Bell V-280 Valor Next Generation Tiltrotor

[AMDR]

V-280 Valor Helicopter, United States of America
V-280 Valor Helicopter - Army Technology

The V-280 Valor is a third-generation tilt-rotor vertical lift helicopter being designed by the US-based aircraft manufacturer, Bell Helicopter Textron. The helicopter is intended to meet the requirement of the Joint Multi-Role (JMR) Technology Demonstrator (TD) programme supporting the Future Vertical Lift (FVL) programme of the US Army.

In April 2013 the V-280 Valor was launched at the Army Aviation Association of America's (AAAA) annual professional forum and exposition held at Fort Worth, US. The aircraft is designed to perform multiple missions such as attack and transport with enhanced speed, maximum reach, and greater payloads.

The V-280 Valor will offer greater control both at low speeds and high speeds efficiently. The helicopter is currently in design concept phase. Bell Helicopter displayed a V-280 Valor mock-up in October 2013 at AUSA Annual Meeting & Exposition in Washington DC.

V-280 for the Joint Multi-Role Technology Demonstrator (JMR-TD) programme
The V-280 Valor helicopter was selected for the JMR-TD Phase I programme in June 2013. The Sikorsky-Boeing team's coaxial-rotor compound helicopter was also chosen for the programme.

The phase one of the JMR-TD programme will include the development of the rotorcraft, while phase two will deliver mission systems for the FVL programme. The $100bn FVL programme is expected to replace about 2,000 to 4,000 medium-lift rotorcraft in service with the US Army.

The V-280 Valor helicopter was classified as a category I proposal, citing its ability to meet all the requirements of the US Army. The technology investment agreement (TIA) for the JMR-TD was awarded in October 2013 and the flight testing is scheduled for 2017.

Design features of V-280 Valor helicopter
The V-280 Valor helicopter will integrate a clean sheet design with a V-tail configuration and fuselage of composite construction. The wings will be made of large cell carbon core.

The helicopter is designed to carry four crew members and 11 troops. It will feature two spacious 1.83m side doors for convenient entry and exit of armed forces. The aircraft will be fitted with a conventional retractable landing gear for better control during take-off and landing.

The V-280 helicopter will be equipped with triple redundant fly-by-wire flight control system for precision aircraft handling and better safety. The system helps to reduce the workload of pilots and weight of the aircraft while minimising the maintenance costs as compared to traditional flight control systems.

The aircraft will offer greater fuel efficiency resulting in smaller logistical footprint compared to other aircraft. The smaller logistical footprint helps to minimise the logistics support needed to move and maintain a warfighting force.

V-280 Valor helicopter engine
The power plant of the V-280 Valor helicopter will include two turbocraft engines coupled to three-bladed tiltrotor and drive units. The non-revolving and fixed engines will make the helicopter more stable during hover mode, and will provide better control.

The engines will be placed at the tip of the helicopter wings. The helicopter will be able to operate with a single engine in the event of loss or damage of the other engine.

Performance of V-280 Valor
The V-280 Valor helicopter will have a maximum cruise speed of 518km/h. It will have a combat range of 500nm to 800nm. The helicopter will offer twice the speed as well as range of the existing vertical lift helicopters.

It will be capable of operating at very hot temperatures of up to 95° and flying at an altitude of 6,000ft.

The helicopter will be a self deployable platform, unlike other helicopters requiring logistic support for shipping to area of operation. It can be strategically self-deployed to a range of 3,889km.

Contractors involved
Bell Helicopter Textron partnered with Lockheed Martin for the development of the V-280 Valor, in September 2013.

Moog was selected by Bell Helicopter Textron in October 2013 to design, manufacture and qualify an integrated flight control system for the helicopter. The system will include flight control computers, support software, and flight control actuation.

GE Aviation was selected to provide propulsion system for the Bell V-280. GKN Aerospace was contracted to design, develop and manufacture the V-tail aerostructure and ruddervators. Spirit AeroSystems agreed to design, develop and manufacture fuselage for the helicopter.

Bell Helicopter Textron also teamed with AGC Composites and Aerostructures to design, develop and manufacture the over wing fairing for the V-280 helicopter.

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Bell Unveils Single-screen V-280 Cockpit
Bell Unveils Single-screen V-280 Cockpit | Defense: Aviation International News
by Mark Huber - May 21, 2015, 9:10 AM

Bell Helicopter is unveiling a single-screen instrument panel concept for its V-280 Valor next-generation military tiltrotor. The panel currently is installed in the V-280 mock-up, which will be on display in the Pentagon’s courtyard from June 2 to 4. The panel display is a collaborative effort among Bell, partner Lockheed Martin and Los Angeles-based Inhance Digital; the companies have been working together on the concept for the last 18 months.

