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Boeing Can Join Together Front and Rear of the T-7A Red Hawk in Under 30 Minutes

Back in April, aerospace giant Boeing rolled off the lines the first T-7A Red Hawk, part of a family of military aircraft that will become the backbone of the U.S. Air Force’s (USAF) training apparatus. By the time the $9.2 billion contract is concluded, 351 of them will be in the air, making sure future fighter pilots know what they are doing.
T-7A Red Hawk 31 photos
Photo: Boeing
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Ever since word of the aircraft became public, Boeing bragged about the fact that it took it just 36 months to take the plane from concept phase to first flight. That was possible thanks to the use of “advanced digital modeling and design techniques,” and this approach will probably mean a very rapid production process for the fleet as well.

Back in May, but only announced this week by Boeing and its partner in the project, Saab, another important milestone was achieved thanks to the said design and modeling methods: the forward and aft fuselage of a Red Hawk were joined together in less than 30 minutes. That’s “a fraction of the time it takes for traditional aircraft builds,” says Boeing.

Until May, the main development of the plane took place at Boeing’s St. Louis facility, but the aft section was being made in Linkoping, Sweden. The section that was so-quickly attached to its better half was the last though to be shipped over from Europe, as Saab will now relocate production of the airplane part at its facility in West Lafayette, Indiana.

The T-7A Red Hawk gets its power from a General Electric turbofan engine rated at 17,000 lbf (76 kN) of thrust. It will be replacing the T-38 Talon and comes with a color scheme meant to be a nod to the almost all African American group of pilots called the Tuskegee Airmen, that flew Curtiss P-40 Warhawks during the Second World War.
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Editor's note: Gallery shows both the plane in both Red Hawk and predecessor T-X concept configuration.

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About the author: Daniel Patrascu
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Daniel loves writing (or so he claims), and he uses this skill to offer readers a "behind the scenes" look at the automotive industry. He also enjoys talking about space exploration and robots, because in his view the only way forward for humanity is away from this planet, in metal bodies.
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