Machining and manufacturing group Magellan Aerospace has a new multi-year contract from Lockheed Martin Corp. to supply machined titanium components for the F-35 program. The parts to be supplied are wing tie bars for leading-edge flaps on all three variants of the F-35 Lightning II Joint Strike Fighter. Deliveries are set between 2023 and 2027.
Machining will be done at Magellan Aerospace’s Kitchener, Ont., plant. Since 2003 that plant has been supplying parts to Lockheed as part of the F-35 program –the first international partner to do so, the supplier noted. Magellan added that it has made significant investments in equipment and technology at Kitchener, which were “pivotal in securing its role on the program.”
Magellan did not indicate the volumes to be supplied, nor the value of its contract.
Last year, the U.S. Dept. of Defense and Lockheed agreed on delivery of 151-153 aircraft for 2022, increasing to 156 aircraft for 2023 and for the foreseeable future.
The Lockheed-built F-35 Lightning II Joint Strike Fighter is a single-engine, Stealth-enabled aircraft designed for deployment for ground attack and combat, and available in three variants for the U.S. Air Force, U.S. Marine Corps, and U.S. Navy, as well as allied defense forces. The F-35A is designed for conventional takeoff and landing (CTOL); F-35B is for short take-off and vertical-landing (STOVL); and the F-35C is for carrier-based variant for Catapult Assisted Take-Off But Arrested Recovery (CATOBAR.)
“Magellan earned a role in the industrial supply chain for the Joint Strike Fighter program early in the program, as the Canadian government was a partner in the program at its inception in 1997,” recalled Mr. Haydn Martin, v.p. Business Development, Marketing, and Contracts. “Magellan has benefited from the opportunity to establish advanced manufacturing technologies in our facilities and is pleased to apply these innovations to support the production of the global F-35 fleet by providing these complex structural components.”