While the team is likely a decade away from developing a system for a flying aircraft, it already has some definite ideas about its architecture. Bell was able to draw on technology developed for Lockheed Martin’s F-35 fighter, including “smart helmets” with PDAS (pilot displayed aperture systems), as well as ideas from commercial off-the-shelf technology. “The pilots who will be flying this aircraft are today’s eight-year-olds,” said Jeremy Chavez, project engineer on the V-280 program. “The aircraft would become operational during the 2025 to 2030 time frame, so we looked at trends where cockpits were heading: more touchscreen interactive capabilities. We looked at the technology currently on the commercial market and who the pilots will be operating the aircraft in that time frame. They have grown up with iPads, pinching and swiping screens. That kind of thing will be highly intuitive to them.”

SYSTEM SURVIVABILITY IS KEY
While the panel is still in the concept stage, the team is focusing on developing a product that can incorporate and present an enormous amount of data and imagery to the pilots from both their own and other aircraft in logical sequence and is ballistically survivable. One idea on the latter is to construct the screen from a series of small mosaic displays that stitch together a larger image. “If a round pierced the screen it might take out one or two tiles, but the rest of the screen would function around it, sort of like poking your finger through a screen door. The screen is still intact; you just have a localized area where the screen is not functioning,” Chavez said.

This survivability is particularly critical since most of the switchology aboard the aircraft will be eliminated and replaced with inputs made directly on the touchscreen. “You won’t have all the toggle switches you have in today’s cockpit, but there will be back-ups that we will develop with the survivability group,” Chavez said. “With the mosaic design, you don’t lose the entire screen. You can move information off the damaged area or the display control system would be smart enough to know not to display critical information in the damaged area and would automatically move it off to the side… Beyond that we are still developing failure modes and how we want to mitigate those risks.”

The V-280 team is also looking at ballistic-resistant materials for the display. “A ballistic-tolerant screen is something we are looking at,” said Chavez, “like bulletproof glass on an armored car. But we don’t want to put something out there that is ballistically tolerant but constantly fails.”

Chavez sees the instrument panel, smart helmet and data projected onto the windshield as providing a triple-redundant system, able to display enough data either in concert or independently to ensure safety of flight. “A lot of the flight-critical information is going to be distributed across the [helmet] visor screen and the windshield. As on the F-35, the visor integrates with PDAS sensors on different parts of the aircraft to provide a 360-degree spherical view of the world around you. That would just be streamed into the helmet and distributed across the visor as the operator wants to customize it,” he said.

KEEPING PILOTS FOCUSED
Another critical challenge is keeping such a massive display from overwhelming the pilots with information or tempting them to fly with eyes only in the cockpit. “It is a massive display and it is very eye-catching, but the last thing we want is for pilots to be mesmerized by it. They need to be eyes out as well. That will be a balancing act that we develop over time,” Chavez said.

Sensors will detect aircraft condition, and system logic will display only the most critical information needed under any given conditions. Chavez gives some examples. “If you are entering a brownout at 100 feet agl, all displays go to a primary flight display; if your radar altimeter goes to 50 agl, certain information would vanish and the display would give you just the most critical information, such as an attitude indicator. There will be a predetermined logic to the system.”

Perhaps the giant display’s most impressive ability is to integrate data from the PDAS to provide a giant outside window with synthetic vision during limited or zero-visibility situations. “It’s basically the same as looking outside. That is definitely where we are headed with this display,” Chavez said.

Major Assembly Starts on Bell V-280 Valor Fuselage
SEAPOWER Magazine Online
FORT WORTH, Texas — Bell Helicopter, a Textron Inc. company, and Spirit AeroSystems Inc. announced in a June 15 release that major assembly has started on the Bell V-280 Valor fuselage.

“Spirit AeroSystems brings decades of composite manufacturing experience to the team which allows us to quickly build an aircraft like the V-280,” said Phil Anderson, Spirit AeroSystems senior vice president of Defense. “This is a major milestone for the technology demonstrator unit. Spirit AeroSystems is proud to be on Team Valor and we are excited to be designing and building the composite cabin and cockpit for the V-280.”

“U.S. ground forces require significant increase in speed and range to operate against and strike adversary systems much deeper than existing platforms,” said Mitch Snyder, executive vice president of Military Business for Bell Helicopter. “That is the vision for Future Vertical Lift. The V-280 advanced technology tiltrotor provides the Department of Defense (DoD) with unmatched speed, range and payload for expeditionary maneuver to win these future conflicts.

