E testing, F/A-22s also will have to simultaneously
defend other aircraft or attack targets.

Although IOT&E will focus on the F/A-22's air-to-air capabilities, the
follow-up operational test and evaluation, scheduled for the summer of
2005, will test the Raptor's ability to drop satellite-guided Joint
Direct Attack Munitions (JDAMs) while flying at subsonic speeds.
Further air-to-ground capabilities are to be demonstrated after the
F/A-22 achieves its initial operational capability (IOC), which is
scheduled for December 2005.

Sambur said that any problems that arise in IOT&E will be "pretty
minor" and are unlikely to cause a significant delay in the program.

Lt. Col. Jeffrey Harrigian, who commands a squadron at Tyndall Air
Force Base, Fla., that will train F/A-22 pilots, said the Raptor has
proven it can outmaneuver and see farther than the F-15 Eagle it is
designed to replace, even though the F-15 has 104 kills and no losses
in real-life aerial combat.

The F/A-22 "is the fighter pilot's dream," Harrigian told reporters.
"There's just no match when comparing the Raptor to the Eagle."

The Air Force plans to spend about $42 billion to buy 277 F/A-22s,
though it will have to buy fewer than that if it cannot eventually
persuade members of Congress to remove a $36.8 billion production cost
cap.

"They originally put the cap in place to make sure that we got our act
in place," Sambur said. "And I think we'll prove to them that we do
have our act in place."



Cheers
John Cook

Any spelling mistakes/grammatic errors are there purely to annoy. All
opinions are mine, not TAFE's however much they beg me for them.

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