It's performed just fine. The OBOGS system is the problem. The same system causing issues in the F18 and F22.

Well, perhaps you can explain the pressurization schedule for the T-45? With the T-45 at 14,000 feet the cockpit is already at 10,000 and the crew has to be using OBOGS air. In the T-2 the aircraft can be above 23,000 feet and the cockpit is at 8,000 feet and the crew does not have to be using supplemental oxygen which is an entirely separate system available anytime the crew elects to use it.

The crew is suppose to (by regulation) be using OBOGS from engine start to engine shutdown - so what does it matter.

That entirely separate O2 system is serious operational limitation. Being a maintenance guy - you know about the logistics of obtaining and supplying liquid O2 to the fleet right?

Maybe you could list these 'a lot of other issues' that the T-45 has had and where it is has fallen short as a strike/fighter trainer? I only flew the sim as I left the training command before it's introduction to SNAs, but I flew the T-2C and the TA-4J, and the people from my timeframe who flew both had no/few complaints.

I think you have some bug about the pressurization system and have taken that to a whole new level where you try to make comparisons between tactical training aircraft that you have no experience with either (or any aircraft) aircraft in the training role to being making any comments about suitability.

Just explain the rationale of the pressurization schedule of the T-45. It is on page I-2-84 of the flight manual. It gets 4.0 differential but not until 40,000 feet. Only an idiot would keep breathing toxic air through his mask if he had clean pressurized air filling an 8,000 foot cockpit.

[QUOTE=F4E Mx;2361758]Just explain the rationale of the pressurization schedule of the T-45. It is on page I-2-84 of the flight manual. It gets 4.0 differential but not until 40,000 feet. Only an idiot would keep breathing toxic air through his mask if he had clean pressurized air filling an 8,000 foot cockpit.[/QUOTE

Clearly you have little or no knowledge of the differences in Navy verses AF systems and why they are set up that way.

What is wrong with the pressurization system?

Just compare it with the T-2C pressurization schedule on page 2-29 of the Buckeye flight manual.

Lets put it another way. Take a T-2C and remove the LOX system altogether and install an OBOGS system. Now lets assume after a few hours the part of the OBOGS system that is supposed to absorb nitrogen fails completely and the system is delivering only pressurized air through the mask. How would you even know the system has failed if you are at an altitude in the mid-twenties or below? In the T-2 you still have an 8,000 foot cockpit up to 23,400 feet and you have to exceed 26,000 feet for the cockpit to go above 10,000 feet. In the T-45 anything above an aircraft altitude of 14,000 feet means a cockpit altitude above 10,000 feet.

"Clearly you have little or no knowledge of the differences in Navy verses AF systems and why they are set up that way. "

Well, I looked up the pressurization schedules of the T-2, T-38, F-104, F-4, F-8, and T-6 and they pretty much have the same philosophy - they pressurize at about 8,000 feet and maintain an 8,000 foot cockpit until the low 20s of aircraft altitude after which they maintain that differential as the aircraft climbs higher.

But do explain the T-45 pressurization schedule. I would really like to know.

Maybe we should just go to LOX, seemed to work for a few decades or so. Yes LOX is dangerous and has problematic logistics but so is JP and things that fly off the rails.

Navy, Marine Corps hornet fighter pilots raise alarm over safety issues | Fox News

I was MUCH more concerned with the Leading Edge Flap (LEF) system failures than I was with the OBOGS.
In many of the flight envelopes, having that LEF failure was unrecoverable.