“We are confident in the capability that the V-280 will provide, and we are proud to have Spirit AeroSystems adding their expertise to Team Valor and to the V-280. Spirit AeroSystems beginning major assembly on the V-280 fuselage brings this high-performance aircraft one step closer to completion.”

The delivery of the first V-280 fuselage to the Bell Helicopter facility in Amarillo, Texas, is expected later this year. First flight of the V-280 Technology Demonstrator is anticipated in the second half of 2017.

With more than twice the speed and range of current helicopter platforms, the Bell V-280 is designed to provide combatant commanders with the ability to reach the battlefield while providing superior low-speed agility at the objective. The efficient speed and reduced reaction time provided by the V-280 will allow operators to outmaneuver their adversaries. The tiltrotor’s speed, range and payload significantly reduce logistical, security and medical footprints, freeing up personnel and additional combat power.

Bell Helicopter has led the formation of Team Valor, a group of preeminent aerospace companies bringing the best engineering resources and industrial capabilities to meet the DoD’s anticipated needs. Team Valor includes: Lockheed Martin, Spirit AeroSystems, Astronics, Eaton, General Electric, GKN Aerospace, Israel Aerospace Industries, Lord, Meggitt, Moog, and TRU Simulation and Training.

Sports-car' Performance Promised for Bell V-280
'Sports-car' Performance Promised for Bell V-280 | Defense: Aviation International News

Textron’s Bell Helicopter unit is pushing on with the development of its third-generation tiltrotor, the V-280 Valor, following an official program award from the Army’s Joint Multi-Role Technology Demonstrator (JMR-TD) last year. The agreement is part of the Department of Defense’s broader Future Vertical Lift (FVL) initiative. While Bell prepares the V-280 for first flight in 2017, Textron sister company TRU Simulation + Training is providing a cockpit “marketing simulator” that aviators are expected to be able to access at the Army Aviation Association of America (Quad-A) conference later this month (March 29-31) in Nashville.

“We’re going to show Army pilots the profile of how you fly a tiltrotor, especially the transition from hover to cruise mode,” said Keith Flail, Bell’s director of future vertical lift. “It’s a pretty sporty timeline we are on right now as we are developing our control laws [for the fly-by-wire flight controls] to get that embedded within the simulator. We think that is going to be very informative to the Army community and give them a greater understanding of how tiltrotors fly.”

The V-280 is designed to carry 11 fully outfitted troops, fly up to 800 nm at a maximum speed of 280 knots and satisfy the Army’s requirement for aircraft operations at up to 6,000 feet elevation at 95 deg F. Estimated mtow of the V-280 is approximately 30,000 pounds and the aircraft will be configured for utility and attack missions. The V-280 features six-foot-wide sliding side doors and a V-tail.

It differs significantly from the Bell/Boeing V-22 tiltrotor in several respects. On the V-22, the engines, gearboxes and prop-rotors all have to rotate as thrust direction is changed; on the V-280 only the gearboxes and prop-rotors rotate. The V-280 also eschews the forward wing sweep of the V-22. Going to a straight wing on the V-280 eliminates the need for a mid-wing gearbox and makes the wing easier to manufacture, according to Bell.

Flail said there will be distinct handling differences between the current-production Bell/Boeing V-22 and the V-280. “The V-22 is a great aircraft but it was designed in the 1980s with a lot of 1980s technology. We get to look back at lessons learned in terms of maintenance and handling. The V-22 is a very agile platform, but the V-280 is going to be even more so. The Army wants to focus on low-speed agility, so the V-280 will have about 50 percent more flapping capability in its rotor system than the V-22. That’s going to enable an even greater level of agility in all axes–pitch, roll, and yaw–so that you have that sports-car type of helicopter performance in the landing zones and objective areas. That’s a focus for the Army customer.”

The program is proceeding at a quick pace, with more than 200 Bell employees dedicated to it full-time and many others brought in part-time, as well as about 100 supplier employees on the team, Flail said. “This is a very exciting year for us. Right now we are heavily into detail design and releasing engineering [drawings] so we can make or buy the appropriate parts. This year we also will have critical design review for all of our subsystems as well as the air vehicle critical design reviews this summer, which is tied closely to the final design and risk report that is due this summer to the government. Then we will start manufacturing and fabricating, which will allow us to start build and assembly in Amarillo [Texas] this summer. We will be building the wing, fuselage and nacelle structure this summer and deliver those and hydraulic, fuel cell and drive components this fall as well. So there is a lot of activity this year.”

