The Oklahoma Air Logistics Center, Tinker AFB, Okla., has started work on its first service life extension program F110 engine. It’s a $600 million effort that will make F-16 engines “more reliable and easier to maintain,” Col. Henry Gaudreau, commander of the ALC’s 448th Hawk Propulsion Sustainment Group, tells the Tinker Take Off. SLEP program manager Dana Grilley says the F110 engines that power the F-16 are showing wear and life design issues after more than 20 years of service. The SLEP will replace core engine parts with ones that are more durable and safer for the single-engine aircraft. The plan, adds Gilley, is “not just a piece by piece fix, but a whole engine fix.”
The emphasis on speed in the Pentagon’s newly unveiled slate of acquisition reforms may come with increased near-term cost increases, analysts say. But according to U.S. defense officials, the new weapons-buying construct provides the military with enough flexibility to prevent runaway budget overruns in major programs.
