Patrol role
Textron also had the advantage of not having to meet the requirements of a specific nation or an air force. This meant that the development team could make changes to the design if they felt it would help the overall project.
"A great example is [British ejection-seat specialists] Martin Baker," says Anderson. "They sent a group of engineers over and they looked at our cockpit cup design, and they said, 'Well, our seat's not gonna work. It'll be several million dollars and 18 months for us to redesign it. But if you can give us about five more inches of volume - three in length and two in width – it will work.' So guess what we did? We made the cockpit tub a little bigger."