Bell has numerous supplier partners on the V-280. In 2013 it announced it would team with Lockheed Martin on the aircraft with the latter providing integrated avionics, sensors and weapons. Other partners include TRU(marketing simulator and desktop maintenance trainer), Moog (flight controls), GE Aviation (T64-GE-419 engines), GKN (tail), Spirit AeroSystems (composite fuselage), Eaton (hydraulics and power generation), Astronics Advanced Electronic Systems (power distribution systems) and Israel Aerospace Industries (nacelles).

One of the supplier technologies the V-280 team is excited about is the Lockheed Martin so-called “smart helmets” coupled to the pilotage distributed aperture system (PDAS), similar to the system on the F-35. PDASuses a series of sensors on the aircraft linked to computer processors to generate images and stitch them together to provide the pilot with a real-time, 360-degree field of view outside the aircraft. “We’re going to demonstrate that on this phase of the JMR-TD,” Flail said. “I think this is a critical demonstration given all the focus that has been put on operations in a degraded visual environment.”

Bell is competing in the JMR-TD phase of FVL against a Sikorsky-Boeing team that is fielding the SB-1 Defiant, a medium-lift compound helicopter that will have contra-rotating rigid main rotor blades, a pusher propeller and fly-by-wire flight controls.

The potential spoils of the eventual winner of the JMR-TD could be as many as 4,000 aircraft by the year 2030 under FVL. The Army eventually wants FVL aircraft to be fitted with future advanced turbine engines that will post a 35-percent reduction in specific fuel consumption, an 80-percent improvement in power-to-weight ratio, a 20-percent improvement in design life (to more than 6,000 hours) and a 45-percent reduction in production/maintenance costs. The technologies for those engines remain under development and are not scheduled to be demonstrated until 2016. Those engines and some other forward-looking technologies will not fly on phase one JMR-TD aircraft in 2017 but could fly on phase two or Model Performance Specification (MPS) aircraft in 2019.

Flail said Bell is reducing technical risk on the V-280 by incorporating select aspects of the Bell 525 Relentless super-medium twin conventional helicopter that is expected to make its first flight this spring. They include parts of the fuselage design and components from the aircraft’s fly-by-wire control system. “The 525 is a great design and we really didn’t need to re-invent the wheel there,” he said. “The challenge every day is pushing the envelope on technology to reduce future risks, but staying on track with schedule, cost and performance objectives.

“Looking around the world today, there are more military missions that need revolutionary change in terms of the types of [air] assets that are required in terms of speed and range. The needs of these missions render legacy helicopters almost irrelevant,” Flail said.

 

[The enlightened]

Single screen looks cool and perhaps improves functionality but what if it malfunctions mid-air?

 

[jamahir]

seeing the bell helicopter single-screen, helicopter design offices in india, iran and turkey will begin talking of single-screen display.

always the followers.

 

[mingle]

Mini osprey ?cockpit looks more and more looks like video game Now play station

 

[420canada]

that looks badasss!!!!

 

[AMDR]

V-280 Valor: Bell Starts Building Joint Multi-Role Prototype

Somebody’s finally doing something tangible about the future of Army aviation. Bell Helicopter subcontractor Spirit AeroSystems of Wichita, Kan., has started assembling the composite fuselage for the first prototype V-280 Valor, Bell’s new military tiltrotor.

The Valor is sleeker, smaller, and, by design, more Army-friendly than the Bell-Boeing V-22 Osprey, which was built to fit on an amphibious assault ship for the Marines. Both aircraft are tilt rotors. Their wingtip rotors swivel upward to take off and land like a helicopter and tilt forward to fly fast and fuel-efficiently like an airplane.

For the moment, the Valor is just a technology demonstrator – a proposal, not a program – and only one of two the Pentagon is subsidizing in a quest to get beyond helicopters’ speed limitations and airplanes’ runway requirements. A few years down the road, the V-280 and its competitor could compete to replace the Army’s UH-60 Black Hawks and AH-64 Apaches with utility and attack aircraft of about 30,000 pounds that can fly faster than 230 knots – about 100 miles per hour faster than most military helicopters cruise — and hover like a hummingbird. Other armed services might want some, too.

The other tech demonstrator in the works is a compound helicopter offered by Sikorsky Aircraft Corp. and Boeing Co., dubbed — a bit cutely — the SB>1 Defiant, where “SB>1” means “Sikorsky and Boeing are greater than one.” Their entry is based on Sikorsky’s Collier Trophy-winning X2 technology demonstrator and derivative S-97 Raider. The Defiant, still in design, is to combine active vibration control, a rigid coaxial rotor and a variable RPM pusher propeller to overcome the speed limitations of helicopters.

