the u.s army hopes to select one design to replace the vulnerable uh-60 blackhawk
and go into full-rate production by 2030. the commander of air force special operations command
said tuesday that he's not interested in acquiring the prototype tilt rotor aircraft being evaluated
in the army's future vertical lift effort as a potential replacement for the cv-22 osprey
army modernization officials are evaluating two experimental aircraft under fvl for the future
long-range assault aircraft the sikorsky boeing sb1 coaxial rotor defiant helicopter prototype and
bell textron's v280 valor tilt rotor helicopter prototype but even if the army does select the
tiltrotor v280 halfson commander lieutenant james slife said the valor is not advanced enough to
replace the cv-22 the air force special operations variant of the v-22 tilt rotor transport aircraft
when the time comes for a follow-on to the v-22 i think we are looking for a generation beyond kind
of tilt-rotor technology said slife who added later that afsoc is looking for an aircraft
that will provide speeds closer to jet light performance we are not just looking at marginal
improvement in speed and range and reliability we are looking at a generational movement for
vertical takeoff and landing capability going into the future slife did say that the u.s special
operations command will likely be interested in whichever prototype the army selects for its
new flraa design since socom is committed to army helicopter aviation under fvl the air force is not
part of the future vertical lift program and that is not the prototype of technology i think we're
going to be eventually looking forward to replace the v22 slive said we would not go into specific
detail there are a number of technology and drive system proposals out there that look like they may
be within the realm of possibility that could provide a generational step ahead in technology
to get us up at the jet speed kind of capability the bell v280 valor is a tilt rotor aircraft
being deployed by bell and lockheed martin for the united states army's future vertical lift
fvl program 2. the aircraft was officially unveiled at the 2013 army aviation association
of america's aaa annual professional forum and exposition in fort worth texas the army is taking
its final step before starting a competition to acquire future long-range assault aircraft and
has done so by issuing an intent to solicit bids using means other than full and open competition
bell and a sikorsky boeing team have been pitted against one another for years to build and fly
technology demonstrators to perform requirements ahead of the flraa competition and both are part
of a competitive demonstration and risk reduction phase bell's v280 valor tilt rotor had its first
flight nearly three years ago and sikorsky and boeing's sb1 defiant coaxial helicopter
bell and lockheed martin are also competing against each other in the pharah competition
bell's offering is the 360 invictus and lockheed's entry is the raider x in the case of flraa
the winner must build eight production aircraft for the first unit equipped by fy30 the plan is
to award a contract to a winner in fy 22 the winner will proceed to deliver a preliminary
design review roughly eight months following the award two companies are vying to produce the next
blackhawk for the army the next-gen aircraft could speed quickly into harm's way drop off troops then
zoom out again sikorsky which makes the current generation blackhawk helicopters recently revealed
their progress on a futuristic machine with two counter rotating rotors that it calls the defiant
x the other contender is bell whose fancy bird is the v280 valor while the competitive program
of record hasn't officially begun yet bell has begun flying their prototypes since 2017. it
takes a very different approach from the defiant x it's a type of aircraft called a tilt rotor what
is a tilt rotor aircraft a typical airplane with an engine on each wing works in a familiar way
those engines provide thrust the wing gives it lift and the plane takes off and lands on a runway
now imagine that the engines on those wings were powering big propellers that could tilt if the
probe blades were perpendicular to the ground it would fly it forward like an airplane but if the
pilot wanted to take off or land vertically like a helicopter all it would take is adjusting those
spinning blades to be more or less parallel to the ground it represents an aviation ideal a
best of both worlds configuration that's fast in forward flight and doesn't need a regular runway
the v280 has hit speeds north of 300 knots or 435 miles per hour a classic blackhawk helicopter
is roughly half that fast we proved that we could fly very fast and at very long ranges
because of the efficiency of wing-borne flight but it can also pull off the neat trick of being able
to take off and land like a helicopter in a recent video bell demonstrated the aircraft demonstrating
some sick dance moves pretty close to the deck the v280 is extremely agile in every mode of flight
says don groove the chief test pilot for the v280 valor and a former v22 osprey pilot the difference
between the osprey and the valor the valor has two engines but unlike its larger ancestor the osprey
those engines don't physically move when the rotors they power change position giving it a
simplicity bonus over the v-22 only the rotor swivel with the aircraft hovering and its two
rotors configured in helicopter position it's easy to imagine how catastrophic it would be if
one of them lost power thankfully the two engines of the aircraft can power either rotor just like
the osprey that's different from what happens when for example a commercial aircraft loses
one of its jet engines the other engine can't magically send power over to its disabled partner
bell also touts another safety feature of the v280 if it were to crash or land hard the wing
of the nacellus which is the engines and the gearboxes and the rotors all that's designed
to break and shed away from the cabin says hanger he compares that to more traditional helicopters
which have all the heft of those dynamic components right above the crew and
passengers
so
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