The Z axis is the pilot’s cockpit “OODA” loop axis or his ability to observe, orient, decide and act. While this is not a new concept having been originally conceived in the famous Boyd “OODA” loop, the information dimension of combat aircraft design now is so important that it forces us to gauge the value of such a weapon system along a third dimension, the “Z” axis. When one considers information and the speed at which it can be collected, fused, presented and acted upon in the combat environment, those who possess this advanced decision capability will be clearly advantaged. The F-35 is not a linear performance enhancement over legacy or fourth generation fighter aircraft. Essentially, the aeronautical design “art” of blending together ever improving and evolving technology eventually creates improvements in a linear fashion. Each aircraft clustered in a “generation” is a combination of improvements. Traditionally, the two dimensional depiction is that the x-axis is time and the y-axis is performance and captures individual airplanes that tend to cluster in generation improvement. This capability establishes a new vector for TacAir aircraft design. The F-35 is now going to take technology into a revolutionary three-dimensional situational awareness capability. But reducing the F-35 to a linear x-y axis improvement or to stealth simply misses the point. Stealth is usually seen as the 5th Gen improvement. The F-35 is also designed with inherent survivability factors first, redundancy and hardening and then stealth. The design characteristics blended together prior to F-35 have been constantly improving range, payload (improved by system/and weapons carried), maneuverability (measured by P Sub s), useful speed, and range (modified by VSTOL–a plus factor). To capture the difference between his generation of aircraft and the F-35, Timperlake has focused on what he calls the Z-axis and the fusion engine. ![]() Ed Timperlake has pioneered work on how to understand the entire approach to re-thinking what the new generation of combat air is really all about.
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