Both the Valor and the Defiant are partially funded — at close to $100 million each, we hear — by the Army-led Joint Multi-RoleTechnology Demonstrator (JMRTD) project, which is in turn part of the far more comprehensive Future Vertical Lift (FVL) initiative. The FVL’s goal is to “move our vertical lift fleet into the next generation,” Program Director Dan Bailey told an American Helicopter Society International (AHS) briefing last month.

With lobbying help from AHS, Bailey got another $14 million from Congress last year to fund other companies to do smaller, related projects. A bit over half went to continue work on competing designs the Army decided not to build just yet when Bell and Sikorsky/Boeing got their JMR demonstrator contracts in October 2014. AVX Aircraft, a Texas design company, received $3.4 million to keep working on a coaxial helicopter with ducted fans for forward thrust. Karem Aircraft, a California company — whose founder, Abraham Karem, is the father of the Predator drone — got $4.1 million to hone a design using Karem’s patented Optimum Speed Tiltrotor technology.

Both the Bell and Sikorsky/Boeing demonstrators are to fly in 2017. Even if they succeed, there’s no guarantee of production. But with many current helicopters aging alarmingly, there’s got to be a replacement eventually.

“The tech demo is the key to understanding what the next generation of military rotorcraft could be for the rest of the century,” said AHS Executive Director Michael Hirschberg.

The JMRTD is just a first step toward the FVL’s goal of new military aircraft in four categories – light, medium, heavy, and ultra heavy — that can take off and land most anywhere and fly fast and far without costing a fortunate or being hangar queens. “It’s much more about learning than it is about specific products,” Bailey said.

Even so, with the V-280 fuselage actually being built, a bit of rotorcraft history is being made. The last time the Pentagon funded a pure vertical take-off-and-landing tech demonstrator was 1973, when after a similar lead up, the Army and NASA’s Ames Research Center awarded Bell a contract to build a small tiltrotor designated the XV-15.

Once they get the V-280 and SB>1 flying, Bell and Sikorsky/Boeing might hope history repeats itself, at least up to a point. After watching the XV-15 fly at the 1981 Paris Air Show, Navy Secretary John Lehman directed the Marine Corps to drop plans to replace its CH-46 Sea Knights with another helicopter and instead develop a tiltrotor. Thus was born the V-22. That once-derided tiltrotor is now in service with the Marines, Air Force Special Operations Command, and soon the Navy. Soon only the Army — which passed on the V-22 despite sponsoring the XV-15 — will still fly conventional helicopters exclusively. A primary goal for these new aircraft is to change that.

 

[MilSpec]

looks like a osprey banged a black hawk

 

[jamahir]

the pilot area of the v-280 look nice but the exterior side-view looks not different than a black hawk, except for the tilted fins at the back... also, the single-screen could have been projector image rather than lcd... a single projector is easier to replace in flight than have work-around solutions for damage to lcd.

i liked the the below third design from darpa... what has become of it?? isn't it called vtol-x??

@AMDR

 

[AMDR]

Bell sees V-280 Valor as common attack-utility platform

By: JAMES DREW
WASHINGTON DC
Source: Flightglobal.com

Bell Helicopter and Lockheed Martin’s third-generator tiltrotor aircraft demonstrator, the V-280 Valor, might still be under construction for the US Army, but already the future vertical lift (FVL) contestant is morphing into a mid-weight, utility-attack platform.

Those attending a land warfare exposition by the Association of the United States Army in October are likely to see a V-280 mock-up on display as a utility platform one day and an attack variant the next. And, perhaps on the third day it will transform again into a medical evacuation platform.

Despite army desires to build two separate, specialised vertical-lift platforms to start replacing the Sikorsky UH-60 Black Hawk and Boeing AH-64 Apache in the 2030s, Bell thinks both missions could be performed by one identical or near-identical rotorcraft based on the Valor design.

Bell Helicopter

Chris Gehler, Bell’s director of global business development for advanced tiltrotor systems, told Flightglobal in a recent interview that the V-280 has the potential to be both a troop carrier and gunship when outfitted with different payloads, and the company is already in discussions with the US Marine Corps about the design.

“We already know the Marine Corps would like to have one aircraft replace utility and attack,” Gehler explains. “We’ve been working with them on developing an attack variant of the V-280 that could be – whether it’s wholly attack or one that can be interchangeable back between utility and attack – if not the same airframe, very identical.”

The concept of having one platform seems like a good idea on paper, and could potentially save billions of dollars by buying common parts, engines, drives and rotor systems. But the army appears unconvinced and says it wants distinct platforms for each mission.

