Tactical Aircraft

F-22 Development and Testing Delays Indicate Need for Limit on Low-Rate Production Gao ID: GAO-01-310 March 15, 2001

The Air Force has made progress in developing the F-22, particularly with respect to fulfilling the criteria for awarding a fully funded contract for low-rate initial production. Nevertheless, it lags significantly in flight-testing because of continuing assembly and manufacturing delays, and it is behind schedule in completing nonflying tests that assess the aircraft's structural integrity These delays increase the risk that the Air Force will likely have to extend the test program past the planned completion date or proceed to the next stages of the program without completing all flight-tests. Moreover, the scheduling delays increase the likelihood that costs will not fall within the congressional cap. The Director of Operational Test and Evaluation has indicated that, on the basis of the test program's current status, operational testing cannot be started as scheduled without clearly unacceptable risks and will probably be delayed almost a year. The Director also concluded there was no reason to authorize low-rate production in January 2001 and some justification to delay it. Cost growth in the development program because of manufacturing and design problems and underestimated amounts of labor required to complete scheduled tasks points to a lack of stability in both design and fabrication.

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