“The medium category is going to be two aircraft with two capability sets,” Maj Gen Michael Lundy, who heads the Aviation Centre of Excellence, told BreakingDefense earlier this year. “We’re not going to build a sub-optimised aircraft."

Still, Bell thinks an AV-280 concept might gain traction, and it plans show off its utility and attack configurations on different days at AUSA. The company already builds attack and utility derivatives of the UH-1 Huey for the USMC (the AH-1Z Viper and UH-1Y Venom, pictured below), and recently demonstrated forward-firing rockets and missiles on the Bell Boeing V-22 tiltrotor.

Bell Helicopter



Gehler says tiltrotors “can be very capable attack platforms” in cruise and in hover, and the V-280’s new rotor design allows it to have side doors for troops to quickly mount and dismount. Bell and Lockheed are already looking to put common launch tubes on the V-280 that can launch rockets, missiles and even small unmanned air vehicles forward or aft with no rotor interference.

“When it’s in forward flight and cruise mode with the rotors forward, it’s still able to do forward-firing weapons,” he says. “We’ve got weapons bays that can open up and fire [Lockheed AGM-114] Hellfires from the main fuselage.”

The Bell-Lockheed Valor and Boeing-Sikorsky SB-1 Defiant – a next-generation propeller-pushed, coaxial rotor design (below) – were downselected last year for the army’s joint multi-role technology demonstrator programme, which runs through 2019. This will help to inform its FVL requirements, and the two examples are due to fly by the third quarter of 2017.

Boeing

FVL, although not currently a programme of record, is a joint programme lead by the army that is meant to usher in the next-generation of rotorcraft for the services by the mid-2030s. The Pentagon plans to make a formal FVL materiel development decision in October 2016.

Even though FVL has been a topic of considerable discussion and debate for some time now, there is currently no funding, no contracts, nor requests for proposals. The general assumption is that a future aircraft must fly further, faster and in higher and hotter conditions than today’s helicopters.

There are potentially five aircraft categories: light, medium-light, medium, heavy and ultra. The greatest demand is in the medium category, which the two JMR teams are focused on. Bell doesn’t anticipate much change between the “surrogate requirements” for its full-scale demonstrator and the final FLV list.

 

[Malik Alashter]

But why no other nation came with a tilt rotor like the U.S?.

 

[AMDR]

Commonality is key to controlling FVL costs, officials say
Commonality is key to controlling FVL costs, officials say - IHS Jane's 360

A planned multi-service Pentagon helicopter fleet must feature common components across types in order to keep the cost of maintenance and operations under control, government and industry officials said on 22 July.

James Kelly, a Department of Defense acquisition specialist who leads the department's logistics team for the Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II Joint Strike Fighter programme, said "huge" cost reductions could be derived from commonality on the Future Vertical Lift (FVL) programme because maintenance costs would be shared across the services.

"There's a tremendous amount of potential here to reduce operating costs on future systems," Kelly said during a briefing at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

The US Army last year chose a Boeing-Sikorsky team and a Bell Helicopter-Lockheed Martin team to build aircraft for the service's Joint Multi-Role Technology Demonstrator (JMR-TD) effort. A flyoff between the former's SB-1 Defiant rigid co-axial rotor helicopter and the latter's V-280 Valor tiltrotor aircraft is scheduled for 2017.

The technology demonstration is expected to feed a potentially USD100 billion Future Vertical Lift (FVL) programme to replace all of the Pentagon's 1970s-era helicopters, beginning with the Sikorsky UH-60 Black Hawk-based utility helicopters and Boeing AH-64 Apache attack helicopters. Army officials have insisted that the replacement effort will begin in the mid-2030s, though the funding plan for such an endeavour remains unclear.

Nick Lappos, a technology fellow at Sikorsky and chairman of an industry group called the Vertical Lift Consortium, said future helicopters should have common cockpits and crew stations, at the very least, in order to allow pilots and mechanics to work across fleets. Personnel training, a key driver of aircraft operation and maintenance costs, could be streamlined under such a plan. "It's amazing how uncommon today's systems are," he said during the same briefing.

 

[AMDR]

Bell, Lockheed Test Out Ideas For V-280 FVL Cockpit
Bell Lockheed Test Ideas Future Vertical Lift Cockpit | Sikorsky UH-60 | Technology content from Aviation Week

The planned replacement for the U.S. Army’s Sikorsky UH-60 Black Hawk will not become operational before the mid-2030s, at the earliest, and will likely stay in service at least as long as the workhorse utility helicopter, which first flew in 1974.

Yet Bell Helicopter is already working to define a cockpit for the Future Vertical Lift (FVL) Medium advanced rotorcraft—the proposed replacement—that will not only meet the expectations of the Army and its pilots 20 years from now but provide flexibility for growth over the following decades.

Bell, with teammate Lockheed Martin, will compete against a Sikorsky/Boeing team to develop the FVL Medium—if the budget-pressured Army makes it a formal acquisition program. As a starting point, both are building high-speed rotorcraft demonstrators, Bell’s V-280 Valor and Sikorsky/Boeing’s SB-1 Defiant coaxial rigid-rotor compound helicopter, scheduled to fly late in 2017.

The demonstrators are being built under the Army’s Joint Multi-Role Technology Demonstration. Phase 1 is focused on the air vehicle, to show the operational value of higher speed—230 kt. for the SB-1 and 280 kt. for the V-280, compared with 150 kt. for a UH-60. Phase 2 will demonstrate the mission equipment package, including the cockpit.

Interactive single-display touchscreen spans cockpit of Bell’s V-280 full-scale mockup. Credit: Bell Helicopter

But Bell is getting a head start on defining the cockpit for its FLV Medium by using its V-280 full-scale mockup to present concepts, gather user feedback, and evolve the design. And the flight deck being shown is dramatically different from the cockpit of today’s Black Hawk.

The biggest change—and the foundation for a flexibility the team hopes will see the design through the next 20 years of development and well beyond—is an instrument panel that is a single touchscreen display from edge to edge, from coaming to center console, complemented by helmet-mounted displays and windscreen-projected head-up displays.

“We looked at all the glass cockpits out there, what information they presented and how it was displayed,” says Jeremy Chavez, an engineer with the V-280 variant team within Bell’s mockup group. But the team’s thinking was shaped by the prevalence of touchscreens on personal electronics. “We can’t put that genie back in the box, so we have embraced the ability to display data on a single touchscreen,” he says.

“As we look forward at who is going to operate this aircraft, they are 8 years old today. And what they are growing up with is smartphones and tablets with touchscreens where they pinch, zoom and swipe,” Chavez says. “If we can bring that highly intuitive interface to the future of aviation, it should abbreviate the learning curve to operate [the FVL].”

Another key element of the V-280 cockpit concept is Lockheed Martin’s pilotage distributed aperture system, a series of electro-optical sensors providing the crew with a 360-deg. view around the aircraft. Similar to the setup on the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, this will fly on the V-280 demonstrator. In the FVL cockpit, the system provides a background image across the entire panel—to enhance situational awareness—on which is superimposed flight symbology and other information.

Bell and Lockheed Martin are using the mockup to look at how information should be organized and displayed in different mission phases. “We want the cockpit to be an extension of the flight crew, to perform like a good co-pilot: providing information, assisting where required, reducing workload and staying ahead of the aircraft,” says Chavez.

An example of the software routines being developed to exploit the touchscreen capability involves an instrument flight rules approach. “The co-pilot can call up the approach chart and flick it across the screen to the pilot,” he says. “They can interact back and forth without having to reach over.”

The V-280 cockpit will adapt to changing conditions, such as a degraded visual environment (DVE) caused by rotor-blown sand or snow. “As the pilot descends and the sensors detect DVE, system logic automatically kicks in synthetic vision and declutters the display,” says Chavez. “The cockpit keeps ahead of you, keeps you focused on the task at hand so you don’t have to decide to turn on a system.”

The team has developed scenarios that show how sensor fusion and the cockpit will work in concert. When aircraft sensors detect air defenses, the system displays a threat dome. If the rotorcraft’s course line pierces the dome, the system accesses weather reports via data link and suggests a deviation to stay clear of the threat and any weather. “It is not just a pretty screen. It is a good co-pilot,” says Chavez.

The cockpit is evolving as the team gets feedback from visitors to the mockup. “There have been survivability questions. What if the display takes a round? So we have developed a concept where the screen is a series of mosaic tiles and we blend the image. If a tile is damaged, the rest of the screen is intact,” he says.

“This is very early on for this program. As we go forward we will look at mosaic screens, failure modes, screen glare and the ability to interact with the display in turbulence,” adds Chavez. “As the system matures, we will move into technology development. Right now it is about getting a consensus from the pilot community.”

 

[Hamartia Antidote]

http://www.verticalmag.com/press-re...stomeric-rotor-bearings-for-bell-v-280-valor/

LORD completes first elastomeric rotor bearings for Bell V-280 Valor

LORD Corporation – a leader in the management of vibration, noise and motion control – celebrated the completion of the first ship-set of the V-280 Valor elastomeric rotor bearings to Bell Helicopter for the V-280 Valor joint multi-role technology demonstrator (JMR-TD) program.

LORD designed and built the units in just 28 months at its manufacturing and engineering facility in Erie, Pennsylvania.
“Delivering bearings from design to completion in 28 months is an amazing accomplishment,” said LORD CEO Ed Auslander. “LORD Corporation’s unique capabilities to design, build, and deliver with the highest quality to unique requirements, make us a great partner on revolutionary programs like the Bell V-280.”

The U.S. Army-led JMR-TD program is the science and technology precursor to the Department of Defense’s Future Vertical Lift program, with the goal to replace 2,000 to 4,000 medium-class utility and attack helicopters. The V-280 Valor is Bell Helicopter’s offering for the JMR-TD program.
“LORD Corporation is proud to be an investing member of team Valor with 10 other premier aerospace companies. Together, we are helping the Department of Defense inform requirements and reduce risk on a new development program while at the same time providing the capabilities to win on the battlefield,” said Steve Meyer, LORD director of global sales.

Bell Helicopter’s Chad Stecker, director, sourcing and Chris Gehler, director, V-280 program manager attended the V-280 bearing completion ceremony along with U.S. Army representatives.
Having demonstrated durability in extreme environments on military and civilian platforms, LORD high-capacity laminate (HCL) elastomeric bearings accommodate high loads and blade motions without the need for lubrication. Operators are able to save on costs associated with unscheduled maintenance and on-condition replacement allows for gradual and predictable degradation mode.

LORD bearings are critical in achieving the low speed maneuverability required by this new, next-generation tiltrotor aircraft engineered to reach speeds of 280 knots, according to Edward Hudson, senior sales engineer. The aircraft is designed to have the capacity to fly for 800 kilometers on one tank of fuel, hover and maneuver in “high-hot” conditions and function as both a utility and attack helicopter platform.

At this time, the design team is working toward building a demonstrator aircraft that will take its first flight in fall 2017.
“LORD has a long relationship with Bell, collaborating on new and innovative rotary-wing platforms, including all their existing military and commercial platforms, as well as the new Bell 525,” said Hudson. “Expertise stemming from multiple platforms including extensive knowledge and design expertise of HCL bearings helped LORD earn the contract. We were selected for team Valor specifically because of our expertise and experience from the design of components for the V-22 program.”

“The elastomerics play a pivotal role in delivering the enhanced hover agility of the V-280,” said Vince Tobin, Bell Helicopter vice president of advanced tiltrotor systems. “The completion of the first elastomeric rotor bearings represents yet another successful step toward the completion of the first V-280. The V-280 Valor is an aircraft that will provide unmatched speed, range and payload capabilities at an affordable cost.

“This next-generation tiltrotor is designed with affordability in mind, leveraging advanced tooling and techniques that remove cost, weight and complexity from the aircraft while yielding a high level of capability.”

 

[C130]

if this cost half as much to buy and fly compared to the Osprey then I like it

 

[Hamartia Antidote]

http://www.businessinsider.com/replacement-for-the-us-armys-helicopter-2016-7

This could be the new replacement for the US Army's Blackhawk helicopter

Bell's V-280 Valor Bell Helicopter Textron Inc.

After several decades of service, the US Army might finally replace their lineup of UH-60 Blackhawk and AH-64 Apache helicopters.

Unveiled at the Farnborough Air Show in England, Bell Helicopter — in conjunction with Lockheed Martin — debuted their latest creation, the V-280 Valor.

Bell Helicopters

Similar to the V-22 Osprey currently in service by the US Marine Corps and Air Force, the V-280 applies a tiltrotor mechanism to fly similar to normal helicopters and aircraft. However, the similarities seem to end there, as significant upgrades look to eclipse its predecessor’s capabilities.

Bell claims that the new V-280 will now be capable of flying at twice the speed and range of current helicopter platforms. Features of the helicopter include a 500-800 nautical miles range, aerial refueling, a crew of 4 and 14 troops, carrying capacity of 25% more cargo than a Blackhawk, and its signature 280 knots true airspeed (KTAS).

According to Aviation Week, the Valor will also have a forward-firing capability and a technologically advanced glass cockpit — like Lockheed Martin’s F-35.

Bell Helicopters

In addition to its performance, the V-280 will be more affordable than the V-22: due to the nature of its straight wing design, the V-280 would not only take half the time to construct compared to the V-22’s swept wing, but also half as cheaper — costing about $20 million, similar to the UH-60.

Other nations, such as Australia, UK, and Canada, have also followed suit in expressing interest in the helicopter. So far, the construction of the helicopter is about 60% completed and is slated to take its inaugural flight on September 2017.

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The screen will be made of many tiles so if one takes damage it wont affect the others.